Can't believe I didn't write anything for the past 3 months. Thanks (?) to my brother, I picked up the habit of playing MUD again. Spent a lot of time on that addictive online text-only game, training new characters, joining groups killing dragon kings, etc. Today, because of the server is down, I finally had some time to continue updating my Sakura Taisen site. Just 2 weeks ago I completed my collection of ST Drama CD series and all the cover scans and related information are now on the Drama CD page. Also acquired some new song albums and OSTs and their information can be found on the music CD page.

The most exciting news this week is Sega/Red Entertainment announced their future plan for Sakura Taisen. There will be a total of 7 games in this new project called Sakura Taisen World Project. A remake of Sakura Taisen 1 with new elements and graphics is currently under development for PS2 and also the whole new start for Sakura Taisen: Sakura Taisen 5 is also revealed. This time the background will be in US: New York. A new player character will apparently be the leader of the new New York Kagekidan: Star Company. No details on if Rachet, who appears in the Sakura Taisen Movie, will make her appearance in this game. Also there are some new Sakura Taisen games with different genre. Some will be pure action games and others pure adventure. This news really bring me something to look for for the next few years. Hopefully Ouji san can stick to this plan and bring us wonderful games as before.

Whoa, it has been a whole month since the last time I added an entry here. Indeed there were a lot of things happened for me during these time. Most important of all is that I passed my qualifying exam and can finally move on to concentrate on my research. Also, I signed up at ICDsoft for a new home for my web site and so far it's working pretty nicely. Originally I planned to work on the Sakura Taisen section right after the exam, but I think I kind of tired out then. Today I finally got enough energy to scan some CD covers and added some information on drama and music CDs. Hopefully in the next few days, I can finish scanning the Kayou show DVDs and book covers that I own. Also need to work on the introduction section, which will be the most important part of the site, I guess. Last but not the least, I hope to add some Soletta Orihime touch to the site. Still trying to come up with a good idea. :)

Got the Creative Nomad IIc MP3 player this afternoon. Setup was very easy but had to upgrade the player center to transfer files under XP. Just needed a few minutes to load up 64MB of WMA files and the sound quality is excellent. The ear phones are not that great but ok by my standard. I will try it with my other ear phone at school (which is supposed to be better). Battery life is not bad too. I think a AA battery could last around 10-12 hours of non-stop playing. Recharged some of my rechargeable batteries just for this baby. ^^ Speaking of which, I need to get some more AAA rechargeable batteries. I need them for palm pilot and gameboy and many other devices too.

Just got back from Microsoft's Visual Studio .NET academic launch event at San Jose State University. It was like a party for the young geeks. Endless deli and drinks. Presentation was like a fun fair too with spider ball flying all over the place. To me, the most interesting thing about .NET is the web service functionality, which allows web applications to talk to each other in XML with relatively simple coding. I think it might be quite useful for the digital library project I'm working on. It eliminates the hassle of writing XML parsing and the server side application can be called without complicated XML requests. OAI or Z39.50 application should be able to benefit from this.

Worked on some Sakura Taisen pages last night and the result looks pretty good. Have to add the content though, which will require a lot of work. And I'm using up the web space on attbi pretty fast. I wonder if I should just break my piggy bank and get a hosting service at icdsoft.com. $5 per month for 333MB space and 5G traffic sounds like a good deal. ^_^

Spending money on Sakura Taisen related goods again. Arggg. ST is really a money sucking hell for me. ^^;; Ordered Sakura Taisen Movie Romantica, TV Romantica and 2 Sakura Taisen 3 guides from Amazon.co.jp. It costs much less than getting them from AnimeBook.com or Kinokuniya even with express shipping (4200 yen, disgusting). I also ordered FFX Ultimania Omega, which costs $30 if I buy here, with the ST books. Only about $20 after sharing the shipping cost. Not bad. ^_^

Last night (well, this early morning actually) I put finishing touches on Akira's story guide in Sentimental Graffiti 2 and activated the link from the main page. I think the gallery page needs a face over and also the SG2 main page. First of all, I'll need to reinstall flash 5.0. Hmmm.......

Went to Kinokuniya book store in San Francisco this afternoon and bought the Xenogears Perfect Work. Cost me over $50 including tax but well worth it. It has over 300 pages with the mech and character designs. Very detailed explanation on the background of the story too. I think I will sit down and have a good look at all the settings after April 18. Also completed my collection of Love Hina manga after buying the no.13 today. Saw a stack of FFX Ultimania Omega there. Might pick one up next Tuesday or Wednesday when I go there to buy the newest issue of Animedia magazine (with coverage on ST4).

Also found a $75 Creative Nomad IIc 32MB MP3 player at dartek.com. It's an excellent fit for me. It plays WMA files and has a USB connection. Also it takes smartmedia cards for expanded memory, which I happen to have an extra 32MB lying around. Can't wait to get it so I can listen to some ST music when I commute.

Phew. Finally finished my practice talk this afternoon. Could have done a better job but oh well, it's just a practice talk. While waiting for my replacement cable modem to arrive this afternoon (the modem, which by the way, is already one day late), brown Santa Claus mysteriously appeared at my front door and handed me a package from Japan. Woohoo, another shipment from Club Japan. This time I got Shin Kayou Zenshuu 3, which includes most of the songs used in last summer's kayou show, Kaisin Bessou, ST 2nd OVA soundtrack, TV series song collection and ST Movie soundtrack. Too bad I got it one hour before I left for school so I only had time to go through Shin Kayou Zenshuu 3 once. I liked it especially the main theme Subete wa Umi he (すべてわ海へ) which features Sakura and Maria. Especially after watching the kayou show, you can just feel the change of heart in the beauty from hate to love that caused by the prince's affection towards her. Many songs in this album don't make sense (in terms of lyrics) until you watch the kayou show, but the melodies are still enchanting nevertheless. Tanaka sensei is truely a master in producing these extraordinary music.

After I got home from school, I finally had the chance to listen to part of the OVA soundtrack and the TV series song collection. Kinema March (キネマ行進曲) is my favorite among the OVA songs. Maybe I just like march style music but I found the song aspiring and cheering and duet by Sumire and Kanna is very nicely done. I'll post some thoughts on the TV series songs if I get the chance to at a later date.

On a side note, I really need to get a new MP3 player that supports USB and WMA format. My sensory science MP2100 is simply out of date. :( Ah, why don't money just fall from the sky?

Mar. 9, 2002

I really liked Benitokage a lot. This is actually the first song show that features brand new songs that were written specifically for this show and did not appear in  any of the Sakura Taisen games or OVAs. The show started with Kore ga Revue (これがレビュウ) that features all eight members of TKD in their revue costumes. All went well just like the opening dances in the previous two shows until Sumire suddenly ran into Sakura and tripped when they did a crossover pattern. This came as a total surprise to me since they are usually so good in dancing. Sumire showed her displeasure with this in an exaggerated way but continued to dance. A minutes later, she bumped into Sakura again and got very angry so she decided to leave the formation and stand by a pillar. Everyone else went on and continued to dance. Sumire felt ignored and being a TO----P STAR of TKD, how can she endure being ignored? To attract the attention, she pulled down the pillar and fell dramatically to the ground. Everyone, hearing her scream, all stopped and gathered around her. Kanna also ran towards her and asked "Are you okay? ......Pillar?"*LOL*.

After this incident, Sumire decided to test how important she is to rest of Hanagumi members. She pretended she got hurt during the fall of the pillar and refused to join the rehearsals of the show Benitokage, in which she is the lead actress. Everybody was worried about her and came to her room to cheer her up with gifts and even Kohran made some "close to ordinary" walking sticks for her (well, still have Kohran touches on them. ^^). But even with everyone expressing their concerns for her, she still thought that everyone is glad that she got hurt. Here is where Reni sang Subarashiki Butai, telling Sumire that even she's the lead cast, she is not alone on the stage and everyone will be supporting her. Sumire was encouraged by Reni and regained her confidence in being the leading role in the new show. With the help from Reni's german medicine (^^;;), her feet recovered overnight and everybody in Hanagumi is glad that the show can be performed as scheduled.

Benitokage is a love drama between a beautiful thief (Benitokage) and a detective (Kozirou 小次郎) who has been trying to track her down for a long time. Benitokage fell in love with Kozirou the first time she saw him. She knew this love does not have a hope of happy ending. Thus when Kozirou finally tracked her to her lair, she challenged Kozirou to a duel. Instead of firing at Kozirou, she fired towards the sky while Kozirou's bullet stroke her. Only until then did she confess her love for him. Shocked by her confession initially, Kozirou soon felt desperate and remorse. Here the music of Ai wa towa ni came up, and this pair of ill-fated lovers expressed their love through this beautiful song. With the song coming to an end, Benitokage became weaker and weaker and finally collapsed and died in Kozirou's arms, leaving Kozirou watching towards the sky, speechless. The End.

Final thoughts. Music scores are just awesome. Combined with the excellent performance from all the cast, the overall experience is unbelievably good. Especially the parts that Reni sang Subarashiki Budai and the "Benitokage" show, I was deeply moved by them. I also liked the dancing when Sakura performed Kamona Asakusa (カモナ浅草) and Orihime's Watashi no Natsu (私の夏). Sakura's dance is lively and energetic, while Orihime's dance is very japanese style (festival dance) and successfully recreated the atmosphere at a japanese summer festival. Of course, there are many jokes here and there throughout the whole show. Some of them, for example, making fun of Kanna and Iris' height (Kanna is 2m tall in the game but is the shortest in the show while Iris is just the opposite), gradually become a trademark for Kayou show. ^^;; One of the funnest scenes in the show is when Iris and Oogami went to visit Sumire in her room, she sang the very cute Chi Chin no Pui (チチンのプイ) trying to cure Sumire with the magical power from these magical words. Iris claimed that it can cure ANY disease no matter what. Of course Sumire thinks it's a flake and is just something that Iris uses to make her feel worse. So right after Iris and Oogami left the room, she got off the bed and said "If it can cure anything, WHY NOT FIX KANNA AND YOUR HEIGHT PROBLEM FIRST?" Oh man, I can't stop laughing when I watched this. Good one, Sumire! Anyways, I would suggest anyone who's interested in Sakura Taisen series to watch this Kayou show. Even with little japanese knowledge, you can still enjoy the show tremendously. By the way, Milkyway is a chinese website with a very rich collection of data on Kayou shows and Reni. Visit them if you want to know more about Sakura Taisen Kayou show. :)

Mar. 8, 2002

Today I received the live performance DVDs of Teigeki Kagekidan (帝撃歌劇団) and Shin Kayou Zenshuu CD (新歌謡全集) that I ordered from Club Japan on Feb. 27. The DVDs I got are the live performances of TKD Ai Yueni (愛ゆえに) and Benitokage (紅蜥蜴) which are their first and third performance respectively. Both performances are excellent but Benitokage is more superior in the arrangement of the play, the quality of the set and the performance of the cast. Tomorrow, I'll write up some of my thoughts after watching these 2 DVDs. Ah, Reni's Subarashi ki Butai (素晴らしき舞台) and Sumire and Kana's Ai wa Towa ni(愛わ永久に) are so moving, I have to play these 2 songs again and again. ^^;;

Last Updated: Mar. 25, 2002