I personally reckon that Hirano having a tumour is a possibility and that this isn’t a troll for attention. This is not coming from any favourable disposition towards her, but rather of pragmatism.

If this case from her was proven false, she would lose everything that she holds dear. Her social standing as a model and as a TV personality would plummet as she insults all those who have to endure the real thing.

Despite her confession of ‘being alone most of the time’, she clearly enjoys the limelight and the attention. Why do you think she posts mundane to self-revealing topics via social networking? Do you think she would risk all that for a simple jab for insincere sympathy? Is she that petty to strike back at those who disdain her scorched-earth departure from seiyuu-land with a false statement that could potentially blow up in her face?

If she was stupid and/or desperate enough to do that, she deserves every bit of contempt that would erupt if her statement was proven false. My stance of indifference would slide to utter disrespect.

@Jamesowsall Good point on the fiery end on Hirano’s seiyuu career. She definitely could have ended it better. Let’s take Chiaki Takanashi: Gravure model, somewhat of an accomplished vocalist and the occasional seiyuu. Absolutely gorgeous with sex appeal (where Hirano has none) to boot.

To be fair, Hirano had a higher character profile, but that’s no real excuse. She could have taken a leaf out of Megumi Hayashibara’s book.

Some harem anime have some direction and end with a certain amount of closure for each of the cast. Kimikiss I thought was great at doing this, but then again, Kimikiss isn’t exactly your typical harem either.

Shuffle wanted to go with one route and they did, but it was important to flesh out all the characters with their own arcs. That wasn’t too bad either.

And with regards to the topic, the harem genre was more prevalent years back, but they’ve gone through a lot of changes. While yes, eroges/visual novels get their own show, popular light novels have their limelight too as it stands.

To be fair, Aya doesn't really deserve all the hate directed to her. Sure her presence as Haruhi and other roles accelerated her fame, but for a seiyuu she burnt out pretty quickly. I guess when she knew that she had a fanbase that weren't anime-centric otaku she tried to get out.

It would hard to think of how this would have ended happily. She could have chosen to jump ship without telling information about her private life, but something isn't quite right. Some seiyuu choose to fade out of public sphere, but Aya pretty much wanted the attention and/or the fame by choosing the TV career route. This is not helped when she releases albums wanting to be the Japanese Avril Lavigne with thousands of sales.

She was just one pretty face to an industry that caters to creepy otakus who either love or despise her. She's good, but really nothing of real value was lost. We still have Rie Tanaka, Miyuki Sawachiro and Maaya Sakamoto of which two have had longer careers. I won't be missing Hirano's voice any time in the future and won't be choking with nostalgia in her past roles.

It’s a fighter for sure, but for those who have incurred slight brain damage.

There is a plateau of fighting games with greater sophistication, balance and aesthetics. If SSB is anyway judged simply because its caters to the Nintendo fanboy, that’s hardly a good dimension to measure its worth by.

Remember the room which erupted with cheers when Daigo parried Ken’s Shinryuken in the SF Third Strike tournament? I can’t imagine that level of play in a SSB game, nor the level of excitement. I think tying the WiiMote to my dick and doing hip thrusts if I was surrounded in a harem might incur a better result.

Counter troll, huh?

Woman? What’s this woman you speak of? That thing in the kitchen that makes sandwiches which I hit to make it go faster?

MasterInfamous said:
I’m doing an essay on how the effects of porn aren’t detrimental and/or good to society. So you guys might as well say something.

[url]http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2010/s3030902.htm[/url]

Basically this professor of sociology goes on how porn is affecting how men think sex should be and that it promotes unhealthy attitudes to sexual conduct.

She raises a couple of good points, bit tends to exaggerate the impact it would have, not to mention that she doesn’t really state about what men think when they get older.

Personally, I think better education will help, but she seems to understated that people can disassociate real relationships with porn.

dirtypair said:

The feets are not farther away as the mouth but there is definitely difference if get a bj or a fj.

How should I put it? Fetishes primarily are objects or actions that have sexual arousal value to an individual, which is not usually found in general population. The key word is ‘sexual arousal’. Given that we are talking about feet here, we can safely assume that people find feet sexy and that it would be the equivalent or more than the sight of cleavage, shapely legs or a gorgeous face.

Since we are talking about fetishes here, merely the sight or the imagination of slender feet and delicate toes here would cause some to lead up to thoughts of sexual encounters centred on footjobs and such. Physiologically, blood would pump into the genital area.

However there is a need to separate the [i]idea[/i] from the [i]act[/i] itself. You see a character; she does something with her feet, like paint her toe nails. You get aroused by this enticing, normal procedure that she does everyday while she looks at you strangely. This is mainly thought processes, buffered by physiological reactions. It is your imagination got wild.

Now to the action: She is giving you a footjob and thus the friction + heat from the constant strokes simulate the act of sex itself. Naturally this is the BESTO situation one can have (it caters to your dream encounter), but it works mainly on the physiological ground and runs into nature’s course.

Now why I bring this when you there’s a difference between getting a footjob and a blowjob in terms of sensation; of course there’s a sensory difference. The tongue can provide what the toes can not and vice versa. But what’s important here is the whether the person has a fetish for the mouth or the feet.

The somatosensory cortex is only one of many explanation that’s based on the neurological makeup of the brain that highlights that certain areas can be fired by association or due to close proximity. It is no way the only explanation on why foot fetishes are so prevalent.

The Foot fetish actually is one of the most common fetishs. So much so that there has been an amount of research into it. There is one part of the brain (somatosensory cortex) which controls neuro-sensitivity in different areas in your body. So your hands have a huge area in that region as there are used all the time.

Now funnily enough the region for the genitals is awfully near the foot. This has lead speculation that this physiological reason is why the foot fetish is so common. In a number of individuals this might be the case, who knows. But it is lead to believe that the feet somehow activate areas in the genitals.

I was under the impression that the Malaysian Censorship board hits a lot of shit under the ban-hammer. Would you so kind to clarify this stance?

Rather than the country itself being conservative, would it be more accurate to suggest that it is ruled by officials who are by majority conservative who wish to impose their moral perspective on their citizens? Or the specific tailoring of the system to suit a population that is over 60% Muslim? For example while this may be old news, I believe that the opposition leader can not serve their political agendas due to ongoing sodomy charges.

Giving a “hahaha oh wow” is good fun and all, but a little more constructive feedback would be nice.

I concur with Envoy: those look like ‘good’ fakes. Looks like the pirates are getting smarter.

I’ve heard a lot of things about the Malaysian government being censor happy. Correct me if I am wrong, but I reckon it’s hard when a vast majority of the population are conservative, whether it be influenced by culture or religion.

@brningpyre
I use DirectX 9 and still get constant crashes. I gather that your rig uses a NVIDIA card? I’ve heard that ATI doesn’t get much love from Firaxis.

In all, it’s a lot of fun Civ 5. They’ve made it accessible, but with the absence of things like spies, there’re bits I miss from the old games. Still, the hexagon tiles make it really interesting to play.

Beats any Facebook game out there.

Got on Steam and my first playthrough was 10 hours.

Except one real problem with Civ 5 is that it crashes all the time. Loading your game? Crashes. Building some wonder? Crashes. Going to the toilet? Crashes.

Well except the last one, but until this is fixed, I can’t fully enjoy rampaging other nations, watching the Roman emperor in his throne with an expression of utter despondency.

Research, ho!

Some of my stuff. Just got Momohime and Yagyu Jubei fairly recently.

I feel for the Americans who found that the exclusive BlazBlue Continuum Shift Player Limited Edition isn't shipping to them locally.

To this I say: About goddamn time America follows suit to the rest of the damn world.

I play Noel as main, but am not very good at all. Still trying to unlock the story since it is quite an interesting take on Magitech.

@Kris

While I do like my HTC Desire, there are other phones that you should consider. For example, the Samsung Galaxy S has inbuilt mkv and avi support while the Desire does not. Assuming that you are an avid anime watcher and don’t mind watching Highschool of the Dead on the lonely bus/train ride home, I can’t stress how important you add that into your personal evaluations.

Yes, the Android Market does have apps that allow the viewing of mkv’s on your phones if it did NOT support it, but these aren’t really good as their rendering is pretty broken. m4v’s and mp4 run great though. The problem with that is that subs can be difficult to add.

Replying with my HTC Desire with Opera Mini version 5 with this message. Maybe you need to update?