Zodai

We're doing fine. I've stabilized with work and stuff. Cyr's busy with her last semester in school.
 
We ok

Oi oi, I can't write that many H-scenes in such a short time ._.

Dinner of the day is MC's girlfriend- SOMEONE will be eating out. :^) 
He clicked on your profile and picked "join game" you idiot  
Oh, do explain. 

Confession: Today, I got randomly matched-up with a Fuwanovel member in DotA match (the match is still on-going).

I'd hope they're doing well.  It's good for things to turn out well between people ^^

I don't think so, I think they're just both busy with real life, though of course I'm not privy to the details of their lives. 

I just got full marks from an English essay exam 
 
Hahah a h a h a h  a  h  a  h  a   h   a   h   a   h   a    h    a    h    a    h    a

Confession: I got a (female) friend of mine to try KS today
 
she likes it
 
It was a good day

Today I woke up at 2:30 AM thinking it was already 7 AM. Looked at my alarm clock: "2:30 AM, oh it must be broken." Look at my other clock: "2:30 AM, oh it must be broken too." Look at my phone: "2:30 AM, weird that my phone is showing the wrong time too." Some minutes later: "Why the fuck am I brushing my teeth in the middle of the night?"

I know people don't care nor do people post these kinds of threads anymore, but I thought I'd make an announcement to say that I'm going through a rough spot emotionally right now, so I'll be putting the new game on hold and taking some time away from Fuwanovel. The whole Aokana TL mess is just pushing me down quite hard, and I just need some time away from visual novel related material. I guess it feels better to post that.
I'll still be signing in on occasion to check if something was updated, I just won't be actively posting for awhile. That being said, if you need to reach out to me, feel free to PM.
Thanks, and sorry for calling this out.

Reading Tae Kim multiple times is probably useful since that way you can cement all the nuances well.  It's likely someone will miss a detail on their first reading.
 
I'd say go through the whole thing twice, then go onto a VN.  After that read it once a week or so along with the VN until you get a bit more in there if you're serious about getting this down.

Tae Kim is the basic thing I use, along with text hooking.  http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/
 
In order to get stuff like context and how pieces fit together you need a general grasp of stuff like grammar for it to make sense.  So read through as much of Tae Kim as you can.  After going through it a few times, try picking up an untranslated VN and going through the hooking process.  There's full guides on here somewhere, but basically it grabs the text from the game and puts it through a dictionary translator of sorts to help you figure out the meaning.  From there you'll be able to start recognizing some along the way while you read.
 
I've been focusing on my writing so I haven't been able to do full-on for this, but once you manage to figure out basic grammar it should be easier to figure out meanings through context.  Once you start getting some experience it can be easier to jump into more kanji-specific or concentrated methods.  Using the language in and of itself is the most efficient method alongside memorization rather than memorization exclusively.

Just couldn't get that quote outta my post window
 
Anyways, I'm currently socializing. Feels amazing. Yay

Confession: I was so bored yesterday without Fuwa

TL;DR Loli/Pedophilia is a sensitive issue, and Tay actually has legal reasons for his enforcing the policy (read: there's no personal anti-loli belief going on as one might think). So he simply asks that you keep these types of discussions* off of Fuwanovel.

You can review those rules here.

*Because they are a part of the traditional VN heritage of Japanese games, we acknowledge that mature, focused discussions of “loli” characters and routes within a visual novel are valid, and we will allow them within the Visual Novel discussion boards, but beyond those confines, Fuwanovel is just not the place for this topic.

Machine translating to English from a Chinese fan translation sounds like a bad idea if you're actually interested in getting at the original meaning.  Not to mention you greatly reduce your chances of actually learning any JP in the process.

After analyzing our traffic and especially seeing the impact of our weekly VNTS updates I think it makes sense to work in two steps:
Move the blog (or run it on both blog.fuwanovel.net AND fuwanovel.net) to be the front page and make the links to the other sections as poppy as possible) Decide whether to build a new frontsite or more specific tools in the future Reason being that we have a lot of traffic that doesn't generate us anything: A following, a core member base, nothing is coming from the main page as it is currently.
I think the site would be better off by focusing on information and we can easily achieve that by moving the blog into the spotlight.
Thoughts?

We actually announced Umineko last year!

This probably will only matter to a select few of you, but I figured I should probably give an update on what has happened to me and why I just dropped off the face of Cyber-Earth, both here on the main site, and on the Skype groups.
Well, first off, please let me clarify that I have no intention of leaving the site. I still love Fuwanovel just as much as I did when I first stumbled in here, as the lowly pleb that I once was. However, I am sure that my long string of inactivity has probably left some of the people who know me thinking I am either slowly dying and distancing myself from the community, or that perhaps I just don't care, and have surrendered myself to the 3D realm.
Both of these trains of thought are not exactly right.
Well, to put it simply, I have just been under a great deal of stress over the last six months or so. First off, I dropped out of University, as I wish to switch over to college and take IT. Second, I have been unemployed ever since and no job has given me the light of day. I currently have one thing hanging in the air precariously, but I have a pretty high degree of pessimism as I am currently basing all future outcomes on previous ones. Last main point; I've been in a really dark spot due to the stress of being unable to find a job. Everyone has been very understanding in my life, and I can't thank them enough for that, but I've just felt so useless due to being a very unproductive member of society. The only thing that really keeps me from caving in is the loving support of my girlfriend, without whom I am sure I would be completely and utterly defeated and on some kind of watch list.
So why does this matter? I have always been very vocal about my personal feelings and the like in various threads, with the Confessions thread immediately coming to mind. How is this any different then what is already public knowledge?
Well, all of this extra stress has started leaking into my writing persona. Until now, my writing persona and my real life persona have been one and the same. I act the exact same way I do in real life, and I have no shame in saying that. The problem is, I don't want you guys to start seeing me differently. I want to remain that friendly feels guy that some of you guys seem to somehow tolerate. 
I mean like, yeah, I do get around to posting every now and again, and I do check in on the Skype groups whenever I can. I just don't stay active because I usually just get bogged down shortly after. Again, I just don't want you guys to start seeing me differently.
 
So yeah, I am going to cut this short. This is not a goodbye. This is not even a notice of a temporary leave. This is just letting people who might care, even just a little bit, know what is up with my fading in and out of the community.
So yeah, sorry for taking up your time with my real world problems. As I have said many times in this post, just letting you guys know why I am so ded. ^^''
 

Ya, I'm fine now, ty all :3

That day was the just the worst.

First, I had to wake up at 6 AM to go do inventory at a Lowes at 7am. Manager estimated us to be done by 12PM-ish. 1 latest. But he didn't factor in that half of our crew are newbies 'cos all the vets quit already so now I'm technically the new vet and was assigned the legendary screws section
So the count went on and on gg me I counted well over 50,000 bolts and screws, all weighed by scale, and wtf it's 4PM, what kinda part time job is this, I don't know what time they actually finished, cuz I had to leave at 4:30 to go home and then get ready for school.

Go to school at 6. POWER OUTTAGE. Complete darkness. What is this, Africa? After 30 minutes they decided to send out an official campus closed message. Yippee, we all get to go home, that's good right?

Cue the traffic and my overheating car. Fk everything.

By the time me and my dad were able to regroup, find a replacement hose at a local AutoZone (thank god they open until 9PM) and make the swap, we were home by 9:30PM ish.

Eat some dinner, do some homework, write up some PINK SAGA chapter 2, then boot up Lucy ~The Eternity she wished for~ and complain 


~~
Life is good  

Man, I've finally reached 1,000 post counts. It only took me 3 years, lol. My activity on this site has always been pretty volatile and spontaneous. Often I would be really active for a couple of months, then disappear for around half a year, and then return like nothing happened. It's for this reason that I don't feel like I know a lot of users very well. Especially newer ones. So I'm mostly going to dedicate this post as a retrospective of both my time here, and how much fuwa has changed. So hopefully even people who don't really recognize me, can at least take interest in some fuwahistory from this dinosaur ;P. 
 
The Fuwanovel community has changed significantly since I first joined in March 2013. Back then Fuwanovel was still a fairly new site, and the community was quite small. I really miss those days during the spring of 2013, which was my first round of activity on this forum. Back then, you ran into the same people all the time on the forums. There were few active users, but the ones that were active were fairly involved. A lot of the time it was the same people having conversations about different topics across the forums, and it felt like the community was a lot more unified. Whereas now, it seems to me at least, that users tend to stick to their favorite sub-forum or even thread (I feel like the people active on the fuwanovel confessions thread are their own sub-community, lol). I'm not criticizing this, and in a sense I feel like that is the natural progression of when online-communities get bigger. But back then, people would often post across all the boards; and you would see the same person’s views on different subjects. It allowed a chance to really get to know other users. Which is why even though the forums were fairly slow in activity back then, people remained; because of vibrant discussion and a comfortable small community. 
 
Regarding vibrant discussions, that was the reason I loved fuwanovel so much when I first joined. Before Fuwanovel, there wasn't really a good place to discuss VNs casually. The few other places where VN discussion did exist (notably vndb and JP), were fairly elitist and not welcoming to new comers and casual VN readers. Fuwanovel had a completely different vibe, everyone was outwardly friendly. Fuwanovel's goal since its inception was to make "VNs more popular in the west", and having a friendly community that welcomes the less initiated is crucial for such a cause. While admittedly most people that were active back then already had some experience with VNs, the friendly environment promoted discussion without fear of being judged. And I remember Aaeru (the founder of Fuwanovel) made it quite clear that fostering an anti-elitist vibe was a very important goal to her. But combined with being friendly, debate and intellectual exchanges were a huge aspect of many discussions back then.
 
It was quite frequent that different sides would get into huge debates with each other, but would always have respect for the other. They were not flame wars because people were listening to the other side, and respected their views. I remember one of the first acquaintances I made on this site (I believe it was Sieg), was a guy I got into a long argument about G-Senjou no Maou with, and afterwards we became friends. Precisely because it was a small community, people usually posted meaningful replies and would then start a conversation with each other in the thread. If you are ever bored, I highly recommend looking at the really old threads on VN talk, as many of them are quite interesting. Aaeru would also very frequently get in huge debates with people (especially with Sanahtlig).
 
Another aspect I miss about the old Fuwa, was the activity of the old staff, notably Ryoji, Tay and Aaeru. Ryoji has hardly been active since the summer of 2013 but was one of the first users to break 1000 post counts, back when merely having 100 was impressive. I will forever remember him as the Sage of Anime. He had been collecting and following anime since the 80's, and knew a lot about the topic. The only person who was his match was another user name Eldin, and when they conversed with each other we referred to it as "Ryoji vs Eldin". Both of them would talk about the most obscure anime that most people have never heard of, and get into intense debates about said long forgotten shows. It was quite entertaining, and fascinating to watch. Ryoji's wife, Kotomi, was also occasionally active on the site. It was always cool to see when the two of them posted in the same threads. Well, those were my thoughts on Ryoji, onto Tay from 2013.
 
These days I feel like few people actually know Tay. I think for especially newer users he is the guy who runs the site, and is often too busy. But back in 2013 (and 2014 as well), Tay was really active. He would participate in many conversations, and he was a strong reason why many people felt that the community was so nice. He recognized users and got to know them. I remember after my first long absence from the forums when I returned, he sent me a pm greeting me back. That gesture deeply touched me, as already then, I felt like a lot of users that I once knew had left. This was back in late 2013, at that point Aaeru disappeared, and Ryoji was also no longer active, not to mention a lot of other formerly active people left. I didn't really know the new community (lol, this was back when Nosebleed was actually new) and I didn’t feel at home. But then with that one Pm from Tay, I knew that I wasn't forgotten. Tay really knew the community back then, and it was obvious he cared a lot about its users. This is still true about him, but now I feel he is too busy to be as engaged as he used to be, which I completely understand. I just want people to know that Tay really does care a lot about this community, and I am glad he runs this site.
 
The last staff member I remember being active from 2013 was Aaeru. Unlike with both Ryoji and Tay, I never really interacted with Aaeru that much. She posted on my Introduction thread, and that’s about all I remember interacting with her. But what I do remember was her crusade against licensing and her vehement pro-piracy views. She believed two things very strongly about Priracy. 1) Was that Piracy was the most efficient means to spread word about VNs, and 2) That fan translators could do a faster job than official licensors and translators. To be honest with you, I agree with both these views still. I respect licensors, but Fan translators can translate any VN they want (they don’t need a license to do so), and I’ve noticed that they have usually been faster. Furthermore, of English translated VNs, I feel like more good ones have either been fan translated, or picked up from fan translators. They are still the backbone of the Western VN community in my view.
 
Furthermore about Aaeru, it was her “Learn How to Read Japanese in 2 Years” thread that first motivated me to learn Japanese. I always assumed that it was an impossible task before that. But her thread convinced me that I could learn the language, and that motivated me to study. If it were not for that blog post, I probably would not know any Japanese right now. So I really must thank her for that. Even though Aaeru has long disappeared, I hope people don’t forget about her. While a lot of drama and controversy was started by her, we wouldn’t have Fuwanovel at all if it were not for her, and so we should pay our respects to her for at least that reason.
 
The spring and the summer of 2013 were the golden age of the site for me. I’m glad that Fuwanovel has grown (and is continuing to grow). It makes me happy because it serves as evidence that Fuwanovel is succeeding in its mission statement to “Make Visual Novels popular in the west”. I have had plenty of great interactions with people during 2014 and 2015 (I have not been very active during 2016 thus far though). I’m constantly adapting to the community’s evolution and support where the site is going. But I don’t want the early days of Fuwanovel, the days that really first shaped the site, to be forgotten.
 
I hope you guys didn’t mind my huge nostagiafest. In the title I mentioned that this was a "3 year retrospective". So if you are curious about my thoughts on 2014 and 2015 I would gladly share them. Every year of this site has been distinctly different, so I definitely have a lot to share. And if others have perspectives of old Fuwa to share, I would love to hear them.
 

My fucking sides. 
So this friend of mine lent his laptop today to a history nut classmate of ours since he had some urgent stuff to take care of during English. 
He just received it back and his history is full of porn searches including HD porn of Ottoman emperors. 
My fucking sides oh god