Ali-Kitty

I made a new group, because... apparently that's what I do when I'm bored. I moved back to America from Japan to reassess my life, haha, and in the time I've spent doing nothing before relevant things begin, I pretend I'm being productive.

So! The new group is Original-FF7, which is dedicated to Final Fantasy VII. But here's the catch - it's only for art/fic/cosplay from the original game! For all of us nostalgic gamers who maybe aren't huge fans of the spinoffs, or like the spinoffs but still prefer stuff from the real game. So, no Advent Children, Crisis Core, Dirge of Cerberus, etc. Care to join?


Another thing, before I left Japan, frankiki and I went to a cosplay studio in Tokyo. Because we didn't know when we'd be able to cosplay together again, what with parting ways, we wanted to do a massive multi-costume Aeris and Tifa photoshoot. Who knows if we'll ever do it again? Our photographer, S, was kind enough to take some great photos and do the editing on some of them, too. I still have a lot of photos to go through, or receive the ones from the photographer, so as though my gallery wasn't oversaturated enough with Aeris pictures, there will be more! I also made the Kingdom Hearts 2 version of Aeris, and had the chance to dig out some old Aeris costumes I hadn't worn in a long time - Kingdom Hearts 1 and Wallmarket.

Hope everyone's doing well!

Hey, everyone! As you might have read on my last blog, yesterday frankiki and I went to Artnia, the Square Enix cafe in Tokyo for some geeky fun! We decided to take some video footage and put it together into a video for anyone who is curious about the cafe.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=O88WyA…

It was hooked on to a shop, pretty similar to the Square Enix shop also in Tokyo, probably the same merchandise. But the cafe was really cute! The "themed" food ended up being basically Final Fantasy VII themed food, which was not very fair but totally cool with me because it's my favorite in the series. Naturally, I got the Aeris parfait, and there was no Tifa parfait so frankiki got Cloud. There was also a really cool "materia fountain" in the display room, sooo pretty!

I just realized that I've been cosplaying Aeris for nearly ten years (no, you will never see the original pictures). I think I should be a little ashamed, haha. But I've done a lot of other cosplay, and to show I'm not a, shall we say, one hit wonder, I'm trying to find some older cosplay pics that are decent quality to show my other costumes. But finding decent pictures is hard, though I recently found Star Ocean's Nel Zelpher, which I uploaded. My other cosplays that I haven't already uploaded here (I think I've uploaded L from Death Note, Lust from Fullmetal Alchemist, and Quatre from Gundam Wing) include KH1 Aeris (hopefully will take new pics in that!), Princess Zelda, Squall from FFVIII, Padme Amidala from Star Wars, Namine from KH, Altair from Assassin's Creed, Quistis from FFVIII, gosh, I can't even remember. But when you're in high school you don't really think about good pictures, just blindly running around and lol'ing with your friends. If I had told myself that in ten years I'd be living in Tokyo, still cosplaying, I'd... well, I'd probably be damn well pleased, but yeah, my life is pretty pathetic, haha.

As for now, today, frankiki and I are going to hit up the new Square Enix cafe (and see if they have part-time jobs LOL)! There have various desserts and sandwiches that are Final Fantasy themed, including an Aeris parfait that I absolutely must consume. Tomorrow, if the weather is good, we're hoping to take some good cosplay pictures - the Christmas present I made for her, by the way, was Crisis Core Tifa. I don't have Crisis Core Aeris but maybe I'll wear something else, or we can take better Amano pics. I bought a new camera so we're good to go!

Square Enix is also hiring here in Tokyo, my friend just got a job there. I think it'd be awesome to work for a gaming company, like SE or Bioware or something, though my dream job would be to be a scenario writer for one of those companies. I'm pretty sure they only hire established writers though, which obviously means I have to get some books published - on my way! just give me a year, or five...

Wow, it seems like I always only post when it's about Comiket. I'm currently working on three new costumes! One is a Christmas present for frankiki though, which I'm sure will be on Deviantart sooner rather than later... it's a secret! I'm not telling! But it's not for Comiket. For Comiket, we're going to try the Yoshitaka Amano designs of Aeris and Tifa. I've always wanted to try making Amano Aeris, but just never gotten around to putting it together. Since I'm home in the US for the holidays, I have a lot of free time and easy access to a fabric store, and decided to give it a try! Once I started to conceptualize how the dress and jacket were going to go together, it wasn't that hard. I'm not finished yet, but pretty much all I need to do is finish adding beads/ribbon, make the hairpiece, and put together the shoes. I'm hoping it'll be pretty and come together all right...

The third costume I've, well, barely started and probably won't finish until after Comiket is Kingdom Hearts 2 style Aeris. (Am I obsessed with Aeris? You'll never know!) I've got a collection of Aeris costumes already, including original game Aeris, Wallmarket Aeris, and KH1 Aeris, and here I am making two more. I don't really have an obsessive need to have ALL of Aeris's costumes (I'm going to pass on Crisis Core Aeris because I don't really like her dress and didn't love her characterization in that game, and though Final Fantasy Tactics Aeris is waaay cute, I probably won't do that one either) but KH2 Aeris's outfit is really pretty, and I could probably wear the top normally, as I think it resembles my personal fashion!

Non-Aeris cosplay plans for the future include Utena Tenjou from Revolutionary Girl Utena! I have a thing for pink hair and love any character with a sword, so I'm really hoping to get to that in the near future, too. With, of course, frankiki to be my Anthy! I've got a lot of other costumes I really want to try, but one costume at a time, I guess!

I'll probably finish Amano Aeris in a couple of days, anyway, so I should have pictures up soon!

The re-release was just released a few days ago, apparently it's just the original PC version with cloud saves (lol) and achievements. I heard rumor that there would be some alterations, such as music and tweaking graphics, possibly script.. but my biggest fear was that they would change Aeris's default name to "Aerith". NOPE. My lady is still Aeris, whoo!!! Which means (hopefully) they didn't touch the script at all from the original PC, which makes this download a little useless, but hey, it was only ten dollars.

Also, the "achievements" are so absurdly simplistic, haha. You used Braver! ACHIEVEMENT! You beat a battle! ACHIEVEMENT! Well, I guess it's an ego-boost but seriously, haha. I'm not sure they put any effort into this at all besides adjusting it for new OS and stuff. Not that I'm complaining, I haven't played FFVII in English for like, a year, lol. And she's Aeris!!! Why does this make me ridiculously happy? Oh yeah, because "Aerith" sounds stupid. XD;

~controversial and edgy, I am.