Another long term project finished. I only became aware of this fandisc's availability a year ago, but at the time I was busy with Hoshizora no Memoria, Koichoco, Majikoi S, etc, etc. Only now that Majikoi S was done could I focus on playing and finishing this fandisc, and thus my tenth favorite franchise of all time. But now the dominoes are toppling swiftly. Two visual novels done in two days. If only this rate of progress could continue!
Now I can focus on Da Capo III. But if I ever need a break from that, there's still Really? Really!, Grisaia's short stories and Majikoi A that I've been meaning to play forever now. There's no shortage of work that needs to be done, and this is all constrained to just the top ten visual novel franchises. I'm not even trying to branch out or anything here, I'm just trying to fulfill the absolute minimum of the very best content available, and there's still so much to go. Please, August, Minato Soft, Yuzusoft, Key, Leaf and Circus, please just take a year long hiatus already and give us fans a break!
I also need to get back to reading Chapter House Dune at some point, but it's a terrible book so finishing the Dune franchise has been put on a bit of the backburner.
There's also a ton of Naruto left to rewatch. The 4th great ninja war is finally starting next episode. But it starts with all the minor characters no one cares about getting their day in the sun. Which is really dull. >.<. Just skip to the Naruto-Sasuke fight already. We all know that's the only thing fans ever cared about.
I will say that Naruto Shippuuden episodes 246-249 may be the best four episodes of anime ever. I wish people could start by watching these four episodes, instead of eps 1-4 of the original series, except I think they would lose a lot of their impact if you just dived in like that. But how many people will patiently wait 300 episodes to see this scene, which the whole world should see, because it's essentially perfection incarnate? Stuck on the horns of a dilemma.
The larger point though, is that every now and then, between all of the boring episodes that just care about getting all the pieces in the right place, every now and then, there are moments in this series that are just unbelievably moving and stellar, perfectly written down to every last word, with every facial expression and gesture artistic brilliance. One of them was Sasuke leaving the village and Sakura's speech trying to dissuade him. One of them was this sequence with Naruto's parents. One of them was the original Naruto-Sasuke fight interspersed with our first flashbacks of Sasuke's life-forming memories that unpeels this extremely complex and wonderful character. One of them was Kakashi, Rin, and Obito's flashbacks together. One of them was Naruto and Sasuke's fight on the rooftop. One of them was Naruto and Sasuke's final climactic fight. One of them was Gaara vs. Lee. One of them was Hinata vs. Neiji. One of them was Hinata vs. Pain. One of them was Orochimaru's introduction. One of them was Hinata and Naruto holding hands. One of them was Gai telling Lee to go ahead with the surgery. One of them was Ino vs. Sakura. One of them was Naruto mastering the Rasengan vs. Kabuto. It feels like they're as plentiful as the stars, it's impossible to list them all.
So many incredible, heartwarming, tearjerking, pulse pounding, deeply revealing moments. Naruto isn't just stupid mistakes and boring stretches of filler. It's also this. There's a reason Naruto was my favorite anime of all time for so long. Who knows, maybe if Bolt is good, it can retrieve the position. . .
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