Filler Posts

Anime REvisited: Dagashi Kashi Season One Episode Five Review!

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Hey guys! We’re back with another fun-filled review of Dagashi-Kashi from our Anime REvisited segment and pick of the month. This time we’re reviewing the fifth episode of the first season, as we close in on the half-way point of the first installment of the series. So what are Coconuts and the gang up to now? We’ll tell you in this review!

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Hotaru in all of her candy-lovin’ glory!

So for all of you guys who love vlogging, you might get a kick out of this episode. So in the first 45 second of the episode Yo and Hotaru make it look like there’s a drug deal going on between them, when we all know that it’s about another dagashi of the day. Thanks to Coconuts, that dagashi is none other than bottle ramen; a crispy wafer snack where the inside is filled with yummy powder – not the other kind you’re thinking of. Later on that same evening Yo is in his room making overnight snack videos on his blog, but his vlogging skills could use some serious work. The topic was about baby star ramen; as the crispy edges of ramen were packaged and given out to the employers during their shift, while the rest ended up being top ramen – kinda like the stuff we enjoy today.

Skipping ahead Hotaru finds herself back at the shop with Coconuts and To, as the three of them end up in another one of Hotaru’s crazy challenges. They proceed to do the yatta-men challenge where if you’re lucky, you’ll win a cash voucher that you get to cash in for more dagashi (and not money…unfortunately). Coco and To win at the challenge, but Hotaru ends up going through numerous packs of yatta-men and wins nothing; as she goes through a sad spell of not winning anything in life from any competition. Talk about being down in the dumps…

Lastly they have a final challenge where all three of them eat a piece of grape dagashi candy, but one of them is the really sour one. You can probably already guess who got the sour piece based on who issued the challenge. Hotaru said that if she lost, she would do anything the winner desires – anything! If anime has taught me anything, these high-stakes bets never, ever, EVER work in the favor of the challenger; especially if you’re the main character! Needless to say, Hotaru lost again, and left the shop without a trace; not even acknowledging the fact that she didn’t hold up her end of the deal with Coconuts and To. Sooo, that’s pretty much the episode in a nutshell.

For this episode and like the last few episodes, we learn tidbits about various dagashi and their origin story in Japan. Of course just like the last few episodes (other than the small moments of comic-relief), I didn’t expect too much coming out from them. Our next review will be on the sixth episode of the series, as we near the half-way mark of season one. Until next post guys n’ gals, stay safe during this pandemic, and stay nerdy! 😉

Anime REvisited: Dagashi Kashi Season One Episode Four Review!

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Here we are again! Hopefully you guys are doing okay in the midst of everything that’s going on, as we do our best to try and make you a little less stir crazy, with another Dagashi Kashi episode review via Anime REvisited. This time around we’re on episode four; as we continue to follow Coconuts and the rest of the gang in their affairs of Hotaru getting the former to take over Yo’s candy shop.

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What are they up to this time…?

In the past three episodes we’ve seen Hotaru going on a quest to get Coconuts to be the nest in line to run his father’s shop. In both episodes 1 and 2 he wanted to do everything in his power NOT to be the next in line to inherit his father’s legacy, but in the fourth episode we see Coconuts and Hotaru in yet another battle via dasashi, as she continues her onslaught in getting Coco to take on the family business. With Yo out doing who-knows-what Kokonotsu finds himself back at the shop and runs into (you guessed it) Hotaru – who happens to be blindfolded for some reason. She eventually goes on about a dagashi known as Fugashi; a special baked rice snack dipped in brown sugar with many different flavors, as Hotaru challenges Coconuts to a battle to see who can guess the most flavors of Fugashi.

After the battle ended in what I can assume is a draw (at least in my view), Hotaru and Coconuts are now outside the shop as the candy otaku pulls out two packs of caramel heart-shaped candy, with four pieces inside. Hotaru explains that each piece would allow you to run about 300 meters, and with Café Endo 1500 meters away (as well as the place where Coconuts left his manga sketch book) Hotaru and Coco dash off to the café. What started off as a competition turned into a footrace to retrieve Coco’s sketch book – praying that Saya doesn’t see it before he can retrieve it. By the time the two make it to where only 500 meters stands between them and that book, Kokonotsu realizes that there were only four pieces of candy – not five. Really, genius? Now ya tell me!

Luckily Hotaru was a little smarter than that as she tossed the last piece of candy to Coconuts so it’ll give him the energy he needed to make it to the café. He did make it to the café…about five seconds too late. As the sound of a screaming Coconuts was heard, Hotaru was happy that she got a toy watch that was at the bottom of the pack of candy. Yep, this was pretty much the whole episode in a nutshell. Usually when you see a pretty girl tied up and blindfolded one of two thoughts will pop up in your head; she’s either kidnapped and needs to be rescued, or she’s kinda kinky and likes S&M. Other than that there’s not much going on with this episode, but I plan on staying committed until I see the outcome of what Coconuts’ final decision will be. Will Hotaru’s influence convince him that running his dad’s shop is what he was born to do? Or will he stay true to the otaku in him and become a manga writer? I guess I’ll find out on our next review post.

Until next time guys, stay home, and stay nerdy! 😉

Anime REvisited: Dagashi Kashi Season One Episode Three Review!

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Welcome back to another installment of our super special anime review segment, Anime Revisited, as we review our pick; Dagashi Kashi! As we mentioned last week we’ll be reviewing the entire first season of the show episode by episode, and today we’re reviewing episode three. If you’re a big fan of ramen noodles then you just might like this episode!

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Time to hit the beach (sort of) – Dagashi style!

Usually with romantic-comedy anime there’s ALWAYS a beach episode, so going into episode three I didn’t think they were gonna pull it out so soon – but they did. However it wasn’t the beach episode that most anime fanboys would expect, instead I watched and found Coconuts, Saya, To, Yo, and Hotaru by the swimming pool in their shorts and one-piece swimsuits. Yo and Hotaru were planning something big, in hopes of getting Coconuts to take over the family shop. To do this they put dagashi candy at the bottom of the pool and made a game out of it, as Saya, To, and Coconuts had a little fun on a little scavenger hunt. Their plan almost worked except for one vital detail; no eating or drinking allowed in the pool, because it’s the law! Them just now realizing this made me smirk at their moment of non-common sense, because well, if you drop a KitKat or a Snickers bar in a pool…

You can make your own joke there.

As for the ramen noodles, the first 5-7 minutes of the episode was about a brief moment of history about Bate-mon (Pork bone noodles), and the many different flavors that it has. It did get a little steamy after Hotaru had her first bowl – manly because the AC in the shop was busted, which lead to mild fanservice in Hotaru’s case. Near the end of the episode Hotaru shows up in Saya’s café shop as the two have a little girl chat time, as she continues to call her ‘master’ due in part to how much she admires her thanks to her skills back in the second episode. So yeah, don’t get your hopes up if you’re expecting the beach episode to be a ‘beach episode’, cuz’ you’ll be in for disappointment. However if it’s any consolation, we do get a quick flashback snapshot of our candy-lovin’ girl in the buff as To walks in on her. (That fanservice is as good as it’s gonna get, so you’d better enjoy it.)

With only nine more episodes to review, we’re starting to see a little something more than just a childhood friendship between Coconuts and Saya. I’m guess as we get down the line a little more the actions or reactions between them will be justified. As for Hotaru, I can only assume that she and Yo will continue to try and get Coconuts to take over the shop. As for what To’s role is in all of this, he’ll just be the buddy-buddy comic relief guy who hangs out with Coconuts – cuz’ every rom-com anime protagonist has that ‘one’ friend. Well, that will do it with our third episode review of Dagashi Kashi, until next post, stay home and stay nerdy! 😉

Anime REvisited: Dagashi Kashi Season One Episode Two Review!

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Welcome back guys! Here we are again with another episodic review post of our Anime REvisited pick; Dagashi Kashi! This time around we’re reviewing episode two. Seeing as though we’re still fresh on the heels of meeting the cast (namely Hotaru), I assumed that there wasn’t going to be a whole lot going on this episode. Surely enough I was kinda right.

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Here we go! Another episode!

So the second episode kicks off with Coconuts telling a kid that he won another dagashi candy after eating the first one; which was a Kiniko powder candy stick. Not even 10 seconds later (which is about 30 in anime time) do we see Hotaru capturing the child and telling Coconuts that he stole a dagashi treat. Okay, kids…candy store…we get it! Afterwards Koko and Hotaru are pretty much inside the store, with the candy-lovin’ girl staying true to her mission into getting Coconuts to take over Yo’s shop – his dad. He then goes into a spell about what his dad may or may not be doing and saying that adulting is hard – which IT is! Between paying bills and having tons of responsibilities, Gen X and Boomers make it “seem” easy, but trust me, if you haven’t heard the words ‘Just wait until YOU have kids!’ then you got a helluva lot of ‘growing’ to do.

Millennials and Gen-Zers tend to have more mental and emotional stress triggers than older generations (cuz’ I’m a millennial and can attest to this) due to being under too much pressure from society’s view of us; especially if you don’t socially fit the ‘mold’, but that’s another post for another day.

Back to the shop! Hotaru and Coconuts began exploring with non-alcoholic beer called Nakami Beer, which comes in small tablets. Then suddenly gets drunk off her ass on it – which was a bit hysterical upon watching it all unfold. (Kudos to Tabitha Ray by the way!) Afterwards we transition to Koko and Saya on the bench with her asking him if he did his homework; replying that it wasn’t even on his mind. (Figures…) Aside from a brief history about Ramune candy in the shape of a Lifesaver, and a Japanese card game where you slam the cards on the ground to try and flip the cards next to it over, this is pretty much a slice-of-life episode. Like I said before, there’s not a whole lot going on in this episode other than Hotaru getting drunk and telling Coconuts to look at her chest. Don’t get excited guys, cuz’ he’s not hitting that anytime soon…I think.

Well that will do it for this review on the second episode of Dagashi Kashi. Since I’m already two down let’s see what the other ten episode will bring to the table! On that note stay safe, stay healthy, and stay nerdy! 😉

Anime REvisited: Dagashi Kashi Season One Episode One Review!

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Hey guys! So now begins our first full-length episodic review of our anime pick, Dagashi Kashi, to help kick off our Anime REvisited segment! This show (or at least the dub) came out in 2016, and it tells the story of a Dagashi candy shop owner in Japan named Yo (yes, that’s his actual name, don’t ask why), as he wants his son Kokonotsu (or Coconuts as his friends call him) to take over the family business. There’s just one issue with that; he’s an aspiring manga artist who wants nothing to do with his father’s business, but ironically has much better marketing knowledge in how to make a better profit in terms of selling candy. Sure, when it comes to owning a family business every parent wants their children to take over, but sometimes the children want to follow their own dreams. For Kokonotsu in this case, that dream comes in the form 2D big-chested beauties!

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Dagashi Kashi Season One Cast!

For the first episode Kokonotsu is in his room working on original manga art…that is until his father Yo asks him that he needs to have a talk with him. Yo tells Kokonotsu that it’s his turn to be the next owner of the Dagashi shop, unfortunately Coconuts comes from a group of individuals who are a part of a generation that likes to disappoint their parents (i.e. ‘Screw you, I’m doin’ my own thing!’ mentality). After their little spat Koko runs the shop while Yo’s away, but then he encounters our candy-lovin’ girl, Hotaru, and her absolute obsession with dagashi candy. Later on Yo comes back and just so happens to be familiar with Hotaru and her supreme knowledge of candy, that he instantly takes a liking to her; much to his son’s dismay. To our anime-lovin’ fellas out there, find you a girl who’s a bigger anime nerd than you are! Why? Because (and we’ve seen this from personal experience) they will defend their man and shoot down any bullies and haters on social media that say you’re anime is trash!

Back to the review; Coconuts (yeah, I’m gonna start calling him that now) finds himself at his best friend, To and Saya’s (To’s sister) café. While they’re talking about the events that transpired via Yo’s candy shop, I had a funny feeling that Saya happens to be Coco’s childhood friend – and we ALL know how that trope gets portrayed. (You’ll see as we get further into the series.) Near the end of the episode Hotaru tells Yo that she wants him to join her father’s candy company, but he declines saying that unless Coconuts takes over the family business, he won’t leave his store. This leads Hotaru asking Yo that if he can convince Coconuts to run his store, that Yo will take Hotaru up on her offer. With the bet set in stone, Hotaru tells Coconuts that he’ll be seeing a lot of her around the candy shop. All of this…and it’s only the first episode.

After watching the first episode there were a few things I picked out; the fact that there are a lot of history tidbits about Japanese candy and its mascots, and early marketing strategies many candy owners in Japan use (or should be using) to help drive sales of their product. The overall feeling of the show is basically a slice-of-life comedy with maybe a touch of romance somewhere down the line. Some of the most common anime troupes are here; the otaku/manga artist (Kokonotsu), the childhood friend (Saya), the perverted best friend (To), and the one who’s obsessed with food (Hotaru). Perhaps as I dive deeper into the series we’ll learn more about what Hotaru’s true goal is – besides asking Yo to join her father’s company. That’ll end our first episodic review on Dagashi Kashi. Stick around for our next review on our next post! 😉

D&A Anime Blog: Plans For April…

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Hey guys. It seems like every second of every hour, we’re receiving more and more cases of COVID-19 through the U.S. as well as other countries. Yeah, as much as we don’t want to accept it, this is kinda the ‘new normal’ for the time being. I will say this; even though many of us are cooped up in our houses, it has given birth to a slew of a whole bunch of exciting creative content. Sooo…we thought about jumping into the creative content pool with some content of our own. For starters, we’re going to roll out our little detailed review series called Anime REvisited; where we revisit anime titles and movies from the last 20 years. We’ll be kicking that off on April 2nd!

Around this time we would be making a list of what anime conventions you should check out for the month of April, but thanks to COVID-19 that is now moot. Instead we’ll be working on some new material for content during the month, so we’ll keep you updated on what we come up with. That’s all we’ve got for now, but if you wanna chat with us more, check out or discord channel #AnimeSnap and our Instagram for more content. Until next post, stay safe and #FlattenTheCurve! 😉

D&A Superstar Blogger Award Official Logo!

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As promised, we now have our official D&A Superstar Blogger Award logo! For the blogs that we’ve nominated for this special award of ours, be sure to copy and paste this logo on your nomination post at the bottom of this one. Hopefully you guys are doing okay, washing your hands, and practicing social distancing amid the COVID-19 Pandemic. Until next post, stay well and stay nerdy my friends! 😉

D&A Anime Blog Superstar Blogger Award

D&A Superstar Blogger Award: Nominations!

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Hey guys! Hopefully you all are doing well and taking care of yourselves amid the COVID-19 pandemic. With new updates and info coming in every hour of every day, we see how that can affect many of us negatively on a mental level. To help ease a little of the stress of the news on and offline, we’ll be nominating bloggers for our brand new D&A Superstar Blogger Award starting this week! This award is dedicated to bloggers who have supported us and liked our content since January of 2016 when we first launched this website, and as far as the rules go, here’s what you have to do:

  1. Add the D&A Superstar Blogger Award logo to your nomination post
  2. List the name of your blog (add a link) and tell us 4 things about yourself
  3. List your Top 5 anime shows (or characters)
  4. Answer the 10 questions listed in bold below this post
  5. Nominate at least 10 other blogs of your choice
  • How did you get into Blogging?
  • What’s one of the best posts you’ve ever written on your blog?
  • What’s the last anime title (or movie) you’ve watched in 30 days?
  • If you could go back 10 or 15 years into the past, what would you say to your younger self?
  • If you had the seven Namekian Dragon Balls, what three wishes would you wish for?
  • Who is your biggest influence for blogging and why?
  • If you could visit Japan, what would be the first thing you’d do?
  • If you could pick one or two anime titles that deserve a second season, what would they be?
  • What are two of your favorite foods and one you wish you could try from another country?
  • Who is your favorite blogger and why?

And with that, here are some awesome bloggers we’ve decided to nominate for our special award. We’ll be adding the official logo for the award tomorrow, so nominees will be able to copy and paste it to their nomination post.

  • I Drink & Watch Anime
  • Otaku Orbit
  • Crows World of Anime
  • Lesley’s Anime & Manga Corner
  • Anime Pad
  • Iniksbane
  • A Geeky Gal
  • Animania404

Sonic Battle (2003) Re-Review: Why There Should Be A Remake!

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So in our last post (after the COVID-19 rant) we mentioned that we’ll be revisiting one of our earlier posts about why Sonic Battle should get a remake. Out of all of the games we’ve played up to now, Sonic Battle in particular was a bit different – unique in its own way. Although it’s full potential was yet to be unleashed on the Game Boy Advance, it pushed the envelope (and GBA’s graphical limits) in terms of what the game’s identity wanted to be. It wasn’t trying to be like Smash Bros. nor could you call it a traditional fighting game, in fact players felt like they could actually feel the ‘impact’ of slamming their opponents into a wall (or vise versa) and following up with a finishing blow.

The story and dialogue was actually pretty decent and humorous, and the finale – wow! (The feels are real once you get there.) Since next year marks the 30th anniversary of the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise as a whole, why don’t they remake this game instead of trying to do a sequel. If you remember games like Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, that game got a remake; graphical designs, music, the whole nine yards! Hopefully if SEGA decides to do this (and we hope they do) there are a few things they could change up for the remake of the game.

Improvement #1: Bigger Roster!

In the original 2003 game there were only 10 playable characters. There are so many new characters out here now, so why not triple the fighter roster to 30; adding new characters like Espio, E-123 Omega, Silver, Blaze, Metal Sonic, Shade the Echidna, The Deadly Six, Classic Sonic, Mighty the Armadillo, Dr. Eggman, Infinite, etc. More characters would really take the game to a whole new level, and even bring in the idea of more than one story arc – which is my next improvement.

Improvement #2: New Story Arc!

With the increase of the character roster, this means that they’ll have to add a new story arc to accommodate the new arrivals. I’d say do two different arcs; the Classic Arc which is basically the retelling of the original story arc of the 2003 game with the original 10 characters. (All battles and story dialogue intact.) The second could be like a Universal Crisis-type arc where Sonic and the rest of the characters (even the new ones) come together to fight an original final boss to save the world. (And we get a Super Sonic battle!) There’s a lot of potential that can be unleashed here, but it will be up to the developers if they want to make this happen.

Improvement #3: More Health (HP)!

I remember fighting as Knuckles during his campaign (which is one of the longest campaigns you’ll ever go through) and I had to fight the three guard robos at the hotel of Night Babylon. After six tries I finally beat them, which is why fighters need to have 2 bars of health instead of 1. They could have it where there’s a big number next to a smaller number; where the big number is your current number of health bars and the smaller number is your maximum. (Every fighter has 2/2 bars of health!) The color of the first bar is yellow while the second is a blood-orange color; meaning if you fall to 1/2 bars of health the second bar is blood-orange. Although it may slightly lengthen the duration of the battle, it’ll give players a little more enjoyment in slamming their foes around.

Improvement #4: Special Attack Upgrade System!

Since we can’t figure out how much damage character special attacks (like Shot, Power, and Set) do, why not have a system where once characters win their battles, they receive Ability Points based on their performance in battle. Yo get 10 for winning without getting hit, 5 for not getting KO’d, and 2 for not losing overall. During Story Mode all character’s special attacks are at LVL. 1, then when they ‘Max Out’ they’ll be at LVL. 5! In Battle Mode and other modes players should get to choose what level they want their character’s special attacks to be at, so they can max themselves out and give their foes a beatdown!

These are just some the the improvements that I recommend that the developers make if they want to make the Sonic Battle remake a real best-seller. Hopefully if it ever gets done, I’d make it for the Nintendo 3DS and the Nintendo Switch. (The 3DS version would play like the 2003 original.) Oh yeah, one more improvement I’d make; High Resolution 2D sprites at 60 fps. If they wanna add cinematic cutscenes, be my guest.

That’s all I’ve got for this post, until next time, stay safe and stay nerdy! 😉

A Founder’s Thoughts With D.J. Lewis (March 18, 2020)!

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Hey guys! I’m hoping all is well and you’re doing well while staying/working from home amid the COVID-19 pandemic. With all the uncertainty on how long we have to ‘Flatten the Curve’, many of us have found creative ways to cope with being inside. The economic impact that corona’s gonna have on our economy is gonna be astronomical, and as scary as that is, this is a critical moment in our lives that we have to band together as human beings and love and support one another. Now is not the time to fight, bicker, or argue about dumb stuff, now’s the time to be there for one another – even if you gotta do it through Skype, text, Discord (like we’re doing) or social media.

I’m 30 years old, and I’ve never seen anything or even lived through anything of this caliber. Hollywood shutting down because of a microscopic terrorist? Unheard of, but it’s happening. Nearly 85% of our quality of life (mostly our social life) has been shut down due to COVID-19, and in the mist of it all – it’s brought out the best/worst in people. Right now the best thing we can do to mitigate the spread of the virus is to socially distance ourselves from one another, however not all of us are taking this seriously. If you don’t believe me, ask the idiots in Florida who are partying at the beach during Spring Break!

With nearly every generation heeding what the CDC strongly recommends, there’s one generation in particular that the rest of the world is counting on; the millennials. As a millennial myself there are so many negative stereotypes about us; from the type of music we listen to, to Avocado toast, to not working a ‘real’ job, to where we stand on politics. In this critical time where COVID-19 cases are climbing day-by-day, I get that most boomers and millennials have never seen eye-to-eye on the content of their character, or even how they live their lives. Still, we all got to come together as one cohesive unit if we plan on sending Coronavirus packing!

That’s all for my rant, now stay tuned for my next post where I revisit why there needs to be a reboot of Sonic Battle for the NEW Nintendo 3DS.

Until next time, stay home and stay nerdy! 😉

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High-Resolution 2D Sprites is a nice start! 😉