Ground Zero (disambiguation)

In my experience all the best introductions begin with a tenuous link to Ancient Greek philosophy, so:
Just as Plato's 'soul of the philosopher' inevitably escapes the arduous cycle of birth and death, so too have I broken free from the chains of compulsory education at long last. Thusly, in my great beneficence, I have decided to share my thoughts on a variety of things with the world at large (or at least those few individuals who stumble upon this humble blog). Without any more delay then, and certainly with no further ado, I'd like to welcome anyone who has found their way here and talk a little bit about myself and what I aim to do with this blog.


As I mentioned previously I am now out of the hellish void known as 'school' and as such, at least until I receive the pending results of my exams, I carry not a care in the world. This leaves me with a rather large amount of spare time on my hands, as one may imagine, and so I've decided to corner-off this little portion of the internet with which I plan to discuss some of my hobbies, nay, passions with whomsoever cares to read about them. The foremost of these, and so what fill form the backbone of this here blog, are the worlds of anime and PC gaming.

It's hard to pin down exactly when I became infatuated with most things Japanese and all things anime. Having previously merely dipped my toes into the vast expanse with your classic shows popular in the West, i.e. Naruto and The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, some time around late 2009 I finally took the plunge and have been swimming happily ever since (not quite sure where I was going with this metaphor...). Although not what many would call a 'connoisseur' of anime (for various reasons which I will most likely detail in my first proper post) a significant portion of my life since that point has been devoted to streaming and downloading as many shows as possible; some good, some downright agonising to watch - by no means do I advocate most of what I've seen in that time - and some absolute jewels. I suppose it would make sense to list a couple of favourites so you can get a feel for the sort of thing I like, but as with my tastes in other things (particularly music) I wouldn't confine myself as being a fan of a particular genre. I will say, however, that Angel Beats is possibly the title-holder for my favourite anime of all time, and I foresee countless references to it in articles to come; flying in the face of irrelevancy I'm sure.

Stretching much further back than my anime fixation, though, are my gaming roots. Beginning with the SNES and early PC titles like the original Monkey Island paved the way for a rich and wholesome gaming lifestyle, or so I would like my parents to believe. Having arrived at this juncture in the intro post, it occurs to me that there is very little to say about PC gaming that's relevant to me myself aside from "I am a PC gamer", so I might have to leave it at that for now, admittedly lacking in eloquence. I look forward to making the inevitable posts about upcoming titles however, including Deus Ex 3, Skyrim, Mass Effect 3, Diablo 3 and many more for which I am waiting with eager anticipation.

So then, what can one expect out of this blog? Well I'll start out by saying that I personally don't find much point in episodic summaries (though they can be entertaining depending on the writing style), and I lack the journalistic flair for writing straight reviews, so most articles on the blog will likely fall under the category of 'editorials'. In this case, 'editorials' is merely a more articulate way of phrasing 'pieces which really don't tell you anything about their subject', as I prefer to analyse the issues raised by a particular show or the direction in which a particular game is steering the industry towards rather than giving an arbitrary score to something entirely subjective - there's nothing either informative or interesting about that. Also worth noting is that I'm not one for forward-planning, and so ideas for posts will be spontaneous, spur-of-the-moment kinds of things nine times out of ten - but that doesn't make them any less meaningful.....I hope. Aside from these articles which will form the bulk of my posts on here, I'll also be posting music that I like, random thoughts - either for discussion or things that just struck me, maybe some 'Top 5's (because who doesn't like a good list?) and maybe even some download links for other stuff I enjoy.

That about wraps this 0th post up then. Hope that's actually given a useful taste as to what's to come, and if not then the fact that I named this post after a Wikipedia link should tell you more than enough about my character here. Please feel free to leave comments - here, and on future entries - which I will most definitely read, and I will be more than happy to see feedback about how to better improve this space and maybe suggestions for topics to write about.

Cheers,
K