And this is my theme music as I roll out to face the enemy. Here’s hoping this year is an epic win!

I’m taking the level 2 again after just barely missing the cutoff last year. This time I’m actually feeling pretty confident about it, as last year my familiarity with a lot of the kanji was pretty suspect and I still came close. After a full year of reading manga almost exclusively in Japanese, I think I’m much better prepared, although there’s still always those horrible trick questions with really ambiguous contexts to confuse you.

Once this is over Epic Win will officially be off hiatus, assuming the test and/or Los Angeles traffic doesn’t kill me, so check back later this week for some new postage. I still have a lot of catching up to do for this season of anime, but I have a couple interesting posts cooked up in the meantime.

Ugh, I’d almost forgotten what a pain in the butt it is to cram for exams. Well, good luck my fellow examinees! And, uh…posthumous good luck to those overseas who already took it, I guess.

/salute

First, I should clarify that I have nothing against Pete Zaitcev; I like him and the stuff he writes. I just can never resist the opportunity to heckle him about his backwater “no comments” policy, especially when his excuse for not allowing them seems to be “well it’s just too much work”.

Of course it’s just my personal preference and I can’t reasonably force that on him, but I find it incredibly frustrating when I can’t just leave a comment on someone’s post to provide feedback. It also eliminates the interesting group conversation that helps enrich a good post and fosters online community.

This issue has already been beat to death, and I very much doubt that Zaitcev will change his ways, so I suppose I’ll have to content myself instead with gnashing my teeth in frustration and hassling him at every opportunity.

OK, so about Google PageRank. In my previous post I mentioned that one reason I removed my normal blogroll was because it’s damaging to the site’s ranking.

Pete responded to my comment with the following:

“UPDATE: Blogrolls do not “damage” PageRank. For one thing it’s impossible to “hemorrage” to begin with. We know that Google applies certain modifiers to the calculated PageRank postfactum, and some of them discourage link farms. However, there are also ad-hoc modifiers for dealing with blogs.” Read the rest of this entry »

For a long time now I’ve been dissatisfied with my  current blogroll, and indeed I’ve never been particularly keen on the concept for traditional blogrolls to begin with. The standard “list of links on the sidebar” doesn’t give much useful information, hardly ever generates any clicks, and also damages your Google pagerank.

Thus, I’m very pleased to present a much more detailed blogroll listing that I feel properly gives credit to the sites that I enjoy the most and which recommend to you, my readers, as being Worth Your Time. This page will be added onto my top menu shortly, so you can always refer back to it if you’re bored and want a good anime blog recommendation.

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The first three blogs in this list, by the way, are my “holy trinity of anime blogging”, writers who I admire and who’s works I read without fail, regardless of subject matter. These guys don’t just write generic episode summaries. They really engage with the work on a creative and intellectual level that gives credit to the under-appreciated depth of animated works, and helps me to better appreciate the artistry of this genre.

If these guys recommend it, it’s probably worth checking out. Read the rest of this entry »

Unfortunately I’ve started developing some symptoms of carpal tunnel syndrome in my left hand, so I’m currently wearing a brace and trying to take it easy as much as possible.

It’s actually rather frustrating, not only because it affects my ability to perform my job, but also because I had a bunch of really cool posts I was working on and had hoped to share with you guys this week. I still plan to post a couple of things this weekend, but unfortunately I’ll have to back off my original blogging schedule a bit to make sure that I’m allowing myself to recuperate properly.

I dealt with RSI in my other hand some years back, so fortunately I know how to recognize the symptoms early and how to properly treat myself. It shouldn’t be a big deal, so no need to worry about me. I mainly wanted to let you guys know the reason why I’ll be reducing the post count for a while.

In other news, Guff finished his summer Japanese study program and is in Hokkaido now. He also still has not sent me any pictures or other blog post material, the lazy bum. Hopefully he’ll have some good stories for us once he actually settles down and comes back to the U.S.

Also Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 and Canaan are both incredibly awesome. Hopefully I’ll actually be able to put together some good posts about them in the near future.

みんなメリークリスマス! Merry Christmas everyone!

I hope Santa Claus brought you all lots of rare figures and doujinshi and moe goodness this yuletide season. Alas, I didn’t get any of those, even though I went so far as to leave a tray of mochi and a box of Pocky out by the fireplace for him. Damn, what could’ve gone wrong? I thought that would work for sure…

Although we weren’t able to post nearly as much as we would have liked this year, we want to continue our annual tradition by taking a moment to remember all you guys who have read and commented on Epic Win over the last year. I feel bad because I haven’t been very good about responding to comments recently (something I hope to do better on in future), but both Guff and I do read and appreciate each and every comment on this site. Read the rest of this entry »

Sheesh, I leave for a couple months and all the anime bloggers start dying off faster than the cast of a Key game. Or perhaps Higurashi would be a more appropriate metaphor, since true bloggers never really die, they just go nuts every once in a while and then eventually everything resets.

Speaking of which, I think we’re about ready to open up shop again here at Epic Win. It’s been a long and busy year, but fortunately things are starting to settle down finally. Having just finished the JLPT level 2 (bleh), along with a couple big deadlines at work, I’ve switched to consumption mode and am busy working through my to-watch backlog. Oh, and if anybody has any recommendations for stuff from this year you think I should be checking out, feel free to let me know.  Read the rest of this entry »

Hard to believe that it’s already been a full year since Guff and I first set up digs here, our humble abode at www.epicwin.org. It’s been a long and somewhat rocky path, as I’m sure is evidenced by our post count in recent months, but all in all we don’t regret one second of the time we’ve put into this site.

As always, first and foremost I have to thank all of you, our readers, for making our blogging adventure a fun and fulfilling one. I’ve always tried to stress the fact that you guys are what makes this site fun, and that we really appreciate your involvement in our own little nook of the internet here. That goes especially to you guys who are still here reading now despite our inconsistent blogging schedule as of late. Without all of you we would be just another empty blip on the internet radar, a hollow monologue talking for only ourselves to hear. For a writer, the idea that there might be no audience out there to ever read the work that you’ve slaved over and poured yourself into is truly disheartening.

Fortunately, that’s something we’ve never really had to worry about here at Epic Win thanks to you all. I especially want to give a big shout out to all of our blogging sempai who have linked to us, supported us, read and commented on our work, and most importantly continued to encourage and motivate us through their own excellent writing. Through participation in the anime blogging community, I’ve become aware of many great anime series and manga that I would never have watched or read otherwise. Likewise Guff and I feel that we have been able to spread our own excitement for a number of off-the-wall but still very fun series, to create new fans and broaden people’s interests. Read the rest of this entry »

Breaking news! The sudden disappearance of superstar bloggers 0rion and Guff over two months ago had left the anime blogosphere in a state of shock, and theories abounded regarding the whereabouts of the former tag team blogging duo.

Today we bring you breaking headline news to report on the status of Epic Win with a live interview with none other than the previously MIA, thought deceased writers themselves. Read the rest of this entry »

While variety is the spice and wolf of life, and while we like always mixing things up here, it’s also good to know what kind of content you guys enjoy most.

In our contest last month I asked, among other things, what you wanted to see more of here at Epic Win. Between that and our recent poll, I think I’ve gotten a pretty good idea of what our core audience is looking for. Read the rest of this entry »

This year I decided to forego the usual western customs in favor of following a more Japanese approach to celebrating the New Year. Fortunately for me, the Japanese community in Los Angeles puts on quite a celebration on the first few days of the year, with traditional food, music, and dancing.

After enjoying the first sunrise of the year (hatsuhinode), I headed down to Little Tokyo to catch the festivities (and buy some manga, of course). They had stages set up for various performances at both Weller Court in front of the Kinokuniya bookstore, as well in the Japanese Village Plaza, pictured below. Read the rest of this entry »