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Seto Kaiba

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  1. Seto Kaiba
    A fair few of them likely ended up as short-distance emigrant ships... there were supposedly a hundred or so fleets like that in addition to the long-distance ones we see more of in the animation.
  2. Seto Kaiba
    Eh... it goes a lot deeper than that, to be frank. The more you look at it, the more it becomes obvious Leadale was copying Overlord's homework... just with Leadale opting for lighter and softer comedy focus without any of the genre deconstruction that drives Overlord, and ending up kind of aimless and generic feeling as a result. IMO, it's just a less compelling series as a whole because it doesn't seem to really have anything to show for itself. Gave Police in a Pod a whirl... not sure what to think of it thus far, but the premise is interesting enough that I'm going to keep at it. Not a fan of the art style, which reminds me oddly of Ghost in the Shell: Arise's character designs.
  3. Seto Kaiba
    After the last two new Star Trek shows, I'm not going to get my hopes up. Anson Mount did a very fine job as Christopher Pike on Star Trek: Discovery - to the extent of being the only character in the series who behaved like he was on a Star Trek show and all but completely stole the entire second season - but I have absolutely no confidence in the writers.
  4. Seto Kaiba
    It's quite vague... the only named ship in the 1st Large-Scale Long-Distance Emigrant Fleet in official setting material is the Megaroad-class SDF-2 Megaroad-01. There is, as noted, an unnamed Nupetiet Vergnitzs-class fleet command battleship that is occasionally alleged to be Vrlitwhai's wartime command under a new captain. Unofficial material - e.g. Master File - mentions three ARMD-class space carriers having been attached to the Megaroad-01 fleet: ARMD-09 Haruna, ARMD-10 Minsk, and ARMD-11 Kiev. Beyond that, it's mostly unspecified. ... that's great and all, but none of that had anything to do with the question. ... Megaroad-04 found Windermere IV in 2027 when she was knocked out of a space fold by a fold fault, which isn't quite the same thing. It should be noted that it's not clear if a replacement was constructed or not, since there were 30 large-scale long-distance emigrant fleets in the first two generations... and they're generally indicated to have been led by Megaroad-class emigrant ships. It's actually less unreasonable than you'd think... the Oliver Hazard Perry-class frigate the US Navy uses has a displacement of 4,165t with entirely conventional materials, and it's a bit under 150m. When you consider that a lot of the Northampton-class's structure is empty space (hangar/munitions bays, engine nozzles, etc.) and it's made out of lighter, much more resilient materials that are said to be 100x or more as tough as an equivalent thickness of steel, 1,200t sounds surprisingly reasonable.
  5. Seto Kaiba
    More than that, the ARMD-class's backstory/development history indicates that the design was originally conceived as a space station. The original concept (in-universe) was that they would be a network of space airfields in geostationary satellite orbit from which space fighters could operate as part of Earth's planetary defenses. Somewhere along the way, some bright spark realized that aerodynamics are meaningless in space and therefore the only thing separating these space airbases from being space aircraft carriers was the installation of a navigation bridge and some proper engines. That slightly reworked design was accepted for use in the Macross Strategic System and the new ARMD-class was born. The final design was intended to accept a fold system, but the first handful hadn't had them installed yet when they were sunk. Later hulls were built with fold systems and used in emigrant fleets and Earth's own space defenses, but they weren't quite as high-endurance as the later Guantanamo-class Advanced ARMD. The later carriers were designed to be spacecraft from the outset, and had more compact and sensible designs for the purpose that factored in advancements in technology, materials, and the basic requirements for stealthiness and so on that accompanied emigrant fleet operations. (Considering the size of some early emigrant fleets, you could also argue that the smaller aircraft capacity of those newer carriers was to avoid putting all your eggs in one basket. Wouldn't wanna lose almost half your force's aircraft support capacity if one ship gets sunk, y'know?)
  6. Seto Kaiba
    I'll take two, please and thank you. Seriously, that is legit the best color scheme for the Draken III so far... should've been Keith's paintjob, since he's the white knight and all.
  7. Seto Kaiba
    No worries. Following trendsetters is pretty normal in even the best of circumstances, we're just seeing it a lot more blatantly in the isekai genre because it's really trendy lately so the number of trend followers that are becoming high-visibility is greater than usual. In all fairness, I grumble about this a LOT when it comes to the glut of isekai titles over the last couple of years given how lazy many of them are. With the current season's fairly weak offerings, I'm rolling up my backlog for the most part. How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom is... well... it feels like it's kind of floundering for want of something to do. The last three episodes have mainly been about tying up loose ends from the previous season, where there was an invasion from a hostile neighboring nation. It's not particularly convincing or entertaining since the prince from the neighboring nation is just a complete prat who is almost never permitted to get out more than the first three words of any given sentence before being told to shut up and he's so far in the wrong that it robs the negotiations of any tension when even his own mediator agrees he's an arse. Continuing to make my way through Ore Monogatari. It's just too pure. It's hard to watch more than one or two episodes in a sitting because of how excessively sweet it all is. In the Land of Leadale still feels like it's fumbling around for something to show the audience. It's clearly taking pointers from Overlord, but visually and narratively it lacks anything to distinguish itself from the hundreds of other western fantasy MMORPG-based isekai titles out there. Leadale is an utterly generic, by-the-numbers, soft western fantasy setting which has nothing distinctive, unique, or interesting to offer. Cayna, likewise, is an utterly generic, by-the-numbers, soft western fantasy isekai protagonist whose only distinctive trait is her loose-at-best relationship with her three NPC "children" that is mostly used for form letter light comedy. It's watchable, sure, but after a few episodes it's really apparent that there is just nothing there. Rent-a-Girlfriend... ech, I'm not sure I can keep watching this one. I hear it gets better, but the protagonist is just such an unlikable bellend that after four episodes I'm heartily sick of him. I get that he's a college kid, but he's so goddamn thirsty he can barely function as a human being. In a bit, I'm gonna tackle one I've been quietly dreading... Phantasy Star Online 2: Episode Oracle and Phantasy Star Online 2: the Animation... which collectively adapt the first three episodes of the story from SEGA's MMORPG and act as a tie-in/prequel to the fourth episode of the story. Mainly, I'm dreading PSO2: the Animation because that was where they began flirting with the isekai genre themselves and the whole Mother arc might as well retitle itself Unlimited Cringe Works, though it did at least put a new and unusually bizarre twist on the MMORPG isekai idea by completely reversing the entire concept.
  8. Seto Kaiba
    You're not wrong, on a basic level... but your argument stumbles a bit on the precise chronology. Overlord and In the Land of Leadale did indeed both begin serialization as web novels in 2010. Six months apart, in fact, with Overlord debuting on Arcadia in May and achieving a fair bit of online popularity before In the Land of Leadale debuted on Shōsetsuka ni Narō the following November. It seems unlikely that the high level of similarity is purely coincidental...
  9. Seto Kaiba
    There is some unintended distortion imposed by the Macross Mecha Manual's writeup of the Northampton-class, which cites an unusual/emergency operating condition instead of its normal operating condition. Also, some of the discrepancy is attributable to those older carrier classes using a greater proportion of conventional (pre-OTM) materials and being much less efficient designs which were intended for orbit-based planetary defense rather than high endurance deep space operations. The drop in capacity vs. the ARMD-class is mainly reflective of the difference in size and the various design concessions made to facilitate long-duration deep space operations on an independent basis... whereas the ARMD-class were originally never intended to leave Earth orbit, never mind the solar system, so they are intended to carry the maximum possible VF complement since there is no need to worry about endurance. So, as mentioned above, what's going on there is some slightly misleading writing on the Mecha Manual's part. Under normal circumstances, the Northampton-class stealth frigate's standard configuration carries either no fighters at all or a single platoon (3-4 aircraft) as seen in Macross 7 PLUS "Spiritia Dreaming". What the Macross Mecha Manual has listed is an unusual/emergency operating condition that was used exactly once. For Operation Stargazer, aboard the frigate Stargazer. In that isolated situation, the frigate Stargazer was basically packed to the rafters with Valkyries at the expense of everything else in order to carry out a stealth insertion and a decapitation strike against the Protodeviln's "home" on the Varauta 3198XE system's 4th planet using thermonuclear reaction weapons. It was meant to be a hard-hitting high-stealth operation using only a single ship and the fleet's most elite pilots to minimize risks, though the attack was ultimately foiled by the planet's defenses and the Protodeviln's biological ability to space fold teleporting the one successfully deployed reaction weapon back to the Stargazer, sinking it. As far as the more than 9,000 Northampton-class ships built by the mid-2040s, the Northampton-class was an extremely simple, extremely inexpensive design that was engineered to be highly adaptable and upgradeable. We only see the general duty version and enhanced firepower general duty version in the animation, but the official setting materials say there are a bunch of variants of the design for specific roles like early warning/radar picket duty, anti-aircraft defense, and so on. There is also a PMC-operated light carrier variant of the Northampton-class that appears in Macross 30: Voices Across the Galaxy. (The Macross Frontier-era stealth cruiser - no class name known - is also derived from the design of the Northampton-class and may be counting towards that "over 9,000".) Its stealth technologies are essentially exactly the same as those of VFs, just... bigger. Hull shapes which deflect radar waves away from the sending station, radar-absorbent material, and active radar stealth technology.
  10. Seto Kaiba
    ... uh-oh, life is imitating art. 🤣
  11. Seto Kaiba
    Yes, the fan art made by Matt Willis is very clearly not official... though when it comes to sources for that other series, even official material from the creators of Macross et. al. is often mislabeled, misrepresented, or grossly distorted. Better by far to simply pretend any "resources" for that franchise don't exist. Battleships of the Galaxy, the doujinshi by Circle FANKY.
  12. Seto Kaiba
    Thanks. It's something I'm used to, whenever the weather changes really rapidly I tend to get a bit bleh... with migraines and such. Mother Nature is in a real bad mood out here right now, so I'm just feeling her wrath a bit more keenly than most. Like a lot of the really in-depth detail, this one has the most detailed answer in Variable Fighter Master File's page. Specifically, Variable Fighter Master File: VF-1 Battroid Valkyrie. Essentially, it's about the angle of the throttle lever... which locks in three positions: Horizontal: Fighter mode 45 Degrees above Horizontal: GERWALK mode Vertical: Battroid mode There's a thumb trigger that unlocks the throttle lever angle to prevent unintended actuation of the mode selector. The aforementioned Master File book has more detail, including diagrams showing how the throttle is used for maneuvering in each mode. What we've been told is that the VF-31AX Kairos Plus is a stock VF-31A Kairos that was upgraded using the remaining spare parts from the VF-31 Custom Siegfrieds. Since it's been indicated in a few places - incl. Master File - that you need a special class of engine for compatibility with a Fold Wave System, I'd assume the Kairos Plus is using the detuned FF-3001/FC2 engines that were originally produced for the Siegfried customs. If they were looking to improve performance, possibly engines detuned less than the ones on the Siegfried were... since the FF-3001/FC2 was originally rated for a base output of 2,110kN when it was deployed on the YF-30 Chronos. (Of course, given the issues that the engines detuned to a maximum output of 1,875kN already caused for the Kairos airframe in the Siegfried Custom type, they wouldn't be able to go too much higher with that without significant frame reinforcement.) So, as I understand it... the reason the Kairos Plus is a thing is that... So yeah, it probably would have been cheaper... but the option to retrofit doesn't seem to have been available.
  13. Seto Kaiba
    It's never not a bad decision to use materials created by fans of that other show when it comes to Macross, Southern Cross, or MOSPEADA. It's a background design only, so details are basically nonexistent.
  14. Seto Kaiba
    Sorry, I'm a bit slow today... not feeling well. I'll get to this one, I promise.
  15. Seto Kaiba
    Simpler than that, the Flood are simply sci-fi zombies... with all the ho-hum tedium that involves in an era where zombies have been overdone to a second death. Given that Paramount+'s creative approach thus far has been "all style, no substance", that could work in Halo's favor given that Halo's story is pretty unremarkable but its action set pieces will benefit immensely from a $8M/episode budget's worth of Things Exploding.
  16. Seto Kaiba
    Miss Kuroitsu feels like it's going to be my stand-out title for this season just because of how relatable it is. I really end up feeling for the protagonist because of all the BS she has to contend with from the middle management at the evil organization she works for, and how unhappy she is to see corners cut on her work because of it all. In the Land of Leadale is not doing a very good job of disguising that it stole its A-plot from Overlord... especially after its protagonist had a breakdown over the revelation that all of the player characters are almost certainly long dead in the world. Its lighter and softer setting helps a bit, but being so overly cutesy clashes with its darker moments in ways which don't quite help it and the protagonist's three "children" (NPCs she adopted in-game) are pretty obnoxious and mostly used for cheap physical comedy. The Strongest Sage With The Weakest Crest is still a bland, boring power fantasy after four episodes. The protagonist Matthias at least justifies his stupid levels of overpoweredness and knowledge by being the reincarnation of a mage who was so powerful a thousand years ago that he is literally worshipped as a god in the present day, though he doesn't seem to have joined up the dots on that one yet. It's still a tedious exercise in watching a smug, swaggering, invincible wankstain of a main character beat up on generic fantasy monsters while assembling the generic isekai fantasy harem. (Like Isekai Cheat Magician, this one's so by-the-numbers you can almost see the barcodes.) Attack on Titan is still Attack on Titan, and therefore an unwatchable mess. Looking at starting My Dress-up Darling later, once we get through Ore Monogatari... assuming Ore Monogatari doesn't kill us all by putting us in a diabetic coma with the disgustingly sweet and pure love story between Takeo and Rinko.
  17. Seto Kaiba
    There is a bit in the Macross Chronicle Zentradi world guide sheet, and a few older artbooks have glossaries of words used in the movie. Not a lot said, tho... the written form of Zentradi is a symbol substitution for plain old English, albeit with some accent marks, and IIRC it's indicated to be a tonal language where the intonation can change the meaning of a word. It's also said to be derived from the Protoculture's own language.
  18. Seto Kaiba
    In the torso, apparently... with the "shoulders" being shown to be where the fighters are recovered before they connected up the Daedalus and Prometheus.
  19. Seto Kaiba
    Looking at the trailer again with more of an eye towards the story they're teasing... it looks like they're planning to follow the story of the games reasonably closely, which is probably for the best. Though I'm not sure if it's such a good idea to... It'd probably be better/safer to start in medias res the way Halo: Combat Evolved did.
  20. Seto Kaiba
    You may laugh, but Rinko spends the better part of an entire episode crying and worrying that she's not the kind of pure maiden Takeo thinks she is... because she wants to hold hands. That's right boys and girls, Rinko is worried she's become a lewd woman because she wants to have consensual UNPROTECTED HAND HOLDING with her boyfriend! Fingers. Locked. *DUN DUN DUNNNN* No, that is not a joke. It is played absolutely laser-straight. A scene like that feels like it belongs in a parody, but this isn't one. That's just how ridiculously over-the-top pure and squeaky-clean this is. Takeo and Rinko are so damned pure and innocent that I feel soiled just watching them.
  21. Seto Kaiba
    To be fair, OG Cortana was so low-poly that she didn't have a hope of making to to the Uncanny Valley... Definitely feels like they left it too long, then... I half expect to see the Gravemind get a director's credit.
  22. Seto Kaiba
    The Macross was intended for long-duration operations in deep space... so presumably it was equipped with some fairly substantial onboard fuel reserves to support itself and its airwing's operations.
  23. Seto Kaiba
    Started Ore Monogatari on a friend's recommendation... and I can't. I just can't. These people are TOO PURE. Too innocent. It tastes like diabetes!
  24. Seto Kaiba
    I've never really been all that invested in Halo as a franchise, but I feel like this is kind of... too late? Like, by a decade or so? This would have been an amazing idea back in 2007-2010 when Halo was a huge phenomenon and the franchise was riding high on the strong finish of the original trilogy. Now that Halo's heyday and period of peak cultural relevance is 15 years behind us and with the franchise's uniqueness having been heavily diluted by time, industry copycatting, and the departure of the original devs that took it from being THE killer app to just another AAA shooter sequel farm, it feels kinda like they missed their window of opportunity. Kinda getting it coming and going too, since the Halo series is going to have to struggle to distinguish itself from the other sci-fi action shows about growly gits in body armor and full face masks like The Mandalorean and The Book of Boba Fett. Cortana looks... awful. I hope they fix that. She's kinda got that same uncanny valley thing they had going for Alita in Alita: Battle Angel.
  25. Seto Kaiba
    There were no Destroids on the Prometheus, so that'll presumably take the numbers down a bit. Master File's contention is 150 Valkyries and ~30 various auxiliary craft including Ghosts, the old F203 Dragon II (which Master File insists on calling F/A-20N), the ES-11D Cat's Eye, LVT Avenger II, and Sea Sergeant helicopters. Onboard fuel storage should actually be SIGNIFICANTLY less than a conventional nuclear aircraft carrier since the VF-1 Valkyrie, QF-3000 Ghost, and ES-11D Cat's Eye are all using thermonuclear reaction turbine engines that are vastly more fuel efficient in atmosphere than the kerosene-based jet engines of conventional fighters.
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