^ Thanks, that explains it. They must've been happy with the material they got this season then. But if their bosses were going to give them what they wanted, I kind of wish they'd done so from the start instead of shifting the pairings around halfway through the story. It's nice when seiyuu openly ship their characters, though.

My two cents on Sunshine: I got more or less what I wanted from the second season and enjoyed it more than the first overall, even if it never reached the same dramatic heights. I was expecting it to hit all the beats of a generic "let's save this place we care about" story and I would have eaten it up anyway, but it made some surprising decisions I thought elevated the show to something much better.

However... what they did with the yuri was weird. Love Live is basically Pandering: The Franchise, so I suspected they would chicken out after the first season went so far with the subtext. But I assumed Chika and Riko would get the same treatment Kanan and Mari did (more scenes with their third friend with the occasional one-on-one moment); I didn't expect the staff to all but drop the pairing after the first few episodes. The resulting shift in dynamics made it look like the girls had selective amnesia. Plus, I only follow the anime continuity and don't keep up with fandom stuff so I'm very confused that Riko and Yoshiko are a thing now. On the other hand, my YouChikaRiko-shipping self was fucking delighted with this season.

Wonder what the movie will be about though?

Does anyone have a list or something of (free) yuri/lesbian themed games? I've tried going through itch.io, but there's so much on there that it's kind of a pain to navigate. I tried "female protagonist" and "romance" but there doesn't seem to be a way to filter out things like otome games...

There's a curator on Steam called Hella Yuri. You can filter their list to only see the free games or the ones where the lesbian content plays an important part.

Two Car was a complete shit show. Not even 'meh' by CGDCT standards.

Oh yeah, how did that turn out? Any yuri?

Worse, went full het with middle aged teacher. Disgusting.

It was very impressive in its complete refusal to have the two main girls progress or develop in any way beyond their childish obsession with their coach. As a result, they dragged the whole show down. It also made the baffling choice to spend a lot of time on the coach's love life and I think we were supposed to care about that? Some of the other characters were okay and the group scenes were nice but that doesn't nearly make up for it.

Shoujo Shuumatsu Ryokou is probably my favorite anime of the year. I don't know how it managed to make the twilight of mankind look so peaceful. Chito and Yuuri have grown on me so much, I find myself stupidly hoping that they'll reach the highest level and find a century's worth of food or a spaceship to take them to the moon where past humans have somehow managed to establish a colony or something equally ridiculous. I wish it could get a second half-season.

Houseki no Kuni was another fantastic show. It completely changed the way I thought about CGI in anime and I hope it gets a sequel. I'll probably pick up the manga because of all the plot stuff and also Cinnabar finally went deredere and I want to know what happens.

^ I was able to read the ending, thanks for posting the link! There's another chapter after 46 labeled 最終話 (last chapter) and that one is still available. Definitely yuri, if a bit abrupt. I'm glad Akina got her girl in the end.

So this series lasted 9 volumes, huh. I honestly thought it would get an anime, it would have been a good candidate. Shame it didn't happen.

Gone Home is currently on sale for $3.50 at GOG.com. It's a nice little game and at such a discount, I definitely recommend picking it up if you haven't played it yet.

On Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Rosa came out as bi recently. She hasn't always had the best taste in men (her first onscreen boyfriend was nice but the second one was awful), so I hope we'll get to see a sample of what her taste in women is like.
B99 is also a really good comedy and that's one more reason to watch it now.

Both Shoujo Shuumatsu Ryokou and Houseki no Kuni had me go "What the hell is that thing?" this week, but for very different reasons.

I'm done catching up with Himouto! Umaru-chan and I'm enjoying it a lot more than I thought I would. Gay disaster Kirie makes the whole show worth watching for me, but Umaru's character growth is a really pleasant surprise and keeps the jokes from getting stale.

Two Car: omg the coach has a face now
...progress?

Also this week's Shoujo Shuumatsu Ryokou might be my favorite yet. Fantastic execution of a classic theme.

I gave this some thought and it's surprisingly hard to find a story where a female character falls in love with a girl, and then with a boy, and her feelings for another girl aren't treated as a phase. The TV Tropes "Bi the way" page wasn't much help. If I had to guess a reason for this, I'd say it's because anime and manga rarely treat bisexuality seriously in the first place. Possibly Shin Sekai Yori? I haven't watched it, but apparently it portrayed its same-sex relationships as serious even though they didn't end well. I've seen conflicting opinions about it, though.

This was adorable. I wish there had been a few more pages after the ending, but this is good too.

cannibalism...

...That's a possibility, but let's hope it wouldn't be that widespread a custom, haha.

There's another theory I have about this show ever since I found out about the kinds of works this author does (also, they like Haibane Renmei, tho I'm not sure how much influence that show has on this one). The girls might be wandering around in limbo all along (either symbolic or literal). That explains all the afterlife talks. & them going up is them reaching closer to heaven. Because of this, there are no corpses seen. That or we'll get a proper explanation down the line.

I hadn't thought about it that way! So far I have been taking the story completely at face value. But assuming the eventual ending isn't just "the adventure continues", we can probably expect some kind of significant reveal when they reach that top level. I've been enjoying the show as post-apocalyptic slice-of-life but I wouldn't mind it having hints of something more spiritual. I'll have to look out for potential symbolism.

I read the ANN review of the latest Kino ep and I realized I was so busy getting annoyed at the setup that I missed the incredibly obvious Jesus parallels. The episode makes a lot more sense now.

There's one thing I've been wondering about while watching Shoujo Shuumatsu Ryokou: not only are there almost no living humans in this city, there are no dead ones. Even though the last war apparently wasn't that long ago. Where are all the corpses? I'm used to post-apocalyptic landscapes being littered with remnants of human life and this makes the setting really eerie.

I'm a bit underwhelmed by the new Kino no Tabi so far. It's only the first half and some of the weaker stories introduced characters that might get more time to shine later on, but this week's episode was... wow. It was so over-the-top about its gratuitous cruelty that after a while I turned it into a game of trying to guess what horrible thing would happen next. Ooh, I bet now one of them will want to rape/torture the girl— Oh, come on, what the hell. That is literally overkill.

On the flip side, the other show of the season about people exploring the world on a motorcycle continues to be an absolute delight.

Well, we didn't have to wait long, did we. :D As evident from the current chapter, Teru is exactly that type of person.

She'd probably have to be extra talented and charismatic, now that we know she had to deal with a socially anxious programmer and an (initially) hostile composer! That was quite the bumpy start for the club.

That's the beauty of college life: you don't have to attend classes, as long as you're prepared to crunch for exams... or are really, really good. My guess is that Teru is the latter, she has that air about her of a person who is ridiculously good at anything she tries her hand at.

I tried doing that one year... Would not recommend! Being good would probably have helped.

But Teru has been surprisingly reliable so far. Sure, she's flighty and unpredictable, but she has been able to give Tamaki good advice when she was feeling down. I think she could be the type of college student who pulls this off.

I love how Teru is like a weird fairy who can pop up any time, anywhere, and provide support or lend an ear. I wonder if she ever goes to class, though.

The anime stopped at the beach chapter. People who don't feel like going over the same material twice could pick up the manga from the next chapter, although I think the adaptation was different enough to make a comparison worth it.

If being "basically the same person" is a problem, then shouldn't the twins be worse than the protagonists?

Ha, you're right. I should've said that they were using the same excuse as creators usually do with twins to avoid coming up with two different personalities. I'll still be watching this, of course. We don't get many anime about racing.

Well, after finding out the author's works through her Twitter & Tumblr, I now understand that the unsettling tone is intentional & that this anime is possibly an allegory of the author's severe depression. This might turn out to be the most interesting ride this season.

Also, good news (?), the author is into yuri.

I'm even more curious about this one now that I know more about the author. I scrolled through her Twitter, looking at all the fanart for shows from 10-15 years ago and I was enjoying the trip down memory lane... and suddenly there was a drawing of a girl slitting her wrists. I really hope Tsukumizu is getting help.

Two Car is okay and has a bunch of shippable pairings but the main girls both have feelings for some guy. Who has no face and is written out before the series starts? It's weird

Yeah that was weird. It was like a lot of effort was put into showing that he didn't matter even though he clearly was an important part of the girls' backstory and motivation. Stranger still was the fact that even with the short introductions they got, all the other teams seemed more interesting than the one we're supposed to root for. They take the time to spell out that the two main girls are basically the same person like it's an endearing quirk.

Hopefully this will be one of those stories where the opponents get as much focus as the protagonists.

There's a new Kino no Tabi?

Yeah! It's a full reboot with a new cast, so it will adapt a few stories that were covered the first time around. ANN interviewed the author recently.

The new YuYuYu season started today for those interested.

Prepare to get your hearts crushed.

I look forward to finding out what new ways of making these poor girls suffer the writers have come up with!

The new Kino no Tabi feels a lot more traditionally "anime" than the 2003 series (which I highly recommend). I rewatched some of the first adaptation and its art direction, sound design and use of highly stylized character designs made even the more upbeat episodes feel mildly unsettling. The new version seems like a bit of a step down, but it's still more Kino no Tabi.

Also mildly unsettling was Girls' Last Trip/Shoujo Shuumatsu Ryokou. Really good first episode. It's about two girls, but I don't know if we should expect much shipping material from this one.

https://dynasty-scans.com/chapters/magic_of_stella_ch21#9
There's been a lot of online debate/discourse/wank about video game tutorials lately and I think Murakami/the author sums up nicely how a good tutorial should be like. It's a good first impression, too—if a game messes up that early, it doesn't bode well for later levels.

Yeah, the blog is fun already as a bonus but the added insight into various story events makes it worth reading, so I'm really glad you guys are taking the time to translate it.

I need to give the game a try some time...

Tamaki's Electra complex creeps me out, but on the other hand, her obsession with middle-aged men gives us some really good absurd comedy... Silver lining I guess?

It's been great to have so many chapters to read. Props to the scanlation group for working so fast, and for translating the blog posts from the Houbunsha website!

Why France tho ? We are not very known for our great games now that infogram is past and Ubisoft is mostly in Montreal .

We have arkanes studio but it’s not really kou’s line of works. Unless she want to character design the next dishonored to have a really different experience than the jrpgs

That was the big question. Why France?

Tokunou spent New Year's in France last year and tweeted about visiting a bunch of places. I think he wanted to write about his characters visiting a country he likes and there's no deeper meaning. I haven't read past what's been translated though, so I could be wrong.