To Live & Die in Obscusion: A Memoir of the 9th Anniversary

Why does one do the things that they do? I guess that question is rather vague & broad, but when I first started The Land of Obscusion back in 2010, I had a simple justification in mind: "I want to write about the stuff that no one else wants to." Now, nine years later, after nearly an entire decade, I wonder if that justification still holds any worth to it. Now, sure, there's merit in it to those who actually read this blog, and I am always thankful that people find it a worthy distraction from a real world that's honestly only getting more & more hectic, & an online one that seems to focus more on spite & hateful discourse, but like anything one does, there has to be that feeling that you yourself are getting something noteworthy out of it... Right?

This April I took the entire month off, after consistently writing for the blog for 100 months straight ever since I started it up. To be perfectly honest, I really enjoyed the break, & it was something I honestly should have done a while ago. At the same time, though, during that entire month I wasn't exactly anticipating returning to the blog; I wasn't dreading it by any means, but it wasn't like I was missing it, either. Since then, every single remaining month of this year only saw two or three articles from me, except for October, which simply was a case of things all coming together at the same time & me wanting to cover two anime to celebrate Halloween. Really, though, taking the month off, combined with the slower pace, made me think back to an idea I had years ago that I never put much stock into: Calling it quits after 10 years.

As I've mentioned in some previous anniversary pieces, hitting just one year felt like an accomplishment, so I just continued doing it, not really thinking about how it'd feel to hit another year. Then the second year came & went, followed by the third, then the fourth, which was then succeeded by the fifth, which predated the sixth, and before I knew it I had reached the seventh & eighth anniversaries of the blog. During all those years, a little thought would sometimes pop into my head, "Wouldn't it be fitting to end after 10 years?", in a sort of romanticized or poetic feel. After all, a decade is a long time, and in a niche world like that of anime, manga, or even gaming only the most dedicated actually wind up even hitting that number, let alone continue well beyond it. Not just that, but who in their right mind would be willing to put in that much time, effort, & even money into something, only to never receive a single, solitary thing in return? After all, think about any notable anime & manga writer or site, some of which I'm personally friends with, and they've all made that jump at some point, for a variety of reasons. In that case, shouldn't I do so, as well? After all, getting that translation for the Gundoh Musashi tell-all interview last year wasn't exactly "cheap".

Monetization is something that I've constantly considered with the blog, only to constantly shirk away from the idea, because of my own inherent habit of hesitation. After all these years, what point would there be in suddenly having ads appear on the blog? Patreon sounds neat, but then it gives the feeling that the blog goes from an intensive hobby to a commitment, & that constantly makes me hold off on doing that. Meanwhile, there's Ko-fi, which seems nice & simple, but then I think about why I do this blog. I write about the obscure & forgotten because I feel like little to no one else will, but at the same time I've always drilled it into my mind that what I write about has no overall worth to it, at least in monetary terms; this is always because I just want to do it. None of my writing is going to inspire a company to suddenly license something like Team Astro, Shinken Legend, Hareluya II BØY, or Ring ni Kakero 1, i.e. stuff that "nobody" will actually buy, or even watch or read legally digitally. My writing style, in general, isn't exactly friendly to pull quotes, either, and it's not like the stuff I write about would even be deemed worthy of that treatment, in the first place; plus, it would be weird to quote a person who wrote about an anime before it saw a legal English release. Finally, & to be perfectly honest, I am simply afraid of having an expectation put towards me, that I have a general assessment of quality or style that is to be expected of me, which is what having someone(s) pay me in return for, or because of, my work would bring about, in my mind. This feeling was only compounded somewhat recently when I was actually offered a chance to write for a yet-to-debut website, a gig that I'd be paid for. I already have expectations for my day job, so I fear how it'd feel to have them towards something I actually enjoy doing; please note that I don't hate my actual job, but it's "just my job". It's one thing if people simply get that of you, which is only natural, but without anything to tie them directly to me, I don't feel the metaphorical weight of that. Overall, it's essentially a mix of me not wanting to get an ego of any sort & being hesitant of having the weight of expectations put upon me.

In other words, I'm my own worst enemy.

Anyway, to put an end to this part of the anniversary celebration, I am NOT saying right now that 2020 will be the definitive "final" year for The Land of Obscusion. That being said, I do want next year to feel like a big deal, which it should be, so while I'll be maintaining the slower pace that I established after April, with maybe another month off at some point, I do have some cool ideas in mind that I have wanted to do for a while, and now I am finally able to do a bunch of them. Video game series retrospectives, some more "unfinished business", another license rescue list (will I ever run out of previously-released anime to bring up?), & maybe finally hitting Review #250 (I only had six "traditional" reviews this year, which was not in the original plans). There are also some anniversaries I want to celebrate, like Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars' 10th & the 30th for SNK's Neo Geo hardware. Not just those, but I have two special Retrospect in Retrograde "re-reviews" in mind to celebrate 10 years of the blog: Next Senki Ehrgeiz in the Spring & Haja Taisei Dangaioh in the Winter. Yep, I'll be returning to my first & third reviews ever for the 10th year, and Demo Disc will be happening in the Summer & Fall to accommodate; even my second review will be getting a related piece, to look back at an important part of world history.

Moving on, how was this year for me & the blog? The first three months were pretty much the same as I used to do, and that included making a last-minute addition of reviewing all 50 episodes of the original Grappler Baki anime to celebrate the new Baki anime debuting on Netflix. Beyond that, I made sure to get in the traditional license license rescue list, which I didn't do last year, & I also celebrated the 35th Anniversary of the fighting game genre by giving credit to six games that helped define the genre but aren't generally thought about, as well as pitting two miracle Game Boy Advance ports, Guilty Gear X & Street Fighter Alpha 3 Upper, against each other. I also celebrated the 15th Anniversary of my first ever published article (on GameStop, no less!), and ended the first 100 months with a re-review of Clockwork Fighters: Hiwou's War, which I found even more enjoyable the second time around. After the month-long break, I slowed down a bunch (~40% of this entire year's content was in those first three months alone), but I made up for that with a crap ton of large & intensive articles. I celebrated Neon Genesis Evangelion's debut on Netflix by looking at the "Eva Clone" phenomenon, which itself required me to watch nearly 60 episodes of mech anime, across twelve different shows, over the course of two months to cover. During that, I also went through the entire Zone of the Enders franchise, made up of an OVA, TV anime, & three video games, in storyline-chronological order over the course of this Summer, which itself was a major time sink. I also pit two iconic movies titled Metropolis against each other, in what wound up being the closest Vs. Battle I've ever done, looked back on the 10th Anniversary of me trying to make YouTube videos (poorly) for a year, & celebrated the 25th Anniversary of Monthly Shonen Ace, 50th Anniversary of Weekly Shonen Champion, & 60th Anniversaires of Weekly Shonen Sunday & Magazine! In true Land of Obscusion fashion, I made up for my lack of quantity by doing a small number of utterly gigantic articles, resulting in me putting in effectively just as much work as I always have.

Once again, I'm my own worst enemy

This month will also be interesting, because while I won't be doing the "Favorite Posts" list because of the smaller selection to choose from this year, I do have a Demo Disc I've been putting off for a while, mainly because it requires me to pull an AWOL -Absent WithOut Leave- & "re-watch + review" it in a new way immediately afterwards: The infamous Engage Planet Kiss Dum! Anyway, I don't want this to be anywhere near as long as last year's anniversary piece, so I'll just end with this: Regardless of whether or not 2020 will be the "final" year for The Land of Obscusion, I have had nothing but fun & joy starting this blog & keeping it going for nine whole years, & I look forward to seeing what Year #10 brings to the table. Thank you, as always, & here's to a new decade, because the New Teens have certainly been "something"!

I swear that I'll always be my own worst enemy, though.
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P.S. This 9th Anniversary piece is also my 500th post on the blog! How's that for coincidence?