The Other Side of the Fourth Wall

Some Persona 4 spoilers follow. Persona 4 is another one of my favorite JRPGs, for many of the same reasons as Persona 5 is. One of the things I like most is how the cast is richly characterized as flawed but well-meaning individuals who must strive to overcome their weaknesses. One such individual is Yukiko Amagi, the heiress to the Amagi Inn, a party member and the Priestess Social Link. Her Shadow, or the side of herself that she refuses to acknowledge, is born from her feeling as though she is unable to decide how to live her life, since she will be expected to inherit and manage the inn, like her mother before her. As such, some people consider the ending of her Social Link, in which Yukiko chooses to stay in Inaba and inherit the inn anyway, to be a copout that abandons all her character growth. This essay, however, will prove why such a perspective is ultimately mistaken. First, some context. As you will learn if you talk to various NPCs, Inaba is a rather boring small tow

In my previous post, I discussed the basics of the isekai genre. Now, I will discuss Sword Art Online, one of the best-known animes, which is credited for the popularity of the isekai genre. The question, however, is this: is Sword Art Online really an isekai series? To answer that question, I will look at the two story arcs that qualify. The first is the Aincrad arc, which takes place inside the eponymous game of death, and covers the first half of the anime's first season, as well as Volumes 1, 2 and (part of) 8 of the light novel series. The second is the Alicization arc, which has its own anime series, as well as a whopping ten volumes of the light novel. What follows is the analysis of how well the Aincrad and Alicization arcs fit into the isekai genre. While the Aincrad arc, as the start of the series, is safe to discuss, beware of spoilers in the Alicization portion. Aincrad The premise for the Aincrad arc is as follows. Ten thousand Japanese gamers are trapped in th

If you watch anime or manga, you will likely hear the term "isekai" (Japanese for "another world"), or hear of at least one series that involves a protagonist being sent to or reborn into another world. If not, this post will provide a beginner's guide to the genre, as well as its potential and pitfalls. As mentioned above, the story involves someone, generally hailing from the time and place the author wrote the story, being transported to another world, generally by two means. One is being reincarnated in that world, and eventually regaining one's memories of their past life. Another is being transported to the other world somehow, often by magic. There are countless variants of isekai stories, but many of them have a few common elements. Stories in which the protagonist is sent to another world tend to involve the protagonist bumbling about and showing their ignorance of the world at first, providing a prime opportunity for a native to give exposition

Warning:  Late-game spoilers for Persona 5 follow. Persona 5 is one of my favorite games of all time, being a deep RPG with many strong points, among them its fascinating story. I could go into more detail about all the things it gets right, but I will dedicate this essay to one part of the story that has always bothered me. The game is all about the abuse of power, with the Phantom Thieves targeting corrupt adults who are causing problems for others by stealing their desires and forcing them to confess their crimes. As such, it would seem like a natural step to question whether the Phantom Thieves could potentially go down the wrong path, especially given their morally questionable methods. That question ends up being brought up in-story after the Thieves' fifth major heist. Their target is Kunikazu Okumura, the CEO of Big Bang Burger, who is responsible for abusing his employees and forcing his daughter into an arranged marriage for his personal gain. Despite being respecte

User reviews tend to run the gamut from fairly well-written to almost laughable. The latter is all too common, which results in many people dismissing user reviews as useless. Perhaps you may not be able to convince those individuals otherwise, but if you follow these tips, more people may be willing to listen to you. The Basics: * Make sure your review has proper spelling and grammar. As with some other points, this is important to ensure that your readers take you seriously. * Be sure to follow the rules of the site to which you're uploading your review. This is common sense, especially considering that if you do not follow those rules, the administrators can and will delete your review. * Preview your post before uploading the review. This can help you proofread it and catch any mistakes you might otherwise end up making, particularly with formatting and any links that you might want to include. * Be fair . Your goal is to evaluate the work you are reviewing, and to do

My first official entry on this blog will, like many others, write about writing about fiction. More specifically, I will deal with various review and analysis pieces that people do. If you go on YouTube, you may see many videos that review or analyze various ongoing series, especially if you have viewed similar videos in the past. These videos can vary in length, with some being around 10 minutes to others being well over an hour long. The question is- should they be that long? There is no easy answer to that question. Longer pieces tend to result in more comprehensive analysis, at least when the video time is used well. That said, a long review can be a significant time investment, especially when it's a video, which is more difficult to skim over. Many such reviewers have large fanbases, who have come to respect them and value their opinions, but it may be difficult for a less established reviewer to ask someone to sit down and listen to them that long, when there are countl

Hello, and welcome to my blog- The Other Side of the Fourth Wall. This post will attempt to explain a few things about my blog- what it's about, why I'm writing it and what you can expect out of it. The blog will mainly be about some of my favorite works of fiction and other entertainment- books, movies, video games, anime, manga and other such things. It will also go into related topics, such as fan reactions to them, how people interpret various works of fiction and other such things. You may wonder why I'm writing a blog on this subject at a time like this. The coronavirus has spread across the world and killed thousands. The vast majority of people are quarantined in their homes in an attempt to curtail the spread of the virus. As a result of that, the economy is in a recession, causing many to lose their jobs and many others who'd been out of work when it hit, myself included, to struggle finding jobs. The healthy feel a variety of things, from loneliness and b