Tsunami Channel
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Tsunami Channel is a manga-style web comic authored by Akira Hasegawa that updates 5 days a week. It launched on June 26, 2001.
In 2003, Tsunami Channel became the #1 comic of Keenspace after Sexy Losers moved to its own server. It held the number one position until Akira moved to his own domain. The motive for this move was partly from unpleasant remarks made by David Willis of It's Walky directed at Sexy Losers and its creator, Clay. Akira is known to be a fan of Sexy Losers, even drawing a crossover strip with the popular adult themed web comic.
Tsunami Channel has been on hiatus for one whole year while Akira Hasegawa worked on professional projects. It is unknown when the comic will resume, but there is actually some new illustrations and news from the author. Resurrection may occur in 2005 (written in April).
The name Tsunami Channel is actually a group header for Akira's various works, especially the ongoing series Experimental Comic Kotone and Magical Mina.
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Experimental Comic Kotone
Experimental Comic Kotone (or ExCoKo) follows the story of Kotone, a young android girl designed by Professor Hasegawa, who is attempting to fit into society and does so very well.
The comic originally started as a series of 14 scripts in a semi-interactive format created between June 26 and September 14, 2001, designed in such a way as to resemble a dating game. The comic now has more than 300 strips.
Main Characters
- Kotone is the lead protagonist in the comic (as stated by Hasegawa himself, and hinted at by the name of the comic). She claims to be 18 years old, but is generally considered 12 by most of the other characters in the comic, due to both her apparent mental age, as well as her appearance. She has an extensive collection of stuffed animals that she enjoys playing with.
- Onii-chan or Player is the secondary protagonist in the comic (it often appears as if he is the true lead character in many of the comics), and is well known for his powers of quick healing, his clueless nature around girls, and his "Love Sim Syndrome", which causes him to attract girls to him without his knowledge. He currently attends Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, majors in computer science, and works on projects for Professor Hasegawa.
- Laika is a half European, half Japanese girl who is an expert swordswoman. In earlier comics, she was extremely violent. She is part oni, causing her to occasionally lose control and potentially go on a murderous rampage if not kept in check with an oni seal on her arm, and she works on the same projects that Onii-chan does for Professor Hasegawa. Her incentive for doing so, however, is a promise by Professor Hasegawa to remove her Oni genes following the successful completion of the project, thus fueling her continual insistence that Onii-chan help her complete the project as quickly as possible.
- Konstantin, one of two characters in the comic with real-life equivalents, is well-known for his bishounen appearance and hentai personality. He is often quoted for his attraction to "anything that moves." His weakness, however, is catgirls, eternally causing problems with his relationship with Anya. It is because of Konstantin and his comrade-in-arms Professor Hasegawa that Tsunami Channel has a large cliquish following of hentai-lovers.
- Haruna is the daughter of two beatniks, but was raised by her traditional Japanese grandmother, owner of the large Japanese conglomerate Kurahashi Corporation. Because of Professor Hasegawa's desire for funding while in Japan, he barters with the Kurahashi family for Onii-chan to marry Haruna in exchange for money. Haruna is extremely traditional and cannot speak English. This does not cause any problems with Onii-chan any more however, despite the fact that he knows no Japanese. Initially, Haruna fell in love with Onii-chan due to his similarity to her dead fiancé Mamoru, but she now loves him for who he is, and not for who he resembles.
- Anya is a catgirl who, after having been saved by Konstantin from being run over by a truck, has now fallen helplessly in love with Konstantin. Konstantin's fear of cats, however, has repeatedly caused problems with their relationship, and he often must make a quick escape when she appears.
- Lisa, Anya's sister, is a kitsune, and true to form, she is a trickster, often playing tricks on various characters, particularly Onii-chan, who must be careful to avoid her occasional attacks. She often shapeshifts into other forms, but has recently become rather confused, as most of the characters have been able to identify who she is, despite her being in a different form. This has caused problems, due to an old animal-people legend that states that one's true lover can tell who the animal-person is regardless of the form they take.
- Alex is a young boy who also loves stuffed animals, and in this fashion has quickly become one of Kotone's good friends. He often has problems asserting his manhood, as he looks quite androgynous.
- Shion is a ghost girl who Professor Hasegawa sent to the United States to haunt Onii-chan as another potential girlfriend. She first met Onii-chan in the Carnegie Mellon anime club and has her own fan club consisting of many of its members. While Onii-chan does not know that she is a ghost, Konstantin may suspect something.
- Professor Hasegawa is the not-often-seen force behind the scenes, often causing problems for Onii-chan, such as leaving Kotone behind upon his leaving the United States for Japan, sending Haruna to marry Onii-chan, and other similar things. Professor Hasegawa is based on the real-life author, except that he is much more hentai than the real Akira is.
- Tsunami, who is Professor Hasegawa's computer, is not only the namesake of Tsunami Channel, but she also serves as a "computer fairy" who helps him design computer programs and other projects. Together with Konstantin, the Professor seeks to corrupt Tsunami, and she constantly hammers the Professor with mallets for his ecchi and otherwise meddling behavior.
Other Characters
- Fuuka is Laika's older sister and gave Onii-chan the first oni seal that Laika wears.
- Mamoru is Haruna's previous fiancé who died soon before her arrival to Onii-chan's house. In order to soothe her sorrow, an agreement was made between Professor Hasegawa and Haruna's parents to send Haruna to America to meet Onii-chan.
- Junichi is another bishounen who has a considerable fanbase. He appeared during the Haruna's Parents arc as Haruna's planned fiancé after the Mamoru debacle. He is currently the main focus of Card Master Junichi, a major fan project (see below). A variation of includes a neko-form, first drawn in a fan comic by Xuanwu (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Xuanwu) and Rheya and later incorporated into Ask the Professor. In neko-form, Junichi can use the "MEGA SPARKLE BLASTER," an attack created by Xuanwu (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Xuanwu).
Magical Mina
Magical Mina (or MaMi) is an action/magical girl manga that follows the story of Mina, a girl who has gained magical girl powers from creatures programmed by Professor Hasegawa. Mina, however, is hardly your normal magical girl, as she is cool, calculated, and quite smart and strong.
It was originally codenamed Magical Project H, and currently has four chapters. Many aspects are taken from such manga as JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.
Main Characters
- Mina is a 12-year-old girl who is rather smart and has gained magical girl powers from various programs programmed by the Professor and his students Onii-chan and Laika. She often fights battles to gain powers, but these battles are consistently against stronger creatures than expected, often causing problems for Mina.
- Mulder is Mina's stuffed animal sidekick who almost never gives Mina accurate information about her enemies, thanks to the supposed overzealous programming attitudes of Onii-chan and Laika.
- Arc is Mina's sidekick who has also received magical powers from Professor Hasegawa. He helps Mina defeat Fire by using a Light spell. His powers utilize Japanese kanji, requiring knowledge of the kanji in order to do his spells.
- Scarlet is another magical girl who will be introduced in the near future. She possesses four fairies that are her magical catalysts: Air, Fire, Water, and Earth.
Other Characters
- Professor Hasegawa and Tsunami both appear in the first chapter.
- Sarah, a character created by Akira for the scripting section of the Tsunami Channel site, will supposedly appear later on in the series.
Mina's Monsters
(Note: These are all in order of Mina's acquisition)
- Sword is made of plants and can be as sharp as necessary. It has no initial form.
- Armor is the first creature Mina acquires through defeat. Its initial form is that of a bug. Armor provides a shield for Mina.
- Wind is the first creature Mina acquires in battle. Its initial form is that of an imp with wings. Wind provides Mina with the ability to cast wind attacks, as well as to grow bat wings to glide in the air (she is not strong enough to fly from a standing start).
- Water is the next creature Mina acquires. Its initial form is that of a shark. It has been mainly used for the finishing blow against Fire.
- Fire is the most recent creature Mina has acquired. Its initial form is that of a dragon, enhanced with powers from Armor and Wind.
Other Projects
Initially, Tsunami Channel was well known for allowing fans to write their own adventures with the characters through the use of the Script Writer Akira had created. The first few TC strips were written using this script writer, as well as several Japanese language lessons.
TC hosted the weekly Drawing Contest for the first year of its existence, until Akira had to call it quits when he found it too stressfull and time consuming when added to his already large workload of maintaining the comic and working late hours at his real job. The WDC can now be accessed through the ponju forums, and is run by Drakahn.
Tsunami Channel has also spawned a number of fan-led projects, the most significant of these are:
- Ask the Professor, or ATP, the single largest fan project of Tsunami Channel, was conceived and executed by ponju member Xuanwu. The project was both a series of audio files and 45 sprite comics in which the Professor and his mailboy assistant Junichi, both characters voiced by Xuanwu, would answer questions sent in by fans, largly consisting of fellow forum members. The project was discontinued in the fall of 2004 however, as the real-life Akira Hasegawa felt his character was being misrepresented. The audio version is still pending the release of the final three parts of its second chapter.
- Card Master Junichi, a fan made "third arc" of Tsunami Channel, designed to sit side-by-side with ExCoKo and MaMi. CMJ focuses on Junichi and is a new spin on the genre of card game based manga stories. Written by Xuanwu and drawn by Guzu Ligo, this comic is Xuanwu's other major Tsunami Channel project. It began in late 2004/early 2005, though it is currently on hold pending the restart of ExCoko and MaMi.
- The OP project, which is to animate an anime-like opening theme for the series.
- The voice acting project, including a radio drama based on the ExCoKo strips, led by Terra.
- Dr. Konstantin, a planned series in which fictional people can ask relationship questions of Konstantin, who is played by RivaL.
- Tsunami Power, set in an alternate universe, was a fan-fic in the form of a comic, written and drawn by Chimou. After its first death, the series was brought back due to fan support. It was a short lived resurrection however, as over-zealious fans of TC continued to harass the creator, bringing the series to an abrupt halt.
- TC KiSS Project, led by Kwanda, to create KiSSdolls based on the main characters found within the TC universe. Anyone may contribute to the project. The main site can be found at tsuchankiss.kawanda.net.
External links
- Tsunami Channel (http://www.tsunamichannel.com/) - The new official site.
- TChan (http://tsunamichan.keenspace.com/) - The old Keenspace site. Currently hosts Card Master Junichi, Ask the Professor, and other TC related fan comics. Akira gave duties for maintaining TChan to Xuanwu in 2004.
- Tsunami Channel Voice Projects - The site for the various voice acting projects for Tsunami Channel, currently down due to the sudden death of the webhost.
- Tsunami Channel Art Contest (http://contest.tcgames.net/index.php) - The site for the various art contests sponsored by Akira.
- Tsunami Channel Games (http://www.tcgames.net/index.php) - Fansite of Tsunami Channel.
- Tsunami Channel Scripting Page (http://tsunamichan.phpwebhosting.com/) - The site for the various scripts Akira has made, including the Script Writer and its fan-made scripts, Akira's original ExCoKo scripts, and Akira's Japanese lessons.
- Tsunami Channel Forums (http://www.ponju.net/index.php?act=SF&f=23) - The fairly active forums for Tsunami Channel, where the most vocal parts of Tsunami Channel fandom discuss various topics, and where many of the fan-led projects are centered.
A Finnish translation may be "coming soon".