It’s been a rough year. I hope you were able to find some solace and escape in fiction.

I’d like to talk about the media that left an impression on me this year. Anything I personally experienced for the first time in 2025 is fair game for this post, not just things released in 2025.

As with most of the internet, this post contains Manosaba spoilers.

Best New Anime (original): Apocalypse Hotel

I already wrote a full review of this in the previous post on this blog, so go read that. Apocalypse Hotel is the sort of show where you finish watching it and immediately know it’s going to stick with you for a long time. When you’ve been watching anime for decades, series like this are harder and harder to come by! Hopefully Cygames keeps siphoning money from everyone’s wallets with their Umamusume-branded straws (this metaphor may have gotten away from me) so we continue getting series like this from them. Fun fact: Apocalypse Hotel is the highest rated anime ever on Bilibili. China has some good taste.

The runner-up for this category would be Turkey!. It has not left a lasting impression on me the way Apocalypse Hotel has, but it showed us how much pathos you can wring out of even the most absurd premise as long as you put your heart into it.

Best New Anime (adaptation): Ninkoro

Whoa it’s another show I wrote about in the previous post on this blog crazy!!! Ninkoro also became an instant classic for me, and it’s a fantastic adaptation of the source material to boot, transformative in all the right ways and demonstrating some of the classic Shaft pizazz. There’s no more suitable candidate for this arbitrary category I invented (one might say it’s my own invention).

The runner-up here would be mono. I know it’s a somewhat divisive show, but I really liked the cast and looked forward to seeing their adventures each week. The stellar production certainly didn’t hurt.

Best Old Anime: Seraphim Call

Shoutouts to Roak on Discord for recommending this one. Ostensibly a promotional vehicle for a Bishoujo Franchise ala Sister Princess, in actuality it’s more like a collection of unrelated short films, each with wildly variant tones, approaches, and subject matter. The first episode doesn’t give the best impression — it’s a lot of dated turn-of-the-century otaku humor — but everything thereafter I found fascinating for me. The highlight for me was the yuri twincest two-parter written and boarded by Mochizuki Tomomi. It’s very much Heisei yuri, focusing on a “closed” relationship and disconnected from real-world social justice issues; but it’s compelling within that framework, with novel presentation (we were calling it “yuri Inception” while watching) and well-realized characters given the runtime. It even manages to have a happy ending!

Best Gundam I Watched This Year: Char’s Counterattack

Gundam has become something of a staple food for me, as I suppose it eventually does for all otaku. This year, I was finally able to get through ZZ, thereby unlocking CCA for my consumption. CCA is pure, distilled Tomino, nothing but his excesses on parade for two hours straight. It is mesmerizing, and it is exhausting. An essential watch for any Gundam fan.

Best Yuri Anime: WataNare

At long last, the world has learned of Mikami Teren’s brilliance. The explosive popularity of WataNare’s anime has been a delight to witness; it will have a lasting impact on yuri and its fandom, mark my words. See, this is what happens when great source material gets a competent adaptation!

Best Surprisingly Good Yuri Anime: Bad Girl

What did I say about these categories being arbitrary? Not much to say here, I just wanted to shine a spotlight on a series that may have gone underappreciated by the yuri fandom. You need an appreciation for Kirara vibes^{[What are these?]} and some very risque humor, but the characters and pairings are all lovable in their own distinct ways. And it has NTR. And the mangaka looks like this.

Best Manga: Kami’ina Botan

Kami’ina Botan is a manga that gets off to a rough start. The mangaka threw a bunch of his favorite character designs together with only the very loose unifying theme of “alcohol,” and as a result the first volume is nothing to write home about. Give it a chance, though, and you’ll see Kami’ina Botan come into its own: a portrait of university students taking their first nervous steps into adult life and adult relationships. Its depiction of uncertainty and unease is haunting, arresting, beautiful. I’m counting on you to do it justice in the anime next year, Aninari.

Also, all of the girls are really cute. （小並感

Best Game Coming Out Next Year That I Played This Year: Distorted Travesty 4

First, read what Zephyr has to say about his own game.

I had the privilege of playing through a tester build of DT4 earlier this year. It was so absorbing that I played it for an average of ten hours a day, 18 days straight, streaming all of my gameplay. Suffice to say it is a masterpiece of game design and a monumental achievement for a single person. It is also a game that should have been made sooner — and by that, I don’t mean that Zephyr should have made it sooner. I find it frustrating that it falls to solo devs like him to advance the mechanical side of the medium, to design games of mastery. I am 36 years old and have been playing games for 33 of those, give or take; I am tired of games which do not assume basic literacy on the player’s part, and I hunger for games which iterate on conventional design elements. Thank you, Zephyr, for catering to players willing to rise and meet your challenges.

Now, how much more can I say about DT4 itself without spoiling the unwashed masses yet to experience it? Prepare to have your world upended several times over. It will test your raw platforming skills. It will test your understanding of the character you’re controlling and her moveset. It will test your ability to solve puzzles of both modern sokoban and lore-driven lateral thinking varieties (Zephyr played La-Mulana in between DT3 and DT4, and it shows). It will test your patience and perseverance as you grind bosses for hour after hour. But don’t worry. Throughout it all, you’ll never stop having fun.

Look forward to it in 2026. Or maybe 2027, but hopefully 2026.

Best Game That Shockingly Came Out This Year: Silksong

There are aspects of Silksong that I don’t expect other developers to be able to imitate, like the way it’s one of the most gorgeous-looking games ever. But I do hope it encourages them to start trusting the player a little more. Kayin’s excellent post about Silksong outlines this idea more eloquently than I ever could; do give it a read. My intentionally reductive take is that I hope Silksong inspires indie developers to make harder games.

It would also be nice if there were less indie games where the dialogue was painful to read. I’m pleasantly surprised that Silksong’s script reads as well as it does, given that I don’t remember seeing a script editor in the credits…

Best New Visual Novel: Mahou Shoujo no Majo Saiban

Who could have predicted that 2025 would have not one, not two, but three wholly original Japanese ADVs moving hundreds of thousands of units each? Enough people have gushed about Hundred Line and Urban Myth Dissolution Center already, so allow me to gush about Manosaba.

The elevator pitch for Manosaba is “Danganronpa meets Madoka”. You’ve got thirteen teenage girls trapped on an island together, forced to literally witch hunt one another via a series of witch trials. (Hence the title.) It wouldn’t be as successful as it is without something of its own, though. You can’t just copy popular things and expect it to work. What does Manosaba do that sets it apart, then? What is its special sauce? Answer after the obnoxious paragraph break.

Manosaba excels by addressing the death game genre’s greatest shortcoming: characters being thrown away. Death game scenarios must necessarily utilize death as a means to an end, a method of eliciting drama, and thus they struggle to ascribe real weight to it. Characters exist to be killed off, and thus it is difficult to become attached to them while they are alive or have a genuine emotional response when they are revealed to be dead. By incorporating timeloop elements, however, Manosaba is able to recast death as a tragedy to be overcome — while also ensuring each character is afforded their own story. It learned the right lessons from Madoka.

This approach is predicated on having a solid cast to begin with. Manosaba is a master class in crafting characters, from their costumes to their personalities. You will come out of it loving all thirteen +α of the girls, and you will sift through the mountains of fanart posted to social media daily. Sorry, but I don’t make the rules, Acacia does. If you asked me who I found the cutest right after completing the game, my answer would have been Noa and An’an, but after seeing so much fanart of Meruru recently (it’s her birthday as I’m writing this post), I’m starting to develop an appreciation for her, too… Here’s a nice post analyzing her character, contradictions and all, by an artist who draws a lot of her. The best pairings are of course Sherry/Hannah and any of the ones involving Hiro. That one Hiro/Reia bad ending (you know the one) is absolute cinema.

Damn, this section is starting to degrade into yuributa ramblings… I better cut it off here so I preserve my reputation as an erudite eroge expert. What do you mean I haven’t had that reputation for a long time now?

Best Decades-old RPG Maker Game: Seraphic Blue

This is another title I’ve already written a review for. I’ve been in the process of playing through some of the classic JRPGs I never got to in-era, and Seraphic Blue has made the strongest impression on me so far, followed by Valkyrie Profile. I considered putting Valkyrie Profile somewhere in this post, but I played it in December of last year, and I absolutely must preserve the sanctity of my flippant nonsense. Feel free to reflect on a time before Sakuraba was washed at your own leisure.

Best Soulslike: Lies of P Overture

I play a lot of Soulslikes, and I would say that 2025 was the best year for the genre yet. We saw a number of expansive, polished titles offering play experiences rivaling or surpassing those of Fromsoft’s originals. Leading the pack for me was Overture, the paid DLC expansion to 2023’s Lies of P. I found it to be a particularly balanced entry in a genre where games often come up short in one area or another, combining diverse combat scenarios and environments with an emotionally resonant narrative.

This entry reads like a game journalist wrote it, and I don’t like that. くわばらくわばら

Best Soulslike If You Have Friends: Elden Ring Nightreign

We^[Who?] were all skeptical of this one before release, but it turns out we needn’t have been. I have over 100 hours in Nightreign as of writing this post, easily the most I’ve put into any multiplayer game ever. Nightreign proves two things: that the core gameplay loop of Souls is robust enough to survive being repurposed in radical fashion, and that Fromsoft is capable of designing a competent multiplayer action game. This unfortunately means that I will have to purchase a Switch 2 in order to play Duskbloods, so maybe Nightreign is bad after all.

Best Demon’s Soulslike: Dolls Nest

Unlike other Soulslikes, this one is about the robots level design REWORK THIS

It’s hard not to yearn for the days when Nitro+ was releasing ambitious, immaculately produced visual novels left and right. I think few people have more of a right to say that than me, if I may be so bold. At the same time, if Dolls Nest forecasts their work moving forward… it’s hard to be too upset with the current state of affairs. Its world of underground superstructures is perfectly realized, cavernous labyrinths of twisted metallic imitations of life which are alluring in their pristine grotesqueness. It’s a testament to the sheer, unbridled talent of Nitro+’s development team that they managed to construct something as singular as Dolls Nest during their first foray into 3D action game development. The future may be brighter than anticipated.

Hopefully their next game has better performance though.

Best Library Simulator: Library of Ruina

Ruina is a one of a kind experience. That may sound hyperbolic, but you’ll simply have to accept that it’s true. Many stories can be described as anti-capitalist in some way, but Ruina truly earns this descriptor, displaying a keen understanding of the pressures modern society exudes on the individual (refer to the lyrics of Children of the City) while remaining optimistic that we can overcome them together. And it wraps this story in a deep, complex turn-based combat system, featuring some of the hardest fights you’ll ever come across in an offline, single player RPG. In every way Ruina is demanding, yet it is equally rewarding — you will get out what you put in, whether you are building teams or analyzing character motives.

The caveat here is that it takes at least 20 hours, if not more, for either the story or the combat to really start coming together. Be prepared for a slow start, and be prepared for some steep difficulty spikes. Don’t be afraid to ask for help, because the game itself seems repulsed by the idea of teaching the player anything.

Best Gacha Game I Should Not Have Picked Up Because I Already Play Multiple: Limbus Company

Having caught up on Limbus, I am most impressed by how it refuses to compromise The City as a setting, despite being a gacha game. It is every bit as horrific as it was in Lobotomy Corporation and Ruina, even if it is now viewed through the lens of an oudou JRPG travelogue. Cantos such as 4, 7, and 8 build upon themes established in Ruina from new angles; Limbus is not a spinoff, but a meaningful continuation of what precedes it. Depending on how you feel about gacha games, this may or may not be a good thing. Personally, I just wish the combat were as fun as Ruina’s. Sanity is a terrible system, with terrible implications for the rest of the combat design…

I’d like to shout out the English translation of Limbus, by the way. I played Ruina in English with Japanese voices and found both scripts to be… fine, more or less. No strong preference for either. In Limbus, though, I find the English script quite compelling in its own right, and feel no urge to switch away from it. Cantos 5 onward are a showcase of excellent localization work, and I commend the current translator for the consistent quality of their output… especially because I know firsthand just how rough working on a gacha game can be.

Best Yuri Couple: Konoha and Satoko

Botan and Ibuki are also pretty good.

Best Music Video: Sunfaded

I don’t play Gakumas, as I cannot stand the male protagonist, but it sure has some cute girls. The best designs in a gacha game since Blue Archive, if you ask me. Something else it has is great music. Sunfaded combines both of these things. Ethereal vocals overlaid on repetitious, grungy guitars as Shinosawa Hiro glides through blanched urban environments, ghostlike and transient. It’s all so captivating. I can’t stop listening to the song and watching the accompanying MV. I can’t believe this is idol music.

Best New Character: Nikaidou Hiro

Acacia was right to put her in all three games. She’s incredibly entertaining as a PoV character while also playing off the rest of the cast in fun ways. I love every single 正しくない and 桜羽💢エマ💢 meme. Looking forward to seeing how many new girlfriends she amasses in Manomura and Hanoura. Damn these 略称 are getting confusing though.

Best 3D Action Game That’s Not A Soulslike: Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix

This is the single game I spent the most time playing after DT4 and Limbus Company this year. I did a Level 1 Critical Mode run despite being wholly unfamiliar with both KH2FM itself and Kingdom Hearts as a series. It worked out surprisingly well. There were certainly some growing pains at first, but I eventually came to appreciate KH2FM as the exceptionally well-crafted game that it is. It contains a staggering variety of inventive challenges which encourage (some would say “force”) the player to explore every last nook and cranny of Sora’s kit. If you’re looking for a game that’s hard from hour 1 to hour 100, KH2FM is here for you. Its embrace is warm and loving, except for when Genie Jafar and Vexen rub against you.

Best VTuber Debut: Fuzuki Miki

It’s got everything you could ask for. Unnecessary amounts of lore, a poorly labeled board game, the viewer being abducted and transformed into an alien hamster, a sudden cameo from Harada. I’ve always enjoyed Miki’s content, so it’s nice to see her back. Her new Live2D is really cute…

Best First Person DMC Clone: Ultrakill

In Ultrakill, stylish play is mandatory. I greatly respect the decision to tie the style meter to the player’s ability to regenerate health, and would not like the game nearly as much otherwise. Once you reach Brutal difficulty, you must play the game on its own terms to have any chance of success. That’s beautiful, if you ask me. Also the encounter design is really good and the story is cool and Fraud when and blah blah blah. Someone else can tell you about that stuff.

Best Shmup Or STG Or Bullet Hell Or Whatever We’re Calling Them Now: Stellavanity

The more shmups I play, the more I develop an understanding of what exactly I want out of them. And it’s pretty simple, really: either IKD or ZUN design. If you can blend both, that’s sick too. あうとさいど’s games do just that, and Stellavanity succeeds at doing so as well. I learned of Stellavanity some time ago from posts describing it as the game with the second hardest TLB (you know what the first hardest is), but it wasn’t until recently that I gave it a spin myself. I was initially somewhat put off by the notion of a shmup with RPG elements, but the design itself quickly won me over with its mixture of CAVE and Touhou conventions, plus a little spice of its own. Even if you’re a scrub like me who can never dream of seriously challenging the TLB, it’s at least worth a 1cc or two. It’s JP-only, but its page on the Shmups Wiki has everything you need to know to get it up and running, as well as translations for every text string in the game.

~~~

Okay, that’s all you’re getting out of me. You might have noticed that this wasn’t a reading-heavy year for me; I hope to be more proactive on this front in 2026. If nothing else, I’ve been diligent about keeping up with issues of Yurihime. Maybe I’ll do another megapost reviewing all of the series currently running in it, since the lineup now is quite different from when I did the last one.

Merry Christmas.

I am interested in what can only be described as a strange number of shows airing next season, so why don’t we take a look at them? Combing through the folds of my gray matter will surely prove more edifying than reading r/anime posts arguing that MyGO!!!!! is lacking in domain expansions.

For the record, the only series from winter season that I am still following is Bravern. It is kino, and peak, and poggers, and all of those other neologistic superlatives the younger generation is so enamored of.

Let’s go down the list on kansou.me, then.

終末トレインどこへいく？ – An anime original, meaning that for better or worse it is an unknown property. And indeed, the promotional materials for this one are frustratingly coy in a way that promotional materials for anime originals oft are; we know that something has befallen the residents of some town, somewhere, and that the protagonist embarks on a journey by train with other girls, but that’s really about it. That said, it has a pedigree, if nothing else―it’s by the director/writer duo that brought us Shirobako. I know it will be pinging on many people’s radar for that reason alone. I’m personally not very well versed in Mizushima Tsutomu’s oeuvre, but it’s a (seemingly) well produced anime original with an all-female cast, so I deem it worthy of an episode or two.

ゆるキャン△ SEASON3 – The Yurucamp movie was, quite frankly, rather banal, but we’re back to adapting manga content with this, so I have no misgivings on the writing front. Said manga content is being adapted by a new team at a different studio, though, so it remains to be seen how it fares on a production front. The first two seasons weren’t exactly the Jujutsu Kaisen of Frieren when it came to sakuga, but they were very competently put together, eliciting atmosphere and pathos. This was in large part due to effectively utilizing Tateyama Akiyuki’s score; in terms of enhancing the visual content, I’m inclined to say Yurucamp seasons one and two have among the best soundtracks in all of anime. Tateyama is in fact returning for season three, so I’ll be keeping my ears tuned just as sharply as my eyes with Eight Bit’s take on the material.

ガールズバンドクライ – I, too, am a fan of BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!!. All right, I realize that’s not fair―this project has been in motion for years, and really, “there are girls in a band and a lot of angst” is a genius concept that we, collectively as humans, should milk for all it’s worth. Of course, I would be lying if I said the approach this series is taking to 3DCG spoke to my soul; or rather, it speaks to my soul in the way a Lovecraftian horror might. The CG out of space, if you will. Perhaps it will worm its way into the depths of my being, perhaps it will merely remain uncanny―either way I am committing to every episode right here, right now. Not simply because it is an angsty girls’ band show, mind you, but because it is written by Hanada Jukki. I consider both Yorimoi and Granbelm to be among the greatest modern anime (don’t try to hit me with an alternative definition of modern, either―even Yorimoi is only six years old), so him doing an original that isn’t merely a new branch in the labyrinth that is Love Live? Yeah, count me in.

Shiny Colors shows up next on the list, and while I’m not watching that, I would like to know whether or not Romeo actually wrote the noctchill scenario one of these epochs. I will wait until the end of time for you to bare your heart to me, Bamco…

夜のクラゲは泳げない – I, too, am a fan of BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!!. Wait, shit, uh, I know how anime is made, this one must have been in the oven for some years too. How do I save face here while demonstrating my deep knowledge of otaku culture in suitably cynical fashion, shit, shit, think… I know. Let’s try that again.

夜のクラゲは泳げない – I, too, am a fan of Niigo from Project Sekai featuring Hatsune Miku. Yeah, there we go. Much like Girls Band Cry, this has girls, a band, and crying, with the additional bonus of sakuga. Yuri fans on my TL are already going gaga for this based on the prescreening, so really my hands are tied here. The writer for this one is the author of the Tomozaki-kun LN series, which I’ve heard a fair amount of praise for―with the caveat that it takes several volumes to get good. In other words, it’s one of those series where people who have only watched the mediocre anime adaptation of the first few volumes look at you side-eyed when you profess your love for it. I’m sure everyone has their own series like that, don’t lie. I bring this up because Tomozaki-kun is the Ryuuou no Oshigoto of fighting games, and Ryuuou itself is the Sakura no Uta of shogi, and the YoruKura trailers give me vague Sakura no Uta vibes, so by law of association with Sakura no Uta we can reasonably infer that YoruKura will be kami. I hear the haters out there typing furiously away as they compose scathing polemics taking big Moogy to task for comparing everything involving creative expression to Sakura no Uta and/or Musicus. Too late, though; my lobbying efforts have already won over the legislators.

声優ラジオのウラオモテ – So what did I say about mediocre anime adaptations of light novels? I’ve read the first few volumes of this and liked them; the series demonstrates deep love and respect for the seiyuu profession, but isn’t afraid to criticize its working conditions. If you’re a seiyuu fan, it’s an easy recommendation. I don’t expect to have much to say about the anime, though; it will likely not add anything to the novels other than featuring the voice talents of the author’s favorite seiyuu. Perhaps that’s reason enough for it to exist, though?

この素晴らしい世界に祝福を！3 – The Megumin spinoff did not have the sauce, but the trailers for this are promising when it comes to sauce. Sauce is unfortunately a metaphysical concept, not easily defined, but I think that if you try licking your screen as you watch the trailers, you will come to appreciate their distinct flavor. I have fond memories of groupwatching season two with friends; hopefully we can realize that with season three as well. This is my way of determining who in my friend group has enough love in their heart to read my blog posts, so if any of them do not comment on this entry, I will know who is an emotionless husk and must be culled…

ささやくように恋を唄う – I, too, am a fan of… uh, well, the band elements are honestly pretty light, so… I, too, am a fan of Yagate Kimi ni Naru? No, it’s not similar to that beyond the barest initial premise either. Do you mean to say I must engage with fictional works on their own terms, not paint them with prejudice that I may file them away? That aesthetics cannot inform you of execution? Preposterous, I say, preposterous. But preposterous as it may be, I have read the entirety of the Sasakoi manga, and thus I know it to be true; while the producers are likely banking on the band theming, I’m not so sure that’s the meat of the series. For more detailed thoughts, please refer to this Twitter thread I wrote a few weeks ago, because anything more I said here would simply be reiterating it.

ブルーアーカイブ The Animation – Equal parts apprehension and anticipation. There are few things in this world I love more than Blue Archive, but the most recent trailer consists entirely of closeups with almost no motion while the shareware demo version of Unwelcome School plays. The previous trailers have looked acceptable from my perspective, but my proverbial needle is firmly lodged in the “it’s so over” half of the spectrum as I’m writing this. Certainly, I believe the anime will function as fanservice for existing fans no matter what, no matter how many wheels on the bus may come off, but it has the potential to be so much more than that, to expand Blue Archive’s cultural purchase even further. Will it accomplish that? Well… it would be nice if it did. Let’s leave it at that.

Well, that about wraps it up. It’s time to return to the world of FF7, where Aerith may or may not die this time. I can’t know until I reach the end of Rebirth; in that sense, she’s similar to Schrodinger’s cat, if you think about it.

Sorry if I got your hopes up with the title but I’m too lazy to write another post in Japanese.

As I’ve mentioned on Twitter, I’ve started working as an in-house translator/editor for JAST USA. Adjusting to the workload has been somewhat rough, in that it has had deleterious effects on my already poor utilization of my free time, but I think I’ve finally gotten into the swing of things. I’m hoping to get back to reading eroge and books with some regularity; after all I’ve found time to write this post, have I not? Sakura no Toki and Black Sheep Town first, of course.

Anyway, I wanted to spew my thoughts on what media I have been managing to consume as of late. If you’re one of the unlucky few reading this post, welcome to Moogy’s wild ride, you’re not getting off any time soon.

Blue Archive

Perhaps one day I’ll write something lengthier about Blue Archive, but for now: two moments in particular have been very striking for me recently. The first is Miyako’s declaration during a later episode of v4c2 that (paraphrasing a Japanese translation of Korean text in English) “In the real world, justice always prevails!” (現実では――どんな時でも、正義が勝つものですから！) Typically I think you would expect to see the opposite of this sentiment expressed; you know, justice is in the eye of the beholder, Emiya Shirou’s ideals are untenable, you know, the sort of statement that isn’t much of a statement unless someone like Nasu or Narahara is really digging into it. But Blue Archive dares to dream big and say that, even in a world filled with corrupt corporations and wannabe dictators (am I talking about Kivotos or our own?) heroism is real and the people will always come out on top. Call it unrealistic―or indeed idealistic―if you will, but I think it’s a resonant message in the context of BA’s greater themes. I especially like how it’s prefaced with “in the real world” (現実では), just to make sure the audience and Yukino know that Miyako means business.

The other bit I wanted to mention is the ending of the current event story, where Ui delves into her reasoning for not turning the time capsule over to the Sisterhood. In her words, artifacts of the past are not meant for our benefit, and putting an item with sentimental value to its original owners on display would be disrespecting the item and its purpose. Ui, I think, sees the humanity in the past―despite her post as librarian it’s not just words on a page or abandoned buildings to her (see also her conversation with Sensei earlier in the story). Up to this point, the 聖徒会 (sorry, I have no idea what the English translation of this) has always been this mysterious facet of the worldbuilding, lore to be studied if you will, but thanks to Ui they seem more human to me now; like any other faction in Kivotos, simply no longer extant. Also please draw Hinata/Ui fanart I am begging you I need it

D4DJ

The current event in D4DJ has Hayate say that Kokoa doesn’t want to be open about their relationship because there are people out there who can’t keep up with societal progress (時代の進歩). I know from reading the comments on event scenarios that there are plenty of people playing D4DJ who are, well, let’s not beat around the bush, they’re homophobes. So I’m glad this is the game’s stance on things. I’m also glad that Hayate and Kokoa are open about their relationship to Lumina now. We also got this really funny 4koma where the joke is that Michiru thinks they’re just Good Friends lol. Hopefully things get cleared up for her eventually.

Also the prior event with Lyrical Lily was 2spooky. Miiko makes for a great horror character.

Out of recent charts, I’ve liked Mikan’s for ENERGY SYNERGY MATRIX, Yamajet’s for 真夏の朝の夢, and Subatos’s for アバンチューールなサマーデーーイズ quite a bit. The last one is fun once you spend like an hour practicing it I swear. It’s fine this isn’t Project Sekai there’s an actual practice mode okay

Yomegami

I’m the editor for this one at JAST and I have to say I am constantly in awe of the main heroine. She’s a cosplay-loving loli Goddess with a regenerating hymen who is also your mom. This game is pretty fun in general so I’d recommend it to moege fans who want to fuck their loli Goddess mom. That sounds like I’m being sarcastic but I’m really not. The voice cast is great too.

BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!!

In a season with a dire dearth of yuri anime, MyGO!!!!! dares to stand tall and shake the heavens. (How many people still get this reference?) I’ll cut straight to the heart of the matter―the characters in MyGO!!!!! are extremely well realized and nuanced. Every line of dialogue, every facial expression, every last little bit of body language, it all matters and it all adds up. The writers understand that if you want pathos, especially of the treacly variety, you don’t need fantastical situations or explosive drama: you just need to devise a cast of well-defined characters and have them play off of one another. And don’t worry, the writers know exactly what yuri otaku are looking for too―just check out the 女女相関図 by the lead writer herself. I have nothing else to watch this season, but MyGO!!!!! by itself is enough to carry it no problem.

ほうかご再テンセイ！

I picked this up on a whim because I wanted to follow more series in Kirara Forward. I really enjoying it―far more than the author’s previous series at Yurihime―but then it was suddenly cancelled. The Kirara classic. This happened to Matazoro too and it sucked even more there. This entry is basically just an excuse to complain about how cancel-happy Kirara’s editors are; only series with anime are safe from the axe. In that sense I’m rather glad that Hoshikuzu Telepath is getting an anime, since now that Matazoro is all you need is killed it’s probably my favorite thing running in any Kirara magazine after Machikado. Anyway I really like そめちめ’s art and Houkago Saitensei’s protagonist in particular had an extremely attractive design. Go follow her on Twitter, she draws Blue Archive fanart so you know she’s a good person.

Afterimage

I find it fascinating how much more Afterimage feels like an RPG than most Metroidvanias, and I’ve been trying to pinpoint why exactly that is. Is it simply because of the equipment system? That certainly goes a long way, but I think it’s a combination of having robust equipment options and how the relative difficulty of a given enemy is greatly impacted by the player character’s level. I’d go so far as to say that it has SotN vibes in its approach to player growth, though obviously it’s substantially more balanced than that game (it is nearly impossible for any game not to be). In any case I really enjoyed how Afterimage successfully blended Metroidvania and ARPG elements and would readily recommend it to fans of either genre! It’s a shame the English translation is lacking, though; I kind of liked the plot and setting, even if it becomes rather… standard by the end, with the villain wanting to merge all souls together or whatever.

TEVI

I’ll admit that some part of me was skeptical about TEVI before playing the demo. Could Gemayue and friends truly recapture the magic of Rabi-Ribi? I’m happy to say that yes, they have. I’ve already spent more time on the demo than I have on many full games I paid for. Forgive me for being breathless here but it feels like TEVI is shaping up to be a once in a lifetime experience. The further refined gameplay is of course part of this, but the more involved narrative also serves to enhance my infatuation with the game; the world has much more appreciable stakes now, and thanks to the much-improved translation it’s way easier to get a handle on the characters. I’ve long dreamed of a game that combines significant narrative ambition with the complex and rewarding challenges of titles like Distorted Travesty, Asakura P, Justice Guy, and indeed Rabi-Ribi. I don’t know if TEVI will be that game… but I hope it is.

Gun Gale Online

LLENN and Pito have the perfect relationship and you cannot convince me otherwise.

Every manga currently running in Yurihime

This is the primary reason I made this post. Allow me to give you my thoughts on, well, everything currently running in Yurihime, whether you want them or not. idk the English titles of anything sorry.

私の百合はお仕事です！ – I don’t know what more there is to say about Watayuri at this point. A masterful depiction of the intersection between identity and persona; if you care about yuri manga at all you’ve likely read at least some of it. I hope the final panel of the most recent chapter isn’t hinting that Sumika wants to move on from Kanoko…

君と綴るうたかた – Don’t tell anyone, but I actually prefer Kimitsuzu to Watayuri (even if the latter is probably “objectively” better). Shizuku’s tale of redemption and forgiveness really speaks to me, and it’s perfectly juxtaposed with the frank and uncompromising depiction of the dying process that is Kaori’s. I don’t know if this manga will resonate with others the way it has for me, but does that matter? Also, the height gap between Shizuku and Kaori is pretty 尊い. Did you know that Shizuku was voiced by Ueda Reina in a PV?

私の推しは悪役令嬢。 – This is shaping up to be one of YH’s flagship series at this point, huh? I’m a fan of the progressive politics in this, less so the otome game isekai stuff. Rae owning the homophobic nun in a recent chapter was pretty satisfying. I like this enough to follow the manga, and I will be watching the upcoming anime (as blighted as its production seems to be), but it’s not a series I see myself ever checking out the source material for.

私の推しは悪役令嬢。メイドキッチン – Despite being a cooking spinoff this is actually pretty enjoyable. tsuke is a very talented mangaka―if you need proof, just look at how deftly they wield the characters of other authors in this series and their contribution to the Watayuri anthology. Or, you know, their previous series, Hinamori-san, which I really wish had continued. I’m glad they’re still getting work but I wanted more of their original characters…

しかばね少女と愛が重い聖騎士の討伐学園ライフ – My favorite of the recent new serializations. The setting is pretty generic, but the mangaka has a good sense of humor and so far the characters have played off of each other well. It has sort of a scrappy underdog feel to it that I enjoy. I’d say I get Disgaea vibes, but that might just be because the protagonist is a zombie. As opposed to a jiangshi, because there’s another series currently running where one of the protagonists is a jiangshi.

伽藍の姫 – This is looking to be an ambitious plot-driven work in a post-apocalyptic setting. Lots of very detailed artwork to feast your eyes on. Feels inspired by NieR Automata in some ways, such as the heroine’s design… I quite liked the first chapter, but the second was pretty slow; hopefully that won’t be a trend.

今日はカノジョがいないから – wtf I love NTR now. NTR in het works is basically always a meme, but I actually care about the characters in this so I’m very invested in how things will play out. It helps that Fuuko is one of the characters of all time, the perfect blend of toxic and coquettish. I must say that the artwork and paneling are always quite effective as well; the mangaka has a clear vision for what she wants to convey and always manages to realize it.

女ともだちと結婚してみた。 – I occasionally skim through this to see if anything happens, and usually it doesn’t.

踊り場にスカートが鳴る – This seems like something I would like but it’s one of the few series I’m not following. I should fix that.

陰キャギャルでもイキがりたい！ – Filling the gap that Futari Escape left, kind of. The leads have great chemistry and the mangaka is knowledgeable (and opinionated!) enough about various subcultures to keep things fresh and funny. Knowing that she’s a model in real life, there were parts of the chapter about modeling where I was like “oh god she’s speaking from experience isn’t she” … Not in this month’s issue or next month’s, which makes me sad.

平良深姉妹はどっちもヤんでる – I’ll be honest, the first few chapters of this were quite bad; unfocused and hard to follow due to confusing paneling. I do think it has improved since then, currently being all over the place in sort of a fun way, but I don’t really see it having long for this world tbh.

ぜんぶ壊して地獄で愛して – The individual chapters of this kind of feel too short, but otherwise I’m digging it. Apparently I have an appreciation for repressed girls with shitty moms―Mafuyu is the only thing keeping me playing Project Sekai at this point, after all. What really sold me on this series was the scene of the protagonist masturbating to the memory of the other girl brutalizing her; if that doesn’t sound too spicy to you, I think you’ll enjoy this.

citrus+ – citrus is too long for me to catch up on at this point, sorry.

嫌われ魔女令嬢と男装皇子の婚約 – I find this series very entertaining but not because it’s good. It’s a concentrated mass of Narou storytelling conventions (would it be rude to call them infelicities?) that is constantly threatening to collapse in on itself, and I find myself gawking at it every time. If you enjoy worlds where everyone except the principal characters (and even some of them) is a petty, small-minded intolerant prone to hurling imprecations at our oh-so-beleaguered protagonist, this is the series for you. I will say that the protagonist, whose name I cannot remember, is pretty cute. Note that this is by far the most popular of the recent serializations amongst Japanese yuri otaku on Twitter, so don’t listen to me I guess.

ゆるゆり & 大室家 – What is there to say about Yuruyuri? It’s the Kochikame of yuri―or the Seinfeld of yuri, if you would prefer―and is very good at being that. You can pick it up at any point and get the gist of things, so give it a try if you are so inclined. Actually, didn’t Seinfeld end with them all going to jail or something? Maybe that will happen in Yuruyuri too.

愛したぶんだけ愛してほしいっ！ – I hate to say it, but I don’t really know what Manio was cooking here, and I don’t think she did either. It’s going to end in the next chapter with nothing really having happened except the formation of a mildly toxic relationship. I guess it would be funny if it ended with 心中. Hopefully whatever she does next has the same spark that Kitakawa did.

アンドロイドは経験人数に入りますか？？ – idk if I would say this series is good, per se, but it’s amusing enough if you don’t mind something raunchy. It doesn’t really go anywhere, but I’m not sure it wants to. The osananajimi is pretty cute.

小春と湊 – A… probably not all that exaggerated (judging by their Twitters) depiction of a real life couple, with chapters drawn in alternation by each of the women. It shows us that this world can have such a thing as a happy couple! A nice way to brighten your day.

私に天使が舞い降りた！ – This is another one that feels too long for me to catch up with. Kefit assures me that that LLENN’s relationship with the loli JKs in GGO is akin to the relationship the protagonist has with the lolis in this, so I will consider having watched GGO to count as 履修ing this.

映しちゃダメな顔 – I occasionally see people on Twitter saying they want yuri that’s similar to BL, and this may fit that bill? Well, I’m probably just talking out of my ass; I am woefully unfamiliar with BL. In any case, so far this is primarily focused around sex and sexuality, with more of a quote unquote adult vibe to it than something like Asumi-chan, so you may enjoy it if you want to see the characters get down and dirty in every chapter.

彩純ちゃんはレズ風俗に興味があります！ – Out of all the sex-oriented series running, this easily has my favorite art, and Nanao is an adorably 健気 character. If you want something with a (heavy) focus on depicting physical intimacy, this would get my vote. Perhaps one day Asumi will remember the ostensible premise of the series.

奈落の花園 – A potent glimpse into the lives of two girls who have been abused by their parents in different ways. Whimsical artstyle, but very heavy content. It’s by no means in poor taste, but the mangaka herself calls for reader discretion on Twitter. If you can handle the subject matter, it’s a worthwhile and heart-wrenching read. Note that it’s an oblique homage to the novel The Secret Garden; the two protagonists are named Mary and Colin. The only reason I noticed this is that my own legal name (as opposed to my illegal one, Moogy) is Colin, and thus The Secret Garden has occupied a space in the back of my head ever since reading it in school as a child. I certainly didn’t expect to encounter it in the pages of YH!

この世で一番素敵な終わり方 – Jiangshi yuri. This has serious Touhou vibes and some pretty raw depictions of grief, but its overall goal remains opaque to me. I think it has potential to coalesce into something meaningful if it’s allowed to keep going.

ささやくように恋を唄う – I still haven’t caught up on this lol. At this rate I’ll probably end up doing so like a week before the anime airs.

That should be everything currently running. If I overlooked anything, fuck you I guess. Sorry, that was rude.

I’ve spent long enough writing this post and WordPress’s editor is starting to lag like hell so that’s it for now. Watch GGO or you are 人間失格.

シングルの発売以来、リリリリさんのMaihimeをヘビロテしているけど、未だに「代替できない仲間」を「大体できない仲間」と聞き間違えてしまう。のは、ここだけの秘密です。どうもこんにちは、麦です。

さて、早くも4月がやってまいりました。ということは、もうすぐ新作アニメが雪崩を打って到来します。かれこれ20年程、アニメの海に溺れている者としては、その荒波に揉まれるのもやぶさかではないといいますか、体が打ち付けられる度に快感すら覚えますが、よい子のみんなさんにおかれましては、今すぐ救難信号を出すことをお勧めいたします。助けが来るとは限りませんが、堕落の潮流に諦めて身を任せるよりは、抵抗を試みた方がいくらかは健全でしょう。まあ、よい子、などと称され得る清い精神を持った人間が、このブログを読んでいるとは到底思えませんが、一応。兎に角、今期放送予定の新作アニメの中から、個人的に興味を惹かれたものを紹介していきたいと思います。ものすげえ偏ったラインアップであると、予め断っておきます。 Continue reading “今期で注目しているアニメ　その他諸々” →

I spent too much time translating this year to read much of anything, so you’re not getting a proper end of year post.

In any case, we’ve entered that awkward space between seasons. The taint of anime, if you will. Perhaps zoomers would more readily understand it as the Backrooms of anime, a liminal space where you’re chased around by video essays singing praises for the latest prestige shounen until you phase through the floor and plummet toward the next heap of shows. Don’t worry, there’s plenty of isekai to break your fall. You know, fans of the Backrooms and adjacent media would probably get a kick out of Otherside Picnic. I think there’s some serious potential in pushing it with that crowd. But I digress.

Otherside Picnic and Castlevania 2 have taught me that it’s a risky proposition to traverse supernatural territory at night, so consider this post a sort of encampment, a safe haven until the dawn has broken and the creepy crawlies have retreated. Soon it will be safe to seek out an exit once more, but until then, join me in pondering what has passed and what is yet to come. Continue reading “the [E]nd of anime” →

It’s been an exciting week. From lesbian tomato innuendo to choreographed maid slaughter, truly this season has something to offer no matter one’s preferences and proclivities. Now that everything I’m interested in has aired, let’s explore how they made me feel, because I have feelings too, god damn it. Continue reading “Fall 2022 Anime – One week in” →

眠れるアニメブロガーの血が、騒ぎ出すッ！　（金子風

I wanted to talk about what I’m planning on watching next season, but I had a bit too much to say about a few shows for it to fit neatly on Twitter, so please enjoy my first blog post about anime in over a decade. Let’s dive right in. Continue reading “Fall 2022 Anime – Preseason Thoughts” →

Don’t expect much from this. It’s just links to a few songs I liked from games released in 2021. Come back in a few weeks and there might be a real post. Continue reading “[Moogy] VGM I liked in 2021” →

This is a list of especially fascinating, provocative, humorous, invigorating, edifying, or otherwise compelling media that I, Moogy, the one and only, the almighty arbiter of taste and apex of the JOP hierarchy, consumed over the course of year 21 of our lord Tanaka Romeo. There’s a lot to cover, and my motivation can only hold out for so long, so let’s jump right into it. Continue reading “Cool Media Recommendations from Moogy 2020 #JOP_Supremacy #VtubersReplacedEroge #YuriOnly” →