The 2nd season of the Muv-Luv Alternative anime is almost upon us, so I guess it’s time for me to dust off this blog and get back into things. Sadly, I’ve been very busy with work and personal matters for the past year, and haven’t had time to write about the many Muv-Luv topics I would like to. To be honest, I’m still very busy, and I don’t really have time to write about Muv-Luv even now. But Season 2 waits for no man, so I’ll make the time.
So, the plan:
Number one, on Tuesday I’ll put up a combined blog post for the coup d’etat arc from Season 1, which I never got around to doing last year. I’ve generally written about the various Muv-Luv anime in arcs, allowing me to explore that arc’s entire story rather than having to address the story piecemeal, episode by episode. It’s extremely difficult for me to write posts for individual episodes, as it’s only in examining the purpose and themes of an entire arc that I find topics interesting to write about. I made an exception for the early episodes of Alternative Season 1, as I found each individual episode fascinating in the decisions made for the adaptation, their strengths and their flaws. But after the show settled in, I regret not switching back sooner to posting by arc rather than by episode. The coup arc simply made the problem I have with writing posts about individual episodes more obvious. I already have the post for those episodes ready, and I found it much easier to slip back into covering an entire arc, rather than attempting to write a post for each episode as I attempted to do last year.
Number two, once Season 2 starts, I’ll continue to write arc-centered posts for the season. I’ll likely have a separate post for the first episode of the season, episode 13, so that we can talk about the new season in general. They’ve already released the preview and summary for episode 13, so I can be confident that it’s a generally self-contained episode. I’ll probably make another post for the episode after that, episode 14, since that will likely also be a major episode with lots to discuss. But after that, my plan is to switch entirely to arc-centered posts, likely covering 3-4 episodes at a time.
Number three, after Season 2 ends, I’ll hopefully have time then to write some posts about Total Eclipse, which came out on Steam earlier this year. I’ve been very open that Total Eclipse is my favorite of the Muv-Luv spinoffs, and I’ve waited a very long time to be able to discuss the game with people who have also played it (almost 10 years!). I’m so sad that I don’t have the time to talk about it right now, but hopefully that just means more people will have had the time to finish the game by then.
In the meantime, to kick things off on that front, I highly recommend reading this post I made back when the game first came out. In it, I lay out what the story of Total Eclipse means, and how its three leads each contribute to the themes of the story. It is by far the longest, most detailed post I’ve ever made, and it’s the one I’m proudest of. At the time I wrote it, the visual novel industry was in a very different place, and there was essentially no hope of the Total Eclipse game ever being translated into English. I wrote the post knowing that almost no one would ever have the correct context to understand it – so I wrote it largely for myself, and for the few people who would also have been able to read the game in Japanese and yet would read an English blog afterwards. It is now 8 years since I wrote it, and with Total Eclipse now officially available in English, I hope many more people will be able to get something out of it.
If I have time, I’d also like to maybe write some things about The Day After, which I’ve also never really written about in detail since it was released. Maybe even Photonflowers/Photonmelodies as well. But that will definitely be in the future. Right now I’ll be keeping my eyes on Season 2.
Posted by type94 
Type-94 