Studio Ghibli, Inc. (株式会社スタジオジブリ) productions recreated in Minecraft.

I stumbled upon this link to a Minecraft map that mimics the worlds from various Ghibli anime films, including My Neighbor Totoro (となりのトトロ), Howl’s Moving Castle (ハウルの動く城), Spirited Away (千と千尋の神隠し), and several more. Having watched many to study Japanese (日本語), I found this to be a great introduction of exploring user “seeds” in this sandbox building game.

Download the Map — [http://www.planetminecraft.com/project/-minecraft-ghibli-world-/] … To install, drop the extracted folder inside of User → Application Support → Minecraft → Saves

After installing the Map, you can follow signed train tracks to the worlds of the films, and then further into other destinations within those worlds.

The Bathhouse (おんせん）in Spirited Away. (sorry for the rain and darkness, the game controls the weather and daylight)  — You can follow the train tracks across the water to the house in the forest, even.

The house and ricefields in My Neighbor Totoro. In the background is the world from another film I’ve yet to explore.

If you’ve heard of Minecraft, be sure to check this out. A tribute map like this is a fascinating addition to an already fascinating project.

Paprika: Movie review

Haven’t posted in a while, sorry guys. Figured I’d review a movie I’d seen recently.

Paprika is an anime-film about a therapist with a device to enter people’s dreams. (It’s called a “DC Mini”.) However, we soon learn that the device was stolen from its development facility, along with two others. To make matters worse, each device was taken before they were protected for use on just-anyone for just-about-anything. No safeguards… but this is where the magic of the story begins.

You’ll have to watch it to learn the rest, I won’t spoil it. But you’re probably thinking… “dude, I am not watching a movie about something like this and reading subtitles trying to understand what the hell they’re talking about”… NOT TO WORRY. I felt the same way (obviously) and switched the Audio to ‘English’. Problem solved, and it’s also available in French, Spanish, and a few others.

The colors / scenes / and plot of this film are fantastic… not at all as inspiring as I’d initially expected. The film absolutely blew-my-mind, especially since I could watch it in high-definition… it’s out on Blu-Ray disc! My PlayStation 3 had no problems playing back the DVD and navigating its features. It’s one of those movies you’ll always remember if you don’t usually watch this sort of thing; contacting you on a subliminal level almost. Its editorial-reviews use words like “mesmerizing” and “dreamed”.

Anyway, definitely check it out. I’ll try to post more often about interesting stuff again. Also, here’s a link to the Wikipedia entry for a better understanding and more information… but beware of plot spoilers!! Enjoy.