Sunday 26 December 2004

Pic of the day: Yay! Another game! Screenshot from the anime Hikaru no Go, showing Sai in one of his more childish moments.

Go Go again

Today I finished watching the "Sai plays Go on the Internet" story arc from the anime Hikaru no Go. As you may remember, Go (or Igo) is an oriental board game, very simple to learn but hard to master. People play it all their lives without reaching perfection. In the case of the fictional character Sai, he plays it even after his death, as a ghost visible only by the young boy Hikaru.

In this particular string of episodes, Hikaru learns that you can play Go on the Internet, where nobody can see your face. So he logs on and lets Sai dictate the moves. Soon, Sai becomes famous all over the world (or at least among Internet-enabled Go players all over the world) as an incredibly strong player, but nobody knows who it is. There is one who gradually starts to suspect, though ... Hikaru's rival, Touya Akira.

You can also get the story in the form of manga (comics) which are coming out in English right now. The first books are already available.

***

As I finished watching the last episode, I dialed up to the Internet (my DSL is still down, grumble grumble) and fetched my mail. Nothing from my online friends (or acquaintances at least) today, but a topic notification from NaNoWriMo.org, you know the place where people gather to write a novel during November. A bit late for that, and I lost this year again, while my eternal rival Tsaiko won again. But I am getting closer! Yeah! Anyway, NaNoWriMo.

So there was an unusually off-topic post on the tech board, asking if anyone knew where to get a Go client for Linux. Now, the connection between novel writing and Go is tenuous at the best of times, and the best of times is November in this matter. Still, the arrival of this about half a minute after I finished watching Hikaru no Go ... that's pretty tall for a coincidence. I would say it would have been downright creepy, if it wasn't about something as uber innocent. Go is a very polite brain sport, and Hikaru no Go is an anime which is unlikely to get any kittens killed unless you are a scary Yaoi fangirl. (And even then it is all in your imagination.)