Well, it’s finally here, the trailer for the G.U. movie. I knew about the existence of this movie for a while, I believe I found out about it around when the third game was out but I didn’t want to do a post on it until a trailer for it had come out. Well, here’s the trailer so here’s my post.

For the un-enlightened, the .hack Trilogy movie is a CGI movie of all three .hack//G.U games. It is set for a March 25^th release date in Japan, which of course around when I’ll see it, since it can be subbed unlike the games I won’t have to wait for a real US release. The movie already looks to be much MUCH darker then the games. Seeing as how a movie version will easily cut out a lot of the things that made the games slow and boring at times, it will likely be non stop action. I already noticed many thing sin the trailer that just made the movie seem so much more serious. First, a few screens and then I’ll talk about the trailer and my expectations for the movie. I won’t do too many shots, as you can watch the trailer for yourself and this isn’t an episode, the trailer is only three minutes long.

One of the first things I have to go off about is just the general statement. OH MY GOD! That trailer was amazing. I couldn’t believe it. I’m a huge .hack fan so something like this is even more powerful for me when I see it, but so many of the things just looked so cool. Things the games couldn’t do because of limitations, just in general how kick ass things looked was amazing.

One of the things that surprised me the most about this trailer and what I’m looking forward to the most probably was that there was a kissing scene between Haseo and Atoli. The game never went that far. I mean, really the wedding scenes in the game were completely optional and just added in there for the fun of things. They didn’t really have any bearing on the actual storyline. Completely storyline wise Atoli was the one Haseo ended up with in the end, but they didn’t show anything going that far, just him kind of running off to her in the end. Even in Returner they still had a distant relationship, Atoli struggling to admit her feelings and all. However for there to be an actual kiss scene in the movie will just mean that the romance aspect of their relationship will be all the more important and will likely play a very crucial part in how things play out, not just something that is thrown in there.

Another really big thing of course is that Haseo seemed much much more crazy and evil in this trailer. I mean, he never came across that insanely psychopathic in the games or even Roots, yet he was going absolutely wild in just the trailer. He really looked evil. He also seems a hell of a lot more powerful too, or at least more flashy in his power. He had this whole Gilgamesh thing going on with the Gate of Babylon where he tore though nothing and thousands of weapons came out of it. The way they all just flowed towards Ovan was something that wasn’t even remotely close to being in the game. Things defiantly seemed cranked up in that sense.

The other really big thing that struck me right away was Atoli. I already mentioned the kiss scene, but the scene where she goes all emo is way WAY cooler and darker looking in the trailer. In the game all she ever did was scream while glowing, here she looks kickass evil. The way her whole appearance is changed to look almost undead is awesome. The scene itself looks to be much much darker, following that theme that seems to be set for the whole movie. I don’t remember Atoli ever plunging her hand through Haseo’s chest in the games either, so it looks like plenty of stuff will be added, at least for that scene, to make things more dark and serious.

Finally, I am curious as to how much some of the side characters are going to be included in the movie. The trailer hardly showed any characters. It didn’t even show Sakubo or Endrance, which are obviously important. It of course showed Sakaki because he’s vital as well, and I’m not worried about Sakubo or Endrance even though they didn’t appear in the trailer. However, there are several more characters that weren’t shown that I would like to see that I’m not too sure about. First is Zelkova, he was pretty important and I just generally liked his character. There are others too but I’m really worried because even if they appear, I’m not sure how important they will be other then just being cameo’s basically. Although there was a lot in the games that was there for gaming purpose that can be cut out, compressing that much stuff into a movie seems like it would leave out a lot, primarily some of the character development for lesser characters, even such as the development for Sakubo and Endrance, and even Pi, Kuhn, and Yata. I hope they still keep a lot of that, but I don’t see how it will be as good because of the constraints. Still, I’m really REALLY looking forward to the movie.

I’m not quite going to say as much as I did in my “What .hack Means to Me” post here: but truly, G.U. was great. There were so many things that were all mingled together, everything mixed together made his just amazingly enjoyable and I loved it. The game was truly made by the characters, the story, and how everything came together.

The characters were one of the things that made this amazing. I won’t talk much about this here at all, considering I have a separate post just or that, but really the characters and their interaction made things great. The one thing that makes G.U. as good as it is, to me at least, is that the characters had flaws and from that they were made interesting. They all had problems getting along with each other and had different kind of relationships with each other, all of which just added together to become interesting. At times it was more interesting o find out what was going to happen between to characters then it was to actually see what was going to happen next, and that alone is just great.

One thing that I always compare G.U. to is of course IMOQ. And one thing in particular are the antagonists. This is what amazes me the most, especially by comparison. In IMOQ, the enemies were really just seemingly mindless and faceless monstrous creatures. They were effectively the phases and Cubia. However in G.U. a majority of the game was focused on human antagonists, which just adds so much more to it. Really I couldn’t care less about monsters. There is no way that it makes you feel for them; there is no seeing it from the monsters point of view. However in G.U. the enemies had motives and for the most part where understandable. Ovan was doing everything for the better good yet appeared to be an enemy at first, but was always mysterious. Just thinking of him as a bad guy was a difficult view because it could go so many ways. Just by having him be a point of interest instead of some monster and creature you don’t really know places so much more detail and conflict into the story and characters, it just blows IMOQ out of the water, and really most of the other installments. Really, not even comparing it to other .hack there are few stories that use this, which is a shame. Not to say that the focus is always n monsters, but it is generally on bad guys who you don’t know. In G.U., especially Ovan, was an antagonist that was seen as a good guy as well as bad, which really just adds whole new layers of interesting.

Of course, the main part of G.U. is also the story. No it’s hard to say overall what the story really means, seeing as it took all these games and a prequel to really play it out, but really I thought it was great. The main thing that I’m surprised about is how dark it is. Yes sure Ovan didn’t actually die. That’s shown for sure in Returner by the fact that…well, they show him. And even in the game Haseo says he feels like Ovan isn’t gone, but that doesn’t mean the story isn’t still dark and deep, serious and interesting. Just the simple fact that there was an issue of someone giving their life or at least putting themselves at serious risk was great. The scene in which Ovan activated rebirth was great, as it was him risking himself for the sake of Aina. Even not referencing what happened to Ovan it was great. There was always the drama about what was going on. Nothing was clear cut, there was not white and black, good and evil, it was all gray. Things were constantly a mess and there were continual scenes of people grieving and when emotions were running high. That by itself makes the story great, not to mention anything to do with Ovan.

I do have to talk about the actual ending of the game. I heard a couple of people complaining about it, and I just don’t understand it. I thought it was done great. Someone complained about the final part of the game not being about AIDA. So what? That doesn’t make it bad at all, that’s just a statement. The AIDA wasn’t supposed to be the overall focus, which became obvious when they revealed what the focus was. AIDA was there to get Ovan to eventually use Rebirth, and that is what then caused for Cubia, and so on. I thought the overall story was great as it focused really on the characters. AIDA was faceless and didn’t have a history with everyone, Ovan on the other hand did. Sure the final boss was Cubia, but everything happened because of Ovan which is much more interesting then the story just being that AIDA groups together and makes a huge creature and you fight it, Ovan helping you out in the end, which is really where it would be left to go if they didn’t have there be a different problem. I thought it was done well, the use of AIDA in the story was great as it caused for problems to happen, and then was the overall drive for Ovan, him wanting to cure his sister of it.

Overall, I think Roots and G.U. are the outstanding examples of all of ht .hack installments, mixing in amazing character development and interaction with story. The story follows along the path that previous .hack installments did yet really seemed to bring a much darker and deeper, really a more interesting, story to everything. It all just seemed to fit together and just Roots and G.U. by itself has proven to be epic just standing alone, and matched with everything else it transcends that as well. Really, to put it simply I loved G.U. I thought the story and ending was great and everything that leads up to it was amazing. This isn’t’ to say it’s not without flaws, but they don’t hinder my impression or thoughts on this game, or more importantly, the story.

“We the players make this world what it is”

Ok, as I briefly mentioned before I’m breaking up my overall impressions and thoughts on Roots and G.U. into two posts, because of how long it may be. This post is going to solely be about the characters taking a look at most individually and my thoughts on them. The second half of my impressions will pretty much be about everything else, and will come soon.

Please limit comments on this post to about the actual characters, the next post will be an overall view where I want all the general this game was awesome or I’m an idiot and don’t understand and other comments about the story and overall Roots and G.U. I want to go.

Haseo:

Haseo is one of the most interesting heroes and main characters tat I’ve seen. I’m kind of tired about all the people who keep saying stuff about how he’s emo and blah blah blah. He’s freaking human. Not that I hate Kite, but Haseo was a so much better representative of how someone would act and as kind of a better hero/main character. When all these problems dropped in front of Kite he pretty much just stepped right up and became mister justice and fought against what he needed to and was always head on against the enemies. That may be a bit ideal for a hero, but isn’t’ reality. The thing that impressed me so much about Haseo’s character was how human he appeared to be. When things started to go wrong and all of a sudden Haseo was stripped of one of the only people who seemed to look after him, who he had a bit of feelings for, he didn’t just say, “This is no problem, let’s think about this rationally and get her back” He freaked out! He went absolutely insane and psycho, which is a so much more interesting response. Then he realized that that power wasn’t what he needed and really he grew as a character. Kite never grew as a character, he started out roughly the same as he ended, Haseo changed so much which I think was a great example of how a human would respond to these kinds of events. That’s the one thing that impresses me about him is how much he changed, that he wasn’t some super ideal super hero, he was a human and made mistakes, had his faults, and grew.

Atoli:

Atoli really impressed me as a character I have to say. She kind of started off a bit annoying and perhaps carried a bit of that though but most of that is from the craptastic job of voice acting. Still, even though she was kind of annoying she had this incredibly dark back story. That’s the reason why she got the epitaph The Mirage of Deceit. The information I heard was even less then they revealed in the game, but she was a miserably depressed and hated girl at school. No friends, everyone making fun of her, she hated her life. I even had read that she was thinking about suicide when she came across a help message board for those with thoughts of suicide and met Sakaki who helped her though it and was introduced to the world, that’s why she had such a tight relationship with him. That already is amazing, an incredibly dark back-story for a character that acted so cheerfully, hence “Mirage of Deceit” Just for that she was interesting, but she did really help support Haseo. Unlike the others who were just working in pretty much the same direction Atoli was really there for Haseo, and although I like Alkaid she really deserves to be paired with him the most and I was very glad to see that he pretty much officially and technically ends up with her.

Kuhn:

Kuhn, never really made a big impression. He was one of the only ones to never really get a back-story. Really….he was quite boring. Yet, he seemed to be important at the same time. He was always there, he was really just support. He would give words of encouragement and kind of just be in the background, always there and working for the goal, but he never really made an impression on me. He was a funny character at times, it was rather amusing seeing him hit on all the girls he could, but really in the serious view of things and regarding character development, he was rather dull. It was almost doomed to be, seeing as he was Sieg he had an identity from previous installments, yet an identity that never actually did anything. The only interesting part I ever remember from him was when he got really pissed about Haseo using his Avatar irresponsibly. Which does go back to his identity of Sieg, seeing as he has first had experience with being in a coma because of the game, yet really Sieg was one of the least important or at least involved of all the original coma victims. Hell, Tsukasa got her own series, Sora got his own series of games and anime (Haseo) Orca effectively got a game series based on his coma. Kazu was a bit in the same boat as he shared IMOQ, and Alph and Curl got their own book series. Sieg…..well he had Liminality. And really, that was completely almost focused on other things, started out trying to save him but then became about the bigger picture really fast, and Liminality was always shadowed by the main IMOQ series going on. That’s one of the things that bugged me, they didn’t reference his past enough, they didn’t even talk about Mai, I really wish they had and perhaps Kuhn would have been a bit more then back up.

Yata:

Yata’s character is a bit interesting. For a large portion of the game he wasn’t really involved. They had absolutely zero character development for him until the third volume; however he was still an important character. I really think he was always important, running G.U. and knowing the most about the situation then anyone except Ovan; however his character still seemed to change by an enormous leap the instant they gave him some development, as that’s when his character was actually interesting. It seemed so sudden which is perhaps why it made such a big impression. They effectively made him go from a boring character and then effectively slapped us in the fact with character development. It was interesting though to see this previously entirely calm and collected person just break down. He went absolutely nuts, yelling how AIDA is a gift but choose Ovan, he loves the world more then anyone, he started to sound evil there. Yelling about how much better he is then everyone else, how he’s the most deserving, to see him break down like that was very interesting and without that scene I think he would have just remained to be boring. However, no matter how boring he may have remained, just the fact that he was Wiseman from IMOQ, trying him to those games as openly as they did would have redeemed his character enough for me, as that was one of the coolest things about his character.

Sakubo:

Sakubo was one of the more interesting characters, although looking at it from just a quick perspective, that seems a bit odd. Sakubo was one of the least included Epitaph users in the entire game. She (I’m going by character PC gender or it will get too confusing to write) was kind of like Endrance, never included as much as the others in some of the things going on, however Endrance had a big deal made about his avatar. I was almost surprised with how quick it began and was over when Sakubo’s turn came around. I mean, Haseo teleports in, sees her going crazy, fights her, and that’s it? I was stunned. Throughout Vol.1 and 2 she was a rather undeveloped and boring, useless, character. Yet in Vol. 3 she became simply amazing. This rally shows me that it’s the individual character and character stories that matter, not their role in what was going on for the most part. Sakubo was just stunning in Vol. 3, having her situation of actually being Bo with multiple personality disorder just made her so much more interesting. It was revealed that the situation was so, then Saku pretty much says she’s going away, like someone was really dieing. Even though it was someone who kind of doesn’t exist, I was really involved in her situation, it stunned me almost. I mean, for someone with Bo’s mental condition, to actually feel sorry for the “other” personality was really very interesting, and I’m not sure on what physiologists’ stands are on this disorder, if its better for the person to one day be rid of the other’s or if they should embrace it yet to let it control them, whatever the case I’m not sure, but bringing up this topic made Sakubo just explode with character development.

Endrance:

Endrance….in a way almost disappointed me. He had such a big potential to become such an amazing character with his interesting story but in the end they pretty much turned his character into a joke, making the whole gay like complex pretty much be a joke and completely made his character loose all seriousness. Not to go bashing homosexuality, not going to touch on that, but the way Endrance was portrayed he just wasn’t taken seriously. Which again, as I said, is a shame. He started out so good. One of the best moments in the entire game for me, at least regarding character development, was that first fight against Endrance and then Macha. Endrance had this great story going. As Elk he was so dependent on Mia that he needed this connection. When she was taken away by project G.U. the first one that failed, he was left without Mia and was devastated. He needed something to need him; he needed something to cling onto like he did with Mia. He blamed himself saying if he was stronger then she wouldn’t have gone and became this amazingly strong and elegant player. Then AIDA came along and Endrance knew it wasn’t Mia but again he was so desperate that he just went with it anyways, then again that was taken from him. It was really interesting to see him and how much he kind of needed someone or something, this great and strong mature person, at least in his 20’s that was just a mess of a person without even a cat he knew deep down wasn’t Mia. The way they showed him devastated, blathering to himself about how she’s gone and he can’t hear her, it made him so interesting it’s really a shame that he lost that later in the game. However, I’ll still remember him as the character that had this interesting story, so all in all he was a very great an interesting character, I just wish they would have dialed up some of that serious stuff.

Pi:

Pi is kind of in the same boat as Kuhn, she really for the most part was never able to become much more then back up. She never got her own story, the only even slight hint they gave to something about her was in the Terminal Disk about her being the guy who was writing the journal’s sister. Although admittedly if I had to say I’d say she was more important then Kuhn just because of the connection and relationship she had with Yata. Kuhn never worked deep with anything but Pi did have some moments where she worked extremely hard and tired herself trying to find Yata, and then scenes such as slapping some sense into Yata when he was kind of depressed and saying stuff about being lonely and unloved and so forth. However really, in the big picture, she was mostly just back up.

Ovan:

“Why must I be deprived of everything!”

Ovan….there is a lot to say about Ovan. He is almost the entire focus of all of Roots and G.U. He is one of the coolest and most interesting characters I’ve seen in a long time. The one thing that kept hitting me as I saw all that he did was how unclear it was of his intentions. The show was full of gray, not black and white good and evil, but everything being I the middle and Ovan’s mystery about him not only really built this game story to what it was but really did make him just simply amazing to watch. Of course he kind of seemed like a good guy at first, being there for Haseo and being a mentor, then he became a bit less reprehensible when he disappeared leaving the Twilight Brigade, then when he came back he was this mystery figure in full force but still seeming like a good guy that just wouldn’t be around long enough to do as much good as possible. Then, yet again, it exploded and he became almost pure evil in the eyes of Haseo and the way the game was focused. He was the one who PK’d Shino, he was the one who unleashed AIDA; he was the one who had manipulated and used, controlled, and orchestrated everything. THEN…THEN he shows that it was all for the better good and pretty much sacrifices his real life (almost) for the world and to save his innocent looking little cute sister. He goes back and forth between good and evil so many times, it’s amazing. Yet he doesn’t do it in a way that make his character just unpredictable, it makes him mysterious. He doesn’t flip flop sides or anything, it’s just as more and more is revealed views and impressions keep getting twisted, it was amazing. He is truly what made G.U. as great as it is. Sure Haseo was the main character but he was just kind of solving problems along the way and going though things, Ovan was the one that had orchestrated things for the better good, he had done some bad things but weren’t in control of it. It seemed as if he was bad but was then revealed he was the victim, having his sister and control of his AIDA thing taken from him. One of the liens that always sticks with me form him, the one I choose for him, was “Why must I be deprived of everything!” Its almost chilling in reference to his character, this mysterious and in control of everything character who was really just the victim, truly amazing.

That took me a lot longer to write then I thought It would, so I’m really going to limit it for all the other characters, as I want to do some other things this decade.

Aina:

Aina was really one of the most important characters in Roots and G.U. Although not really included until the final volume, all that happened throughout these installments was by Ovan for her, so she was really the motivation for everything, making her rather important. As an actual character she was interesting, and made me really feel for Ovan’s cause as she was cute and seemed so innocent when she said things like wanting to spend time with her brother if she gets better. Plus, she had a backbone yelling at Haseo saying how He never helped Ovan when Ovan helped him, really was a miraculous character, not just her importance but the actual character and personality was great too and as a character one of my favorites.

Sakaki:

Sakaki was certainly a very interesting and important character, and was one of the best and most interesting bad guys I’ve ever seen. What really makes a bad guy in anything good, a good character that is, is when they themselves don’t view themselves as bad or evil, and really that fits with Sakaki perfectly. Hell, in Vol. 2 I was split between what to think, as what he was trying to do wasn’t really evil at al. His gals were effectively to make a world without cruelty or disease, where people were kind to each other. Thant’s to evil. Wanting there to be no cruelty? That’s noble, yet he was still a bad guy perhaps because of the methods. Still, his goals made him an interesting character because he wasn’t just some “Mwahaha, I’ll kill everyone for no reason because I’m evil.” Really he was very interesting to watch and his motives were continually intriguing, so he quickly became a very fascination character.

Zelkova:

Zelkova quickly became one of the more interesting characters in the game, and I would say certainly the most interesting non epitaph user character by far. From the beginning he always had an air of mystery around him, making comments and seeing to know way more then he should, then in Vol. 3 it’s almost as if he’s part of G.U. having more knowledge and control of things then Yata. Definitely became extremely interesting while always remaining a mysterious character, definitely one of my favorites.

Kaede:

Kaede never really did anything. I don’t have too much to say about her because really all she ever did was cling to Zelkova and agree to things.

Matsu:

Matsu seemed, to me, almost surprisingly featured. He never really struck me as that interesting of a character. Not that I hated him or anything, he just never really made that great of an impression on me. He was included a lot, but never really important. It just seemed liked he was included too much for how little he did, but again wasn’t too terrible, just a bit clichéd cool guy esque.

Sophora:

Sophora was hardly included at all. You just encounter and fight her once when going though Moon Tree’s headquarters, and that’s it, she’s not even mentioned again. Which is a bit a shame because she’s pretty much a cat girl ninja. It is a girl because Sophora, or Enju rather (Japanese name) has a role in the book Alcor as she has a crush on Silabus and an alternate character of hers joins Canard because of it, this takes place back when Alkaid was emperor. Anyways, hardly included at all and never even talked about, but was kind of cool.

Hiiragi:

Roughly the same as Sophora, not included too much but was shown more then Sophora. I’m really not sure if Hiiragi is a guy or a girl in either real life or as a PC. Regardless, Hiiragi was very very weird, as she was just obsessed with Sakaki. But aside from beating her in the arena and then in Moon Tree, she wasn’t included much more, but did kind of do some things or him because of…its obsession, so was included more but still roughly undeveloped….and really just very very weird.

Nala:

There isn’t too much to say about Nala, after all he was Nala and really after the very first part of Vol. 2 he was never really shown at all. He did bring up an interesting topic that characters had multiple characters, he would have been cooler if he used Nala later on to trick someone or just really anything.

Sirius:

Sirius was a rather good character, although again like many characters not too terribly important. He started out just being another emperor that you had to beat really for gaming purposes, however I was rather impressed with him in Vol. 3 where he really did start to show some of his character, calling upon your help for just things such as figuring out what’s wrong with Taihaku, and then even becoming a Lost One himself because he couldn’t stand by and do nothing. He really went from a rather average character to a pretty interesting one and I think his personality and attitude, as well as his contributions however futile they may have been added a lot to his character, making him pretty cool.

Alkaid:

Alkaid was certainly one of my favorite characters. First off, she was hot, that does have a bit to do with why I liked her, but there were other reasons as well. She did seem to change throughout the game which just simply made her interesting in that sense. Going from hating Haseo and trying to be tough to rather lightening up and warming, becoming nicer while still remaining a very strong person. Although I liked her character and would have liked to see her with Haseo, I do think Atoli was a bit of a better fit just because Alkaid didn’t seem to connect and support him as much, but was still a great character and was very fun to see her in some of the love triangle scenes in Vol. 2. Plus, again, she’s hot.

Taihaku:

Taihaku was always a rather interesting character. He was never important really in G.U until Vol. 3 However, he was a bit intriguing in Roots. They didn’t quite explain what he was doing in Roots and really the importance of it never became apparent until Vol. 3 but it was interesting none the less to see there is a connection for Roots to Vol. 3 without really anything in between. He was always a bit mysterious and did pose some rather deep questions which is what really made him interesting, things such as filling a void left form passion, and then just the fact that he effectively met Harold made him interesting, but in the end he was never used more then another emperor you had to defeat.

Anteras:

Anteras was interesting. I’d almost compare him to Phyllo. Although Haseo had already learned a lot of stuff, Anteras was really the one who gave him advice on some things, not just teaching him about things like the Job Extension or some conveniently placed tutorial esque things, he did post some things such as not giving up, and so and so, really the overall role that Phyllo kind of played, which did make him interesting.

Silabus:

About the same as Gaspard, the both of them did play a role, and it’s a bit hard to pinpoint what exactly their influence was. They weren’t important in the sense they knew what was going on or were epitaph users or anything like that, but they did play a role, as annoying as they were along the way, of addressing the point that Haseo was growing. Without the two of the he wouldn’t have changed as much as he did, and one of the interesting things about Haseo were how the changed, so the two of these guys did play a part in that, which did make them not completely useless in the story.

Gaspard:

About the same as Gaspard, the both of them did play a role, and it’s a bit hard to pinpoint what exactly their influence was. They weren’t important in the sense they knew what was going on or were epitaph users or anything like that, but they did play a role, as annoying as they were along the way, of addressing the point that Haseo was growing. Without the two of the he wouldn’t have changed as much as he did, and one of the interesting things about Haseo were how the changed, so the two of these guys did play a part in that, which did make them not completely useless in the story.

Gabi:

It was a bit of a shame that Gabi wasn’t included more then he was. Although he never really had a big important role he still made an impact on me. He wasn’t important because he was never an epitaph user or anything, he never had much to do with the events like Zelkova did, but was still a great character. He seemed so overly-joyed about things and just said weird things, it was hilarious most of the times he ever said anything. I just think things would have been more fun if he was included. I don’t think it would have been good for him to have an important role, but it would still be more enjoyable and likely hilarious.

Bordeaux:

Bordeaux was interesting just because she was more or less a bad guy that just became a pawn of AIDA. However, she seemed to have this deep hate of Haseo that carried over form Roots. Yes, she was in Roots, and I’m not confusing her with Ender. Her hate continued and became rather interesting she was one of the first examples of what AIDA did to someone and was an example of someone who wasn’t smartly using it like Ovan or Sakaki, but was going crazy with it.

Negimaru:

About the same as Negimaru, nothing much to say about him, had to include him though. They had a rather odd attempted touching moment with his reunion with Grein and stuff, but it was mostly lame, he was never important at all, or interesting.

Grein:

About the same as Negimaru, nothing much to say about him, had to include him though. They had a rather odd attempted touching moment with his reunion with Negimaru and stuff, but it was mostly lame, he was never important at all, or interesting.

Shino:

Shino was definitely one of the most important characters. She was pretty much Haseo’s Aina. While Ovan’s drive to do everything was for Aina, Haseo really had the motivation throughout the series to do all of this to save Shino. Later on it became a little bit about Alkaid to, as he referred to saving both Shino and Alkaid, but all of it really started form her. She certainly was the focus of Roots and Haseo going crazy and then back to normal a bit. However, as a character she wasn’t too impressive. They didn’t really give much of a back-story about her, and she really was included very little in the actual series. Still though, she was very important and the bit that was shown from her, mostly in Roots, showed that she was a very kind and compassionate character.

Tabby:

I don’t think enough people give Tabby enough credit. She was a bit off a goof and a tad annoying in Roots, but really she played an important role. She was someone who was affected deeply by everything that happened to Haseo as well. She pretty much went through what he did in Roots, she knew everyone just as long and Haseo really hadn’t become that special when she was around. It was interesting to see how she reacted to things and really near the end she did a lot to try and bring Haseo back form disaster, only focusing on helping him which really made her interesting I thought. Sure she had some faults, but her role wasn’t just comedy and for there to be some fanservice or anything, she had a role that I think a lot of people overlook and I really liked her.

Piros:

Piros…ah Piros, Piros was….odd. Very odd, yet you couldn’t help but smile almost seeing him. Sure he was really rather annoying as hell and kind of lame, but it was rather funny. It’s not like they tried to make him important, they were obvious with making him an idiot and just plain weird, so it did turn out to be rather funny. Not a cleaver kind of humor, but it was still a bit funny. Plus, he was of course an original .hacker.

Natsume:

There’s not too much to say about Natsume. Hell, she’s technically a completely optional character, as you don’t have to get her at all, pretty much her and Tabby you don’t have to get to beat the game, and can even get after you do such. However it was neat just to see her, seeing as how she’s blatantly obviously a character from the first game and was technically a .hacker.

Iyota:

Just like Asta, really didn’t’ serve a role in the actual story, but at least did have an interesting role by the fact that because of Iyota and Asta, Haseo was kind of pushed to be who he was. It was interesting though to see the both of them in Vol. 3 face off against Haseo in the arena. It gave some material for Haseo to address the issue of being the Terror of Death and who he used to be.

Asta:

Just like Iyota, really didn’t’ serve a role in the actual story, but at least did have an interesting role by the fact that because of Iyota and Asta, Haseo was kind of pushed to be who he was. It was interesting though to see the both of them in Vol. 3 face off against Haseo in the arena. It gave some material for Haseo to address the issue of being the Terror of Death and who he used to be.

Announcer:

I have to include him or someone is going to yell at me. Nothing much to say about him…he announced the games. It was really weird to get an email from him saying stuff about how he’s been an announcer for so long but you gave him inspiration or something weird like that.

Sakisaka:

Only important in Roots, his role was really mixed and I’m not sure what to say about it exactly. He kind of bailed on things when the Twilight Brigade went to hell, and aside from that really only played a role in filling members for the guild and showing the different views that people had on what was going on. Of course, he also had a role in being a mentor to Tabby, but it was more that she just clinged to him.

Touta:

Touta was an interesting character. He almost seemed to come out of nowhere. Even if he was Tawaraya, when Touta appeared it was a while after TaN had disappeared and had a role completely different then Tawaraya. He really came out of no where yet all of a sudden started giving advice to specifically Tabby, really adding to her character. He talked to Haseo a bit too but he was already crazy psycho at that point pretty much, so his main interesting ole was what he did in giving advice and helping out Tabby and his interaction with Phyllo.

Tawaraya:

I’m just listing him as some still don’t think he is Touta, I do, but in case he’s not I have to include everyone. He played even less of a role then Touta did really, just more or less serving as a character that kind of was a public face of TaN, as Naobi (Yata) was being secretive.

Ender:

Although she is Pi, I’m including Nala so I might as well include all alternate characters. Ender surprised me a bit just because of how different she acted from Pi. She kind of needed t though, her role fit her actions, but it was interesting to see her being different. She was very important in Roots, and Pi continued being important in Roots as well.

Naobi:

About the same as Pi, except he was hardly ever shown. He didn’t strike me as being different from Yata at all, and really I don’t think it would have made much of a difference just because he was hardly ever shown, even in comparison to when he became Yata, Yata as the PC was much more included then he was when he was Naobi.

Saburou:

I’m not sure entirely why, but I really took a quick liking to Saburou. She’s only a character really in Roots, appearing in Returner as well. She (I’m going by PC gender, Saburou is played by a guy, using a female PC, with a guy name) was rather interesting, as her personality and attitude were just fun to watch. She really didn’t do too much, yet still just her attitude was awesome. She would say these metaphors all the time for some reason and I just though that was so weird, yet really rather funny to see. She even commented once about how that metaphor she just said was really good, seeming pleased with her self. I just wish she’d be in G.U. as they never said what happened to her. She just disappeared after Roots was over, and she was even the one who actually saw first hand the fight with Haseo and Azure Kite when he was first data drained. Anyways, she never was important but still n awesome character.

Phyllo:

Phyllo was by far one of my favorite characters in Roots. His role was just amazing and was really by far one of the most important characters in Roots and even G.U. Although he didn’t really do anything in G.U., I think he was so important in Roots that his impact on people and Haseo effected things into G.U. He always gave advice and seemed so wise on everything. He helped everyone out and always posed some very interesting topics and questions, causing for the problems people are dealing with to be much more human and interesting. It was very sad that he died but did fit and just overall I’m thrilled with his role and will always be one of my favorite characters.

Midori:

I was a bit disappointed that Midori wasn’t included more, at least in G.U. For those who don’t know she’s the brandish that Haseo tried to beat when he was all super evil and powerful, but couldn’t. She saw the fight with Azure Kite and Ovan. She didn’t do too terribly much but I think just the fact that Haseo didn’t beat in Roots, if you could fight her and try and win in G.U. it would be great, like a solo battle or something, a rematch, but nothing like that happened.

Hedeyo:

In the same group as Seisaku, he had an interesting role in Roots in swaying and dealing with Tabby’s feelings, but then was completely forgotten in G.U. as he really had no point, except his kind of cameo of his name being a medic union guy, which could actually be him if he changed his character model somehow by making a new one.

Seisaku:

In the same group as Hedeyo, he had an interesting role in Roots in swaying and dealing with Tabby’s feelings, but then was completely forgotten in G.U. as he really had no point, except his kind of cameo of his name being a medic union guy, which could actually be him if he changed his character model somehow by making a new one.

Skinny Shop Keeper:

I really couldn’t find their names anywhere. They are the two guys who ran an item shop that Touta visited and was friends with. He helped them out with some things but they were mostly for episode specific plot only. (Told you I’m including everyone)

Fat Shop Keeper:

I really couldn’t find their names anywhere. They are the two guys who ran an item shop that Touta visited and was friends with. He helped them out with some things but they were mostly for episode specific plot only. (Told you I’m including everyone)

Crimson Knight:

There is really nothing much to say about him. He didn’t have any role in Roots or G.U. at all really, but was shown in the last episode of Roots so I have to include him. It was kind of fun to see him though, seeing how many other installments he’s appeared in.

B-Set:

In the same group as Gord. Their part was interesting, as they did have some effect but not really directly almost. The both of them were both examples of people who used to be with Ovan and the Twilight Brigade, yet quit. The two of them brought up an interesting point of view, as they were with Ovan like Haseo was in Roots yet more or less told Haseo that Ovan was obsessed and not worth his time. What exactly that did to change Haseo mind isn’t ‘sure, it’s sure that it brought up some doubt and just made things interesting in Roots, regardless of if it had any overall changes.

Gord:

In the same group as B-Set. Their part was interesting, as they did have some effect but not really directly almost. The both of them were both examples of people who used to be with Ovan and the Twilight Brigade, yet quit. The two of them brought up an interesting point of view, as they were with Ovan like Haseo was in Roots yet more or less told Haseo that Ovan was obsessed and not worth his time. What exactly that did to change Haseo mind isn’t ‘sure, it’s sure that it brought up some doubt and just made things interesting in Roots, regardless of if it had any overall changes.

That is freaking all the characters in Roots and G.U. I of course didn’t include A.I.s, so no Aura or the Azure Knights, and I didn’t include more ore less no name characters such as random PCs that you just got their name via walking up to them or from message boards (This includes Chaotic PKs as well). If I missed anyone, tell me, and I’ll call you a liar and then look it up or yell at you for being an idiot and not listening to the first statement of this paragraph.

Haseo and everyone who knew Ovan are called to a mysterious festival lost ground by a mysterious email claiming to be from Ovan, stating that he has something he wishes to entrust to everyone.

Impressions:

This OVA was great. I don’t know hat some people are talking about when they say it wasn’t that great of an OVA. I think it did everything it had to perfectly. It had a lot of really great comedy and brought in some old characters that they haven’t shown in a while, and all the interacting. Really, it was great and I loved it. Really, this OVA wasn’t supposed to be about actually putting a new end to things or really for explaining things, it is all about just making things more fun. To show the character interacting that may not have interacted before, to have the familiar characters focus a bit more on comedy now that the story is out of the way. Sure this OVA kind of had some story about “Good AIDA” and Ovan returning, but really it was great just for all of the other stuff they had.

It was great to see all of the characters again. I was really pleased with how much they included tabby and Sakisaka. It really made it feel like it was tying in Roots a lot, seeing as how the length of G.U. is much bigger and that it’s the main story, Roots just being a prequel, to see them include elements form Roots as much as they did was great. I really do like Tabby’s character although she may be considered a bit annoying. How she kind of freaked out saying there were two Shino’s was great, and just the way she dragged Sakisaka around was very funny and reminiscent of Roots. I did like they brought Sakisaka back, and I am a bit surprised about how much he was involved considering he quit the game in Roots and Tabby only suspended play to become a large breasted cat girl nurse………………………..ANYWAYS, it was fun to see them again. I especially loved that they included Saburou and Touta. They were two of my favorite characters from Roots, especially Saburou, yet they were completely not even mentioned in G.U. which is a bit of a shame. Touta can understand as he said he had to study abroad, but Saburou I was surprised with. Saburou never said anything about quitting the game, plus Saburou was important enough that actually witnessed first hand Haseo’s fight with Azure Kite, she was in the church at the time  the fight, yet was discarded during the game. So it was great to see them back and of course as I said the large breasted cat girl nurse……..

There were a ton of just small things that I found absolutely hilarious. In fact it is defiantly the thing that I liked most about this OVA, not really seeing any kind of continuation or the people meeting, but just the great comedy bits they showed. I absolutely loved Tabby and Sakisaka’s explanation of what sounds the monster made, yelling “PIKAA” and “NEMOO” They said it with such enthusiasm and like it was the exact sound the monster made, I found it hilarious. I also thought it was hilarious how Kuhn was hitting on Saburou, who is actually a guy in RL but uses a girls PC, with a guys name. It was just fun to see because of how flirtuous Kuhn is, that he hit on a guy without knowing it, plus to just see that kind of character crossovers. Then there were just some smaller things such as Saku playing the gun game and only aiming at the Haseo dolls, wanting hundreds of shots to shoot Haseo. There was also a Kite mask that Kuhn put on to hide, and then the scene with Endrance and the crap load of Haseo doll things. The way he acted and Haseo kind of flinched away from him was great. Then of course I just loved the general interaction between Saku and Endrance. Although that dynamic of their relationship isn’t really anything new, it was obvious in the game, they didn’t get too good of chance to really show it has a great comedy bit until now, so I thought it was hilarious how she was trying to get him and her alone and then kiss him.

One really sad thing I have to point out shows just how obsessed and pathetic I am. When the Lucky Animal came out of the bush I was instantly able to recognize it as being a Kudan. I thought that was a bit pathetic of me, as I didn’t even try and I actually didn’t do any of the Lucky Animal stuff in Vol. 3 before watching this, so it’s not like it was fresh in my mind either.

I really loved all of the little cameos as well. Not referring to the big appearances by the characters that actually spoke, but even more so I really loved how they showed other characters, if only in the background. The ones I managed to spot, and I’m pretty sure I got them all. There were Gord and B-Set together playing a game, the shop keepers that Touta helped out in Roots, Silver Knight, Taihaku, Matsu, Bordeaux, Iyota, Asta, Azure Kite, Azure Balmung, Azure Orca, Gabi, Sophora, Hirragi, Piros, Natsume, Anteras, Sirius, Alkaid, Death Grunty, Mellow Grunty, Zelkova and Kaede. Of course, those were just the ones that had a cameo and didn’t speak. There were of course the obvious Saburou, Touta, Gaspard and Silabus among others, but even the small ones that didn’t have speaking roles were cool to see.

They did leave out some characters that I wish they would have included, but not that it makes much of a difference. They showed Bordeaux, barely, but no Negimaru and Grein which I would have liked to see. Also, they only showed two of the grunties, and I would have hoped to show all of them if they showed any. They also didn’t show Mikoto, the Brandish from Roots who Haseo fought and lost to, who witnessed Ovan and Azure Kite’s fight. Then the only other ones I can think of that had a name or small part in Roots or GU are Hiedeyo and Seisaku from Roots. Although they had Medic Union characters named after them, if not them, in G.U. they didn’t show them in their original form which I would have liked to see as well.

Haseo and the others go after Cubia in hops of restoring the game and saving the real world form total chaos, but without Ovan’s epitaph they are unsure of how to overcome his power.

Summary:

• Haseo and the others meet at Netslum. They say that they have to defeat a lot of the bug creature, Gomoras, in order to locate Cubia’s body. Zelkova says to do so they have to use area hacking at four of the lost grounds.
• Haseo heads to one of them and soon finds himself surrounded by dozens of them at once. All of a sudden, someone comes running from behind and defeats a bunch of them in one fell swoop. It’s Alkaid. Haseo is stunned; amazed that she is fine and Alkaid kind of shrugs it off, saying of course she’s fine. Haseo walks up to her, hugging her telling her to no scare him like that again. More Gomora show up, completely overwhelming them but Sirius and Taihaku come to the rescue, defeating them. They say they received the email and will help. Taihaku says he called all the ranking arena members to assist, and sys that the stain Haseo’s name received in the Sage Palace tournament has been wiped clean. Haseo runs ahead while Alkaid, Sirius, and Taihaku stay behind and fight the Gomora.
• In another Lost Ground, all of the Moon Tree people assist in defeating them, such as Kaede, Matsu, and the ninja cat healer girl who has that alt in Canard in Alcor. Then, in another area and Silabus, Gaspard, and Anteras help out. Then, in the fourth and final area Gabi comes to the rescue, along with Bordeaux, Grein, Negimaru and the two Pkers who PK’d Haseo in the very beginning.
• Haseo and the others find out the location of Cubia, and go though a dungeon and outer dungeon until they arrive at him. They see it as a huge giant of a monster, and everyone lends their power to Haseo so he can defeat it. He summons the new white Skeith, and goes into battle with Cubia. After defeating it to the point of being able to data drain it, Haseo and the others find that it has no effect. Yata says that they must destroy Cubia’s core, which is likely inside of him. They take a plunge inside Cubia in order to find his core.
• They arrive inside him and see his core. Yata says that the strain on the network right now is huge, and if they don’t do something soon the world may end up in chaos. All of a sudden Haseo finds himself alone. A blue ball of light appears speaking in Aura’s voice. She says how she is the unawoken one yet, that she has no power decide the future of the world, the ones who will decide what to make of it are the players of the game. All she can do is connect thoughts. She tells Haseo to reach out and touch the feelings of those who share his inner thoughts.
• Haseo then fights though the long paths inside of Cubia, having his friends fight with him and stay behind to fight off the doppelgangers Cubia is making. Eventually Haseo gets to the core and fights and defeats it. They finally breach its defenses and say that their only hope to defeat it is to use the power of their epitaphs. They all give Haseo power and still in normal PC form, powered up he jumps up and strikes Cubia. He tires to penetrate through a barrier but can’t. Yata says its no use, without the power of The Rebirth they can’t do anything. Haseo’s arm starts to crack where he is making the attack and a bright light cause him to close his eyes.
• Haseo opens his eyes to find himself in a large white room. Ovan appears behind him, placing his hand on his shoulder and arm, saying now you have them all, and gives Haseo a word of encouragement before vanishing into a pile of dust. Haseo looks with new determination and says all of the feelings he’s carved into the world are going into this one attack. He returns to Cubia and penetrates the barrier, destroying it.
• Everything goes blank and Haseo finds him once again in a white room. Ovan is standing before him and says, “You’ve become stronger, a lot stronger then you were back then.” Haseo responds, “Well, I was forced to become stronger, thanks to you.” The same quote from the begging of Vol. 1 when Haseo meets Ovan after he’s disappeared. Ovan says if he puts his feelings together, there’s no telling how far he will grow. Ovan starts to glow blue and disappear, saying that this is goodbye. Haseo yells at him that he always leaves before Haseo can tell him what he is feeling. Ovan says, “One ending, is really a new beginning. We are not finished, our journey will still continue. Don’t you think that’s true?” Ovan then turns and walks away. Haseo chases after him, saying he’s still got so much to say. He reaches his hand out but Ovan disappears as he turns around to look at Haseo.
• Aura then appears before Haseo, saying that his wish has gone though so much anguish but has awakened Ovan’s heart.  She says, “He heard your lament and the deepest wish of his heart was to answer him. The bonds between our souls are what drive the world and it will be all of you that drive the new world. Now, you must go. Little children of Morganna.”
• Haseo says, narrating, that the world finally returned to normal. The chaos and confusion in the real world had subsided.
• Haseo gets email form pretty much everyone he’s met, saying how things are back to normal, and they are happy, thanking him and so forth. He also gets an email from Shino, telling him to meet her at the cathedral. Haseo goes there and they talk, Shino saying she was watching Haseo the entire time, as lie with Aina her consciousness was tied to Ovan’s left arm. Atoli then comes, Shino saying that she called her here. Atoli just manages to say some things, nothing really important and eventually just wishes Haseo luck, with a tear in her eye and runs off. Shino tells him how he should do what he wants, that she’s been watching him. Haseo then chases after Atoli. Atoli crying at the chaos gate but when she sees Haseo running to her, she cheers up and smiles.
• Haseo gets some more emails, getting some member addresses form Aura, giving him the three Azure Knights, and an email from Bordeaux. He gets a message from Tabby, saying she’s back and wants to meet him, and some other random things like the Forest of Pain opening again.
• In Online Jack, Salvador just kind of says that they weren’t able to investigate much, as they saw some lab and the missing children didn’t remember anything. However, they believe that CC Corp has been hiding the truth. A young girl walks past them, and says, “Opposing mirrors of hope and despair.” A nurse asks if she’s getting discharged, and someone takes her name off the wall near the room.
• In the other news, the warrant for Ovan for being AIDA’s creator was revoked.
• In the final epilogue for the game, Haseo is on a bridge in Mac Anu with Shino. They just say some things about all they’ve been though, and that they miss Ovan. Haseo says that he doesn’t know why, but he has a feeling Ovan will come back.

IMPORTANT!

Hold off comments about the game in general, I will probably move any comments posted here anyways. I will do a post on Returner, the G.U. OVA and then a three part Impression and Review about all of Roots and G.U. So please hold comments until those three posts about everything in general.

Impressions:

Now, I won’t talk too terribly much on the overall game and trilogy, as I said I’ll save it for the large impressions posts, but I do have to say I loved the end. I don’t know what the hell some idiots are talking about when they say it was disappointing. My god, how fucking narrow minded are you? It missed a chance to be really dark? Who the fuck gives a crap. It was amazing. It doesn’t have to be some supper apocalyptic thing where everyone really dies, and even if Ovan didn’t actually die at all he still made a huge sacrifice to save others. That was enough and was really amazing. I’ve even heard some retard say that the story was bad because it in the end wasn’t about AIDA. MY fucking god, seriously how stupid can you be? Who the hell cares? ADIA didn’t have to be the overall focus. It proved a huge purpose in getting things motivated, and was the reason for Ovan’s Rebirth and thus the reason for the network strain and the reason for Cubia and so on. I’m sorry but I’ll defend this story to the death. Not just because I’m a fan, but because really looking at the story intelligently, the story was great and the way things built up was amazing.

I do have to say quickly that it just sent chills up my spine when they showed the kind of recap thing. Not when they showed the movies during the credits, but Haseo was kind of going over everything that happened, the scene was put together incredibly well and really, as said, sent chills up my spine, the good kind.

It should be pretty obvious but I do want to point it out that in the end, Haseo ends up with Atoli romance and relationship wise over anyone else. Yes I know, blah blah blah, there is the whole wedding thing, I’m not an idiot. However, it still doesn’t change the fact that technically and storyline wise he ends up with Atoli. Really that wedding stuff was just randomly thrown in there to kind of appease people, but not only does it make sense for him to end with Atoli, pretty much the second to last scene, the last one if you don’t count the secret epilogue, he runs to Atoli. I mean, come on! Now, although I do really like Alkaid and all I do think that it makes the most sense for Haseo to end up with Atoli. I mean, really it just fits. Shino was gone for too long and Haseo didn’t have as much as a connection with her, and Alkaid was not only gone a long time but wasn’t as close to Haseo. Atoli was always there supporting him and really her character is very interesting, making her a great fit.

I did find it really cool one of the lines Atoli says, as it really addresses what the REAL title of this volume is. The Japanese title for Vol. 3 is Aruku no Hayase de which translates not into “Redemption”, but pretty much “At Walking Speed” The line was more or less Atoli saying, before the Cubia fight, that they have to keep walking forward no matter what. Even if things get in the way, as long as they walk forward together, they can get though it. I really think that “At Walking Speed” is a better title. Although it’s a bit more confusion, and on the surface it may seem like Redemption is easier, referring perhaps to Ovan’s redemption, but I think at walking speed helps to point towards what the overall point of most of G.U. was, which is that all this crap kept coming at them but they need to keep walking forward, even if its slow as long as they go straight ahead it will be for the better.

I also just loved the moment where Haseo was face to face with Ovan at the end before he disappeared. I, again as I have probably unhealthy before, just freaked out when the started to say the same line from Vol. 1. The line being, “You’ve become stronger, a lot stronger then you were back then.” “Well I was forced to become stronger, thanks to you.” That line was the same as the beginning of Vol. 1. Before Haseo is data drained, he meets with Ovan for the first time after he disappeared and that line is said. However Haseo kind of says it with a bit of malice towards Ovan. Them saying the exact same line at with a completely different feel and pretty much meaning was just incredible and I loved that they did something like that. It really kind of shows how things have changed, yet have not.

Although it wasn’t rally that important, I absolutely loved all of the reunion type scenes. When everyone kept coming to Haseo’s rescue to fight the Gomoras. Of course, my favorite was when Alkaid showed up. That really surprised the hell out of me. I LOVED that scene, Haseo hugging her like that. Even though he ends up with Atoli, it was still cool to see her come back. Then with Sirius and Taihaku came to the rescue, wow, it was great. Of course, the others were cool to when other people came to the rescue, but the Alkaid one was the best, the way her, Sirius, and Taihaku stood together fighting for Icolo’s name was cool. Although, technically isn’t Haseo the only member of Icolo? I remember them saying that the requirement for being in Icolo was that you were a CURRENT emperor, so even though Alkaid had access to the hall when you first see her she’s not in Icolo. So technically after Haseo beat Taihaku, he should be the only one in Icolo except for whoever won the two lower tournaments after Haseo, which they didn’t show. Anyways, not important, I just loved the Alkaid to the rescue scene.

Haseo recovers from Ovan’s Rebirth, finding himself in Net Slum with his new form due to Zelkova’s hacking and learns of the new threat to the world and the entire network, Cubia.

Summary:

• We see Haseo on the ground, in a red dusty desert area. He has static pieces all over his body, missing from him as he struggles in pain on the ground. All of a sudden what looks to be a giant ship comes towards him, on top of which is a huge city. He turns out to be some kind of turtle flying thought he air with a metropolis on his back. It slows down and lands near Haseo.
• Haseo wakes up in darkness, asking where he is and where everyone else is. He asks what he’s been doing, and what the point of everything was, was it just a waste? Then, Haseo hears a voice, Zelkova’s, call out to him. Zelkova says Ovan has activated the full power of the rebirth. As an Epitaph user his PC and consciousness severely damaged. He says he is on the verge of loosing himself. He must ask his Avatar just who Haseo his. Zelkova tells him to head towards his own truth.
• Haseo remembers back on everything that happened to him, saying how after Shino died he thought what he needed was power, but when he lost it he found all his friends and that was what gave him power. He says he will protect them. All of a sudden another Haseo in 3^rd form white armor appears saying if he is serious. He says he’s turned is back on that road so many times, it’s tough, hard, and takes work. The original Haseo says he’ll still go though with hi. The White Haseo says fine, and starts to leave but the original Haseo says that he should stay; he’ll see this though till the end. Haseo then gets his Xth form.
• Haseo says that because of the Rebirth, there were great consequences world wide. Travel, finances, everything was effected. The third Network Crisis people were calling it. However, in the midst of it The World became peaceful, with AIDA being purged. The Lost Ones were gradually retuning to normal, but Shino…Haseo gets many emails following everything. Sirius has recovered, but Alkaid and Shino still haven’t. Kuhn says that The Rebirth has caused effects world wide and CC Corp is planning on using Ovan as their scape-goat, but no one knows who he is in real life, or if he is even alive.
• Haseo meets with Yata in a lost grounds as request via email. When he gets there Yata tells him to look below and he sees several bug creatures a giant one. Yata says that it is Cubia, an anti existence. It is the shadow of the Morganna Factor, of the epitaphs. When Ovan’s Rebirth shone light, this shadow was cast, and if Rebirth spread throughout the network then Cubia may as well.
• Yata says that he will take responsibility for his mistakes. Seven years ago, when “the world’ and the real world were in danger, he was on the battlefield. There is a flashback to a scene from Quarantine, with Kite, Lios, Wiseman, and Balmung, and then a shot of Cubia and Corbenik. Yata says that Cubia showed up then too. He says that Ovan sacrificed his life to cure AIDA, to cure the Lost Ones and protect the world. Yata says he will protect it with his life now as well.
• In the news, there is repots that Ovan, Masato Indou, has been officially blamed s the creator of AIDA and a warrant has been issued for his arrest. There are reports that the space station in this time period is malfunctioning due to AIDA and will likely crash into the earth, causing untold amounts of damage. There are reports of computerized trains crashing and super sonic passenger plane that has crashed, again due to AIDA. There are also nuclear power plants that are malfunctioning.
• In a new Online Jack it shows Salvador and the others going into an abandoned CC Corp lab. There they find stuff, but all of a sudden a giant monitor in the room turns on and shows “The World” It briefly shows the scene with Ovan and some code scrolls across the screen saying Epitaph activated, and then “Rebirth” in large letters. White energy appears and explodes out of the screen and then the three of them are caught by security.
• Haseo gets an email form Yata saying that CC Corp has sensed Cubia’s presence. Yata believes the true finale, the true 3^rd Network Crisis, will begin when Cubia becomes active.
• Haseo gets an email form Aina, asking Haseo to meet her somewhere. Haseo goes there and says he’s glad that Aina is alright. However Aina gets upset saying that this isn’t good at all. Ovan is in a coma now on the verge of death. She says that she and Ovan were linked though the AIDA, that when she was unconscious it was like a dream of seeing what her brother was doing. She asks how Haseo couldn’t save him when Ovan had saved him before. She then runs away and teleports out of the area.
• Haseo learns from Bo that Aina is in trouble, under attack from Cubia. Haseo goes there and saves her and Aina is still mad at him, saying that she’d rather the world just go away. If she can’t be with her brother through it then she doesn’t give a damn what happened. Bo just says that Haseo is a nice person and Aina can’t dump her sadness on him. Haseo says that Ovan wanted more then anything to cure Aina, and he’ll do what he can to make things right.
• At the Serpent of Lore, Yata says how the only choice of defeating Cubia is to defeat his main body. However, Cubia is the anti existence of the avatars, so fighting him head on would just cancel each other out. They say if they had all eight they may have a chance, but Ovan is gone. Yata says there may still be a chance, with Aura. However, not even Ovan was able to go down that path.
• Haseo says they will try anyways, and head to the cathedral with Yata and Aina. There, Aina shows the book The Epitaph of Twilight that Ovan gave her. All of a sudden she starts to glow and rise with the book, reading it. Haseo begins to glow and Yata basically tells him that he is the Key of the Twilight, as he’s absorbed the powers of all eight epitaphs. Haseo is the Key of the Twilight. Yata tells Haseo to awaken the goddess that left this world.
• Haseo summons Skeith and it’s the new super powered white one. In avatar space he flies up and puts his hands around Aina and the book, light spreading form him into her, exerting all his power. Aina begins to glow with power and screams out.
• Haseo returns to the normal space and three lights appear, causing the three azure knights to appear before Haseo. They fight against them and Haseo defeats them, but they keep regenerating and coming after him. Soon however, Aina says, in a different voice for them to stop and they immediately obey. Yata figures out that this is Aura, speaking through Aina as a vessel. The Azure knights were Aura’s Knights, fighting against anomalies in the system. Aura says some things but nothing really useful, and kind of disappears.
• Back at the Serpent of Lore they say how things have pretty much gone to hell. Cubia’s influence has spread throughout the network and things are going bad. They say they have to relocate to an area that is in the world yet isn’t because all of the towns are breaking apart, so everyone heads to Net Slum.
• There, Haseo and the others talk and they kind of figure out how Aura isn’t really going to help them, Endrance guessing because she is just going alone with the world, and is the world itself. People just saw and regarded her as a goddess because that’s what they needed. In any event, they figure they won’t get much help from her.
• They say that although defeating the bug things Cubia spits out won’t destroy them, they must fight to save the world. Haseo says how they haven’t done anything, haven’t fought against the bugs, not against Cubia, they are doing nothing. If there’s a way, they have to fight. Zelkova says they can rally the people of the game to help, and they all decide to fight to protect the world and real life as well, as Zelkova has pointed out Cubia’s influence as spread throughout the world and is causing massive chaos, such as malfunctions and possible meltdowns of nuclear power plants.

Impressions:

I was a bit surprised about Aura’s appearance. Although, she didn’t really appear at all, just talked though Aina. I was a bit surprised that her appearance, again although she didn’t actually appear, was kind of unimportant. It really seemed as if she didn’t do anything. Aura was such a big focus in other installments, and seemed to be the reason G.U. was started, yet she basically only said she can’t do anything, and left. I was a bit surprised really.

I did find it really interesting when Aina was for the most part upset about AIDA being gone. Her reasoning being that it connected her to her brother. I hadn’t really ever thought of a side of the picture that regarded AIDA as good, and really overall I wouldn’t agree that it was, but it was interesting to see that Aina kind of regarded it as good because  was the only thing that connected her to her brother. Again, I think its really for the better its gone, after all she has woken up and Ovan is no longer tormented by the arm, but for her to regard it at all as being good wasn’t really weird, but interesting to see her point of view.

I nearly lost it when they showed an actual screenshot from IMOQ in discussion. I do tend to get a bit more involved in .hack then perhaps is healthy, but still I freaked out when I saw that. It appeared to be from Quarantine, and showed Kite, Lios, Wiseman, and Balmung. (Which I in other world theorize to be respectively Ovan, Phyllo, Yata, and Taihaku) It’s nothing new at this point in the game that they reference IMOQ, which I still really enjoy seeing, however to actually show a screenshot as a flashback was just pure awesomeness.

I loved that they included Cubia. Although, it wasn’t really a surprise or anything, I was so engrossed in the moment where he was introduced I kept yelling at the screen for Yata to actually say Cubia. He kept talking about the damn monster and I just wanted him to say Cubia, as it would be a much bigger connection to IMOQ. I knew they pretty much would, but I thought it was a bit interesting that I got so involved in it that I was just effectively yelling at the in game character to say Cubia.

I was pretty surprised with all of the news reports. It really struck me how much things that were going on in the game were effecting the world. More so then just people being into comas, but nuclear power plants malfunctioning? Damn, things were really fucked up and I thought that was really cool. Not that I want millions of people o die from nuclear meltdowns, but it made things much more series and the stacks much higher.

Yata begins his wakening as an Epitpah user, making all of the phases awakened and moving Ovan onto the next phase of his plan.

Summary:

• Haseo logs in and meets Pi at the Serpent of Lore. She says she’s gained control of the admin rights for G.U. since the higher ups were all up in arms about what to do following Sakaki’s event. She says she’s got a fix on Yata’s signal, and pulls him up on screen.
• On the screen Yata is on the ground screaming, and soon Avatar symbols appear around him. Everyone is shocked and Haseo guesses that Yata is the final epitaphs user (no shit genius) Pi tells Haseo to come with her, and runs off to the dungeon where Yata is.
• Haseo and Pi eventually get to Yata. They find him on the ground, saying that he alone understands the world, so why… Yata then explodes in power and summons the avatar Fidchell the Prophet.
• Haseo defeats Fidchell and when he does, Yata appears in front of it. He says something about, “The aberrant key, borne in they left arm. The Key of Twilight, borne in they right arm. The final wave, the surge of rebirth… shall become light and fill the world. Thou shalt lead the new gods to their twilight. Thou destroyest and createst, thou powerless one… As the stirring footsteps of a giant shadow sound. Oh blessed be the little ones…
• Yata returns to the other plane and wakes up. Pi runs to his side and Yata says how pitiful he is. He who lobes and knows the most about the world, has his feelings rejected. He asks why he must be alone. Pi slaps him and says he isn’t loved because he doesn’t accept the love of others. He has to accept being treated kindly by others. Yata says he doesn’t need that, what he wants is to be recognized. Recognized by the world. Pi says if he wants to be recognized, he has to regard the feelings of others. She says he isn’t’ in this world alone.
• When Haseo logs out we see a scene of Ovan back in the room with Aina. He says how all the users have awakened. He is then shocked when he sees Aina is missing.
• Haseo logs off. In some of the message boards there’s talk of a rumor of an area called “paradise” people say it was a place in the old game called Net Slum ruled over by the queen, Helba, a hacked PC.
• Haseo gets some emails form Pi saying Yata is reinstated as the leader of G.U. Yata says that all epitaph users have awakened, partially due to Ovan’s plans, which now means he must have moved onto the next stage whatever that is.
• Yata tells Haseo of his past before Haseo met Ovan. He was once a player in the old game and was an information broker, and was even a bit of a hacker. As fellow hackers, he and Ovan had something in common. He respected and admired Ovan. At some point he changed, he started ragging that bizarre arm around and wandered though areas, and even set up the Twilight brigade to search for the Key of Twilight. He doesn’t know why he changed or much about AIDA, but there’s some reason driving his actions. Haseo also receives an email from Saku saying how it doesn’t matter what Bo says, she’s not needed.
• Haseo gets an email from Pi saying she’s detected AIDA in one of the towns. Haseo logs in and we see a scene of Sakubo, Bo, in an ally getting lost. All of a sudden Aina appears before him. Sakubo seems to recognize her, saying that she’s Aina, and Aina responds knowing he’s Sakubo. Sakubo asks if she wants to play with him, and we see some AIDA emanating from Aina’s legs. Haseo meets up with Pi and heads to the AIDA signature she’s detected. Haseo and Pi see Sakubo and Aina, and a large cloud of AIDA. Then they disappear and Haseo and Pi head after them though Area Hacking.
• Haseo doesn’t find them in the Outer Dungeon and logs off where he sees a post about a ghost girl, describing Aina who was with Sakubo. Pi contacts Haseo and tells him to meet with the poster who spotted the girl to try and get more information.
• Haseo eventually finds out where Aina was reported via Piros. After going though another outer dungeon he finds Sakubo and Aina. Aina says some things like hatred, sadness, joy, and sorrow. She asks how Sakubo is one, while also being two. She says it’s mysterious, and then vanishes, so Haseo logs out.
• Haseo eventually gets an email form Yata saying that they have something about the prophecy Yata blurted out. When Haseo logs in we see a scene of Ovan wondering where Aina went. There is a flashback to the two of them in that white room, without the Sign and broken scattered books. Ovan is reading to Aina and Aina asks when they meet again, if Ovan can read to her, she promises to get better. All of a sudden ADA appears and they both don’t know hat it is. It attacks Aina but Ovan jumps in the way and his arm is infected. He screams in pain and AIDA fills him. Aina calls Ovan’s name in concern and Ovan turns to her and we see a Sign appear and Aina screams.
• Back past the flashback Ovan sees Aina behind him. Ovan wonders what’s wrong, asking if AIDA did anything to her. ADA appears around her and Ovan turns to his arm. He says damn you, not only did it make Aina unconscious. He asks if it is going to steal everything from him. Ovan says there’s no more time. The last resort….No, I guess this was the only resort right from the start.
• Yata and Pi tell Haseo and the others they’ve figured something out about the prophecy. Pi says it seems odd, its seems to be referring to one specific person. Haseo figures out its Ovan. Soon, the monitors in the Serpent of Lore go haywire and Ovan’s image comes though, telling them all to meet him somewhere.
• Haseo goes though the dungeons and after a lot of warping, comes to the white room where the books and Aina are. Ovan is there and says that this is the creators room, a part of the black box left in the world by its great creator. Ovan makes a book appear and says, “Here lies the divine stores of this world.” Yata asks if that’s the Epitaph of Twilight. Haseo says enough talk, and asks Ovan if there’s a way to bring back the lost ones (Um, I thought he said no more talk)
• Ovan says that something about changing things is easy but bring back to normal isn’t. He uses an example of milk and tea and that you can’t separate them. Then he says that when Haseo destroyed the AIDA server, those in it who lost consciousness came back. Therefore if he could remove the AIDA there’s a chance Shino will come back. He unleashes his arm saying for Haseo to defeat him, for if he does there’s a chance that Shino and the others may come back.
• Haseo eventually defeats Ovan, and as he is hunched over, out of breath, He says this is the Rebirth. Yata asks if he just intended to use The Terror of Death to Trigger The Rebirth. Yata and the others are teleported out of the area, leaving Haseo. Ovan says Yata’s guesses are so close, yet so far.
• Haseo asks why Ovan did all of this. Ovan says it was all to save his little sister, Aina. She was a Lost One, probably the first. Ovan says The Rebirth is safety device, a fail safe really, left behind by the creator of “The World” However, only the fully awakened Terror of Death is capable of activating it. Ovan says he will spread Rebirth throughout the entire network. Ovan says AIDA is throughout the whole network. It’s a gamble, but his only choice.
• Haseo gets upset as to why Ovan didn’t tell him and trust him. Ovan says he did. That’s why he chose him, protected him, and guided him. Haseo then gets mad at him for all the pain he’s caused everyone just so he could serve his dream, all the people who suffered because of him. Ovan says that everyone’s dream is special. Ovan tells Haseo that he has found the Key of the Twilight. He says that is the sign he is at the truth. For Ovan, the 8 epitaph users for him were the Key of the Twilight. He says just as there are many truths that can exist for any one reality, there are as many keys as there are thoughts for the world.
• Haseo asks what exactly the Key of Twilight is then. Ovan says perhaps it’s like a bluebird. Aina comes down in front of Ovan. Ovan slumbers over to her and hugs her, saying he can hear it. The sound of the Rebirth awakening.
• All of a sudden there is a bright flash of light as Ovan is holding onto Aina. His arm starts to glow and cracks come down it all the way and to part of his face, glowing. Ovan yells to Aina to wake up, now is the time for her to recover. AIDA then comes out of her body, and she seems to get better. Then power and light fly all over the place, seeming to distinguish a large cloud of AIDA that is in the air. Then, all of a sudden things shut down.

Impressions:

Wow…..Wow…. That scene there with Ovan and Aina after the fight was incredible. Hell, it’s probably one of the most important events and scenes in the entire G.U. story. I’m sure almost everything else to come will kind of be the repercussions of this. It was just great to see. However, even though so much happened, for the most part I have no idea what the fuck just happened. I can kind of guess that AIDA is gone form Ovan and that the Rebirth purged AIDA from everything causing massive shutdown of the internet and making the game god. I get that. However, there are still a lot of things left to be found out such as the situation of Aina and Ovan and… Well, come on, it’s not over yet.

I was really glad that they touched on Yata’s character more. They really did make him much much more interesting with the whole bit saying how he is all alone and isn’t’ loved. I almost felt something form Pi like she had feelings for him or something. At least she cares for him at least in a non romantic way. It was still cool to see him get some character development. He’s been a relatively untouched on person, and this made his character a lot more human and interesting, ad his drive for everything was one of the most interesting I’ve seen. Having so much confidence in something and then kind of going crazy from loosing his place and feeling unimportant because of his control over the Avatar. Everything just really fit together perfectly I thought and made him a great character.

Fidchell’s prophecy was certainly interesting. It was cool enough and important and cryptic like for me to put it up as my new quote displaying on my site. I’m sure that pretty much addresses the entire story of this volume and what’s to come, although some of it will likely no make sense at all until it happens. Still, it was kind of neat. What I thought was interesting was it does kind of fit my theory of Ovan being Kite. After all, saying the Key of Twilight was in his right arm fit because Kite’s bracelet was on his right arm.

Fidchell was certainly very cool looking. What surprised me a lot about it though was how much it looked like Yata. I mean, for the most part most of the Epitaphs don’t look that much like their users. Some of them resemble them in a bit, but no where near the amount Fidchell resembled Yata. It seemed as if he had a head with short white hair just like Yata and his design made it look like he had cloths in the same fashion as Yata as well. Not that it matters, I just found it weird.

I was a bit surprised at the encounter between Sakubo and Aina. I mean, it wasn’t really too far off for the two of them to meet like they did, especially considering Aina was already joust n the loose. However, for as far as I could tell, they knew each other. At least hey recognized each other, which was rather odd I thought. Hell, I could even perhaps buy that Aina new Sakubo considering she’s a bit different and special; Ovan could have told her stuff about the Epitaph users. However, for Sakubo to just see Aina and recognize her was just odd. And they haven’t even really explained that yet either. They’ve pretty much left it unexplained, and I’m guessing they will for the most part. It’s such an odd thing to have be confusing, as it doesn’t really affect anything else, its just odd.

Haseo makes his way to the title match in the arena, facing off against Taihaku and Sakaki who is pulling all the strings.

Summary:

• After another random fight, Haseo goes to the arena to fight against the Hetero Trio. He eventually wins the fight, but near the end Hetero begins to be consumed by AIDA. Sakaki says that it must not have been enough, and feeds more AIDA into them causing a large AIDA creature to emerge. Haseo says that he will use Skeith, he doesn’t care about Sakaki, and he’ll use it whenever he damn well pleases. Haseo defeats Hetero and the match is over.
• Haseo does yet another random quest before his next match, after the quest, done with Atoli, Haseo thinks to himself that Atoli is really cute, and wonders when she changes so much. He then thinks however that he may be the one to change, and decides he must protect Atoli. Haseo gets an email informing him of the title match against Taihaku.
• Haseo fights against Taihaku, who has incredible power with the infected sword. Near the end of the fight when Taihaku starts to loose Sakaki tells him to give the sword more hate and he can’t loose. Taihaku says he never had any interest in being emperor; it’s just that this sword was so beautiful. Kuhn shoots the sword out of Taihaku’s hands and it goes flying up. Haseo jumps up and attacks it, breaking it into pieces, releasing Taihaku from its grips.
• However, the sword fragments soon turn into AIDA that swarms and strikes Haseo and swarms around in the sky around him. Haseo reels with pain as avatar symbols around him start blinking. Then, Haseo’s eyes turn black and he starts to glow, screaming in power and pain. He soon gains hold of himself though and repeals the AIDA, falling back down to the ground.
• Sakaki jumps into the arena, saying Taihaku was worthless. Haseo remains kneeling, panting from his encounter and when Atoli and Kuhn go to defend him, Sakai teleports them away. He says he will finish him off himself, and holds this sword above him. All of a sudden he stops as a blade plunges though his chest. Endrance is behind him, delivering the blow and Sakaki falls to his knees.
• Endrance says he was looking for a chance to get him, Sakaki asking if he’d been planning to betray him all along. Endrance just says of course, he’d never leave Haseo. Sakubo gets startled, not being in on it and asks what about her then, and teleports away.
• Sakaki gasps in pain on the ground and all of as sudden explodes in power and AIDA, transforming into a large AIDA creature. Sakaki says this power is wonderful, he is the god of the world, and then says some more stuff about how he’s great and will destroy others.
• Haseo says he’ll defeat Sakaki once and for all, and tries to summon his avatar, but falls to his knees saying he’s still got too much damage. Atoli’s voice comes though saying his name, and Kuhn’s does as well. They say to not forget about them, they are there with him. Then Kuhn, Endrance, and Atoli all say they are right here with him, and Haseo summons Skeith.
• Haseo defeats Sakaki, Sakaki being in complete disbelief that he lost, and falls to the darkness of the plane. The arena guy isn’t sure how to call it, but announces Haseo the winner. Kuhn tells Haseo that he got a message form Pi; she’s found Yata and is at the Raven home.
• We see Sakaki in an outer dungeon, on the ground. Ovan appears and Sakaki says he did exactly as he asked; he followed his script, and begs Ovan for a seed of AIDA. Ovan just turns away and says it looks like they are here, Sakaki’s grim reapers. Ovan disappears and soon after the three azure knights appear and kill Sakaki.
• Haseo gets an email from Ovan saying how it was him who was pulling all the strings, who gave Sakaki the AIDA and told them who to use them, as well as the strategy for manipulating CC Corp, he says he’s pleased to see how much he’s grown. Haseo also gets a bunch of emails congratulating him, and one from Taihaku telling him to meet him at Icolo.
• Haseo meets with Taihaku and Taihaku shows him the Sage Room, which now belongs to Haseo, as he’s the emperor. Taihaku asks, “When you loose a passion that was too intense, how do you fill the void of powerlessness it leaves behind?” Haseo sys he’s not sure, back then, remembering to the Twilight Brigade, he just ran and didn’t fill the void with anything. However, he says he thinks he’s a lot better now, and leaves after some more random chat. Taihaku asks Haseo kind of to himself, “What did the forest of Pain teach you about life”
• Haseo gets a message from Saku telling him to meet her. Haseo meets up and Saku says she’s saying goodbye. Haseo ask if she’s quitting the world and Saku says that’s one way of putting it. She says not to worry; Bo will still play so they won’t be short on epitaph users. When Haseo asks why, Saku says it’s because her job is done. Her body only exists here in the world, and her mind only exists inside of Bo.  Haseo figures out that Saku isn’t really Bo’s twin sister, but another personality living inside Bo. Saku says Bo is a crybaby, in the real world and in game. She was born to protect Bo, but now Haseo is doing that, same with Atoli and Kuhn. Saku asks Haseo to take care of Bo for her, he may be a crybaby but he’s a good kid. Haseo says to wait, that Saku should stay. Saku says she was never supposed to exist, and isn’t’ needed. She says as long as Endrance and Bo have Haseo, there’s no reason for her. She says there’s no one in the world that’d be sad if she wasn’t here. Haseo tries to stop her but Saku just yells how no one would miss her, and she’s not listening to what Haseo says, and runs away. Haseo soon gets an email form Bo saying how Saku’s said she’s leaving and he thinks it’s his fault. Bo asks Haseo t to stop her; he doesn’t want her to go away.
• Haseo gets an email from Pi saying that she took her eyes of Yata for a second and now he’s gone in the real world, and asks Haseo to assemble at Raven.
• We see a seen of Yata in the game in some dungeon, being approached by Ovan. Yata says that Ovan was the one to pull the strings behind Sakaki, he ask why he would do something such as take away his place in G.U. Ovan says it was in order to move the clock forward. Yata asks if his plan is to awaken the eight epitaph users. Ovan says that’s one step, but the great concern for his plans is him, Yata. Yata gets mad asking if it’s because his avatar hasn’t awakened, only him out of the eight epitaph users. Ovan says he’s a stuck up know it all boy. Yata gets mad saying he’s better then everyone, he says he’s better then Haseo. Ovan tells him to face facts but Yata keeps insisting that he’s the most dedicated player, he loves the game. Ovan says what he loves, is Aura. Yata says he even pains for AIDA, the gods that came for this world, but they didn’t return his feelings. Yata gets furious saying that they picked Ovan. He says Ovan was blessed by Aura and AIDA; he awaked and held AIDA inside his body. Yata keeps screaming no, and then just screams out.

Impressions:

Wow, that was amazing. The confrontation between Yata and Ovan was just amazing.  It had a lot of importance behind it, and was just fascinating to se for Yata’s character himself. To see that kind of passion from him, he went almost mad but not entirely in an evil way either. It wasn’t just an important scene for the talk of Aura and AIDA, but I was almost just as amazed about just Yata himself. I hope he continues to get some character development, as his character is more interesting then I ever thought it would become. Of course, the scene also had some great talk about Aura and AIDA. I was surprised and kind of on the edge of my seat when Ovan said that what Yata loved was not the world, but Aura. These scenes are what makes this game as interesting s it is.

I was also just amazed and shocked at the whole Sakubo thing. Honestly, I had already been kind of spoiled to the overall fact that Sakubo was one person, Bo, with multiple personality disorder. However, I didn’t think that they would make anywhere near this big of a deal about it or have effectively drama about it. I’m now really interested in what is going to happen. I didn’t think it would be a big deal at all when the truth was announced. Hell, just thinking about it before seeing the scene in this part, I would have thought that it would be better for Bo as a person to have only one personality, but now essentially really want Saku to come back because I feel sorry for Bo and Saku both and the whole issue of being needed and so forth.

I was a bit surprised and kind of glad when Haseo actually thought to himself that Atoli was cute. Really I don’t think it’s a bad choice for Haseo to end up with Atoli, and she’s kind of becoming my number one pick just because she isn’t really that annoying, she is always there for Haseo and has a strong heart. Anyways, when Haseo thought she was cute I thought it was great, as it made the actual story hint at the romance and not make it JUST the wedding thing thrown in at the end.

I was a bit disappointed with the scene where Haseo summoned Skeith using the help of everyone else. I was really looking forward to that scene because of seeing it in the trailer, it seemed like it would have a much bigger importance to it, but it wasn’t anything special really. It wasn’t for one of the final fights, and Skeith was just he same. I guess we’ll just have to wait for Xth form to see the white Skeith.

Taihaku did turn out to e an interesting character. I was hoping his character would get a bit of focus other then just being defeated. I thought his whole speech about filling the void in his life was interesting. I still think he’s Balmung, and that would really fit with his little speech. He talked about losing something, a passion. I really hope they expand a little bit on him, but don’t’ have too much hope for it. At least they had some of it though.

Haseo fights against Sakaki’s plans as he tries to manipulate the arena and everyone’s emotions towards Haseo’s fight, all trying to get closer to taking Sakaki out of power and defeating Taihaku.

Summary:

• Haseo registers for the tournament so he can stop Sakaki from spreading AIDA sees throughout the world. While registering he runs into Matsu and Anteras who both are entering the tournament, Matsu because of his past as a PKer and to Anteras’s guess, because of his history with the arena. Haseo gets upset at them both because this is all a ply by Sakaki but they are falling into his hands. They don’t seem to have a problem with it and Haseo wonders if anything strange is going on involving them.
• Haseo meets up with Kuhn, Atoli, Sakubo, and Endrance in order to decide the team for the tournament. Sakubo and Endrance come together, late and almost immediate Endrance says that he won’t be participating, and leaves soon to be followed by Sakubo. Kuhn wonders what is going on, seeing as how Endrance is all over Haseo usually, so it just leaves Atoli, Kuhn, and Haseo for the tournament, Atoli with what is revealed to be a full awakened Avatar.
• After doing some random quest with Matsu, Haseo heads for the first match of the tournament. There Sakai stands before the crowd, who seems skeptical that Sakaki, the guy who preached about PK’ing being bad is running a PK tournament. Haseo fights in five rounds against PKers he’s encountered before, and wins. Sakaki just laughs and says that it won’t be over soon, that he’ll see him in the second match. Atoli mentions during the fight that she hears the AIDA noise from the entire arena, that he Sakaki has effectively turned the arena into an AIDA server.
• Haseo and Atoli are talking after the fight, Atoli saying that Anteras and Matsu won their fights. Kuhn then comes running up saying there’s something wrong, it’s Sirius. Haseo runs to the arena to see Sirius in the fighting ring, defeated. He was defeated by the Hetero Trio. Haseo looks to Sakaki and he says how AIDA has increased the emotions that drive the players, such as Matsu and Anteras. However he gave AIDA power to this Hetero Trio and rants about how the petty human emotions couldn’t defeat AIDA. Haseo screams and Sakaki laughs and they leave. Kuhn says there’s nothing they can really do now, and they wait for Sakaki’s next move.
• Haseo gets an email from Pi informing him that Sirius has become a lost one, due to Atoli’s observation that the AIDA noise she hears is coming from the arena, meaning that it is an AIDA server so anyone killed there has the potential to become a lost one.
• Haseo also gets an email from Kaede, asking him to meet her and Zelkova somewhere. They head there with Pi as requested. They strat to say something about Sakaki, and how the PK tournament is troubling them but Haseo says how it’s too dangerous for them to get involved. Zelkova just says fine. However he then tells Pi that her Area Hacking programs are quite interesting and asks if she’s seen anything besides AIDA in the Outer Dungeons, the areas reached by Area Hacking. Pi is kind of shocked and Haseo answers no.
• Zelkova then leaves and Pi seems troubled. Haseo asks what’s wrong and Pi says she came here because of an email from Zelkova, one on her private cell phone asking about something beside AIDA and the Outer Dungeons. The two of them wonder what it is he is looking for.
• Haseo logs out and gets an email from Zelkova thanking Haseo from coming. He says he’ll give him some advice to stop Sakaki. He says that Sakaki has his position in G.U. because of his control over AIDA. Without that he is a normal player. He says Sakaki knows this and that’s why he placed himself in such tight security within the Serpent of Lore. If Haseo can data drain the AIDA from him then he’ll be a normal player, and he says his chance to do this is in the arena.
• Haseo wonders how Zelkova knows this and gets an email from Pi wondering the same thing. She tells him all the information she knows on Yata. She says that when AIDA appeared CC Corp was unsure of what to do so they hired a player who played the first version of the game who used to be a hacker. He was an information analysis broker and a member of the .hackers. They hired him to figure AIDA out, and that’s all she knows. Haseo then gets notice of the second round of the tournament.
• We see a scene of Taihaku in his chambers. Sakubo approaches him and says that they have something to tell him, and calls over Endrance. Endrance approaches Taihaku…
• Haseo begins his next fight in the tournament against the two players who PK’d him when he first started playing the game.  He finds out that they are still hunting beginners just for fun and kind of snaps, saying how he will destroy them. Haseo gets a real evil look in his eyes and kind of yells how he will tear them into pieces and carve the fear of the “terror of Death” into their mind. Kuhn and Atoli are startled and concerned. He nears the end of the fight and stands before them. Sakaki encourages him to kill them to use his avatar, to give in to the hate (Come to the dark side) but Haseo stops and says that he won’t go back to being the Terror of Death, and the match ends with Sakaki disappointed.
• There are reports in the news section about official announcement of the discovery of the virus called AIDA that has affected computer programs and online games, describing it as a virus that can rewrite data and so forth. There is talk on the message boards about if this is what the black dots in the game are.
• Haseo then gets an email from Matsu, telling him he’s lost to Anteras.
• After a random quest with Kuhn, Haseo gets an email informing him of his next match in the arena against Anteras. He gets another email from Pi saying that form her investigation, Sakaki suggested to CC Corp that IDA has a strong interest it the arena, giving Endrance and Sirius as examples. Pi wonders if he’s really the one behind this all, as he’s just a normal player. Pi says she suspects a larger plot here.
• Haseo fights in the arena against Anteras, winning. However after the match is over Sakaki says that Anteras threw the match so Haseo could win and everyone in the crowd is in an uproar. Sakaki says that Haseo entered the tournament with a hacked PC and shows videos of Haseo using Skeith in the other arena fights to the crowd, and they are all in chaos over this. He then says he has more charges against Haseo, and says how they are members of an organization of hacked PCS who are the cause of the phenomena around the game, G.U.
• The entire crowd boos at them and yells in anger. Atoli starts to loose it, saying she can hear their malice, and AIDA’s response. Sakai asks the crowd if Haseo is guilty or innocent. They all yell he is guilty, and Sakaki says he sees. He disqualifies Haseo from the arena, and banishes him from the world. Saki says that Haseo’s morals mean nothing now, all he’s worked for is gone. He will be remembered in the history of the world as a horrible cheater.
• All of a sudden Taihaku appears, along with Endrance and Sakubo at his side. Haseo asks what they are doing and Sakubo says they don’t have to do what Haseo says. Sakaki says that hey have rightly chosen to side themselves with him, and Haseo is at a loss for words. Taihaku asks Sakaki to repeal the disqualification so Taihaku may defeat him himself, and Sakai agrees, but laughs saying his masterpiece the Hetero trio are his next opponents and he doesn’t stand a chance.

Impressions:

Wow… I was really rather shocked and on the edge of my seat at the final arena fight. Not for the fight, but of course the events that came right after it. I didn’t think that Sakaki would expose like Haseo like that. I feel so bad for Haseo now that everyone pretty much hates him and thinks he’s a cheater. I just want Sakaki to die, god, that was terrible how he just turned everyone against him. Then later on the message boards everyone was saying how disappointed they were in Haseo and how much his actions disgust them. GOD DAMN SAKAKI!

Although I was sure already that Yata was Wiseman I thought it was just amazing, and really kind of freaked out when they actually more or less stated that. In Pi’s email she pointed directly to Yata being Wiseman, actually saying that he was a member of the hackers and served as an information broker/analyzer which is what he was when Kite met up with him.

I’m also a bit more sure of myself now that Zelkova is Helba. He’s almost got to be. After all, he knows way more then he should for a non epitaph user and was really interested in hacking and knew a lot about it. It just fits perfectly.

All of the real life reports of AIDA were a bit unexpected. The fact that there were news reports about AIDA being an official virus according to most people was odd. I wasn’t quite sure how much of the outside world would be dragged into everything that was happening, but if AIDA is big enough of a problem now that the real life world has been let know about it, some things should happen soon.

I thought it was pretty funny and cleaver when on one of the message boards, someone was objecting to the PK tournament and the stat of CC Corp. They said something along the lings of CC Corp losing it and it’s like its being run by some 10 year old. Of course, Sakaki is kind of running CC Corp and he is 10 years old, so it really is being run by a 10 year old, I just thought that little bit was funny.

I thought it was really….odd, and just pure bizarre how they had dancing grunties. Not much more to say about that, it was just really weird.

I was a bit surprised by Sirius becoming a coma victim. He almost didn’t seem important enough to be someone who would go into a coma. After all, especially after Vol. 2 his part in the game was almost done I thought. It was cool to see him be concerned and kind of push you to do things, but him becoming a coma victim was a bit of a surprise, but really won’t change much.

Haseo finds out that because of the way thing shave been going, Yata has disappeared everywhere and replaced by Sakaki, who has signed a contract with CC Corp to control all of the AIDA and the game as opposed to the plan to eradicate it.

Summary:

• We see a shot of a large white room with books all around and a bit Tri Edge mark around a broken piece of ground, with a girl sitting in a rocking chair with long white hair.
• We go to a flashback the girl and Ovan in the cathedral. The girl’s name is Aina and she asks Ovan if when she gets better she can live with him and be with him like they are now in the world. Ovan then tells her about the statue of a goddess that used to be in the cathedral.
• Ovan says her name as we come to a shot of him alone in the room before, holding The Book of Twilight (The book Aura gave Kite to give him his bracelet) He says things about the Key of the Twilight, Ultimate A.I., The Morganna Factor, and Harold Howerwick. He looks up at Aina on a chair on a floating platform asking what song they shall play today.
• Ovan talks to Aina, and kind of himself, saying that the Epitaphs data drain could not remove AIDA from her. The wound was too deep and the treatment too late. All of a sudden Ovan keels over and Aida starts to spread and infect him more. He yells in pain for someone to shut up, saying how they dare lay hands on his Aina. Ovan then seems to talk in a different voice saying that that is right, he is the one who made his sister Aina, a lost one.
• Ovan says there is no more time, that he will…and stops himself, looking at the book and saying the Epitaph of Twilight.
• We then see Haseo alone on the battlefield where he fought Sakaki. He stands looking at the Tri Edge symbol, yelling to himself how it was Ovan all along. That he was the one who hurt Shino, and he’s been manipulating him. He asks what it is Ovan wants, what he is planning.
• Yata is looking at some monitors asking why Ovan didn’t ask for CC Corp or his help if AIDA was inside him. He’s put the World in danger and its possible AIDA has spread to the outside world, which would cause panic and disaster. All of a sudden things shut down. A voice says that Yata’s access to the Serpent of Lore has been terminated, and administrators teleport in around him.
• There are several news reports of many things in the real world malfunctioning. And there are several reports on the forums about “black dots” obviously being AIDA appearing a lot.
• In the new Online Jack: Salvador has recovered and leaves the hospital, mentioning how some of the elementary school children are still missing and says that he will figure out the truth of what’s happening. They visit some doctor that I guess was shown before and he says he’ll help them.
• Haseo gets an emergency email form Pi telling her to meet her in Raven’s home. He goes there with the other epitaph users and Pi tells them how Yata has gone missing, in the game and real life. All of a sudden the Serpent of Lore powers up and when they go there to see what is going on, Sakai appears in the pedestal Yata always was in. He says how he has surpassed the system and fused with AIDA, that he is unstoppable. He says that he has signed a contract with CC Corp and is now the new leader of G.U. He shows Yata’s PC body on the ground and starts kicking it saying how he was worthless, and how he will not be coming back.  He says any action against him will be seen as action against CC Corp as he signed a contract with them. He orders everyone around but they refuse and leave, Sakaki saying that is what he expected and starts to laugh.
• After some unimportant quest with Silabus and Gaspard, Haseo gets another email form Pi asking to meet somewhere. The go somewhere and use some area hacking to get to a special area where Sakaki won’t be able to monitor them. They just say how they will get though this. Pi will search for Yata in real life and the others will do random things. The jist is that Sakaki’s is completely in control of the world now.
• Haseo gets an email announcing the Sage Palace tournament being a PK tournament, where the towns become PK’able and the tournament is messed up. A message form Taihaku make shim sound evil saying let the weak bow before his blade. He then gets an email from Sirius asking to meet him somewhere to discuss this.
• He sees that Lumina Cloth town has become a PK free for all. He meets up with Sirius and he says he wants to show him something at the tournament title match. They go there and watch a fight between a group and Taihaku. Taihaku easily defeats them, showing that his sword is infected with AIDA. He then rises it up after winning and AIDA swarms around it and in a large cloud of it there is some odd face and the AIDA speaks, “Feed me more”
• Sirius says he doesn’t want to see Taihaku end up like Alkaid. Haseo says that he will save him, both Taihaku and Alkaid. He figures out that there is only one person who could have changed the system and made the Tournament rules different t and is in control of AIDA… He soon gets an email form Sakaki confirming that it was him who instigated this all. Sakai says that if Haseo doesn’t enter the tournament he will spread AIDA throughout the world, causing countless Lost Ones, and if Haseo looses the tournament he will have to pledge his allegiance to him.

Impressions:

Wow, I was amazed at the Book of Twilight thing. I was just in shock from seeing it. I wasn’t expecting it to really appear, as there are so many ways to make so many things happen, I didn’t think it was necessarily, but I am glad it was there. Of course for those who don’t know, The Book of Twilight, the book that Ovan was holding in his hands when he was in the room with Aina is the book that Aura tries to give to Orca but then end sup giving it to Kite, the thing that makes his player data special and gives him the bracelet. I’m not sure what kind of purpose it will hold in G.U. though, if really any. After all, the main characters already have a means of being special from the fact that they are the Epitaph users, they don’t need something to give them power and its highly unlikely that they would give anything to a new random person. Even if it doesn’t end up having an important role, it was really cool to see it. It also kind of fits with my theory that Ovan is Kite. (Theory, I don’t know for sure I haven’t spoiled myself on Vol. 3 and DON’T tell me if I’m right)

I really do feel really bad about my theories on what is going to happen. I had guessed that Ovan was going to die somehow, and I feel really bad now because of Aina. She looked so cute and innocent when she was standing with Ovan, asking if once she gets better if she can finally live with her big brother and see him. My god, it’s going to b horrible if indeed it turns out he dies and she can’t be with him.

I did find the whole Sakaki taking over G.U. thing really interesting. I really wasn’t expecting him to have quite that kind of role. I had guessed that he would come back, after all he was a cool bad guy and just being defeated and done with when you fought him in the previous volume wouldn’t really have gave him justice, but taking over G.U. in an official way such as he really was replacing Yata was just…wow…. It will certainly be interesting to see how they get around him technically working for CC Corp. He’s got to be defeated but it won’t be as direct, which will be fun to see.

Taihaku and the whole tournament thing was pretty interesting. I knew Taihaku had some rather big part in this volume but I’m glad to see that it is pretty interesting. I would have been a bit disappointed if the tournament where you fight him was just like the one with Sirius. Although the situation is roughly the same, the changes to the tournament will make things just more interesting in general.