Shuuen no Shiori

Shuuen no Shiori, English name being Bookmark of Demise, sounds very dark..

A couple of days ago while scrolling down the main page of Manga Fox. Seeing as I check out the small pop-up on each manga to see if there is anything interesting I saw this piece, a quick read over the summary and peak at the genres told me that this could be interesting to read.
So what could go wrong with genres like Horror, Mystery and Supernatural all together with Josei and School Life, to be honest, everything, if you ask me.

To my surprise it actually didn't go wrong even with that mix of genres.
For those who are wondering why I think that is a bad mixture, I usually read Seinen and Action mangas.

The manga is quite creepy, but in a good way. You usually expect an introduction of the main character, somewhere along these lines "Hello! I am XXXXX and I'm XX years old.. bla bla bla", right?
Not with this one, first a slight description of the Book and the bookmark and the game you have to play if you receive the book. After that you get a lower half of someones corpse standing in the school field and the upper body on the other side of the school. Nice way of beginning.

Later on I find out about the characters (and their names).

Four main characters, that have been named in a weird fashion. In my opinion at least.

Characters

In order they are A-ya, B-ko, C-ta and D-ne. Weird right?

A-ya

A-ya, showing a psychopath smile
I personally find it awesome

B-ko

C-ta

D-ne

Why is it that A-ya makes the best psychopath smiles? -w-

Character relationships

Okay, so A-ya and C-ta are childhood friends. C-ta although doesn't admit it, depends on A-ya's presence very much, wanting A-ya to be depended on him. Something to do with how he supposedly helped A-ya behind the scenes when they were kids.

He is quite the stalker, setting up cameras in A-ya's room to watch him.. -3- No homo

On another note D-ne is like C-ta,  to put it in D-ne's words that she said to C-ta

"...There is someone we can't live without. In truth, you know what I mean that you, yourself, are an empty existence.  If you don't find your own reason for existence inside of someone else, you wouldn't even be able to live. In truth you're meaningless, powerless.."

 For D-ne the person she can't live with out is B-ko, whom she is in love with.

And to end this with a few more A-ya smiles..

You would think he's reading porn or something, with the face his making

Last one, you just can't help but love the faces he makes

Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn

Another thing I have been doing during the summer is that I participated in the closed beta test of Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn.

The official game will be launched on 28th of August, so at the end of this month.

The game itself is a mmorgp, I was surprised when I first tried it how well it had been executed.
I personally don't like paying for games that much, but this game, even tough it has a monthly fee, I am willing to pay for.
And unlike free to play games, players can't get better gear and the like for real money, so everyone has an equal chance and equal characters.

World

The game-world is called Eorzea.

There are 3 different spots where you might begin the game from, depending on the class you have chosen.
These locations are the following:

• Ul'dah
• A city on a desert like continent
• Classes that begin from here
• Gladiators
• Pugilists
• Thaumaturges
• Gridania
• A small village in the midst of a huge forest
• Classes that begin from here
• Lancers
• Archers
• Conjurers
• Limsa Lominsa
• A port city near wide green plains
• Classes that begin from here
• Marauders
• Arcanists (just a guess)

Characters

As always the first thing you do is create a character for you to play with. 

Unlike most games where the race you choose for the character it doesn't limit the class and job you can choose for your character.

Races

Here are the race's you can play with, and unlike the picture shows all of the race's have female and male versions.

Each race has also two options, these have a  slight impact on the allocated points on defense, agility, strength etc., you have at the beginning of the game. The other is more suited for magic while the other more suited for melee combat.

From left to right: Elzen, Lalafell, Hyur, Roegadyn and Miqu'te 

Elzen

Elzen are the elf characters of this game, and are quite a lot taller than Hyur's or Miqu'te's.

You can choose between Wildwood and Duskwight Elzen, Wildwood being more suited for melee combat and Duskwight more suited for magic.

Wildwood

Duskwight

Lalafell

Lalafell are small and have childlike features, they kinda look like dolls that walk around..

You can choose between Plainsfolk and Dunesfolk, I do not know which is better for magic and which for melee combat, since I haven't played with them.

Dunesfolk

Plainsfolk

This is annoying trying to get the pictures next to each other =_=''

Hyur

Hyur are the humans of the game.

You can choose between Midlanders and Highlanders, but as before I have not played with the Hyur, but if I had to guess I'd say that Highlanders are more suited for melee combat. 

Midlanders

Highlanders

Roegadyn

Roegadyn are the race that would usually be the tank class.

It is a sight to behold when a Roegadyn joins the battle and takes out a small stick and starts healing others...

You can choose between Sea Wolves and Hellsguards, and as before I haven't played with this race and don't know which are better for which.

Sea Wolves

Hellsguards

Miqu'te

Miqu'te's are the cat-folk in the game, compared to Hyur, they have a smaller build and are shorter.

You can choose between Seekers of the Sun and Keepers of the Moon, for once I know which is better for combat and so forth. Seekers of the Sun being more suited for melee combat and obviously Keepers of the Moon being more suited for magic.

Seekers of the Sun

Keepers of the Moon

Well that's all of the races.   And I'm banging my head to my desk because of the amount to write about

Classes

There are four types of classes: Disciples of War, Disciples of Magic, Disciples of the Hand and Disciples of the Land.

You can have multiple classes for one character, and once you level up your character you can use some of the skills you get with one class on another one. 

You are not required to play with more than one class, but to get a job you need two classes. Later on about the job system.

You can switch between classes when you are not in battle or an instance like dungeons.

Disciples of War and -Magic are the real classes you use when in combat.

There are five different classes under the Disciples of War and three under Disciples of Magic.

The five classes of War

Gladiator

Gladiators are a tank class in the game, they use a one-handed sword and a shield.

Pugilist

Pugilists are specialized in close combat and most of their weapons are brass knuckles of a kind and have a lot of combo attacks.

Marauder

Marauders are the second tank class in the game, the weapon they use is the greataxe.

Lancer

Lancers weapon of choice is a pole-arm or a long-spear. They also, like pugilists, specialize in close combat.

Archer

Archers are, well archers. Their weapon of choice is a bow. I can't even come up with anything clever about archers =_=''

The three classes of Magic

Conjurer

Conjurers are the healer class in the game. Their "weapon" is a branch of a tree or a stick.

Thaumaturge

Thaumaturges are the wizards of the game, and use elemental magic to attack. Their weapon of a choice is a staff.

Arcanist

Arcanists are a class that will appear when the game is released, so I don't know much about them, but they are some sort of magicians. Their "weapon" is a book(?)

Disciples on the Hand and -Land are more like side jobs or skills you can learn to create items. To be exact Disciples of the Hand are types of jobs you can use to create armory, weapons, accessories and potions. While Disciples of the Land are jobs that you use to gather necessary items and ingredients that you use when creating items.

Disciples of the Hand

I am sure that all of you know what, which class does, but a small note on them either way

• Carpenter
• Woodworkers
• Blacksmith
• Metal crafters
• Armorer
• Armor creators
• Goldsmith
• Create accessories
• Leatherworker
• Leatherworkers (duh)
• Weaver
• Makes clothes my thought crashed here because of an interruption
• Alchemist 
• Scientists (make potions and such)
• Culinairan
• a cook of course

Disciples of the Land

• Miner
• Mines metals, stones and other stuff
• Botanist
• A farmer in simpler terms
• Fisher
• A fisher...

Good god can't think straight at all

Jobs

The game has a job system, basically jobs are more advanced classes that you can get after leveling up enough. To get a job you need to level up two different classes to certain levels, each job requires two particular classes. Basically each class has one job you can get, except for arcanist.

Once both needed classes are at the minimum level that is needed, the "main" class will get the quest to get the soul gem. When a soul gem is equipped you are in job mode.

Earlier I noted that you can use skills that you have aqquired trough other classes, jobs restrict this to the skills of the two classes that you need.

Paladin

You can become a paladin through the Gladiator class.

The second class you need is the Conjurer.

Paladins strong point is his/hers defense.

Monk

Monk is the job for Pugilists.

The second class you need is the Lancer.

Monks strong point is the great amount of damage they deal.

Warrior

Marauder is the primary class you need for the Warrior.

The second class is Gladiator.

Warriors have the greatest amount of HP out of all the classes, no surprise there since it's the job you need both tank classes for.

Dragoon

Dragoon is the job for Lancers. 

They also are the opposite of Monks since the secondary class is the Pugilist. 

Bard

Archers job is a bard.

The secondary class is the Conjurer.

Bards have the ability to give buffs to teammates but also to fight.

White Mage

Conjurers can become White Mages.

The second class you need is the Gladiator.

White Mages are great healers.

Black Mage

Thaumaturges can become Black Mages.

The second class is the Pugilist.

Black Mages specialize in elemental attack magics.

Summoner & Scholar

Summoner and Scholar are jobs you can get for an arcanist, but I do not know which are the classes you need for them.

Either way Summoners can summon beings to aid them in battle.

Though I have no idea what Scholars do...

Well that's all I can write right now.., but I'm sure this was long enough already. 

Here is the link to the official site http://www.finalfantasyxiv.com/

Finally I finished this

Finally got something done and to show

Last fall i agreed to enter a cosplay contest with my friend, not just any contest but the World Cosplay Summit, well the Finland qualifiers and they are just around the corner. A bit over a month now till the contest.

The characters my friend decided that we do are Noel Kreiss and Caius Ballad from Final Fantasy XIII-2.

I'm going to be Noel and my friend is obviously going to be Caius. 

Here are the pictures of Noel (left) and Caius (right).

But seeing as I'm a lazy-ass, I didn't start making the outfit until the beginning of the summer, the only thing i did early was buy the wig before Christmas and yesterday finally I ordered the contact lenses for my outfit. And even now the only thing I have to show my work is the shoes, which I finished making yesterday with the help of my friend. 

Here are the shoes

As you can see the picture is from my friends blog, you are free to visit there, but a lot of it is in finnish.

Other than that the pants are almost done and the weapon is quite far on its way

A couple of early stage pictures of the weapon, just cut. Now though it is much farther in the process, sadly I haven't remembered to take any pictures of it.

As you can see it has a lot of small pieces, they are a real pain in the ass.

Another annoying thing is that we need to enter the contest next monday, well 4 out of the 8 contestants are chosen then and the other four are chosen on the 19th, so we need to hope that we are chosen to be a part of the contest.

And this will also be my first time entering a contest and also my second outfit that i have done, but luckily my friend is a sort of a veteran in this so no worries, and me being a bit of a perfectionist helps in this as well.

I'll do another update once I have finished the weapon or the pants. Now I need to start making those small gear looking trinkets on his belt and necklace. On friday, finally we are going to get the needed cloth for the shirt, hopefully we can finish making it next week. 

Sadly school starts on monday again, so the time we can spend on the outfits is smaller, even more so since I have to start my driving lessons.

But if we do get chosen to represent Finland we have already thought of possible outfits (at least the other of the needed two), ans they would be Saizo (me) and Izanami (my friend) from Brave 10, but we are not entirely sure if we are going to do them, we'll se later.