Go! Go! Nippon! ~My First Trip to Japan~: Reflections and Reminiscence on A Journey to the Land of the Rising Sun Five Years Earlier, and Revisiting My First Visual Novel

“Japan never considers time together as time wasted. Rather, it is time invested.” –Donald Richie

On this day in 2017, I was sitting on the benches at the Vancouver International Airport awaiting a flight back home. Although exhausted, I was immensely satisfied with my excursion. Early in May, I boarded a plane bound for Narita International Airport. We’d arrived later in the evening, so after reaching our hotel, we had time for dinner at a Chinese-style restaurant at the Hilton Tokyo Narita Airport before hitting the hay. The next morning, after a full Western breakfast, we boarded our ride and headed straight to the heart of Tokyo to check out the Meiji Jinju Shrine and Tokyo Imperial Palace. After stopping briefly in Ginza for a shabu-shabu lunch, the afternoon consisted of walking the Sumida River and exploring the Kogan-ji temple. The day wrapped up with an exquisite Wagyu beef and snow crab dinner at the Hotel Heritage. Here, I had the chance to soak in their onsen: having seen the procedure countless times in anime, I felt right at home in cleaning up and enjoying the experience. On the second day of our lightning tour, we travelled deep into the mountains of Yamanashi, stopping at Heiwa Park near Gotemba to view Mount Fuji from a distance. Following yakiniku, we visited Oshino Village and Mount Fuji’s Fifth Station. From here, we drove out to Shirokabako Resort by Mount Tateshima, where we spent the night. The next day opened with a drive to Magome-juku, where we took in the quiet of the Japanese countryside and had a traditional lunch before being whisked away to the heart of Nagoya to check out Atsuta Shrine. The final stop for this third day was Gifu: we were now within a stone’s throw from Kyoto, and on our final full day, we entered Kyoto itself, stopping by the Kinkakuji in the morning. Here, I enjoyed matcha ice cream and the iconic golden-leafed walls of Kyoto’s most famous temple under drizzling skies. Following a kaiseki lunch near Yasaka Shrine, we visited Todaji Temple in Nara, known for its free-roaming deer population. The day concluded in Osaka: after taking in the sights of the Sakai shopping district, we stopped for an omurice dinner, and I swung by a local bookstore to grab a copy of Kimi no Na Wa‘s manga before turning in: the next day, I’d been slated to fly on over to Hong Kong for the trip’s second leg, so early in the morning, we made our way over to Kansai International Airport. Although a flight out usually is more a matter of procedure, a pair of surprises awaited me here at Kansai International Airport; I was able to try authentic okonomiyaki, and I came upon a copy of the Kimi no Na Wa artbook while waiting for my flight. Like the protagonist Go! Go! Nippon! ~My First Trip to Japan~, I had a very short window in which to take in the sights, sounds and tastes of Japan, and I similarly realised an inevitable truth: that it would take a lifetime to fully experience everything Japan’s got to offer: this game had come into my path some five years prior to my travels to Japan in 2017.

As the story goes, on a miserable late autumn afternoon, I was typing away in the quiet of my office space: having finished building a sodium-potassium pump on the same principles as the renal filtration model I’d designed during the previous summer, I was working on a term paper ahead of a presentation for my research course. As I reached the section on my findings, one of my friends appeared at the lab. His classes for the day had ended, and he had something amusing to show me: a YouTuber was playing through a visual novel about visiting Japan, and was doing a throw-your-voice style voiceover of the dialogue. I’d only been mildly interested at the time, and despite having picked the game up to try it out, Go! Go! Nippon! remained a bit of a curiosity for me until, four years after its initial release, the 2015 expansion was announced. The additional content and visual improvements were enough for me to pick this up, and I’d beaten one of the Makoto routes posthaste. However, a post never materialised, and it is with some irony that I reflect on how my typical tendency for procrastination meant that I would only write about the game a full five years after I’d returned home from my travels to Japan and Hong Kong. The premise in Go! Go! Nippon! is simple: a foreign traveller decides to visit Japan at the behest of two pen-pals he’d met in an online chatroom, and upon arriving, discovers they’re sisters, Makoto and Akira Misaki. Despite the initial awkwardness, said visitor gets a very personalised tour of some of Tokyo’s most famous destinations, and along the way, becomes closer to Makoto or Akira, depending on the choice of destinations visited. Despite its hokey premise, Go! Go! Nippon! has proven to be surprisingly entertaining, being part visual novel and part Lonely Planet travel guide: the game is remarkably detailed about the history and information surrounding some of Tokyo’s attractions, from Ginza and Akihabara, to Shibuya and Mount Takao. The setup provides players the ideal environment to acclimatise to what a visual novel is like, using a story that is relatable for overseas players who might be dreaming of one day setting foot on the Land of the Rising Sun. In this way, despite being cheesy on first glance, Go! Go! Nippon! ends up being a fantastic experience for both introducing players to visual novel mechanics, as well as providing a guide to Tokyo’s sights to the same level of depth as a travel book might. The visual novel consequently received a pair of expansions, which brought Go! Go! Nippon! into the world of HD and provided animated character models using Unity. In addition, additional locations were added along with a more sophisticated decision tree that brings with it, new events for players to check out. The concept has proven quite enduring: Makoto and Akira have since become Virtual YouTubers, and the developers, OVERDRIVE, have also been surprised with the success of this series and its characters. When they’d started the Virtual YouTubers programme with Makoto and Akira, they’d made a tongue-in-cheek remark about how if they ever hit ten thousand subscribers, they would begin development on Go! Go! Nippon! 2. This particular milestone has since been reached, and all eyes are now on OVERDRIVE as they begin work on a sequel to a game that I’m certain that no one expected to reach the heights that it did.

There is a degree of irony in the fact that I ended up playing through and writing about Go! Go! Nippon! five years after my travels to Japan; a trip to Japan costs around 2400 CAD for an individual, whereas Go! Go! Nippon! and its expansions together are two orders of magnitude cheaper (since I bought Go! Go! Nippon! during sales over the years, my total for all three games was 14.91 CAD). However, despite the dramatic contrasts in the manner in which one gets to experience Japan, there are also striking similarities, attesting to how well Go! Go! Nippon! is able to capture the feelings of travelling Japan. While on first glance, Japan possesses a dramatically different culture, set of values and customs compared to somewhere like Canada, setting foot in Japan also made it apparent that the similarities were greater in number than differences. Outside of Japan’s numerous temples, attractions and sights, I found that whether it was Tokyo, Gifu, Nagoya, Kyoto or Osaka, the roads and streets were filled with people getting from point A to point B. Some were salarymen headed to work, while others were students who were out and about on their daily activities, no differently than how my days ordinarily went back home. My vacation had allowed me to see Japan’s sights, both iconic and ordinary. Seeing tranquil power surrounding a shrine to the striking views of Mount Fuji, enjoy some of their finest food, including kaiseki, Hokkaido Snow Crab and Wagyu beef and iconic experiences like soaking in an onsen was lovely, but I also had a chance to order ramen in a restaurant where the staff did not speak English (or Cantonese), buy manga from a bookstore and sit down to an omurice in a department store restaurant. The scope of my experiences thus ranged from the touristy, to the everyday, and in retrospect, this is what had made this vacation especially memorable. Recalling this allows me to better understand the reason why some folks seek out authentic experiences that allow them to do what locals do now, and having now revisited Go! Go! Nippon!, it becomes clear that this is also one of the reasons behind the game’s charm: Makoto and Akira take the players to iconic locations around Tokyo, but also gives one a chance to see things from a local’s perspective, whether it be a Japanese summer festival, fireworks performance or even Comiket itself. Thus, with this being said, being able to travel to Japan for real, curiously enough, gave me a better sense of appreciation for what Go! Go! Nippon! was going for, too.

Additional Remarks, Screenshots and Commentary

• It may surprise readers to learn that, when this blog was about three months old, I’d actually written a first impressions piece about Go! Go! Nippon!. Back then, my posts had no consistent format and style; that particular post had six screenshots, and barely covers any of my reflections surrounding Go! Go! Nippon! (the idea of a reflection would come about four months later, after I finished cell and molecular biology). This post, then, aims to offer a slightly more comprehensive set of thoughts on what is my first-ever visual novel experience on top of giving me a place to reminisce about my travels five years earlier.

• Typically, visual novels simply entail reading the text, gaining a modicum of understanding as to what’s happening and then playing through by making decisions at critical junctures, decisions consistent with one’s own values to see what the outcome is. Depending on one’s choices, an outcome can end up better or worse, pushing players to evaluate their own decision-making in specific contexts. Go! Go! Nippon! is a little more gentle in this regard in that there are no wrong choices. One’s itinerary in Go! Go! Nippon! impacts which of Makoto or Akira players spend more time with, and this cascades into a tearful ending that, sometimes, will end with a romantic outcome.

• On my own trip to Japan, I ended up visiting Meiji Jingu (a Shinto Shrine just a stone’s throw from Shinjuku Koen), Ginza and Sumida Park, just across the river from the Tokyo Skytree. All of these locations are fairly close to the spots that are available in Go! Go! Nippon!: in its original incarnation, Go! Go! Nippon! had been focused on Tokyo’s attractions, but the expansions allow players to check out Mount Takao and Kyoto. On my trip to Tokyo in 2017, I did not have a chance to visit Asakusa, one of the most iconic spots in Tokyo.

• As a natural part of Go! Go! Nippon!‘s progression, players will “accidentally” walk in on Makoto drying herself after a shower. Of Makoto and Akira, Makoto is better-endowed, and it is in the expansion games, where the character models are animated, that players really appreciate the HD updates bring to the table. The newer games are rendered in Unity, and I imagine would use the game engine’s rigging to handle animations. Attention is paid to details: when Makoto perks up or leans forward, oscillation is also present in her model. As an aside, I prefer showering in the evening, so were I to take the protagonist’s place, there’d be no chance of this happening.

• Dialogue with Akira and Makoto is such that players gain a bit of insight into their character; Makoto feels weighted down by expectations and is graceful, studying English at the local university, while Akira is a fantastic cook, tsundere and feels like she lives in Makoto’s shadows. In between Akira and Makoto explaining the history and details behind every location to the level of detail that would be appropriate for a Lonely Planet travel guide, one gains the sense that Makoto and Akira are full-fledged characters whom, in addition to their profound knowledge of Japan, its attractions and history, also have their own unique traits.

• One could say that Akira and Makoto’s knowledge of Japan is encyclopaedic: both bring up nuances and details that really illustrate the history of a given area, but isn’t something that one could readily just recall off the top of their head. To put things in perspective, while I’m familiar with the history and trivia of some of the most famous attractions in Calgary, I can’t just bring this stuff up in casual conversation with the same level of detail. Granted, this is a visual novel, which allows OVERDRIVE to thoroughly research locations and incorporate them into the game, allowing Go! Go! Nippon! to be both instructive and entertaining.

• Folks looking to learn about the locations visited in Go! Go! Nippon! can easily look up their details online, and Go! Go! Nippon!‘s expansions include a link to Google Maps, allowing one to get the precise spot that players visit in the game. Here, I’ve opted to try an izakaya out; the Japanese equivalent of a pub, izakaya are quite different than a pub in that food is served over a duration of time and is shared by a party. Having Akira and Makoto around would make an izakaya easier to experience: while my rudimentary Japanese allowed me to order food in a more conventional setting, I’m certain that without a guidebook at my side, an izakaya would be trickier to order at.

• On the second day, players “accidentally” walk in on Akira changing after Makoto asks them to check in and see if she’d awaken yet. Unlike Makoto, who’d taken things in stride and is swift to forgive, Akira’s reaction is par the course for what one might expect in reality, and in most anime. Akira’s dissatisfaction is most apparent when she swaps out sugar for salt in the player’s coffee, but seeing the player taking their lumps leads Akira to forgive them in the end. This is where my old post ends: in 2012, my patience for playing visual novels was nil. In the decade that’s elapsed, I’ve come to appreciate a much wider variety of games.

• From here on out, I venture into a side of Go! Go! Nippon! that I’d not previously visited; my choice of destinations for my first full play-through of the 2016 expansion took me to destinations that were quite similar to those I’d visited in my 2017 trip. This particular trip had been billed as “美食” (jyutpimg mei5 sik6, literally “beautiful eats”) oriented: attractions had been secondary to visiting places with particularly fancy Japanese cuisine, and as a result, the places we chose to visit were a bit more inconspicuous, selected to be closer to the dining venues.

• While we didn’t visit the Tokyo Skytree itself, or Kyoto’s Fushimi Inari Shrine as a part of this trip, the locations we did end up hitting were quite scenic and enjoyable in their own right. A bonus was that the crowds here were fewer, allowing us to spend less time in lines and more time exploring. In retrospect, I am glad that I picked the 美食 oriented approach: especially nowadays, it is possible to gain a good measure of what an attraction feels like using virtual reality and Google Maps. However, there is absolutely no equivalent for being able to sit down to a meal in another country and enjoy what foods a nation has to offer.

• Unlike the original Go! Go! Nippon!, the 2016 expansion gives players a chance to visit Kyoto, as well. Kyoto was day four for me: having spent the first day in Tokyo, our second day was in Yamanashi, and the third day was spent in Gifu prefecture. On the morning of the fourth day, the Kinkakuji was the only destination I visited; this is an iconic part of Kyoto, and because we were there on a Saturday, the crowds were immense. Here at the Kinkakuji, I remember marvelling at how brilliant this gold-leafed temple was, even on an overcast day.

• Aside from spotting some tourists decked out in maiko outfits (it was 1100 in the morning, and real maiko usually begin making their rounds at around 1700), I also had a chance to sample the iconic matcha soft-serve ice cream. Japan’s soft serve is in a category on its own: while visiting Oshino village at the foot of Mount Fuji, I ended up going for a blueberry ice cream, as well. Enjoying these smaller things accentuated my experiences, and I had been glad to have brought the equivalent of 250 CAD worth of Yen in cash for this trip. This allowed me to buy things where credit cards wouldn’t work: while Japan is an ultra-modern society, I was quite surprised to learn most places didn’t accept credit cards.

• The Kinkakuji is such an integral part of Kyoto that every single anime with a class trip to Kyoto will inevitably feature this park, and of note is the fact that both K-On! and Kinirio Mosaic: Thank You!! visit the area as a part of their third year class trips. Besides being an iconic landmark with a storied history, I know the Kinkakuji best as Futurama‘s “Omaha, Nebraska”, and recall that one of the Kinkakuji’s most famous tales is that it was burned to a crisp by a monk-in-training during the 50s. Its lesser-known cousin is the Ginkakuji, which, contrary to its name, is not covered with silver plating.

• Go! Go! Nippon! captures the look-and-feel of a quiet Kyoto side street perfectly; after my visit to the Kinkakuji ended, I headed on over to Torihisa, a kaiseki restaurant. Kaiseki is a multi-course meal in which numerous small dishes are served in an artistic fashion. I thoroughly enjoyed lunch; kaiseki had been high on the list of things I’ve wished to try. Torihisa is located across the street from Maruyama Park, home of Yasaka Shrine. Maruyama Park is a fantastic place for hanami,  but I’d arrived about two months too late.

• Although the protagonist of Go! Go! Nippon! has two full days in Kyoto to explore, I was on a more rigid schedule: as soon as lunch ended, we immediately set course for Nara Park, home to their famous sika deer. The portrayals of Nara Park in anime is no joke: the deer are very friendly towards people, and I watched one deer boldly snatch a tour pamphlet from a visitor’s hand here. After Nara had wrapped up, my final destination was Osaka. During my last evening there, I had dinner at an omurice restaurant and decided to go with a curry-katsu omelet rice; this was an all-in one that allowed me to try authentic Japanese curry and tonkatsu in conjunction with what is a contemporary Japanese comfort dish.

• Just like that, my week had come to a close. Go! Go! Nippon! makes it clear to players that there is so much to see and do in Japan that a single week will be insufficient to experience things in full. This message is accentuated by the visual novel format; one has the opportunity to go back to a save point and make different decisions, allowing for a more complete experience. The equivalent to doing this in real life would be prohibitively expensive, but I was impressed with the breadth of my experiences over the course of a week.

• If I had to pick the most standout moment in a vacation that was one long pleasant memory, it would be on the first full night. After we spent the day exploring Tokyo, we went out over to Saitama’s Heritage resort, a secluded retreat on the western edge of Musashi Kyuryo National Government Park. This evening saw the fanciest meal of the entire trip: an exquisite Wagyu beef nabe, sashimi and several small, artfully presented dishes, including unagi, pickled daikon and a side of fried potato croquettes. This was a feast for the eyes and the taste buds. There is an old saying of unknown origin: the Chinese eat with their mouths (taste is king), the Japanese eat with their eyes (presentation matters) and the Koreans eat with their stomachs (a meal should be satisfying). I’m not sure where this comes from, but seeing the artful presentation of meals in Japan, I confirm this certainly holds true.

• To round out what was an excellent dinner, I set foot inside the onsen, and because of my timing, I had the entire baths to myself. After cleaning myself off thoroughly, I lowered my body into the waters and felt all of my aches melt away. Meals on the other days were still solid: the second night saw me at a buffet at Shirakaba Resort Ikenotaira Hotel. What stood out most to me here was the fact that they had bakke and fiddlehead tempura available. We’d travelled through Yamanashi so we could see Mount Fuji from several different vantage points on this day, and although Mount Fuji remained completely obscured by cloud throughout most of the day (as Yuru Camp△‘s Rin would describe it, “wearing a hat”), we did end up hitting the Fifth Station at Narusawa for an up-close-and-personal look at Japan’s most famous mountain. Aoi, Hinata, Kaede and Kokona start their ascent of Mount Fuji here in Yama no Susume‘s second season, so my second day essentially had me visiting Yuru Camp△ and Yama no Susume destinations.

• On day three, we continued through the mountains of Nagano on our way into Gifu. The highlight of this day was the stop at Magome-juku, the forty-third of the stations along the Nakasendō trail. It’s a beautiful village perched on a hillside, and after venturing from the top of their main street to the bottom, we stopped for lunch at Magomekan Food Stands. Their set lunch was as beautiful to behold, as it was generous in portion sizes, and tasty to eat. Featuring rolled omlette, karaage and grilled fish, as well as a massive bowl of noodles, it was the perfect way to round out the morning’s activities.

• Back in Go! Go! Nippon!, I’ve reached the end of my first playthrough, and thanks to the way I roll, I ended up with what is considered the best ending for the Makoto route: I chose a Makoto destination for days one and three, and did an Akira destination for day two. In this way, I unlocked the ending where players and Makoto ring a bell together. Although Makoto struggles to be forward about her feelings, in the end, she comes through and openly returns the player’s feelings. Contemporary reviewers found the whirlwind romance aspect of Go! Go! Nippon! to be completely contrived, out of the blue.

• However, players with enough maturity will quickly realise that Makoto and Akira are representations of the joys of visiting Japan itself: in this way, Go! Go! Nippon! might be seen as a visual portrayal of falling in love with Japan over the course of a week, coming to see for oneself the nation’s pluses and minuses, and deciding for oneself if their initial impressions were on the mark or need rectification. Whether it is house-hunting, travel or romance, there are many commonalities. All involve that initial honeymoon-like phase where everything feels perfect, and how over time, imperfections manifest. What happens next then depends on the person: individuals willing to accept imperfections and embrace what they’ve fallen in love with will find happiness, while those who cannot accept the imperfections will restart the process anew.

• In my case, nailing the Makoto route on first try was quite entertaining. However, in the spirit of playing through Go! Go! Nippon! properly, I switched over to one of my other saves so I could check out the destinations I’d not visited on my first run. Tokyo Skytree ended up being first on my list; while in Tokyo, I gazed wistfully across the Sumida river: this hadn’t been a destination we had in mind, and therefore, we skipped over checking out the tallest building in Tokyo. In retrospect, I am okay with this choice: that day had been overcast, and the view from the top wouldn’t have been quite as impressive.

• In 2015, following my journey to Taiwan, I ended up going to Hong Kong, and here, I did check out the Sky100 observation deck, in addition to Taipei 101. On any given vacation in East Asia, Hong Kong inevitably becomes a part of the itinerary because the flights are actually more economical this way, and it gives me a chance to visit family. Whenever heading into Hong Kong, I always get the feeling that I’m going home: to me, Hong Kong simply feels like a super-massive Chinatown, where Cantonese is the lingua franca. Unlike Japan, or Taiwan, where I only know enough phrases for the basics (and in the case of Japan, enough to surprise store clerks and servers at restaurants), I’ve got level three proficiency with Cantonese and can carry out conversations.

• While I technically are a native Cantonese speaker, I have next to no exposure in legal and professional vocabulary, so I’m unable to conduct business in Cantonese; for instance, I have no idea how to describe the process for sorting out a build error in an Xcode project in Cantonese. While my Cantonese is practically native at the conversational level (I know enough slang to keep up with things, for instance), I hesitate to say I have native proficiency on things like a resume because that would imply I can read and write, as well. If I had to guess, I have level 2 proficiency with written Chinese, and level 3 proficiency with Cantonese, having worked in a Chinese language-setting previously.

• Here, I accompany Akira to a ramen joint after picking the “ocean” option, and she demonstrates how to properly eat ramen. While it is appropriate to make some noise in Japan, the practise is not kosher in China or Hong Kong, but when I visited the ramen place in Gifu, I followed local customs just to express my enjoyment of the noodles all the same. Sushi etiquette is a little easier to follow, and this reminiscence did leave me with a hankering for sushi. Fortunately, there’s an excellent sushi place within walking distance now, and I’m making good on my promise to try things out. Yesterday, I ordered a combo with California, Volcano and Dynamite rolls, plus salmon, tuna and shrimp nigiri with a takoyaki: this was a very tasty lunch, a welcome change of pacing just before the Victoria Day Long Weekend arrived.

• By now, I’ve become a ways more receptive of raw fish dishes: five years earlier, I ended up dousing my sashimi into the nabe at Heritage Resort, rendering it cooked, as back then, I wasn’t too fond of raw fish (exposure to shows like Yuru Camp△ have since broadened my mind). These days, I enjoy raw fish as much as I do cooked fish: the salmon and tuna nigiri were the highlights, being excellent with a dash of soy sauce. Although it is mentioned frequently, food is only a secondary aspect of Go! Go! Nippon!: being a virtual experience, things like food cannot be adequately mimicked. While one can see Akira explaining how to properly eat a ramen, one’s imagination must kick in to fill in the rest; imagination plays a very large part of enjoying visual novels: these games are quite static, and although they provide a few cues (such as sound effects and whatever visuals are available) to convey a moment, on top of what the dialogue yields, one must let their mind’s eye do the rest.

• One of the numerous events players can unlock in Go! Go! Nippon! is the summer festival; although absent in the original, the expansions introduce events which unlock after certain conditions (flags) are met. The summer festival is a pleasant event and would allow players to really experience an authentic Japanese celebration; the natsumatsuri is equivalent to the state fairs of North America (or for my Canadian readers, the Calgary Stampede), featuring plenty of games and eats, plus performances and fireworks. If memory serves, unlocking the summer festival requires going to specific destinations on the first and second day.

• Visual novels have a vocabulary that is quite related to programming. “Flags” in software usually refer to Booleans that control whether or not something happens (e.g. if the “isLoggedIn” flag is true, show the home screen, otherwise ,show the login screen). In visual novels, flags keep track of a player’s state, and “events” result from certain combinations of flags being set. I normally think of events as certain actions or inputs a program listens for, but in visual novel speak, “events” are simply things to show a player. Go! Go! Nippon! allows me to demonstrate this: if I visit certain destinations on days one and two, the flag for the Comiket event are set true, allowing me to experience it. It took me several attempts to get this right.

• On the topic of conventions and gatherings like Comiket, it’s the May Long Weekend, and that means Otafest is now in full swing. Back in February, I declined to submit an application to volunteer, feeling it to be more prudent to leave time open in the event that my move had left me busier than anticipated. In typical fashion, I’ve finished all of the essential tasks, and even got my driver’s license and banking information updated to reflect the new address, so this long weekend, I’ve actually had more time than anticipated. However, I’ve decided against attending the local anime convention; having experienced Japan so thoroughly, the appeal of visiting an anime convention as a guest has diminished for me.

• Instead, I became more interested in taking a more active role through volunteering, which gives me a chance to give back to the local community. My plans to continue volunteering at Otafest will depend on my schedule, so I’ll have a better idea of whether or not I’ll be returning closer to next year’s application deadline. For now, my long weekend has consisted of sleeping in, tending to housework and hitting the gym, before swinging by the local mall so I could pick up some new shirts and shorts. Afterwards, we sat down to our first-ever Southern Fried Chicken at the new place. This year’s Otafest looks like it’s a scaled-back event, and there’s nothing particularly stand-out on the schedule, so I’ve no qualms with sitting this one out in favour of a relaxing long weekend.

• Go! Go! Nippon!‘s easy-to-use UI means the user experience is solid, and in this way, I was able to go through the game several times in order to accrue screenshots for this post. Here, I accompany Akira to Mount Takao, which Hinata and Aoi hit back in Yama no Susume‘s first season. Located about an hour from the heart of Tokyo, Mount Takao is about a ninety-minute hike in total and offers stunning views of Tokyo. It was nice to see Go! Go! Nippon! include a vast range of destinations into the expansions: the original game only had six destinations and two possible routes.

• This would have made it considerably simpler to complete, and in retrospect, Go! Go! Nippon! “grows up” with players. The first game truly is a suitable introduction to the visual novel format for first timers, and I’ve long felt that while the game’s subtitle is My First Trip to Japan, the title also can count itself as My First Experience With a Visual Novel: the premise of travelling and exploring different destinations is a much gentler and accessible introduction to the format compared to something like CLANNAD or Higurashi, where making bad decisions can irrevocably alter the outcome of one’s experiences.

• First-time players will also be unfamiliar with the save mechanics. Visual novel veterans will tell players to save right before decision branches come up. This is a matter of efficiency: if one makes a bad choice, they can instantly revert and make another pick. Similarly, in a game where a choice causes the story to open up in a different way, one instantly has a snapshot they can go to. On my first playthrough of Go! Go! Nippon! in 2012, I saved simply when I needed to leave the game, and this made revisiting the game somewhat cumbersome. By the 2015 expansion, I was better versed in how visual novels work and more ready to explore new routes.

• In the present day, I know enough of the ins-and-outs so that I could easily navigate the storylines of Go! Go! Nippon! and swiftly acquire screenshots for this post. I am glad to have picked up the 2016 expansion; I had debated doing so when it first came out, having already dropped coin for the 2015 expansion, but after visiting Japan in 2017, I decided to bite the bullet and complete my Go! Go! Nippon! experience when the expansion went on discount during the summer of 2018. Although I had intended to play and write about Go! Go! Nippon! back then, 2018 was a bit of a more difficult time for me: my start-up was in dire straits, and I had been in the middle of discussions to take on a Xamarin project, which meant I needed to swiftly pick up Xamarin and C#.

• Further to this, I had been invited to Battlefield V‘s closed alpha, and Harukana Receive was airing. Between everything that was going on, Go! Go! Nippon! was benched, and for four years after that, sat untouched in my Steam Library. The five-year mark to my return home from Japan, coupled with one of my friends bringing the game’s recent successes in the Virtual YouTuber scene and OVERDRIVE’s intention of making a sequel came together to provide the encouragement I needed to finish enjoying, and writing about Go! Go! Nippon! in its latest incarnation.

• I am glad to have done so now: the game offers an interesting parallel with my own experiences, and although I didn’t have two kawaii guides walking me through the history and etiquette of various areas, I was able to see for myself the wonders of Japan, both historical and modern. While my experience with Go! Go! Nippon! started out as a joke, I was pleasantly surprised to find that even in a game meant to instruct and gently poke fun at foreign impressions of Japan, there is a considerable amount of depth in the writing. For instance, Akira’s tsundere personality is not representative of Japan as a whole, but from a broader perspective, shows how something that initially seems difficult to understand has more to it than meets the eye. Akira feels like a close friend, a companion over time as players spend more time with her destinations.

• I’ve long been a Makoto fan, and my decisions on my first run through Go! Go! Nippon! reflect this. However, in revisiting the game, I learnt more about Akira. In time, I came to like her character, as well. Finding newfound, pleasant surprises in the familiar is something I’ve always been fond of, and much as how revisiting Titanfall 2‘s campaign allowed me to get my paws on the EM-4 Cold War in one mission, re-playing Go! Go! Nippon! let me to see a side of the game, and a set of destinations that I’d otherwise never see.

• The premise in Go! Go! Nippon! shows players why there is incentive to replay the game again and make different choices; this outcome would extend to different visual novels and similarly encourage players to go back and try things out again. In the case of CLANNAD, for instance, players can make choices to go down the most well-written central route, which follows Nagisa, or they can opt to check out Kyou, Kotomi and Fuu’s stories. However, whereas Go! Go! Nippon! does not have a persistent state that lingers even after one has completed multiple play-throughs, CLANNAD does: certain actions can only be achieved by revisiting the game multiple times and making smart decisions. In this way, Go! Go! Nippon! can be seen as an introduction to a genre which is one that I do not play often, but one that has its own nuances, as well.

• As a consequence of playing the Akira route with the aim of unlocking one of the events (at the time of writing, I’ve yet to succeed), I ended up with the second outcome for Akira, which has her bringing players to Toshimaen, a theme park that is quite special to Akira. After returning to Tokyo from Kyoto, the sum of a player’s decisions allow them to visit a special destination, and there is no “bad end” here in Go! Go! Nippon! in a traditional sense. Visual novels are legendary for their bad endings: unlike the average first person shooter campaign, which only has one ending, and any “bad end” is dying in the campaign, visual novels can take depravity and the macabre to the next level.

• All told, spending a day with Akira at the waterpark isn’t a bad outcome by any stretch: it gives players a chance to see Akira rocking a polka-dot bikini. Tango-Victor-Tango incorrectly pegs Akira as being flat, although this moment also led me to wish that there was such an equivalent moment with Makoto. I’m now curious to see what the optimal route for Akira yields, but I’ll likely get around to this later in the future. The Division 2 had just opened their ninth season, and having spent the whole of last year on break from The Division 2 after completing the Manhunt event for Faye Lau, it’s been fun to return to the game and learn that my old standby, the Hunter’s Fury gear-set with the Chatterbox and Ninjabike Kneepads, is still viable. Similarly, I’ve recently resumed playing Ghost Recon: Wildlands on account of an excellent sale, so between these two games, I expect to be somewhat busy in the gaming front for the foreseeable future.

• For the remainder of my revisit through Go! Go! Nippon!, I have a bit of footage from the other destinations I ended up going to as a result of trying to unlock various events. Here, I’m back in Ginza: in a curious turn of fate, Ginza was the first place I visited when I played through Go! Go! Nippon! in 2012, and it was also the first stop on my trip to Japan in 2017. Ginza is known for its high end shopping experiences, and while we browsed shops, we found that prices were jaw-droppingly high. Here, Makoto welcomes players to the district and the famous Wako Store, with its distinct clock face. I most vividly recall Ginza because we had shabu-shabu here.

• Because of the scope and scale of any trip to Japan, I would contend that there is no right or wrong way to go about things. Anime fans tend to visit Tokyo and Akihabara, while folks looking for a more historical experience will tour Kyoto. Visitors looking for the ultimate seafood experience are best served checking out Hokkaido, while Japan’s southern section, near Hiroshima or Kumamoto, would provide a quieter experience. For me, one potential return trip would entail taking a closer look at Kyoto’s highlights; it’s a destination that K-On! and the Kiniro Mosaic movie both swing by the old capital as a part of the third year’s class trip.

• However, this would be secondary to my long-standing wish to travel Takehara in Hiroshima. Well off the beaten track, Takehara is home of Tamayura, and even a full decade after I’ve finished watching the anime, the town’s iconic warehouse district has more or less remain unchanged. If I were to visit, I imagine that I’d be able to see the sights that Fū and her friends saw in their everyday lives. On such a trip, I’d likely choose lodgings anywhere outside of the Warehouse district: hotels right in the old town are considerably pricier. I imagine that a week in Takehara would be more than enough to explore all of the spots in Tamayura.

• Back in Go! Go! Nippon!, for my shot at getting Makoto’s second ending, I ended up playing through a completely different set of locations, in turn allowing me to unlock a host of achievements to go with my adventures. The 2016 expansion is the only way to actually unlock achievements, but as of the 2015 expansion, Go! Go! Nippon! added Steam Trading Cards and badges. It took me a while to collect enough cards to make a level 5 Makoto card. The only way to get an Akira badge is to get foil drops, but badges cost a dollar apiece, so the logic of doing so wouldn’t be sound.

• The CG scenes in Go! Go! Nippon! are of a varied quality: the protagonist is rendered without eyes, and this creates a bit of a disconnect whenever he’s visible. The faceless male is a long-standing element in visual novels, meant to give players additional immersion, but here in Go! Go! Nippon!, the effect is quite uncanny and looks a little off. Conversely, stills of just Makoto and/or Akira look gorgeous, and I found myself thinking that, were Go! Go! Nippon! ever to be made into an anime about touring Tokyo, I would have no qualms in watching it.

• That no such anime has appeared a decade after Go! Go! Nippon!‘s release indicates that such a wish will remain a pipe dream at best. Here, at Tsukiji Market, I explore Tokyo’s largest fish market. After departing Japan and landing in Hong Kong, I had the pleasure of checking out Sha Tin Market, an indoor wet market, while awaiting a dim sum lunch with relatives. I’ve always been fond of wet markets because they represent a very active place where seafood is sold; by comparison, most seafood is frozen at home, although some supermarkets do carry live seafood, as well.

• Looking back, the Hong Kong side of my travels were also superbly enjoyable: I know Hong Kong like the back of my own hand, despite only having visited a handful of times, and this is largely in part owing to the fact that 1) there are English signs everywhere and 2) I speak Cantonese well enough, allowing me to ask for directions without any trouble. The MTR is also intuitive, allowing one to visit any part of Hong Kong with ease. My time in Hong Kong was characterised by spending plenty of time with family, window shopping at various malls, and experiencing Hong Kong’s culinary landscape.

• In Go! Go! Nippon!, since Makoto isn’t much of a cook, players won’t pick up anything from the fish market here, and instead, she’ll bring players to the Tsukiji Hongan-ji, a Buddhist temple that originally opened in 1617 but burned to the ground forty years later. It was moved to a new site, was destroyed by an earthquake in 1923. The modern temple was completed in 1934. This does appear to be a recurring theme in Japan’s landmarks, which have been destroyed and rebuilt on several occasions. While the buildings we see now might not be in their original form, seeing them rebuilt is a testament to the tenacity of the Japanese people.

• Having now gone through three-quarters of Go! Go! Nippon!, it is evident that attention has been paid to the background artwork, as well. Backgrounds in this visual novel are intricate and life-like, and although some scenes are blissfully quiet, others are filled with people. This aspect is one of the most crucial elements in Go! Go! Nippon!: visual novels often feel empty and devoid of human presence, isolating players and forcing their attention towards the heroines. This was the case in Sakura Angels: although the artwork was stunning, the world felt very empty. According to my records, I began Sakura Angels in June 2015, but never finished, and the last time I opened the game was back in 2017, so the time is probably appropriate for me to go back and wrap this one up.

• Stay! Stay! DPRK! had similarly felt quite empty, but then, it was a logical design choice because players are visiting North Korea. As such, when Go! Go! Nippon! strikes a balance between the tranquil areas of Tokyo, and the livelier ones, it gives this world a more life-like feeling: Sakura Angels exuded a sense of isolation and loneliness that is simply absent in Go! Go! Nippon: Makoto and Akira keep it lively, but cues in the game’s artwork and presentation also serves to capture the sheer energy (and volume) of crowds in Tokyo’s most iconic locations.

• Having tea in Japan is a quintessential experience: for 850 Yen, one could stop by Nakajima-no-Ochaya for whisked matcha and wagashi. One element in Go! Go! Nippon! that initially appears inconsequential to gameplay was the inclusion of a wallet. Players are asked to enter the exchange rate (at the time of writing, 1 CAD is exactly 100 Yen), and then the game keeps a running total of how much one has spent over their travels. One could play the game as someone with infinitely deep pocketbooks, or approach things more frugally, but as far as I can tell, one’s expenses don’t affect outcomes. Having said this, the wallet mechanic helps one to ballpark how much their itinerary might cost in reality, to within a precision of ±20 percent.

• As far as landmarks go, I know Tokyo Station best as being the home base for Rail Wars!, and in 2017, I do not believe we passed by this landmark: the original brick building was constructed in 1914, and over the years, became infamous as being the site of two high-profile assassinations. With a passenger volume of up to half a million every day, it is the busiest station in Japan and is Tokyo’s equivalent of New York City’s Grand Central Station. With the ten-year mark of Rail Wars! fast approaching, I have plans to revisit the series again.

• On my all-Makoto run, I ended up wrapping up the day to Tokyo Station by accompanying her to a sweets shop of sorts, located in the labyrinthine interior of Tokyo Station and its many shops. Owing to the sheer volume of foot traffic at train stations in Japan, stations also double as shopping centres. This stands in stark contrast with home, where our light rail stations appear to be arbitrarily placed. Urban planning in North America is built around vehicle ownership, and while this creates sprawling cities where people have a great deal of space to themselves, it also results in inefficiency. Having now moved to somewhere within a stone’s throw of a light rail station, I am rather excited by the fact that I can now hop on a train and be anywhere in the city on short order.

• Moments like these really serve to showcase Makoto and Akira’s personalities beyond initial impressions the original game presented: Makoto might not be a capable cook, but she absolutely enjoys her sweets. It was very endearing to see Makoto this way. This is something that was only introduced with the 2016 expansion, which really fleshes things out. I would hold that the expansions are not optional add-ons, but essential parts of the Go! Go! Nippon! experience: the expansions each give the UI significant upgrades, and the 2016 version will openly indicate which of Makoto or Akira will accompany a player to a destination.

• This makes it much easier to determine which destinations one should visit when playing through Go! Go! Nippon!: on my first run, my thoughts were that I should bias the game slightly towards Makoto. To this end, I picked Makoto destinations for two of the three days, and then went with an Akira destination for the remaining day. If I had to guess, going with Makoto or Akira for all three days seems to create in Makoto or Akira an overwhelming sense of yearning, causing both to wish to remain with the player, whereas balancing things out gives either Makoto or Akira a chance to think things through and come to terms with expressing how they feel more openly.

• On this route, I ended up taking Go! Go! Nippon! over to Shinjuku Gyoen, a beautiful park at the heart of Tokyo that folks know best as the setting for Makoto Shinkai’s Garden of Words. For the player and Makoto, a rainstorm soon develops, perhaps being a clever (and subtle) callback to the events of Garden of Words, soaking Makoto to the bone. During my trip to Japan, our destinations did not include Shinjuku Gyoen, and instead, the day began with a visit to Meiji Jinju Shrine, which is a twelve-minute walk away from Shinjuku Gyoen.

• The end result of this route sees Makoto pick up a stylish new outfit, and with this, I’ve now got two of the three possible Makoto endings unlocked. I never thought that Go! Go! Nippon! would be quite as engaging as it was; my introduction to the game had been through a friend who was watching a YouTube playthrough of the game in between classes, and the game had seemed quite hokey at first glance. However, going through the game again, I’ve come around: while Go! Go! Nippon! might be a dating simulator pretending to be a Lonely Planet travel guide, it does feel sincere in its portrayal of things.

• This is why I’m rather excited to see what Go! Go! Nippon! 2 has in store for players; since Makoto and Akira broke into the Virtual YouTuber scene, their popularity has increased, and generated enough buzz so that OVERDRIVE seriously considered a sequel. While Makoto and Akira are unvoiced in Go! Go! Nippon!, they have the traditional “anime dub” voices as Virtual YouTubers, which makes them sound like RWBY characters. High on my wishlist for Go! Go! Nippon! 2 would be to have some proper dubbing: in particular, Ayano Taketatsu is suited for playing Akira and her tsundere personality, and Ai Kayano similarly could play Makoto: Kayano’s voice has a matronly and warm character to it.

• Besides complete voice acting, other items on my list include a wider set of destinations, extending north to Hokkaido, and south towards Hiroshima and Kumamoto, or even perhaps Okinawa. Additional things I’d like to see include high resolution character models and 4K support: Go! Go! Nippon!‘s character models look a little fuzzy compared to their CG counterparts and the background artwork, so seeing improved assets would be fantastic. Similarly, Go! Go! Nippon! only goes up to 720p, but even back in 2016, 1080p resolution was already commonplace. A 4K visual novel with 1440p and 1080p settings would bring this series into the present. Beyond these technical aspects, it’ll be exciting to see what OVERDRIVE chooses to do with their next iteration in the series.

• Reminiscing about my vacation to Japan and Hong Kong in 2017 a full five years later was a fun exercise: since then, I’ve only travelled abroad for business (having gone to Denver to consult on and save an app, and then to Silicon Valley to attend an F8 developer conference). Aside from statuary holidays, I’ve been putting my nose to the grindstone for the past five years, and as a result, my world now is quite different than it had been then. While I had a life-changing experience in Japan, I continue to maintain that it would be most unwise of me to uproot my life and become an expatriate in Japan (as one of my former friends had done, at the expense of their career), but now, things have reached a point where I am able to begin considering a return trip: for me, one of the biggest joys of travel, outside of seeing the world outside my routine and enjoying a culture’s best, is knowing I’ve got a home and a warm bed to return to.

Although travel is doubtlessly a large aspect of Go! Go! Nippon!, the elephant in the room is the fact that this game also has elements of a traditional dating simulator, in which player decisions impact the story’s outcome in a tangible way. The setup in Go! Go! Nippon! prima facie appears implausible, and contemporary reviewers felt the romance aspect in Go! Go! Nippon! to be wedged in as a means of appealing to the demographic most likely to look at such a title. While it is the case that the romance in Go! Go! Nippon! can appear superficial at first glance, Go! Go! Nippon! cleverly utilises the dating sim mechanic to, again, speak to the joys of travel. It is the case that Makoto and Akira can be anthropomorphic representations of what travel entails: there are goods and bads, moments worth remembering, and accidents one would rather forget. When one travels to a destination for the first time, they fall in love with the initial impressions. As one’s experiences broaden, they learn more about the destinations, both the pluses and minuses, ultimately cultivating a unique and distinct collection of memories that accompany them home, and in some cases, creates a yearning to return. With this as a metaphor, it is not so implausible to suppose that one could fall in love with someone as quickly as they do a place. Watching the player depart, and how each of Makoto and Akira handle this moment, brings to mind what happens at the end of a vacation: there always is a desire to extend one’s stay, to do more. This aspect of Go! Go! Nippon! proves surprisingly enduring, and it is, curiously enough, through a dating sim setup that different facets of travel can be explored. I imagine that OVERDRIVE had initially designed this more as a piece to ensure players would gain the classic dating simulator experience when going through Go! Go! Nippon!, but the consequences of this element, intentional or not, is that it brings additional depth and enjoyment to the game. Curiosity to see what happens when one makes different decisions to see how things with Makoto and Akira turn out also pushes one to visit, and learn about, different spots. Getting to know Tokyo and its surroundings better, then, is analogous to getting to know Makoto and Akira better. On my first run of this game, making decisions as I would in reality earned me what is considered the “best end” for Makoto: I received a kokuhaku and the story allowed us to reunite. This speaks volumes about my character, but jokes notwithstanding, I would very much like to visit Japan again in the future. Until then, Steam is suggesting that I’ve still got about a quarter of the achievements to unlock in Go! Go! Nippon!, and its successor, Go! Go! Nippon! 2, looks like it’s going to be a reality now, so I’m curious to see what this entails. This time around, I will try to complete Go! Go! Nippon! 2 at least once before planning out a return trip to the Land of the Rising Sun.

Revisiting Titanfall 2: Exploring Hidden Depths in Blisk’s Philosophy and Reminiscing on the Start of a Journey to Japan Half at the Quinquennial Mark

“I’ve got other people with money to see.” –Kuben Blisk

On this day five years earlier, the sound of an alarm clock shakes me from my sleep. Blearily, I rub my eyes and prepare to start my day. However, it’s no ordinary day: on a typical day, I would wash up, get dressed, eat my breakfast and then drive to work. However, this day is different: I’m fulfilling a long-standing dream of flying out to Japan with the family. Although the itinerary states that this is a lightning tour, whisking us from Tokyo to Osaka up through Saitama, Yamanashi, Nagano, Gifu and Kyoto over the course of five days, before heading on over to Hong Kong to visit the other half of my family. Excitement for this particular vacation was enormous: this represented my first time travelling out of country since a pair of conferences a year earlier, and it was also the first vacation I’d taken since I began working. Having finished all of the preparations the night previously, this particular morning saw me drive to the airport for a direct flight from home to Narita. Upon touchdown, we found the shuttle bus that took us to the Hilton Tokyo Narita Airport, which overlooks the countryside and is elegantly appointed. After a hasty dinner, I was surprised to find that night had already fallen in full. Deciding against exploring the area nearby, I retired for the evening ahead of what would be a fantastic vacation. My vacation had come at a curious time: it had been booked for over a half year, and at this point in time, I’d been with my first job, a start-up, for just a shade over half a year, as well. The founder had bootstrapped said start-up, and six months into my work, I’d already delivered a rudimentary iOS app for a computational oncology firm based in the United States. Our founder, and the president of the American computational oncology firm, had spotted the potential in mobile apps, leading my start-up to pivot from a 3D visualisation tool, to a mobile platform intended to bring health data collection to users through smartphone apps. The concept was a revolutionary one, and at this point in time, our company had a number of brilliant and dedicated people looking after things, so I was able to go on vacation without worrying about the work that would pile up in my absence. In this way, I was able to enjoy what would become my favourite vacation in recent memory, and I came back to work refreshed and ready to go. Before I’d set off on this journey, I had spent the previous month playing through Titanfall 2, which had caught my eye when it first launched. Upon finishing Titanfall 2, I had been thoroughly impressed with the gameplay. More recently, nostalgia led me to play through Titanfall 2 again, and this time around, having already known how Jack Cooper’s journey concludes, I was able to appreciate other details within what was a superb narrative.

In particular, the presence of the Apex Predators, mercenaries led by one Kuben Blisk, and their role as Titanfall 2‘s primary antagonists, proved to drive the story and characterisation in ways that wouldn’t be possible had Cooper and the Militia directly fought against the IMC. The additional personality that each of Kane, Ash, Richter, Sloane and Blisk brought to the table indicates the size and scale of the IMC, but because the Apex Predators were mercenaries, Titanfall 2 had implicitly shown players that right from the start, the IMC were consigned to failure in their attempt to utilise the Fold Weapon against the Militia world of Harmony; after IMC’s fuel depot on Demeter had been destroyed, they were denied access to the Frontier, and in a bid to destroy the remnants of the Frontier’s Militia, the IMC have resorted to hiring mercenaries. Conversely, for pilots like Cooper, their motivation lies purely in protecting their home. The strength of their conviction rather outweighs the motivation the Apex Predators have for completing their assignment: mercenaries will fight on the behalf of anyone who offers a sufficiently large sum. Politics and ideology are irrelevant to groups like the Apex Predators, and it is not inconceivable that under different circumstances, Blisk and his crew may have fought the IMC instead. It is for this reason that Cooper and the Militia are able to have their victory in staving off the destruction of their home world. While Cooper’s achievements at the end of Titanfall 2 are doubtlessly impressive, the game also provides subtle cues to players that, while the IMC are doubtlessly a threat to freedom and the like, the Apex Predators themselves are not irredeemably evil, despite its members acting in dubious ways. In particular, Blisk is shown to have a sense of honour. He expresses a begrudging respect for Cooper and, after Cooper defeats Sloane, invites him to join the Apex Predators if he so chooses. In addition, Blisk is very precise and detail-oriented; he refuses to kill Cooper despite General Marder’s protests, stating that Cooper was never part of his original contract. That players never have the chance to fight Blisk directly suggests that the Apex Predator’s way of thinking is not intrinsically evil or macabre. Although it is respectable and honourable to demonstrate loyalty and fight for one’s way of living, the flipside is that there are cases where one must also consider fighting for themselves.

Screenshots and Commentary

• Titanfall 2‘s soundtrack was what ended up persuading me to give the game a go: I previously had played Titanfall during a trial period, and Stephon Barton’s compositions had captured the gritty nature of warfare between the IMC and Militia. In particular, MacAllen’s Endgame had been a particularly standout track: about forty-five seconds into the track, the iconic Titanfall motif can be heard, and there’s a sort of somber finality about the war being fought. The emotional tenour conveyed in this track evokes a feeling of departure, and thanks to the wonders of shuffle mode, I listened to this song while flying out of Taiwan’s Taoyuan Airport at the end of my journey there in December 2014.

• My vacation to Taiwan in December  2014 had been a first: traditionally, I travel during the summer months, but that year, I’d been busy with the Giant Walkthrough Brain. After arriving on December 24, we did a counterclockwise tour of the island, beginning in Taipei before heading over to the Xitou Yaoguai Village, a Japanese-style village that was constructed in 2011. This eccentric site features many Japanese features like torii and Japanese lanterns. Despite being a well-known attraction in the area, the fact that it was located in the deep forests of Taiwan’s central island gave it a bit of an eerie vibe, and that evening, I developed serious stomach problems while trying to turn in at the Leader Hotel, an old hotel surrounded by forest with a wing that clearly looked like it was not in use.

• These stomach problems went away after leaving the area, and I was able to enjoy the remainder of my trip without issue, including a delicious all-fish lunch in a restaurant under the Kao-Ping Hsi Bridge. In fact, the only thing I wish I was able to try was the grilled squid I’d seen at the night markets: although night markets are sanitary owing to government regulations, I decided to exercise caution to avoid unnecessarily putting strain on my constitution. As we moved from west to east, we travelled along a narrow, winding mountain road that took us through Daren Township. From here, we headed north towards Taitung.

• I remember that evening particularly well: we stopped at a vast jade warehouse on a remote country road under the mountain, and after hearing a pretty guide explain the details of jade production in Taiwan, we headed for dinner before retiring at the Yih Shuian resort. There were numerous sulfur hot springs here, but I decided against trying them out: unlike Japanese onsen, swimsuits were required. The next day, we travelled north towards Hualien for Taroko Gorge. The trip would conclude with a train ride to Yilan and a visit to Jiufen Old Street. This vacation proved remarkably fun even with my constitution troubles, although back then, I only had a Nokia Lumia phone with a weak camera and therefore, did not take very many photos.

• On a return trip to Taiwan, I’d love to explore the Taitung and Yilan side in greater detail: this mountainous side of Taiwan has stunning scenery. With this being said, spending time in larger cities like Taichung, Tainan, Kaohsiung and Taipei would allow me to sample the foods at night markets, as well. On my to-do list, Taiwan would be second after a trip to Japan: my desire to visit Takehara or a ryokan has not diminished. Such vacations remain in the planning stages for now, but since I did listen extensively to the Titanfall soundtrack, hearing the music brought back old memories of my Taiwan trip.

• Stephen Barton would return to score Titanfall 2‘s soundtrack: familiar motifs make a return, and this time around, Titanfall 2 would feature a full-fledged campaign set on the planet of Typhon. Here, the gorgeous mountain scenery and vast research labs, coupled with use of Traditional Chinese characters, gave the planet a distinctly Taiwan-like feeling. As I made my way through the campaign, I was thoroughly impressed with how the game handled. Movement was smooth and responsive. However, what stood out was the fact that every mission was unique in its own way, making use of a specific gameplay mechanic to challenge players and keep things fresh.

• My decision to pick up Titanfall 2 for myself came while I had been queued up for a late February meeting with my financial advisor to get my investments renewed: I received an email that had indicated that both Titanfall 2 and Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare had been going on discount. After my meeting ended, I hastened to get back in front of my computer and ended up buying both titles on sale: Titanfall 2 had been going for 60 percent off, and Infinite Warfare‘s Legacy Edition was going for a third off, allowing me to, in effect, pick up Infinite Warfare and Modern Warfare Remastered for the price of one game.

• I subsequently made my way through both campaigns and found enjoyment in both. Although Infinite Warfare had been widely criticised for being a knockoff of Titanfall 2, I ended up enjoying that game quite thoroughly. Titanfall 2, on the other hand, was universally acclaimed, and a large part of this was the fact that the campaign was so solid. The combination of novel gameplay in every level, coupled with the fact that the campaign’s missions slowly opened players up to what Pilots could do, and a companion that greatly served to ease the overwhelming sense of isolation on Typhon made it quite memorable.

• Although this isn’t usually discussed in great detail, Typhon itself proved to be a well-done location for Titanfall 2‘s events; the game opens in a verdant tropical valley with waterfalls and steep cliffs, and transitions over to a sewage processing facility. As Cooper and BT get closer to Major Anderson’s position, they pass through a vast underground complex that surpasses even the sewage processing facility in size. Once the pair reach Major Anderson (more appropriately, what’s left of him), Cooper explores a derelict IMC research facility, and then to get their findings back to the militia, they hit a communications site set in a karst landscape.

• The terrain and vegetation on Typhon brought back memories of Taiwan, and I remember during one lunch break at work, I decided to see if I could find the Xitou Yaoguai Village. Because I’d travelled Taiwan without a good set of offline maps, I had next to no idea of where precisely our destinations were. One of the search terms I’d put into Google was “Ghost village”, and while this approach did eventually lead me to Xitou Yaoguai Village, I also stumbled upon, purely by chance, a remarkably well-written travel blog by a web-developer and travel photographer named Alexander Synaptic.

• In this blog, Synaptic details various haikyo around Taiwan, and in one post, he writes about the Mingxiong Ghost House, a famous haunted house in Taiwan located just a ways outside of Chiayi in the Chianan plains. Although the precise story of how this once-gorgeous stone mansion fell into ruin is unknown, what is known is that the site is very famous, to the point where a café opened next door to provide visitors with refreshment after they’d finished visiting this landmark. At the bottom of the post, the related articles ended up sending me to Synaptic’s bike tours across Taiwan.

• By coincidence, Titanfall 2‘s soundtrack came onto my music rotation, and I listened to Burton’s majestic compositions while reading about Synaptic’s travels through Taiwan’s central ranges, an unforgiving region lined with narrow mountain roads and tough conditions, as well as down the sunbaked eastern coast. The striking scenery fit remarkably well with the Titanfall 2 soundtrack, and since then, I’ve felt an inexplicable connection between Titanfall 2 and Taiwan. Subtle hints, including hanzi characters, and a subtropical climate, reinforces this connection to me.

• I don’t mind admitting that I spent a little more time than I should have browsing through Synaptic’s blog; his writing style is precise and informative, and I absolutely love the pictures that are posted. In the months leading up to my Japan trip, and shortly after I purchased Titanfall 2, work had slowed down somewhat because the start-up I’d been with was mid-pivot: after I delivered my first-ever commercial iOS app to a computational oncology firm in the United States, our founder saw the potential for a genericised app for handling medical follow-up surveys.

• At this point in time, the details were still being hammered out, and I was asked to develop a functional mock-up of what the app would look like. At the time, I wasn’t particularly versed in things like UIKit or Autolayout (another developer handled that), and therefore, spent most of my time working with the JSON parsing code, as well as designing survey formats that could be stored to a backend and then parsed within the app to deliver questions for users. This was a realm I was a ways more familiar with, and because this had been more tedium than difficult, my days ended up being a ways slower as a result.

• As such, I did slack off during quieter moments, browsing through both Synaptic’s blog and Google Maps to see if I could find those same spots for myself. Through these virtual travels, I fell in love with Taiwan’s eastern side, especially the Huadong Valley extending from Taitung to Hualien. This valley consists of a vast plain surrounded on both sides by mountain. There’s a tranquility about this place found nowhere else in Taiwan, and I noticed a large number of bed and breakfasts located in this valley. In my mind’s eye, I saw myself waking up on a hot summer’s morning at one of these bed and breakfasts, sitting down to a scrumptious breakfast before biking off for that day’s itinerary.

• In reality, I’m not too sure how well I’d be able to navigate such a trip: my Mandarin is weak at best, but I imagine that ahead of such a trip, a little touch-up and having some translation apps would probably be helpful. While enjoying the sights of Huadong Valley is within my wheelhouse, wandering Taiwan’s haikyo is probably something I’ll leave to the pros. Urban exploration has long fascinated me, but there’s an inherent danger about it such that were I to go on such an expedition, I would prefer to have a good guide handy.

• For now, my exploration of haikyo is limited to video games, where there are no threats like broken glass or asbestos to deal with. Exploring the derelict IMC facility and seamlessly transitioning to a functional facility was probably one of the most innovative modes of gameplay I’ve ever seen, comparable to Portal and SUPERHOT. No games since Titanfall 2 have been this creative or enjoyable: many games of the present are completely fixated on in-app purchases at the expense of gameplay, and these trends have resulted in increasingly inferior games of late.

• This isn’t to say there aren’t good games: DOOM Eternal and Ace Combat 7 have managed to maintain good gameplay without sacrificing it for cosmetics. While skins make sense in third person games, I’ve never understood why people care for them in first person games, when one can’t even see what they’re wearing. Since the success of Titanfall 2, even Respawn has entered the battle royale cosmetic shooter realm; Apex Legends is a spinoff set 18 years after the events of Titanfall 2, and with the IMC defeated, Blisk founds the Apex Games. Although Apex Legends is most certainly not the kind of game I’m interested in playing, it was interesting to learn that Blisk was the founder: Titanfall 2 denied players a chance to fight Blisk.

• Despite being the antagonist, I never felt any animosity towards Blisk or his Apex Predators. Blisk himself openly expresses respect for Cooper and declines to kill him, stating Cooper and BT were never part of his contract. Five years later, I’ve seen now for myself why Blisk was adamant about Cooper not being a part of his contract; scope creep can make even seemingly simple projects into monstrosities that seemingly cannot be completed. When I signed the original agreement for that Xamarin project, the expectations were that I would spend about a month on the project, get the bugs sorted out and then walk the computational oncology firm through the App Store submission process, which had previously given them trouble.

• Had we stayed within this scope of work, I would have wrapped up mid-September and had time to focus on our own product. Instead, this project expanded in scope as I continued working on it. Fifteen bugs became sixty, and I was asked to implement features that hadn’t been covered in the original contract. This pushed the project out to October, and I remember being contacted to fix a “high priority high severity” bug while I was out in Vernon for a well-earned break (the salmon run had been going that year), only to learn that it was a user error that produced the bug (they downloaded an outdated build).

• This experience immediately sees parallels in Titanfall 2, being equivalent to General Marder asking Blisk and his Apex Predators to go after Cooper. Throughout the course of Titanfall 2, Cooper and BT-7274 become such a formidable pair that they are able to begin picking off Blisk’s subordinates. In this way, Kane and Ash are killed after underestimating what the pair are capable of. From the player’s standpoint, this follows logically, but I imagine that for Blisk, Cooper represents an unexpected thorn in their plans. However, despite Cooper and BT-7274’s actions, they are not successful in stopping the Apex Predators from bringing the Ark to the Fold Weapon.

• Revisiting Titanfall 2 meant having a chance to explore more thoroughly, and here, I managed to find the only EM-4 Cold War in the campaign. This burst-fire bullpup grenade launcher fires small, but highly-damaging rounds in fours, and against the foes in the campaign, they are quite effective: a single hit will vapourise IMC soldiers, and even the Reapers will go down in a few bursts. Playing games again is fun for this reason: I get to discover new things about them, and oftentimes, revisiting a game under different circumstances impacts how I feel about a given scene.

• In the case of Titanfall 2, I see a fantastic story that has aged gracefully, and with five more years of life experience, I also see a convincing tale of why scope creep is undesirable. Had Marder managed to convince Blisk into accepting that killing Cooper and BT-7274 was a part of their scope of work, Blisk likely would’ve died by the player’s hand. My Xamarin assignment with the computational oncology company indeed saw scope creep of an unreasonable extent, and I got the distinct feeling that the Winnipeg team was actively working to prevent me from finishing my tasks.

• Reading through the commit history, it was similarly clear that the previous developer who’d been working on the mobile app was competent, but similarly hampered by the Winnipeg team; the changelogs show that the endpoints were added very late into the game (about a month before I was asked to start). There is little doubt in my mind that the fact I was nailing down issues, and fixing a fatal flaw in their user onboarding flow (transforming a ten-step process into a three-step process), was making their developers look bad, so they were attempting to save face by throwing more bugs at me, and even introducing changes prior to demos that they knew would cause the app to crash.

• Thus, what was supposed to take six weeks at most doubled to twelve weeks, and I was left exhausted by this project. Looking back, I know now why Blisk states to Marder that Cooper was not his problem; Cooper represents a low severity, low priority issue to Blisk in that since he’s already delivered the Ark, he’s done his work. For me, my contract was explicitly stated as ending once I submitted the app to the App Store, although this was later expanded to “taking care of any high priority, high severity bugs that the Winnipeg team introduced”. Dissatisfaction at this project for dragging out as long as it had, coupled with the fact that it ultimately cost us the other deal we had, led me to resign from my first startup.

• Although the work had been engaging, I was not able to see a future in which we would be successful: that the Xamarin project was allowed to expand in scope as it did also gave me little confidence that we would be able to work on our own products without being interrupted constantly by external factors. Had I continued, I likely would’ve continued to suffer as a result of the Winnipeg team’s incompetence. When I transitioned over to my next position, another startup, I found myself far happier, and under a new founder, I ended up cultivating a diverse range of iOS skills, from UIKit and Autolayout, to things like writing my own networking wrappers and reachability tests, push notifications and payment handling through the Stripe SDK. The only reason why I ended up leaving this position was because investment dried up after the results of the 2020 election. With revenue dwindling, the founder and I shared a conversation about our directions.

• Unlike my first start-up, whose founder has fallen off the radar, I’m still in contact with my second start-up’s founder and occasionally lend my time to help out with a side project. Curiously enough, towards the end, my second start-up’s founder also asked me to lend my skills for another project, but this time, armed with significantly more experience, I delivered a product I was proud of, and one where there had been no scope creep because all of the lines were clearly drawn in the sand. More importantly, unlike the Xamarin project, I was also fairly compensated for my work: with the second start-up’s project, I was involved in every step of the process and knew exactly how much the client was paying, as well as how the funds would be dispersed.

• Conversely, with the Xamarin project, I wasn’t involved with discussions when money was concerned, and although it sounded like the payout was considerable, in the end, my compensation only equaled the sum of my travel expenses. Considering the amount of trouble the Winnipeg team put me through, I was definitely shortchanged by this turn of events. Experiences like these reshaped my experience with Titanfall 2 a second time around, and so, while Blisk might be an antagonist, I completely empathise with his sentiments in the present; considering the amount of experience I’ve accrued as an iOS developer (and all of the ancillary know-how I’ve picked up), I agree with Blisk’s thoughts: “I don’t work for free”.

• Blisk’s remark, that he’s got “other people with money to see”, shows that his skills are in high demand, and that he’s able to make his own call as to what assignments he wants to take. Since there are other clients implied to be bidding for his services, Blisk no longer regards Marder as his employer, hence his attitudes towards the end of the game. Others have argued that this lessens Blisk’s character: from this point of view, Blisk is only saying this because Cooper has thoroughly beaten his team of elites. However, given the tone Marder takes with Blisk, the opposite is true; Marder sees Cooper as a threat to the IMC, but Blisk simply has no interest in doing what’s outside of his original scope of work.

• My experiences doing contract work at start-ups to help keep my lights on has meant that I look at Blisk’s character completely differently now, and for this reason, I’m glad they chose not to have Cooper fight (and defeat) him: it shows that Titanfall 2 understands the other side of things. The me of five years earlier had been more similar to Cooper, fighting loyally for a cause to both learn and protect. I only left my first start-up after it became clear there was no future, and I was fighting right to the end. This was, in part, because I was not confident in my skill as a developer at the time. Correspondingly, the me of five years earlier was a little disappointed at the fact that Cooper never did get to take Blisk on.

• According my site’s archives, I reached the penultimate mission of Titanfall 2 mid-April. Fighting through the various IMC warship en route to the Draconis, I was fighting off a minor head cold at the time. However, a cold was not enough to dampen my spirits: at this point in time, my Japan trip was only a few more weeks away, and I was very much looking forwards to my experiences. After my experiences in Taiwan, I was most excited about the fact that I was rocking an iPhone 6: despite only sporting 16 GB of internal storage, this phone had an eight megapixel camera and shot images of a decent resolution.

• Moreover, access to the App Store meant I had access to offline maps, which proved instrumental in helping me to remember which destinations I visited. This bit of technology allowed me to record my vacation in greater detail than any vacation I’d been on previously, and so, I am able to recall specifics about this particular vacation with a much higher precision compared to something like Taiwan. Owing to an incident when I was migrating machines a few months ago, I lost all of my original photos, which were carrying the EXIF and date information, but since I uploaded my images to social media, I at least still have a majority of the photos I took.

• As noted earlier, I will be returning to revisit this particular journey later this month. However, rather than share the vacation photos a second time here, I will be recounting how this vacation shifted my perspectives. I will be fitting this discussion around Go! Go! Nippon!: this game acts as a virtual simulation of what an idealised first-time trip to Japan is like, and while it began as a bit of a joke, this visual novel is surprisingly well done, providing players with some useful information about Japan, along with an amusing scenario that makes the game more immersive than its premise would suggest.

• Having said this, I’ve never actually written about Go! Go! Nippon! despite having beaten it twice. The game has received two expansions, once in 2015, and again in 2016, which dramatically upgraded the resolutions and number of destinations one could visit. As such, the time has come to correct this, and for my play-through this time around, I will be going through the 2016 expansion: my last play-through of Go! Go! Nippon! was for the 2015 expansion, which proved to be a remarkably enjoyable one. Games like Titanfall 2 are more commonly seen in my wheelhouse compared to things like Go! Go! Nippon!, but I will remark that, while I’ve got a bias towards FPS and action-oriented titles, I am generally open to a wide range of games.

• Towards the end of Titanfall 2, as a clever callback to the overpowered MK5 Smart Pistol of Titanfall: the Smart Pistol was originally able to instantly kill a Pilot in the multiplayer. While automatic target acquisition took some time and only could occur at short ranges, a skilled Smart Pistol user could decimate foes in close quarters without retribution. However, the Smart Pistol was useless at medium and long ranges. To mitigate these issues, Titanfall 2 has the Smart Pistol become a boost rather than a loadout weapon, and while retaining most of the original Smart Pistol’s functions, the MK6 cannot be fired unless one has a lock, and players will be alerted to the fact they’re being locked onto.

• In the campaign, it becomes a weapon that Cooper can reliably fall back on: after securing the Ark, Cooper is captured, and BT-7274 is destroyed, forcing Cooper to retrieve the SERE Kit and reach a drop point to continue the mission. Having the Smart Pistol offsets the overwhelming odds, and this is the only point in the campaign where the Smart Pistol appears. The speed and efficiency players have here is a culmination of everything one has learnt throughout the campaign, and it is expected that one can make full use of their weapon and environment to reach the drop site for a new Vanguard-class Titan equipped with the Legion setup.

• On this date five years ago, I was on a plane bound for Narita. On that day, I certainly wasn’t thinking ahead five years; today, I’ve finished another workday, and by, this point in time, I feel like I’ve settled in after the move. Housekeeping has become smoother, and I’ve found enough time at the end of a day to write. I’ve also resumed my anime schedule, and at the time of writing, I’ve now finished Akebi’s Sailor Uniform, which I look forwards to writing about soon. In addition, settling in means being able to capitalise on both the fact I’ve got several brilliant parks and good restaurants within walking distance.

• Over this past weekend, I had a chance to try out the pizza place just across the way: we ordered a Greek pizza (purple onions, green peppers, black olives, feta cheese and tomato slices), alongside a house special pizza (an all-meat pizza with pepperoni, sausage, extra cheese and crispy salami slices) and honey-garlic wings. Having not gone out for pizza for quite some time, what stood out was the fact that the pizzas from this particular place (a 2-minute walk) were packed with toppings. I’m not a pizza connoisseur, and the mark of a good pizza for me is the toppings: a winning pizza has a flavourful and healthy amount of meat, vegetables and cheese.

• With this, I’ve beaten Titanfall 2 again, but this time, it’s under different circumstances. Five more years under my belt means I’ve been able to see the story from another angle, and in this way, I’ve also found that Titanfall 2‘s answer to the question I’d posed whilst playing Project Wingman is simple: mercenaries don’t really care for ideology and concern themselves with a job well done, so it was interesting to fight on both sides of the fence (as a mercenary in Project Wingman, and against them in Titanfall 2). I imagine readers tire of non-anime posts here, so my next goal is to swiftly wrap up a post for Akebi’s Sailor Uniform, and then kick off Go! Go! Nippon!: since I moved to my current desktop, I’ve lost a host of save files on top of my old travel photos. This means that I’ll have a chance to go back through Go! Go! Nippon! with a fresh set of eyes.

While I passed through the Meishin Expressway cutting through the farmer’s fields near Shiga, my iPhone began playing BT’s theme. The me of five years earlier had admired the majesty and scale of Titanfall 2‘s soundtrack, as well as the game’s movement system and visceral gunplay. I hadn’t yet caught onto the fact that Titanfall 2‘s portrayal of Blisk was strikingly similar to that of a software developer. Blisk is described as being in his line of work both for the fact that it pays well and because Blisk loves the the thrill of a challenge. In addition, Blisk is particularly fond of testing out cutting edge hardware and weapons, as well as experimenting with different solutions and pushing himself to complete assignments at all costs. Blisk is loyal to no flag or ideology, serving a client only until his task is completed as stated. As a software developer, I’m surprisingly similar: although some problems are frustrating, there’s a certain satisfaction in solving them. Working as a developer means being able to play with beta builds, new SDKs and even cutting-edge hardware. I’ve similarly worked on assignments (both in an organisation and as a consultant) where I stop development once the stipulated milestones are reached (and out-of-scope work is described as such). Seeing the commonalities between myself and Blisk led me to appreciate Titanfall 2 in a new way, and at present, I understand Titanfall 2‘s choice to let Blisk live by disallowing players the chance to fight him. Looking back, I’d been similar to Cooper in that I had been loyal, to a fault, with my first startup. As I accrued more experience, both professional and personal, realities meant that it became easier to see what drives Blisk’s character; Titanfall 2 has Blisk end the game by stating to Marder that with his current contract over, Cooper is no longer his problem, and that he’s got people with money to see. For me, the first start-up I worked for ended up failing: with the paycheques no longer coming in despite having delivered a working app, the time had come for me to move on, as well.

Reflections on visiting the Land of the Rising Sun and Pearl of the Orient

“All right, okay, now we’re in the quiet safe room where none of the stuff that I bought from various shops can be lost in transit. Now, let’s look at all the stuff we got. We got a Kimi no na wa Official Visual Guide, that’s sixteen hundred yen. We got a Mount Fuji fridge magnet, that’s four hundred and eighty yen. We got, uh, a…some bells from the Hong Kong airport. Seventy Hong Kong dollars.” —Stealy, Rick and Morty

I’m back from my travels across the ocean to Japan and Hong Kong after two weeks; having returned for a week now, the effects of jet lag and a persistent cough picked up on the flight back are no longer felt, and the time is appropriate to do a short reflection at my travels through a section of Japan, which encompassed a journey from Tokyo to Osaka over a four-day period. It’s the first trip I’ve done in some time that did not involve my graduate work, and during the course of my travels, I noticed that time moved at a much more relaxing, casual pace than it does when I’m at work. After brief stay in Tokyo and an overnight at the Hotel Heritage Resort (where I had a fantastic evening dinner and soaked in the onsen) on the first day, we travelled to Mount Fuji and toured Oshino village nearby before ascending to the Fifth Station located on the side of the mountain for a closer look at Japan’s most famous mountain for day two. The day ended at the Ikenotaira Resort, located in the Kirigamine Highland. On the third day, after enjoying some fresh strawberries at the Enakyo Observatory overlooking the Kiso River, we strolled down the walk at Magome Village and sat down to a Japanese-style lunch before visiting Nagoya’s ​Atsuta Shrine. On the final day, Kyoto’s legendary Kinkakuji was first on the list of things to take in, followed by Nara’s ​Tōdai temple in the afternoon. The day concluded in Osaka, bringing the lightning tour of Japan to a close. Subsequently, I flew to Hong Kong and spent a week there with family, doing a self-guided tour by day and sitting down to dinner with relatives and family friends by night. It’s been a most pleasant experience, and by the end of things, I was quite ready to return to the True North Strong and begin working again.

The experience in Japan was a wondrous one, an opportunity to visit the Land of the Rising Sun for myself: it’s definitely a fine destination for visiting, striking a fine balance between modernity and history. Most of my travels saw me visit more traditional locations, such as Tokyo’s Meiji Jinju Shrine and Imperial Palace, but a glimpse of the Tokyo Skytree and drive through Tokyo’s metro area also showcased Japan’s urban aspects. Most of the trip was actually spent exploring historical and rural attractions: Magome and Oshino Village were located a ways from urban centers, offering a quiet respite from the hustle and bustle of the city that is a far cry from images of a busy, never-sleeping nation. I greatly enjoyed these places, where the pacing was calm and easygoing; it is one thing to see these things from behind a screen or written on a page, so to have experienced a diverse array of places and foods in Japan personally was most illuminating and enjoyable: besides Japanese snow crab, Kobe beef was also to be savoured. As with France last year, the Japan component of my vacation was also a humbling one: compared to Hong Kong, where I can get by moderately well on account of fluency in spoken Cantonese, my command of the Japanese language is not particularly good, so even though I can wield enough of the basics to order food and ask for directions, travelling in a foreign country serves as a constant reminder that the world is vast, and complex societies that have developed reflect on the sheer diversity on our planet. Overall, this vacation to Japan was superb in all ways, and while only scratching the surface of things, afforded me a chance to explore and experience a plethora of elements in Japan.

Image Gallery

• Last I did a post featuring photographs with anime vectors superimposed was back for the Cancún ALIFE XV Conference last July, and this post will feature thirty images on top of the standard issue discussion. The vectors are deliberately placed, to liven up the images, although some images lack these vectors, since placing them would seem illogical. The photographs begin on the full first day in Tokyo: we had arrived in the early evening on the previous day and stayed close to the hotel, being exhausted from the flight and dissuaded from exploring the nearby plains on account of a shower. This image was taken from the open area besides the Imperial Palace in Tokyo’s Chiyoda district.

• Driving into Tokyo from Narita, then visiting the Meiji Jinju Shrine and Imperial Palace took up most of the morning of the first day. We stopped by a nabe place that featured a hot pot already set up with cabbage, shiitake mushrooms and bean sprouts, with an egg, fried chicken and thinly-sliced beef strips and udon noodles. It was quite fun to cook the meats for myself, and lunch was a highly delicious affair. Following lunch, we spent some time in the Ginza district, browsing around the shops in the area.

• The Wako building in the Ginza district is visible in this image, being dwarfed by the other developments along the road. The building was constructed in 1932, and I know it best from the film King Kong vs. Godzilla. It houses the Wako department store, selling fancier items like jewellery and designer clothing. I suddenly recall that I’ve yet to actually beat Go! Go! Nippon! – having visited Japan in person before finishing a simulated visit is perhaps one of the strongest reminders of just how big of a procrastinator I am when it comes to entertainment.

• Owing to time constraints, we did not actually go inside the Tokyo Skytree, and instead, stopped on a promenade along the Sumida River about a klick and some away from the Skytree. The heavy cloud cover would have made it difficult to get a good view of Tokyo that day. With a height of 634 meters, it is the second tallest structure in the world, bested only by Dubai’s Burj Khalifa. While a broadcasting and communications tower for several Japanese television stations, there are also two observation decks, a larger capacity one at 350 meters and a smaller one at 450 meters. By comparison, Taipei 101’s observation deck is 391.8 meters above the surface, and the International Commerce Center in Hong Kong’s observation decks is 387.8 meters above the surface.

• The Koganji temple is located around seven klicks ways from the Skytree as the mole digs in a shopping district. It is a popular destination, as the temple is a place where people can purify and heal minor ailments. On the fourth, fourteenth and twenty-fourth day of each month, a small festival is also held here. This image was captured facing south from the temple grounds.

• If my travels to Taiwan and Hong Kong in December 2014/ January 2015 was a high-buildings visit, then this trip to Japan and Hong Kong was a cuisine tour: lunches and dinner were thoroughly enjoyable, and I looked forwards to each meal. On the first evening at the Hotel Heritage, we sat down to a feast of sorts: besides the sashimi closeup here, and katsu visible in the background, there was also miso soup, rich personal-sized nabe with rich cuts of beef, leeks, enokitake mushrooms and noodles, a finely-prepared bento box with abalone, eel and other small dishes, plus unlimited snow crab, whose meat was sweet and tender. An hour after dinner, I took off to relax in the onsen.

• On the second day, we headed for Mount Fuji, visiting three different locations that each offered a unique view of Japan’s most famous mountain. We began at the Fuji Bhuddist Temple in Gotemba: Mount Fuji is just across the way, and while that morning was beautiful, the mountain itself was enveloped in cloud, almost as though it was still preparing itself to be seen. Here, the views of the mountain would have been spectacular, although despite not being able to see the mountain itself, I nonetheless enjoyed the cool, fresh air here.

• The main reason for why I’ve been able to document my travels over the past two years is because of my iPhone: the combination of a powerful camera and a good set of offline maps allowed me to chronicle every destination visited. I note that Google Maps does not provide offline areas in Japan owing to laws and regulations, so I went with Maps.me. Having good maps is essential to travel and takes away a bit of the guesswork in estimating where I am in relation to a destination, and in the aftermath of a vacation, also has the benefit of providing exceptionally precise recollections of where I went.

• We made our way to Yamanakako shortly after, where we stopped at a yakiniku restaurant besides Lake Yamanaka for lunch. Plates of beef, chicken and pork awaited us, and I drank miso soup while waiting for my lunch to cook. There was a shared grill that we used to bring the meat to perfection, and I chose to grill the pork and chicken first, leaving the beef for last. I do love a good grill, and this lunch was as fun to eat as it was to cook.

• Yamanakako is situated right beside Lake Yamanaka, and our stopping point was on the lake’s western shore, so I was not able to get any photographs of Mount Fuji and the lake. Largest of the Fuji lakes in surface area, it is also the shallowest and is a popular spot for water sports. In the moments after lunch, there was sufficient time to purchase some souvenirs, so I picked up a fridge magnet and was on my way.

• Next on our destination was the village of Oshino, where we visited Shibokusa. The quiet and tranquil of the village gave way to a bit of a crowd as we neared the Nigoriike pool and sourvenir shop. I ordered an ice cream: the weather that day had remained quite pleasant and warm, hence my wish for something cool. In a bit of carelessness, I had forgotten my hat back home, but a good supply of sunscreen and mercifully cooler weather on the trip meant that this mistake was not too much of an issue.

• While I was walking the streets of Shibokusa and marvelling at a water wheel driving a traditional mill, some folks in my social media feed were deep into the Kantai Collection Spring Event, fighting the impossible Random Number Generator in the hopes of besting the Abyssals and unlocking ships. From their remarks and those of other Kantai Collection players, the game seems to be more trouble than it’s worth (the setup alone requires a doctorate in computer science, from what I hear), so between Shimushu, get! or eating an ice cream in a peaceful village thirteen klicks from Mount Fuji, Mount Fuji would win every time.

• Although the season for hanami has passed, some trees were still in blossom at Shibokusa. As this image attests, the area is quite popular amongst tourists, being a ways livelier than the quieter reaches of the village. One of the locals handed out some peanuts to us while we were walking en route to Shibokusa, and I immediately wondered that, had I chosen to eat the peanuts, where would the shells go? One of the challenges about Japan is the relative lack of trash cans: the broken window theory is offered as the reason why, suggesting that forcing people to hold onto their trash means a decreased inclination to throw refuse out at random.

• The clouds around Mount Fuji had lifted somewhat by afternoon, and here, I caught a glimpse of the mountain before it was engulfed by clouds again. We had reached the end of the shops on the street and found ourselves looking into someone’s backyard at this point, hence the decision to turn back, revealing the mountain. Another aspect of Japan that I was unaccustomed to were the presence of toilet seats that seem more advanced than the seat of a fighter aircraft even in public facilities. Found at our hotels, I admit that heated toilet seats were quite nice, but I never bothered using their additional functions, which seem quite intimidating. By comparison, the toilets in Hong Kong were rather more familiar and straightforwards to use. One of the things I noticed while in Japan was the lack of soap dispensers in public restrooms: carrying a small bottle of hand sanitizer rectifies this.

• The final destination for the second day was the Fifth Station, located 2400 meters above sea level. Being the highest point that climbers can begin making their ascent from, the site is home to some shops and restaurants, and the mountain itself is vividly visible. Up here, the conditions are rather different than the warm temperatures of the surrounding regions: there is a distinct chill in the air, and having a nice jacket makes it more comfortable to wander about here.

• By the time we finished the descent Mount Fuji and travelled out to Ikenotaira Hotel, on the shores of Shirakaba Lake. While utterly exhausted, I was reawakened by the buffet dinner at the hotel. I enjoyed their tempura and snow crab to a great extent and did not partake in the onsen, preferring to hit the hay almost straightway. The next morning was the third day: I woke up early and walked out to the lake’s edge to capture this image, before exploring the resort connected to our hotel. It’s an older facility that bring to mind some of the haikyo I’ve seen, but is still well-maintained and comfortable.

• There’s no anime character vector here because I took this photograph with my phone over the railing of the Enakyo Lookout point over the Kiso River, and it simply won’t make sense to obscure the image 😉 It was shaping up to be a warm day, and we puchased some strawberries from a vendor on the roadside, savouring their sweetness before moving on. There’s an amusement park, Enakyo Wonderland, adjacent to the observation point, and unlike the legendary Nara Dreamland, this one is still active: open most days from 9:30 AM to 5:00 PM, admissions start at 1100 yen.

• This house carries with it a very Takehara-like feel to it, overlooking Magome-juku. Forty-third of the Nakasendõ‘s sixty-nine stations that were located along the ancient road between Kyoto and Tokyo, Magome-juku’s old town is well preserved, featuring buildings from the eighteenth century. It was a thrill to walk down the town’s main road and take in all of the buildings, among them a water mill.

• Mount Ena is just visible on the left-hand side of the image here, being partially covered by some trees. The walk through Magome-juku brought to mind Taiwan’s Jiufen Old Street, which I had visited back during 2014. Not quite as busy or crowded, but exuding an equal amount of atmosphere, it was a pleasant experience to be treading the a path that’s existing since the Edo period, and here, I reach a point in the street where Mount Ena is visible.

• Upon reaching the bottom of the hill and the end of the walk, lunch was served in a bento form: picked daikon, vegetables, fish, fried chicken, Japanese omelettes and large, sweet red beans. We also had a bowl of freshly-prepared noodle soup accompanying lunch, and a recurring theme is that while portion sizes appear smaller in Japan, that’s an illusion. Finishing everything provides plenty of food energy and of course, is an adventure in and of itself.

• By the time lunch ended, the skies had turned overcast, and I took a short walk around the area. During the course of this trip, I’ve spent more time in the inaka than I did in urban areas, and this was a wonderful surprise; the Japanese countryside has always held a certain draw for me, as I’ve taken a keen interest in the languid, slower-paced feeling from the rural areas conveyed by anime such as Please Teacher!, Ano Natsu De Matteru, Non Non Biyori, Flying Witch and Sakura Quest. Not quite as remote or empty as the Canadian Prairies, the inaka offer a sense of quiet while at the same time, give a warm, inviting sense that is absent when I drive through the parts of my provinces outside of any towns or hamlets.

• Leaving Magome-juku, our next destination was ​Atsuta Shrine in Nagoya. A location steeped in history and interesting architecture, I have no photographs here to show because most of them were quite dark as a result of the large cypress trees in the park. There is a museum here housing upwards of four thousand Japanese artifacts, among them a dagger that is one of Japan’s National Treasures. With this location checked off, it was off to Gifu, where our hotel was. After checking in, I had ramen at a nearby shop: although the owners did not speak English, I spoke enough to place my order, a savoury, piping hot pork ramen. The restaurant shortly filled with Chinese tourists, and for a brief moment, it felt like I was in a Hong Kong noodle shop.

• On our final full day in Japan, the first destination was the Kinkaku-ji in Kyoto. One of the city’s most famous landmarks, the building we see today is a reconstruction: after a monk torched the original in 1950, it was rebuilt in 1955 and given an extensive gold-leaf exterior that confers the temple’s distinct colour. Yui and her classmates visit the Kinkaku-ji in K-On!‘s second season, stopping to take photographs in the exact same spot that we visited, and whereas I bought a matcha ice cream to enjoy, K-On! has Yui and the others order a more traditional matcha desert and tea.

• After lunch in a park whose location and name I can’t quite remember (that lunch was notable for being a nabe with tempura on the side, in addition to being the only place where we had to kneel rather than sit), we made our way to Nara Park and ended the day in Osaka. Spent from the travelling, we had omurice for dinner (I ordered the curry katsu omurice, which was delicious) and I browsed around at Tsutaya, a Japanese bookstore, coming upon a volume of Your Name. Our journey in Japan concluded here, and we left Osaka for Hong Kong at the Kansai International Airport, where I bought the Your Name Official Guidebook for a mere 1600 yen.

• On the flight to Hong Kong from Osaka, our Cathay Pacific flight featured Your Name, so I watched that before dozing off on the flight. It was midnight when we arrived in Hong Kong, and on day one, we visited the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen museum in Central Hong Kong, before stopping by the Western market to window shop and have lunch. There’s a delightful bistro on the first floor that I ordered a prawn spaghetti from, and the day closed with a family dinner. The next day, Repulse Bay and Aberdeen were on the list of places to visit. Despite having went to Hong Kong previously, we’d only gone to Stanley, so this time, I figured it was time to try something different. Repulse Bay is rather quieter than Stanley, and has a beautiful beach that was featured in the first moments of Roman Tam’s “幾許風雨” music video.

• While my trip in Hong Kong was largely oriented around spending time with family over there, we had plenty of time to go sightseeing because this time around, we were visiting during the regular season, during which everyone is working. I myself took two weeks off work for this vacation, and previously, one of my coworkers noted that leaving for any period of time meant coming back to what felt like a completely different company. While on vacation, I did keep an eye on things occasionally, so I was roughly in the loop for comings and goings, so I can’t say that coming back felt like too much of a shock. Here is a photograph of Hong Kong’s central district, where I rode the Hong Kong Observation Wheel and got a nice discount on admissions on account of it being the twentieth anniversary of Hong Kong’s handover to China.

• While we did not ride any junks across Hong Kong Harbour, we did ride the Star Ferry over to Kowloon to walk the streets, and I spent an afternoon at the Tsim Sha Tsui Clocktower, the Avenue of Stars and iSquare adjacent to the infamous Chung King mansions. While there are three cross-harbour tunnels and the MTR linking Victoria Island to Kowloon, taking the Star Ferry from Central (or any ferry from North Point) has more character. Ferries are also a pleasant way of visiting Discovery Bay, a quiet resort town with a nice beach and mall. I’m a little envious of the quality of sandwiches that Hong Kong fast food joints make — their burgers are about as nice as the burgers I can get at pubs back home for a fraction of the price.

• This is the Hong Kong Heritage Museum in Sha Tin, a city just north of Kowloon. There’s an indoor wet market at the far side of Sha Tin in Sunshine City Plaza; it’s one of the cleanest wet markets I’ve ever seen and has a very solid ambiance, bringing to mind locales from Deus Ex: Human Revolution and Deus Ex: Mankind Divided: it’s filled with people browsing the stalls selling fresh cuts of fish, shellfish and squid, as well as siu laap and baozi. There’s a profound beauty in the cacophony, as folks order fish to take home and slurp noodles in streetside stalls.

• Eating in Hong Kong represented a world of difference from Japan: whereas Japan was all about trying Japanese cuisine, Hong Kong wasn’t too different from home, although definitely delicious, to be sure. I went out for dim sum on two occasions, and had dinner at 嘉豪酒家 in Shau Kei Wan with family during some of the evenings. Cantonese food in Hong Kong is about the same as it is in Canada, so I’m familiar with what restaurants serve. There were some nights where we ate elsewhere: here, I’ve got a close-up of an Italian style seafood rice (scallops, mussels, calamari rings and a large prawn) at the Itamomo in Shau Kei Wan, and on another evening, I had a chicken-and-beef steak sizzling hot plate at Taikoo Shing Mall. During another evening, we had dinner at the Harbour Plaza Hotel, whose seafood buffet was simply fabulous. While being advertised as a seafood buffet, they had pork ribs, prime rib, rack of lamb, siu mei, chicken and veal in addition to whole fried crab, crayfish, large prawns, scallops and sushi. With family, we stayed from opening until closing, partaking in both the buffet and conversation as the skies grew dark.

• The biological sciences building of Hong Kong University is visible here. This vacation was, for the lack of a better adjective, incredible, and looking back, I can understand why folks undergo a bit of a change after visiting Japan. While going to Japan did broaden my perspectives, fear not, I’m not going anywhere: it’s not sufficient to lead me to drop my career and attempt to move there. By comparison, Hong Kong feels like home, minus the exceptional humidity and crowds. With this last image, my reflections come to an end, and this means that it’s back to business as usual both in reality and at this blog: the upcoming Call of Duty posts won’t write themselves, and I’ve got an eye on Koe no Katachi, which I may write about later in June as time permits.

In Hong Kong, on the other hand, my wonder and amazement gave way to a sense of familiarity and belonging, being a world of difference from Japan. Although I am naturally most at home in Canada, my background means that if there were a place in the world that feels to me like a second home, Hong Kong would be it. Making my way around Hong Kong is remarkably straightforwards: the MTR allows one to reach almost anywhere in Hong Kong quickly, and on Victoria Island, a tram links the island’s eastern and western reaches together. Finding directions and ordering food is as straightforward as it is back home. The incredible contrast between Japan and Hong Kong was thus another aspect of this vacation I enjoyed greatly. Aside from visiting attractions in Hong Kong, such as the Observation Wheel in Central and the Antique Street in the mid-levels, I spent a considerable amount of time with family there, as well as browsing through their shopping centres. Dim Sum was invariably to be had when visiting family and friends, as were large evening meals, although there were some evenings where we dined out at smaller establishments, too. With this vacation now over, I leave feeling refreshed, a bit more learned, and will definitely anticipate a return trip at some point in the future. For the present, as a part of returning to my typical routine outside of writing Swift 3.1 code and architecting apps, I will be easing back into the swing of things for blogging, as well as reading through the various Your Name books I picked up, playing Battlefield 1 and generally making the most of what is shaping up to be a fabulous entry into yet another beautiful summer.

The Giant Walkthrough Brain: Reflections on a life-changing project

“Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.” —Melody Beattie

Neurosurgeon Joseph Bogen proposed in the early 70s a fantastical structure resembling a sixty-story brain that would function as a museum. In this brain museum, there would be galleries, exhibits, gift shops and canteens for visitors to explore, learning about the intricacies of the brain. As the stories go, engineers found such a building to be unfeasible (or did not otherwise desire to build it), but the ever-improving capabilities of graphics and the ability to create 3D, virtual worlds means that, even if such a brain is not built, they can be reconstructed in a virtual environment. This is the story of the Giant Walkthrough Brain, one that I’ve become very familiar with in recounting the project’s to audiences. The project itself began in the summer of 2014, after a tough start to the year: by April 2014, matters concerning unrequited love had taken a physical and mental toll on my well-being. I had just completed an iOS course and had implemented a navigational system for exploring 3D anatomy on an iPad, when Jay Ingram approached my supervisor and asked whether or not it would be feasible to create an interactive brain presentation. After a brief demonstration and discussion, Ingram found the answer to be a resounding “yes”; my supervisor was considering the application of the then-newly freely available Unity Engine and asked me to determine if the engine was suitable for deployment. Tasked with constructing a prototype, I immersed myself into the project: the first prototype convinced Ingram and his band that a 3D, interactive brain museum would be possible. For the next two months, I worked on the Giant Walkthrough Brain‘s Unity component, adding in user interaction, controls, navigational elements and slideshow mechanics to aid in Ingram’s talk. Over the course of the summer, I attended three performances of the Giant Walkthrough Brain: once at the Banff Center for the Banff Summer Arts Festival, and two more at the Telus Spark Science Center during Beakerhead. During the course of this project I learned more about game design and the Unity Engine itself; the pain of unrequited love fell to the back of my mind as I attended the shows to see the Unity project integrated with the Giant Walkthrough Brain show, and exiting the summer of 2014, sorrow had been displaced with a new sense of hope. With a summer’s worth of Unity experience under my belt, I was now ready to begin working on my graduate thesis.

• Only lasting for two nights and two days, packing for Kelowna turned out to be quite quick, and I fit everything I needed into a larger carry-on article. Shortly after arriving in Kelowna on the evening of January 29, we visited a pub (I had dinner before leaving home and ordered nothing), before checking in at the Manteo Resort. I was utterly exhausted despite the short flight; following a quickly shower, I hit the hay. I woke up the next morning to blue skies and a light dusting of snow overlooking Okanagan Lake.

• The air was quite cool, but still a ways warmer than the weather back home. The Manteo resort is a very comfortable establishment, and when I arrived, I found some complementary cookies were prepared. I decided to set them aside and eat them later, since my mind was focussed on sleep. I would eventually bring the recipe back home, although my busy schedule has precluded baking anything so far.

• One of my favourite parts of travelling is the presence of a full breakfast: a platter of scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, hash browns and pancakes are a perfect way to start the morning, and the quiet atmosphere of the Manteo resort allowed me to enjoy breakfast. As an early riser, I arrived before anyone else did, but eventually, my colleagues and the performers showed up. Their discussion went towards renumeration for the performances, but as I was a little tired, I was under the impression that I would need to cover some of the expenses myself. They were surprised at how I calmly I’d delivered the question (I wasn’t expecting to be paid for helping out) and clarified that, I would be paid for helping out.

• It’s a three-quarter hour walk to the performance venue, and I arrived shortly before noon to help configure the Unity project. The performance would make use of an MSI laptop which surpasses my MacBook Pro by an order of magnitude in hardware; I would fulfil the role of a backup in the event that anything happened to the MSI laptop or its operator. As the staff worked to prepare the audio-visual elements, I was asked to re-tool some of the UI elements to make it easier to adjust the controls mid-performance if need be.

• I originally purchased a MacBook Pro to assist in delivering Keynote presentations and acting as a platform for building iOS apps to gain experience prior to entering the workforce. It’s been in service for a little more than a year now and, like a warplane, has some interesting missions under its profile: it’s travelled to Kelowna and Laval, France, delivered my seminar and thesis presentations, and presently, it’s my main workhorse for constructing iOS apps for work until we acquire new iMacs for development. Although limited in hardware and storage (rocking only a dual-core i5 and a 128 GB SSD), this entry-level MacBook Pro has proven to be surprisingly resilient and effective, similar to its operator.

• As the afternoon wore on, I stepped out to help pick up sandwiches for the crew, who were rehearsing for the evening’s performance. I ordered a Montreal Smoked Meat sandwich and hit the green room to eat, before returning to the stage to watch the rehearsal, playing games on my iPhone while waiting for the evening performance to come.

• With minutes left to the doors opening for the public to enter, I quickly entered the stage and got this photograph before taking off. Prior to agreeing to help my supervisor with this performance, I remarked that the best performance would be one where my role was an absolute minimum: it’s rather similar to a sniper operation where a backup sniper is deployed in the event the main sniper is rendered incapable of carrying out their assignment. When I make my statement, I am wishing for a solid performance that proceeds without a hitch — to require my backup would mean that something had gone wrong.

• Besides acting as a backup, I was called to quickly create a set of slides for the screens to signify the University of British Columbia’s hosting of this event. After crafting the slideshow and verifying it was to specifications, I sent them off to the AV control booth. I still have the slides at present, archived away in a hard drive.

• The Giant Walkthrough Brain proceeded smoothly, and every song was a trip down memory lane. My supervisor had asked for some photographs of the event, and every so often, I would disappear to take some photographs, while steering the Unity project to ensure that I would be ready to switch over at a moment’s notice should anything fail. Ultimately, the performance was a smash hit, and I would have dinner with the crew, along some faculty of the University of British Columbia, at the Bike Shop Café. The next day, we gave our encore presentation to another sell-out crowd and full house, before taking off for the airport to make the journey home.

• One of the jokes is that a sequel to the Giant Walkthrough Brain is in the works, dubbed the Giant Walkthrough Gut. Having graduated now, such an undertaking would be left to other members of my old lab, although if it were ever to be realised, I would definitely go watch that show. This is the project that brought me out of a year-long slump that materialised during the summer of 2013, and subsequently, I would go on to realise several goals, most notably, experience the best things in my area, as well as travel internationally with a clearly-defined purpose.

Relentless, the march of time placed a year-and-a-half between myself and the summer of 2014. By last year, I was gearing up for the job search in preparation for wrapping my master’s degree, and was also occupied by several conference papers I was getting ready to submit. Unexpectedly, my supervisor had asked me whether or not I would be interested in helping out with the latest Giant Walkthrough Brain performance, to take place in Kelowna, B.C.; he was originally set to attend, but other commitments had arisen, so I agreed to substitute for him to help out. On a cold Friday evening, I flew out to Kelowna and checked in to my lodgings at the Manteo Resort. Falling asleep immediately, I woke up Saturday morning, sat down to a delicious breakfast and then began making some last-minute adjustments to the Giant Walkthrough Brain project, before setting off on foot towards the Kelowna Community theatre. The setup and rehearsals took much of Saturday afternoon, and by evening, the show was ready. To hear Jay Ingram and his band perform again was a marvellous treat — the code underlying the Giant Walkthrough Brain, although not documented or structured well, nonetheless stood the test of time and ran flawlessly. The music and presentation proceeded without a hitch (there were no thunderstorms in Kelowna to knock out our power this time around); the different songs brought back vivid memories of summer 2014, and I realised that my own interests and commitment to software came out full force roughly during this time. Deciding between an MD and MSc at the time, my experiences led me to ultimately go with the MSc, an experience that has guided me down the path I’m taking. It is not an overstatement, then, when I say that the Giant Walkthrough Brain has largely shaped the course I’ve taken: in addition to helping me overcome matters of the heart that would otherwise take a bit of time to heal, the Giant Walkthrough Brain played a substantial role in revitalising my interest in software and game development, as well as mobile platforms. Considering its impact, I am immensely grateful and thankful to my supervisor, as well as Jay Ingram and his band, for offering me this opportunity to contribute on a project that both brought science to the public, as well as help me discover where my passions lay.

ISAL’s ALIFE XV Conference: A Personal Reflection

“I was in Cancún, Mexico, sitting in a disappearing-edge swimming pool, on a bar stool that was actually under the water, watching palm trees sway in a sultry breeze against the unmistakable aqua splendour of the Caribbean Sea; drinking coconut, lime, and tequila from a scooped-out pineapple, with salt spray of breaking surf and sun kissing my skin. Translation: I’d died and gone to heaven.” ―Karen Marie Moning

I’ve returned from the ALIFE XV Conference now: held in Cancún, Mexico, for the first time, this conference deals with artificial life. This is a field where life and natural processes is studied by means of simulations, robotics, engineering and biochemistry; my research is related on the software side of things, since I primarily work on building agent-based models to illustrate biochemical reactions at the molecular level. The emphasis is on illustrate, since my models largely lack a solid implementation of protein-protein and protein-substrate interactions to act as a predictive model. So, back in February, my supervisor and I submitted a paper to the ALIFE Conference about my research, which was being held in Mexico for the first time. Another paper about a project a colleague had worked on was also submitted, and in both cases, our papers were accepted. Owing to logistics, I attended this conference alone, flying out to Houston last week. Unlike Laval, the flights proceeded very smoothly, although when I had arrived at Houston, I realised I had forgotten to arrange for transportation from Cancún International Aiport to the Zona Hotelera. Fortunately, some quick thinking rectified that, and by the time I boarded my flight to Cancún, my transportation was confirmed. So, I was able to reach the Zona Hotelera without difficulty and set about preparing for the pair of presentations I would give.

The first day of the conference was uneventful, and I attended several of the different workshops and keynotes. On the second day, I presented my paper and sipped a lemon daiquiri with my evening meal (chicken au tequila). The third day saw the trickier of the two presentations: my colleagues were unavailable, and I was to give a presentation on their behalf. Although I was quite nervous, that presentation went quite well. The remainder of the conference was dedicated to speaking with the other attendees (some know my supervisor and others were my instructors during my undergraduate), attending different keynotes and learning about the exciting research being done in the field of artificial life. As it turns out, NetLogo is gaining the capacity for multi-scale ABM, and I also heard a keynote about how tumour cells propagate (in addition to how blood vessel formation is disrupted severely during tumour development). There were other keynotes on how infants’ attentions gradually move from face to hands as they mature, and how networks might be useful in relating the different scales of a model together so that an individual’s behaviour can in fact, be used to predict what might happen throughout the system. ALIFE XV was a spectacular conference, and not all of the exciting elements lay in the conference itself. The food and locale were both amazing. During the mornings before the first keynote presentation was set to begin, I took strolls along the white sands beach near the conference venue. The weather was remarkably pleasant: there was no rain or even cloud cover during duration of my stay in Cancún. So, I was able to take to the beaches in the mornings and relax under the morning sun, marvelling at how warm the water was and walking along relatively quiet beaches. From the food side of things, the conference provided dinners on a few of the evenings (there was one excursion to Porfirio’s Cancún, where dinner included crab tacos, Mexican-style steak and Churros, and the farewell dinner was a surf-and-turf, featuring steak on a bed of mashed potatoes, prawns and vegetables). On other evenings, I stepped out and sat down to dinner at Casa Tequila, a restaurant serving Mexican and Mayan dishes that also has some of the best atmosphere I’ve seen anywhere: I dined under a sidewalk patio with Mexican music playing all around.

• Nothing beats walking down the quiet beaches of Cancún at eight in the morning: this is before other beach-goers begin showing up, so for all intents and purposes, I had most of the beach to myself to stroll along and explore. Even at this hour, though, it was still around 29°C, so it was plenty hot.

• A short ways down the beach from the entrance near Plaza Forum By The Sea, there’s a small rock face that juts out from the beach. The first morning I walked this, I brought my full shoes and tread carefully so I wouldn’t get sand in my shoes; during later excursions, I wore my swimsuit and brought sandals, walking bare-foot along the beach. To prevent myself from burning, I liberally applied SPF 60 sunscreen, and for the most part, it was effective.

• Before anyone poses the question, these morning walks did not negatively impact my conference performances. I woke up at six in the morning, had breakfast by seven, spent around an hour on the beaches and returned to the conference venue (a mere 120 meters away) just in time to take in the first keynote of the day. The conference ran from nine in the morning to six-thirty in the evening, and I attended most of the sessions.

• On my second morning, there were no clouds in the southeastern skies, so the photographs I took turned out amazingly well. Armed with my sunscreen, I stood on the water’s edge and allowed the waves to wash over me: unlike the icy waters of the Pacific near Vancouver or those of Lake Okanagan in Kelowna, the waters in Cancún are a comfortable 29°C. Aside from the clusters of kelp, they’re pleasantly clear.

• Besides the more obvious modifications I’ve made to each of the images, the colour balance, saturation and hue in each of my images have not been altered. The vivid turquoise colours of the water and white of the sand are exactly as I saw them on the beaches. Every image in this post was taken with an iPhone 6 and then subsequently resized to fit the 16:9 aspect ratio. The water colours arise from the shallow water that allows light to reflect off the sand or reefs at the bottom, preventing the longer wavelength colours from being absorbed and results in this distinct colour.

• For the presentation I delivered, I used the original variant of my thesis defense presentation. I had enough content to last around 25 minutes, but the thesis presentation only allowed a maximum of 15 minutes, so I trimmed out quite a bit of content to ensure that I could succinctly describe my project. Armed with more time, I could elaborate further, and similar to Laval, one of the questions I got was concerning my background, given that my research involved molecular biology and simulations to a substantial extent. Thankfully, the questions I got were rather easier to answer than those of my thesis.

• For my colleague’s presentation, I was mostly familiar with the project’s concepts, but less so for the implementation. I practised this one extensively and read enough of the background to give a reasonably solid talk. After the presentation ended, the audience seemed impressed with the project. With both presentations done, I took a few more liberties with my time and went souvenir shopping.

• I realise that Cancún is probably too nice of a place for an academic conference, so I clearly must be bullshitting readers if I said I went to Cancún for a conference. To convince readers that ALIFE XV did indeed happen in Cancún , here are the conference proceedings published to the MIT Press. The entire thing, with all of the papers, is around 26.3 MB in size and consists of 753 pages of content.

• During the second evening, after I delivered my presentation, I was feeling quite pleased and decided to have an alcoholic beverage of some kind. I eventually settled on a lemon daiquiri, sipping it under the warm evening sun at Casa Tequila after dinner. I got a minor headache of sorts and decided to close my eyes for a bit on the hotel’s roof: when I woke up half an hour later, the sunset was underway and gave rise to beautiful cloud patterns visible in this image.

• All of the images in this post have been vacation-like in nature, so to thoroughly convince the reader that I was in fact at a conference, here is a poster bearing the ALIFE conference’s name. With this post over, it means I’m formally back, and while I will note later that I’m going to write about Amanchu! and Planetarian to some capacity in the near future, the two posts that are immediately upcoming (i.e. to be finished before July is over) will be When Marnie Was There and Pure Pwnage T3h Movie, both of which I watched while flying to and from Cancún, and both of which occupy opposite ends of the spectrum. The former made me cry my eyes out, and the latter, I could not stop laughing.

Thus, yesterday morning, I was a little saddened that the conference was ending whilst preparing for the journey back home. I flew back amidst thunderstorms and several delays, and are back now from my second conference. Like Laval Virtual, I learnt quite a bit about the diversity of research occurring in the field of artificial life, and some of these experiences will be useful even as I wrap up my thesis paper and gear up for application of my experiences in the industrial setting. The ALIFE XV Conference marks the first time where I travelled alone (in Laval, I was accompanying one of my colleagues); this definitely was an eye-opening experience. Lacking a travel buddy of sorts, there was no second person to converse with or bounce ideas off of with respect to itinerary. As well, I needed to observe double-vigilance to look after my belongings. However, I did experience all of the freedoms associated with travelling alone, and since I was travelling light (this is the first time I’ve given presentations off the iPad Air 2), moving about at the airport and in the city was quite straightforward. I further learnt that I have no problems with dining alone at all: while some folks are embarrassed to do so (solomangarephobia is quite real), I feel like it’s a scene straight from a Tom Clancy novel or similar when I eat alone in a restaurant. Given my experiences in Cancún, I would definitely like to make another return trip: perhaps on my next trip, if I’ve got a week, I will book visits to the Mayan ruins and explore those in greater detail, as well as enjoy the beaches once more. For now, it’s time to get my mind back in routine and start work. Returning to the blog side of things, I’ll be writing about Amanchu! and Planetarian for the summer season, at intervals that work best with my schedule: we’re in the depths of summer now, the perfect time to explore and enjoy the long days that summer has to offer.