Azure Flame Reloaded

Greetings all, I still don’t have my PhD, I’ve started a new job and just moved house…but I felt a sudden desire to review video games and so I’m bringing the blog back. I’ll be focussing more on games than anime this time around, because anime reviewing becoming a chore was one of the reasons [...]

When I started my PhD three years ago, I ended up with a lot less time and energy for blogging. Nor could I spend hours each week keeping abreast of the latest anime and manga, reading and commenting on blogs, and generally staying in the loop. Real life had called, and contrary to form, I [...]

On Monday, I looked at the state of classic fantasy in anime, and although it would have been enough to end it there and conclude that it was generally in a sorry state, I knew there was something more I had to write about- namely, fantasy with a sci-fi twist (like you couldn’t guess that [...]

Writers from all over the world have made a stable income employing the “classic fantasy” formula in all sorts of media- be they novels, games or even anime, the story of a young boy and his sword banding together with a bunch of eclectic allies to defeat the Lord of Darkness has been used over [...]

This picture has nothing to do with the article, but people seem to expect random eroge CGs when reading editorials. For a while now, there have been several editorial titles sitting on my computer, but the effort needed to actually write such pieces has always seemed to be just beyond my grasp. In an attempt [...]

Although anime comedy is created with Japanese viewers in mind, it has to be admitted that even though us foreigners may not get all the references without recourse to liner notes or onscreen pop-ups, we can still derive entertainment from it. Perhaps the most difficult to wade into, however, are not those series which simply [...]

A while ago, I wrote about anime that managed to surpass its original manga, and I promised to follow that piece up with a second article discussing anime based on video games. As always, it took a little longer than anticipated to actually write the article in question, but now the time has finally come [...]

Regular readers of this blog will be aware that I have a habit of unfavourably comparing anime series to the original manga- it’s not something I do to be provocative or controversial, merely a statement of my opinion. As my manga experience has increased, I have continually found that the majority of manga-based anime series [...]

Those with the ability to recall trivial and largely useless information may recall that some time ago, I wrote an article about second seasons that directly followed on from the first, and whether they were always destined to be inferior to their predecessors. The conclusion seemed to be that, actually, despite the stigma attached to [...]

If you like something, it seems only natural to want more of it- anime included. After all, if it comes down to a choice between more episodes about your favourite characters and settings, or watching something new and unproven, the former may well sound infinitely preferable. Unfortunately, the saying “too much of a good thing” [...]