After School Affairs: Prologue Review

I hope everyone is having a good start to their year! I can't believe it's about to March. Time is really flying this year. I need to step my blogging game up lol I was excited to hear that Voltage had a new game releasing this month because it had been awhile since their last one. So here's my review of the latest otome game After School Affairs.

February 19th, 2016

Your are a homeroom English teacher of an all boy's school where the students excel in sports, Kasuga High School. You learn that you will be moving into new employee housing and discover that you live with teachers from the nearby all girl's school Seika Ladies' Academy. The next day to your surprise you found out that your school will be closing and merging with Seika Ladies' Academy to form Seishun High School. There's one major rule: there can be no dating between students and staff.

The Guys of After School Affairs

• Shinichi: Strict and cool
• Kiyonori: Reserved
• Rikiya: A little aggressive but thoughtful
• Hidetaka: Sweet and encouraging
• Kenzo: Laid-back and nice

Nintendo NY Grand Re-Opening

Hello! Yesterday I had the chance to visit Nintendo NY for their re-opening. Formerly known as Nintendo World. They were closed for a month for renovations and re-branded Nintendo NY. Their renaming makes me wonder if there will be other official Nintendo stores opening in the US! Anywho me and my friend Tiff had a chance to check it out.

So Tiff and I already planned on going to the grand re-opening regardless of whether or not I obtained my special edition. I'll take about my whole special edition fiasco at the end of this post. I will be upfront and say I am extremely grateful to have gotten because a lot of folks haven't been able to get one.

We got to the store around 9:30 and to our surprise the line was super long. I have a feeling that some people camped out overnight. It was super cold and we tried to dress accordingly. I even had a blanket big enough for us to share which we ended up doing later on. The blocks in that area of town are quite long. So we headed to the back of the line. I received an email from Best Buy's eBay letting me know that my item was ready for pickup. I had selected a Best Buy two subway stops away from Rockefeller Center. So I called to double check that it was for the right item and it was! So I left Tiff in line to hold our place and then went to Best Buy. I was SO happy when I got my hands on it. I will say the box was smaller than I expected lol The trip only took about 20 minutes total.

When I meet back up with Tiff in line we had moved a good bit. We figured why not just stay in line and see how it all played out. It was really cold outside but we were pretty prepared. The voice actor of Mario even came out to day hi to everyone. It was awesome that he came that far back in line. Tiff even got a high five from him!

Voice Actor of Mario, Charles Martinet

I was able to snag this picture of him upstairs without standing in the long ass line to meet him. I think you needed to have a wrist band in order to participate in the meet and greet, but since the area was so open I figured I'd grab a pic.

 Took these when we were finally by the store and thoroughly freezing our butts off

New York Comic Con 2015: Thursday and Friday

I hope ya'll had a nice holiday! I'm back with my second post for my time at NYCC. I hope you enjoy it :)

Thursday

I decided to wear Kagome the first day of the convention since I had already worn her once before at Waku Waku back in August. My commute was a little hectic coming in because of traffic in the George Washington bridge. That's okay, selfie time!

I got to the Javits Center at 11. Which wasn't too bad it was only about an 1 hour after the con opened. I met up with Rae on the walk over. She was killing the game in her Captain America hoodie. It's always such a blast geeking out with her.

The first thing we noticed was the food trucks right outside the Javits. This was the first time since I've been that they've done that. I don't know why they hadn't thought of it before. It really helped with grabbing food as you as you can in or came out.

Walking into NYCC is always so mind blowing because they really go all out. First Rae and I headed to the Artist's Alley to meet up with a few of her friends. Seth Meyer was actually there out in the open. I think he was doing some sort of social experiment and seeing how people would react to him just being there.

The whole NYC we wanted to try Cookie Cat because we love Steven Universe, but the tickets for the Fantasy Food truck would go SO fast we never got to. Tiff did get a recipe for it so that we can make it at home.

Seth Meyer a few feet in front of me

There was a remote controlled R2D2 running around and making sounds. Ugh, it was so cute! We rushed over, so Rae could meet one of her idols: the creator of Deadpool. He was really funny and charismtic! She was so adorable while she was meeting him.

We grabbed a corner of Artist Alley that wasn't crowded and took pics of my Kagome cosplay. For some reason I had a few people mistake me for Sailor Jupiter from Sailor Moon which was a little odd lol

NY Super Week 2015

I hope everyone is getting ready for the New Year. I don't know have any resolutions this year other than trying to maintain the ones I've set for myself awhile ago. I hope you all get to spend it with the your family or loved ones!

This year I was lucky enough to grab myself and Boba 4 Day tickets to NYCC. Believe me I was super shocked it happened. I am used to only being able to grab tickets for a single day. I knew that when you bought a 4 Day you were given a NY Super Week card for free which gave you access to events the week of NYCC. You still had to pay for the tickets to the individual tickets, but many of them were under 10 bucks. This year NYCC was October 8th-11th with the NY Super Week events starting the Monday before on the 5th.

I used the NY Super Week app to take a look at events and settled on two: Black Girl Nerds vs. FanBros Live Podcast on the 6th and the Crossplay Cosplay Contest hosed by FanBros on the 7th. They both sounded super interested and you know I gotta support my geeks of color and blerds. I let Tiff know about the crossplay event since it she also cosplays male characters. I may get into more crossplaying as I pick more cosplay. There are a bunch of male characters I want to cosplay and many of them I don't want to be genderbent. Also it highlighted POCs cosplaying non-black characters.

Black Girl Nerds vs. FanBros Live Podcast

I have been getting more into podcasts and I thought what better way to experience one than live. Especially when it can be hard to pull out a book on a crowded subway. I was already a huge fan of Black Girl Nerds prior to attending this live podcast.

The goodies in each chair

Before the podcast started there were some bomb ass mixes being played. I think they were made by BenHaMeen. I remember there was a dope mix that had the Rugrats theme, a mash up of Stronger Than You from Steven Universe and Just the Two of Us, and an amazing Mario mix. I really need to see if he has a mixtape because those songs were lit.

The podcast was broken up into 5 segments that centered around pop culture, geeky news, and current events. The first segment was "This Week in the N Word" which really addressed racism, anti-blackness, and pain ol tomfoolery that was currently happening. Rihanna, Kanye West, and Pokemon were discussed.

After this they followed up with Geekquently asked questions where the audience could them ask FanBros and Black Girl Nerds questions. They even took some questions from twitter. One question that came up is if not Harriet Tubman on the the 20 dollar who should it be. Feminista Jones commented on that question and she was extremely eloquent and brilliant on the subject. I really need to follow her on twitter and check out more of work. There actually a few other famous people there like author of Shadowshaper, Daniel Jose Older, and a gentleman that worked for DC Comics, Joseph P. Illidge.

Waku Waku +NYC Day 2 [Pic Heavy]

Hey y'all, I hope that had a wonderful Christmas or holiday if you don't celebrate it^^ I had a relaxing day with my friend at his apartment in Queens with his two cats Ali and Boom. I'm back to finish my adventures at Waku Waku +NYC.

Day 2
On Sunday, the first thing on our list was to attend a panel called Introduction to Manga and Anime Studies and it was really interesting. We both are writers (Tiff more so than me), so we figured it would be cool to go to a panel for a career or hobby we are interested in doing. Since I'm a big fan of the humanities (particularly literature) I spent a lot of my time reading in school and analyzing texts. I haven't analyzed manga or anime yet, but I think it would be something I could be potentially interested in doing. The panelists talked about looking at anime and manga under the same lens as film and other contemporary media. They discussed why such a field should exist and one of the reasons being that mainstream American pop culture has been influenced by anime and manga. You can see its influences in shows like Steven Universe and Adventure Time to name a few. Putting these texts and films into context is a great way to explore why these influences exist. I wonder if one day the US will be like how it was in Blade Runner.

It's interesting that for manga and anime to be such a huge influence on American pop culture that there is no such thing in schools as an anime/manga studies major or minor. There are a few schools that has Comic studies as a minor. But students that want to examine Anime and Manga are usually studying it under a Japanese literature or film studies major.

The also pondered what is categorized as manga and anime citing for an example that Miyazaki does not like his work to be called anime. I had no idea he felt this way because he is often heralded as a major front runner to the popularity of anime in the West. His work is usually synonymous with the word anime. They also brought up shows like Avatar the Last Airbender and RWBY and how there are debates about whether or not shows like this can be considered anime. It was a really informative panel^^

After the panel we headed back to the Brooklyn Expo center to grab something quick before lining up for the Baby the Stars Shine Bright fashion show. We remembered how long the line was the day before for the PUTUMAYO fashion show and figured it would be even longer for Baby whose show we did not want to miss. What I grabbed to eat was so scrumdiddilyumptious like oh my word! I got a chicken katsu sandwhich from Katsu-Hama and my life was changed.

Waku Waku +NYC Convention: Japanese Pop Culture Festival Day 1 (pic heavy)

Hey everyone! I hope the weather hasn't been too harsh for ya. NYC hasn't been told cold which is a relief and kinda worrisome at the same time. Fingers crossed for a mild winter! I've attended quite a few events and I'm behind on writing about them. Ah the convention season lol

Back in August Tiff and I attended Waku Waku +NYC and it was amazing! It was the first time that this convention had been held, but it didn't feel like it. It was ran very well except for a few minor snags here and there. Waku Waku +NYC is a two day Japanese pop culture festival that launched this past summer in Brooklyn. The festival consisted of many aspects of Japanese pop culture like anime, manga, music, food, film and fashion. There was a dealer's room, exhibits, panels, screenings and fashion shows.

We learned beforehand from the schedule that the event would be spread out over five locations in Greenpoint and Williamsburg (Brooklyn Expo Center, Transmitter Park, Wythe Hotel, Brooklyn Bowl, and the Verboten). They were also kind enough to have shuttles that went between each location and would also pick you up from the Greenpoint subway station. The first day I cosplayed as Kagome and Tiff wore her young Eren cosplay from Attack on Titan. 

The pre reg line was great which was a welcome change from what happened at AnimeNEXT. They were kind enough to direct everyone to stand in the shade. The line was slightly wrapped around the block but it went very fast to our relief.

6% Doki Doki booth

We headed straight to the dealer's room the place where your hard earned coins go to die lol I lied to myself sayin I was only gonna spend $50 haha Yeah right! I went in the first day and spent way more than I originally wanted. I don't feel like anything I bought was a waste :)

Mi spoils lol

Butler Until Midnight: Prologue Review

Hi everyone, I decided to play Voltage's latest released before work kicked my butt tomorrow. I can only imagine what my inbox will look like after four days -_- Welp, I'll deal with that tomorrow on to the prologue review!

November 2nd

The MC is in the middle of relocating for a job in Tokyo and is searching for an apartment. She finds an apartment that sounds too good to be true. She immediately signs without fully reading over the lease agreement. The prologue fast forwards to a month later on the day the MC is moving into her new place. She discovers that she missed a pretty big feature that comes with her apartment on the lease agreement, a personal butler?!

The Guys of Butler Until Midnight

• Yuma Akagi: Charming
• Aoi Shirafuji: Cool
• Tomoki Matsuba: Strict
• Kyo Aizawa: Aloof
• Itsuki Matsuba: Mischievous

My Trip to Istanbul

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving with their loved ones^^ I was fortunate enough to celebrate twice with a Friendsgiving that was too lit last weekend and with Joe at his apartment yesterday. I ate real good both times and have a blast.

Earlier this month I had my first work trip abroad to Istanbul. I didn't really get to see to much until the last morning before my flight. Each night I would try to go out and see a little bit near my hotel. A lot of the modern building construction reminded me on China and the driving oh lord that sure did remind me of China haha

There was a street near my hotel that was like 5th avenue in NYC. I also got to go to a really cool street near Taksim Square. It was a really long street that had different shops and restaurants along side.

On the last day I woke up early and headed to Hagia Sophia; it was so beautiful! I originally wanted to go to the Blue Mosque, but it opened later due to the prayer schedule on Friday. I'm really happy that I took the time to go see it rather than sleeping in.

You also had the option to walk up to the next floor above the main area. What was really interesting is the walkway was so old that it wasn't stairs. It was like walking on cobblestones that gradually got steeper and steeper as you made your way up.

 Once you get to the top you're greeting by this beautiful ceiling.

I actually took the metro to get to Hagia Sophia and it was very easy to navigate. Apparently if you take a taxi you can end up getting stuck on the bridge that takes you from the Europe side to the Asia side for hours.

I made my back to the hotel to pick up my bags and headed to my first flight back from Istabul to Paris. Traveling back was a little scary because I was in Paris during the attacks at the airport but I didn't know what had occurred until I landed back in NYC after my second flight from Paris to NYC. I remember feeling really shocked when I saw what was happening on social media being that I had just been there. I always take the time to be thankful and cherish the people in my life and being that close to a tragedy that has affected a lot of people has only reinforced that for me. I hope you all stay blessed and safe.