Now reading Bridge Of Birds by Barry Hughart...

RPGamer | Feature | RPGs of the Decade – 2000 to 2009 – #1 Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3

 

https://web.archive.org/web/20141110111957/http://www.rpgamer.com/features/decade/decade-1.html

While many other RPGs had bigger budgets and others have had shinier presentations, Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 shows that it's not all glitz and glamour that makes a great RPG. Persona 3 is an experience like no other before it. It blends a dark, edgy story with dungeon crawling, monster collecting, and social interaction in a way that is addictively unique and memorable.

One aspect that sums up the RPGamer love for Persona 3 is the unique feeling that you had never played anything like it before. Shoji Meguro's soundtrack is one of the catchiest collections of tunes in some time and his techno style fit the game's diversity to a tee. One minute the game has you fighting your way through dungeons, battling powerful demons known as shadows, and the next you're in school taking quizzes, doing homework, and making friends. There is no one defining facet of Persona 3, but the blending of all of them is what makes this game an experience you have to play to understand. So whether you are wooing the sexy Mitsuru or just making friends with an elderly couple at a bookstore, Persona 3 is an RPG you just don't want to stop.

Whether you picked up the initial release or waited for FES, Persona 3 is an endearing experience. While Persona 4 no doubt made some major improvements to the system, Persona 3 is where it all originated from. For its story, characters, music, gameplay, and overall originality, Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 is not only our pick for RPG of the Decade, it's easily one of the top RPGs of all time.

Now listening to Go West by Go West and Open Up And Say... Ahh! by Poison...

On Lonsdale Avenue in North Vancouver. Summer of 2018.

Lonsdale Avenue has been a cornerstone of North Vancouver since the city’s early days. When North Vancouver was first established, Lonsdale was planned as a prominent thoroughfare, running right down the middle of the city’s layout. Its strategic importance was tied to its role in transportation—originally, the ferry at the foot of Lonsdale (in Lower Lonsdale) was a key connection point. These ferries, initially privately owned, were later managed by the government as the city grew, ensuring steady access to resources and workforce mobility. This made Lonsdale a vital lifeline for the burgeoning community, connecting it to downtown Vancouver and beyond.

As of 2019, Lonsdale has become a desirable area for young professional families, business owners, and investors. With the cost of living in downtown Vancouver skyrocketing, many are drawn to North Vancouver for a high quality of life while still being close to the city. The avenue features art installations, new parklet outdoor spaces, and some of the North Shore’s best restaurants, shops, cafes, and parks.

Lower Lonsdale, closer to the waterfront, is known for its real estate market, with a mix of houses, apartments, condos, and vacant lots for sale. It’s also home to the Lonsdale Quay Market and the Shipyards, a popular spot for dining, events, and waterfront views.

Further up the avenue, Central Lonsdale is more residential but still vibrant with charming coffee shops, restaurants, and boutique stores. It’s a walkable area with a community feel, often highlighted for its rows of shops and eateries.

Lonsdale Avenue encapsulates the evolution of North Vancouver—from a ferry-dependent settlement to a modern, thriving community. It’s a place where history meets contemporary living, offering a balance of cultural richness, accessibility, and community spirit.

 

The 11 year old who fooled us all| A Lindsay Lohan Retrospective

Blush Bunny gives an analysis of Lindsay Lohan's masterful performance in the 1998 film "The Parent Trap". One girl, two roles. Lindsay Lohan is forever an icon.

Ghost Sweeper Mikami reminded me that anime was exciting and great for a few decades

 

A still from Ghost Sweeper Mikami (1993), directed by Atsutoshi Umezawa

I am now done playing Persona 4 Golden again on my laptop. As I pointed out in an earlier post, this was my second time playing Persona 4 Golden because I played it for the first time on my PlayStation Vita. I'm glad that I'm now done with this video game because I consider it to be a disappointing remaster and port of the original Persona 4, which was released in 2008. It's very unlikely that I will pick up and play Persona 4 Golden again because I will only be playing the original Persona 4 again. I consider the original to be a considerably superior game. I went over some of the disappointing changes in Persona 4 Golden in an earlier post, and, the more I think about these changes, the less I like Persona 4 Golden. I can even say that the changes made in Persona 4 Golden make it a somewhat different game from Persona 4. The team that worked on Persona 4 Golden, which was different from the one that created Persona 4, turned the game into a modern generic, cute, upbeat, cluttered, and easy video game. This team took Persona 4, which is considered by many people to be one of the greatest video games of all time and which is one of my favorite video games, and turned it into a mediocre game that was supposed to be more in line with other popular video games of its time, especially ones for handheld game consoles. They took someone else's vision and added a bunch of nonsense that clashes with this vision. For example, compare the atmosphere in Persona 4 Golden when the weather is rainy with the atmosphere in Persona 4 when the weather is rainy. Because of the changes to the graphics and the designs, the gloomy and calming atmosphere in the original game became an unaffecting atmosphere in Persona 4 Golden. When it rains in the original game, you can see the water on the ground flowing in whichever direction the ground slopes. In Pesona 4 Golden, this effect doesn't exist because the new team didn't want to put in the effort in order to make the game stand out and look like a quality work. Almost all of the changes in Persona 4 Golden are bland and poorly designed. If the original Persona 4 had still been readily available for purchase, I wouldn't have given Persona 4 Golden another thought and would have simply forgotten about this poor remaster. But, unfortunately, it's this poor remaster that is readily available for purchase and not the original, which is now stuck on the PlayStation 2. As I pointed out in an earlier post, I consider almost all video game remakes and remasters to be inferior to the originals. Almost all of the games that get remade or remastered are great video games and not bad or forgotten video games. These video games are great because they got made by certain people at a certain time. They almost always get remade or remastered decades later by less talented or less inspired people that are "just doing their job". Such people don't make great or original video games themselves, but they are given the task of remaking great video games by the companies that they work for in order to make a quick and easy profit, since they don't really have to come up with anything new themselves and since remakes, and especially remasters, don't take a long time to make. It's almost like seeing some bad art student in the 21st century trying to make a copy of Michelangelo's Pieta and making changes to the sculpture that he considers to be better than the master sculptor's ideas. What makes the matter worse is that Atlus is actively trying to remove PS2 Persona 4 ROM files on the internet by using copyright claims. So, not only is this company pushing a corrupted and poor remaster onto the consumer, it's also trying to deny people from accessing the superior original game for the PS2. Therefore, I won't be buying anything that's made by this company anymore. Even if this company manages to release an amazing Persona 6 game some time in the future, which I very much doubt that it will be able to do, I won't be buying another one of its new games. It's clear that this company isn't in the business of making great video games anymore and that it's only in the business of providing projects for its new untalented employees and of obliterating any alternatives to its new video games on the internet. The dastardly practices of companies like Nintendo and Atlus make me glad that I own older consoles like the Xbox 360 (the original white model) and the PlayStation 3 (the original black model). The rather high launch price of the Nintendo Switch 2 has finally caused many gamers to become angry with Nintendo. I have been angry with Nintendo for a long time already, and I won't be buying the Switch 2 in 2025, just like I didn't buy the Nintendo Switch in 2017. The Switch is an expensive and poorly designed console that can do almost nothing except play Switch games. Sure, it has been commercially successful but that's mostly due to the fact that Nintendo has done a good job of marketing this console and to the fact that the other console manufacturers haven't been able to release successful alternatives to the Switch in the eighth generation of video game consoles. The release of the popular and critically acclaimed games The Legend Of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild and Super Mario Odyssey also helped to boost sales of the Switch right after its launch and to build momentum in 2017 and into 2018. But it seems that now Nintendo has even managed to anger some of the tourists with the high prices of the Switch 2 and its video games. The tourists are those gamers that buy any new console that's being advertised or any new console that they see on store shelves or in online marketplaces. They don't care about the history of video games, they rarely care about the quality of video games, and they don't care about video game preservation. They just buy whatever it is that's readily available. Now that playing video games has become a very popular hobby, and not just a hobby for certain children or nerds, there are many, many tourists out there. Well, although some of the tourists may be angry at Nintendo now, I'm sure that almost all of them will still buy the Switch 2 and Nintendo's bad new video games sooner or later after they get released. It's because these people just go with the flow and they don't stay angry for long. While some of the tourists were fuming from seeing the price of Nintendo's lame new console, I was finishing to play Gears Of War 3 on my beautiful Xbox 360. I have owned my Xbox 360 for a few years already, and it hasn't failed me yet. I take good care of my electronic devices and of my other possessions. If I don't need something, I sell it on eBay, even at a small monetary loss if that's necessary. If an electronic device fails, the cause is usually overheating. There's a reason why many electronic devices have cooling fans. Motherboards and circuit boards in video game consoles or in computers get damaged by heat. Therefore, it's important not to keep electronic devices turned on in tight or small spaces where they can easily overheat. It's a good idea to get rid of the dust that builds up on electronic devices so that heat can continue to escape from them through slots. It's also a good idea not to keep electronic devices with batteries plugged in and charging for a long time because batteries fail and become useless because of long charging periods. It's best to disconnect a charging cable from an electronic device with a battery from time to time, even for a few minutes, if you don't want to buy a new battery. The first two Gears Of War games are dominated by the colors grey, black, and brown, with the action usually taking place at night or during cloudy or rainy weather. Gears Of War 3, on the other hand, has a multicolor palette, with the action taking place at daytime and during sunny weather. Gears Of War 3 doesn't seem to me to be quite as epic as Gears Of War 2, which is probably the best Gears game. In the first few chapters of Gears Of War 3, the player has to fight off Lambent creatures and a Lambent Leviathan. Although the visuals and the designs in the first few chapters are impressive, they are not quite on par with the grandiose visuals of Gears Of War 2, where you have to fight off a giant riftworm and where you get to see the sunken and burning ruins of a big city. The palace of the Locust queen Myrrah in Gears Of War 2 seems to me to be the most impressive sight in all of the Gears games, but the hotel in Azura in Gears Of War 3 does come close, I suppose. The impressive visuals of Azura and the excellent designs of the hotel contribute to making the last two chapters of Gears Of War 3 seem like an epic finale. Overall, I very much enjoyed playing Gears Of War 3 because it's very similar to Gears Of War 2 when it comes to visuals and gameplay and because I have become very familiar with the gameplay of the Gears games by now. Playing the third installment was like riding a bicycle again after a short break since I finished playing Gears Of War 2 not long before that. There's really nothing to complain about. Gears Of War 3 is one of the best and most memorable video games for the Xbox 360.

Watching the fifth episode of Ghost Sweeper Mikami recently reminded me of why I like to watch anime. Of course, this doesn't mean that I like to watch all anime. Much of the anime that has come out after the mid-2000s is bland and unwatchable for me. And I'm not just saying this for no reason. I really have seen a number of modern anime films and series that are considered to be good by modern anime fans. Doing this was mostly disappointing and a waste of my time because modern anime generally isn't that good. But the anime from the 1980s and the 1990s, the golden age in my opinion, is often irresistible for me. Anyway, I didn't think that I'd be making a post about anime again, at least not for a long while, because I'm not an avid anime viewer. But watching Ghost Sweeper Mikami and also films like Vampire Wars (1991), Vampire Hunter D (1985), Princess Mononoke (1997), Street Fighter Alpha: The Animation (2000), and Bye Bye, Lady Liberty (1989) recently reminded me that anime from the golden age is truly exciting and great. The fifth episode of Ghost Sweeper Mikami, titled The Howling Of The Haunted Mansion!, is a surprisingly moving episode about a boy and his dog. Moreover, the animation in some scenes is just so striking and lovely, especially for an episode from a long TV series. I began watching the TV series after I watched the hour-long 1994 film, which was released by Manga Entertainment in North America. I found out a little later that Ghost Sweeper Mikami was created by Toei Animation, which is a studio that made many other great anime series, such as Dragon Ball, Sailor Moon, Digimon, and Fist Of The North Star. Dragon Ball Z and Fist Of The North Star are another two anime series that I am slowly watching now. I have already seen Sailor Moon, about a decade ago, because a sort of friend of mine recommended it when I was going to high school. Sailor Moon is actually another great anime series that features lovely animation, memorable music, and openings and endings (such as Moonlight Densetsu and Heart Moving) that are bursting with creativity and originality. Watching Dragon Ball Z with the original Japanese openings and endings also makes the viewing experience so much better. Back in the day, some anime viewers and critics didn't appreciate Sailor Moon because they thought of it as just a show for girls and a monster-of-the-week show. Of course, that was when anime wasn't as bland and unoriginal as it is now, and those people didn't care and didn't know about things like creativity, film history, originality, and craftsmanship. Many people weren't like that. Sailor Moon was a very popular show. But there were some insecure and badly-informed viewers that mocked shows like Sailor Moon only to look cool. And let's not forget that anime wasn't as popular back then as it is now. Sailor Moon is one of the shows that contributed to making anime popular in North America. Anyway, there is a video creator on YouTube who described the situation somewhat better than me. His username is Super Eyepatch Wolf, and he had the following to say in his video about the film Akira. "After all, Akira doesn't look like modern anime. It doesn't move like modern anime. Hell, it doesn't feel like modern anime. Nothing about Akira is even remotely reminiscent of what anime has become, and that's a big part of what makes it special, as Akira was the culmination of one of the most exciting times in anime's history, the mid to late 80s, an era that many have dubbed the golden age of anime. This title is more than just a rose-hewed tinting of the past, however. There were very specific factors that made anime of this era special. Japan of the 1980s was for the first time since World War II starting to see a major economic upturn. This brought the Tokyo stock market index to an all time high and surged Japan's economy to heights it had never seen, which meant that a comfortable middle class lifestyle was now available to anyone willing to don a shirt and tie and embrace the life of a salaryman. This excess in disposable income meant that there was now a massive influx of money to both consume and create film and animation, with anime films in particular seeing an unprecedented growth. In the 1970s, 49 animated feature films were produced in Japan. But, in the 1980s, that number more than quadrupled to 220. The golden age of anime was more than just a fiscal boom, however. At this point, anime had been a commodified industry in Japan for more than two decades, which meant that by the mid-80s there were professional animators in Japan who had been honing their skills for nearly 30 years, while the generation that had grown up with the works of these masters were now just entering the animation industry for the first time and together the two groups were beginning to realize the potential these films could unleash. Just as critically though the anime industry was still relatively new. This was a time before anime had really become anime, before otaku culture had really galvanized and fans started looking to anime for hyperspecific things, and before studios started to pander to them. And so, what you had was a flourishing industry awash with cash, filled with skilled and passionate animators, who were for the first time realizing the full potential of animation and who weren't trying to adhere to an abstract concept of what anime should be. And the results were projects that were aimed at no one and therefore could be appreciated by everyone. Beautiful expressions of mood and tone like Angel's Egg. Thoughtful and harrowing depictions of the chaos brought about by war like Grave of the Fireflies. Joyous flights of imagination like My Neighbor Totoro. Or insanely polished OVAs like Gunbuster. Anime from this period is often seen as hyperviolent and grotesque and sexualized, and, while it certainly is in a lot of cases, to me this adult content was also a sign that Japan's animators were realizing that animation didn't need to adhere to any one audience, that it could depict literally anything and this was them slamming up against the boundaries of those preconceptions. And so, the 80s became awash with anime that was experimental and adult and gorgeous. And the precipice of this came in 1988 in the form of Akira."

'Very much in a free fall': B.C. doctors sound the alarm as drop-in medical clinics disappear

 

https://vancouversun.com/news/bc-doctors-sound-alarm-drop-in-medical-clinics-disappear

Shortage of doctors and incentives to work in family practice has cut walk-in clinics by a third to a half in B.C.

The NDP’s efforts to improve health care through a new payment model for family physicians and the establishment of urgent and primary care centres has had the unintended consequence of cutting the ranks of walk-in clinics across the province.

According to the medical mapping service MediMap, the number of walk-in clinics across B.C. has dropped between 30 to 50 per cent in recent years as clinics move to an appointment-only model or close their doors.

This has led some doctors to warn that there are fewer and fewer options for immediate care in the province as urgent-care-clinic appointments remain hard to book in certain communities and emergency room waiting times continue to skyrocket.

Dr. Rita McCracken, a family physician and UBC assistant professor in the family practice department, said part of the problem is the new payment model introduced by then-health minister Adrian Dix in 2023 that aims to retain family physicians through better compensation. The model encourages doctors to work in family practice instead of putting in hours at a walk-in clinic, she said.

She likened health care to the education system and wants the province to increase the capacity of primary care, arguing that neither walk-in clinics nor urgent and primary care centres are an ideal model.

“If we want people to have better access to primary care when they need it, we need to have clinics that have the capacity to be able to provide care to the people that live close by, just like we do for elementary schools,” McCracken said.

“I’m not saying that there aren’t many, many problems with education right now, but if we just kind of take a look at that model of access to public education, we’ve completely thrown that out the window when it comes to primary care.”

She said there needs to be a wholesale rethinking of how primary care is provided to people without a family doctor and that interested parties such as municipalities and community groups need to come together to figure out a solution.

Some physicians say they have seen first-hand the effects of the decline of walk-in clinics.

Dr. Kevin Mcleod, a North Vancouver-based internal medicine specialist, says people now come to see him for basic ailments, such as a bladder infection, that would be better dealt with by a general physician.

“They don’t need to see me as a specialist, but they have nowhere else to go.”

Mcleod said a walk-in clinic across the street from his office has papered over a sign saying “no appointment necessary,” indicating it has moved to an appointment-only model.

The company that owns the clinic, Well Health Technologies Corp., did not respond to a request for comment, but a representative of the North Vancouver clinic said it does still accept non-registered patients, those patients now need to make an appointment.

“I know the government gives their statistics that thousands of people are getting attached to a family doctor, but there’s still 800,000 people who aren’t and where do they go?” asked McLeod. “A lot of people don’t realize (that) if your family doctor retires or deactivates their college number, any outstanding refills or renewals of medications that you might have at your pharmacy are all automatically cancelled.”

Angie Gaddy, a spokesperson for the B.C. Pharmacy Association, said in an email this was not accurate, pointing out that in June the College of Pharmacists of B.C. adopted new protocols allowing pharmacists to take on and renew prescriptions from retired practitioners. The new protocols came into effect in August.

Josie Osborne, B.C.’s new health minister, said she is aware of the challenges in getting primary care.

Osborne says the main challenge is the shortage of health-care professionals in B.C. and believes the province’s efforts to recruit more physicians, nurse practitioners and other health workers fields will help.

As for treading the line between encouraging doctors to go into family practice and working at a walk-in clinic, the minister said it will be a matter of working with family doctors and health-care professionals in each community.

“The nature of the way primary care is being delivered is changing, and we’re seeing that in what physicians want, in terms of their work life, their work style, but also in needing to stand up clinics that work for communities and being able to tailor them well for what a community’s needs are,” said Osborne.

MediMap CEO Thomas Jankowski said solutions are needed in short order as the closures of clinics has made waiting times at remaining walk-in clinics rise by 60 per cent. Meanwhile, emergency room waiting times continue to worsen as more people lose access to other options for primary care.

According to the provincial government’s website, all or most of the walk-in clinics in communities like Victoria, Surrey, Langley and Maple Ridge are by appointment only. Nanaimo only has one walk-in clinic.

“Wait times at ERs are getting horrific right now, and this might be actually the first year that we’ll talk about ER waiting times more openly as we’re starting to monitor those across the country as well. We’re seeing now the first year in which it’s quite regular to see entire ERs close because of staffing issues because of doctor burnout,” said Jankowski.

“I just feel that health care is very much in a free fall right now, and we’re not really thinking of systemic solutions in a way that truly address this, as opposed to moving the puck from one place to another, which isn’t working.”