We’ve seen OtakuTalk before, but at that time, I failed to answer a couple of the standard review criteria, e.g. speed or actual content, since I didn’t have the time to post in their forums to gain download access.

Luckily, John - one of the admins there - gave me temporary access to try out OtakuTalk’s direct downloads, and here are the results:

1. OtakuTalk

• Speed: Quite Fast
• Posts Required to Access Downloads: 10 posts.
• Content: Most recent episode from 5 ongoing anime series (e.g. Tsubasa Chronicle 2nd Season, Naruto, Bleach, etc.), and recent manga chapters from Naruto and Bleach.
• Update Frequency: Frequent
• Video Format: .avi (HQ)
• Note: Requires free registration and 10 non-spam forum posts to access downloads. Ad-free.

Here’s some stuff that kept me in the loop for the past week or so:

1. Akagi First Impressions
   Ahh… someone who has discovered the uberness of Akagi. Reminds me that I should restart blogging on the series since it has entered a new arc (ep. 8/9) - which BTW seems to be suggesting that Akagi’s crazy skills could actually be more outrageous than we’ve seen so far.
2. The 5 Loli-Sister Collection
   Who in the world can withstand the “insidious whisperings of the Dark-Loli-Siscon-Overlord”? Surely not me…
3. Death Note Movie Out in Japan
   This piece of news would surely be more interesting if I had gotten past Volume 3. Probably time for a restart (urghh, should kill this word from my vocab soon…).

Given the out-of-the-box layout and ad-free nature of this site, I’m not sure whether it is production-level (i.e. ready for public use) or not. But if it’s not, I guess we’ll find out soon enough, so no point letting it go to waste.

Anyway, here it is (tip courtesy of Rainy):

1) Flying-Panda.net

• Speed: Above Average
• Content: Recent episodes from 5+ ongoing anime series (e.g. RAY The Animation, Witchblade, Eureka 7, .hack//roots, etc.)
• Update Frequency: Above Average
• Video Format: avi (HQ) or .mkv (HQ)
• Note: Hassle-free, i.e. no registration or forum posting required to access downloads. Ad-free.

Although the TeamSkn anime direct downloads site has changed into a post-for-download anime forum, TeamSkn still provides those less inclined towards forum posting a hassle-free avenue: AnimeSkn - a huge public XDCC bot at #AnimeSkn @ irc.rizon.net (tip courtesy of Pie-sama).

Those of you who have fast connections will also appreciate Pie-sama’s comments that 1MB/s is a clear possibility with AnimeSkn.

1) AnimeSkn Pack List

• Usual IRC Nickname: AnimeSkn
• Usual Locations (IRC Server and Channels): #animeskn @ irc.rizon.net
• Content: 600+ episodes from a variety of completed (e.g. Monster, DN Angel, etc.) and ongoing anime series (e.g. Disgaea, Suzumiya Haruhi, etc.)
• No. of Download Slots: 20
• No. of Queues per Person: 10
• Update Frequency: Very Frequent
• Video Format: .avi (HQ), .mp4 (HQ) and .mkv (HQ)

I’m backkk… Not that I was gone for very long though. I had some web dev. stuff to handle over at A-Level.EconoRef, so I had to take a few days off from posting here.

Anyway, enough of my excuses and back to the meat. Here’s HSB Site - a site that is providing direct downloads through their own server for a limited period of time (their email said until next month, but it could be earlier). They also have quite a lot of stuff (to say the least) in their Anime Storage section, where they provide anime hosted on free file hosts.

1) HSB Site

• Speed: Below Average (it could just be me, but my downloads kept stalling every few minutes)
• Content: 10+ completed anime series (e.g. Junni Kokki, Gundam Wing, Ranma 1/2, etc.) on their own server, and about 50+ more (both ongoing and completed anime) on free file hosts..
• Update Frequency: N/A
• Video Format: .rmvb (LQ to MQ) or .avi (HQ) or .mkv (HQ)
• Note: Free registration required, but forum posting is not required at the moment. Direct downloads hosted on their own server are temporary, but those hosted on free file hosts should not be.

Darn, a day late on the wrap-up here, but that’s what a poor memory gets you I guess. Anyway, these are the anime direct download sites and XDCC bots featured this week, or rather last week (in chronological order):

1. Animenoobs - Anime Direct Downloads Forum
2. saiyan-REBIRTH - .rmvb Anime Direct Download Site
3. Animorc.net - Anime Direct Download Site for Latest Fansubs
4. black halo inc - Anime Direct Download Site
5. Koolaid - Some Anime XDCC Bots

For more anime DDL sites, you can check out last week’s wrap-up.

I’m in the process of adding category stickies (i.e. posts that always stay at the top of category pages) for all the anime categories on this blog as a form of introduction for those categories.

The implementation I’m using is based on WordPress traditional posting feature, plus the Adhesive plugin. As a result, the category stickies I’m writing are actually normal blog posts, which can thus appear on the main page and in Anime Field’s RSS feed.

So, I’m taking this opportunity to announce this fact in order to prevent any confusion, as well as to apologise to those who find this irritating.

As most of these category stickies are works-in-progress, feel free to correct any mistakes within them in the comments. Thanks!

P.S.: A few have e-mailed me with possible solutions to this problem, e.g. opt-out plugin for WordPress to exclude certain posts from the main page. However, I feel that there is more benefit in letting these posts appear on the main page. Furthermore, having to use another plugin… hmmm…

Just a quick one today. Here’s a whole set of anime-filled XDCC bots for your perusal, courtesy of Rainy.

1) Koolaid XDCC Bot Pack Lists

• Usual IRC Nicknames: [H3R0T3K], [Lunar]Suzukah3r0, [R-a]Kanami, A-K|Pacifica, AonE|Dark, KoolAidAsami, KoolAidBlast, KoolAidBurst, KoolAidPsP, KoolAidTsunami, KoolAidTV, and KoolAidXXX
• Usual Locations (IRC Server and Channels): #anirupt @ irc.rizon.net
• Content: Recent episodes from almost all ongoing anime series (e.g. Glass no Kantai, Yakitate Japan, KIBA, xxxHolic, etc.)
• No. of Download Slots: Varies
• Update Frequency: Very Frequent
• Video Format: .avi (HQ), .mp4 (HQ) and .mkv (HQ)
• Note: KoolAidTsunami provides great speeds for Asians, or those with Asian-routed hookups.