It’s no lie with how addicted I’ve become to Azur Lane with how fun it is, and it’s fine. For now, it’s fine. I’m loving Azur Lane because it’s doing things I love in a warship related game while also being semi-similar to KanColle, thanks to how accessible it has made itself be. Anybody can play it anywhere while doing anything. They’re things Kadokawa & Kantai Collection developers are afraid to do, too rigid, or even too ‘complacent’ to even expand on, something Azur Lane developers keep taking advantage of every chance given. I still admire KanColle, I still respect it, it’s just a ‘husk’ of its former self because it refused to adapt and modernize. Too salty and rigid, something Azur Lane still currently isn’t. Just loving Azur Lane because I can just chill with my phone to the side on ‘auto-pilot’ while occasionally pressing buttons to send them to various nodes to level them up while watching Youtube, or some other game.
It’s also thanks to the game ‘Silent Hunter 3‘ that I’m this hyped up about ships and ship girls leading me into KanColle, watching ‘Arpeggio of Blue Steel‘ anime, then into Azur Lane. We honestly need more games like Silent Hunter 3 on a more surface ship side of things, something which isn’t ‘World of Warships‘. Something more singleplayer, maybe with co-op features. Need something to play throughout the ages in an open-world environment. Until then, Azur Lane: Crossfire quenches that desire until that void is filled in.
When people ask me what I’m doing they always find me playing Azur Lane. Or they’ll just say, “Are you playing Azur Lane again?”….. Yeah. I am.
- Azur Lane JP: 1011828744 (Kiel)
- Azur Lane EN: 68466835(Avrora Server)
- Azur Lane Fleet/Guild: 67114650 (Avrora Server; Arcticu Floof Den)
(I don’t expect people to join my fleet/guild, it’s however there for the interested. Anybody is welcome to my casual fleet/guild.)
Related Articles:
- Comparing Azur Lane & KanColle: https://ghostlysubstance.swgbex.com/Blog/?p=5176
- KanColle Admiration:
https://ghostlysubstance.swgbex.com/Blog/?p=4548
What I love about Azur Lane is how much lore is being placed behind it. As you can see with that image above you can see how my ship girls were keeping my headquarter safe until I came back. ‘How’ they managed that is beyond me (low-grade weapons), they however kept it safe. I honestly want to see more subtle things showing them interact with their environment, doing things on their own, among other cool things relating to that letter Akashi sent me. I gained a nice welcome back party (fuel, coin & etc) to the English side, I made us of it, and I boosted my fleet well enough to tackle the Bismarck event to claim her as my ‘waifu’ for my Bismarck days.
Fun part of Azur Lane is how ‘chunky’ the story is. It isn’t in your face, it’s in accessible chunks, while also focusing more about the gameplay than the story. It’s there, it’s fun, and it’s enjoyable.
It’s also comical with how self-aware it is, as with Shiranui painting weapon boxes golden from being purple. She’s basically scamming/False-advertising the boxes by making them appear more powerful than they really are. Gambling issues…. Akashi is obviously alarmed. She has to deal with customer backlash.
I do have a Japanese account… I started off with Chinese, went onto a Japanese account, then in a very belated manner jumped onto the English one now desiring to make the English one my actual home…. I however missed out on Neptunia, among other collaborations English side thanks to how settled I was on my Japanese account. All the collaborations are on my Japanese account so I’ll have that as ‘back-up’, or similar, until my English account manages to catch up to near similar status as my Japanese account. I jumped onto English so I could understand the story, something which has been nagging at me for the longest of times…. Japanese & English accounts are my main now.
I’m in an awkward position right now thanks to my constant account hopping; Ownership of two accounts. Having to play on an account which gets fatigued first before jumping onto the other. I’m however glad I’m properly re-united with Bismarck on both JP & EN accounts while also having Tirpitz. Bismarck’s sister, Tirpitz, happily blasting her foes apart making me smile. I admired those two worships since even before the whole ‘ship girl thing’ thanks to the ‘History Channel’ showing how mighty and majestic they were. Such beautiful ships. They may be over-rated, over-hyped, overshared,…. Sure. I still however admire them because they’re gorgeous vessels.
Now that I have an English account I’m now wanting to settle there instead because I’m now at home, I can read it, I’m more involved with it. Thankfully I can gradually make my way back to similar state my Japanese account is currently in, if in a bit more ‘short-cut’ manner by ignoring various things. It’s a weird situation. Being able to read the dialogue is far more engaging, something I needed for the lovely Bismarck event. More and more prefering the English version over the Japanese client wishing I could port over my Japanese girls onto the English side.
Loving how they handled Bismarck by following her same fate in history, but with a neat twist. The chase was still on in a more unique way. Instead of being sunk by the Swordfish, a new tale is spun. One which adds in the Sirens, very deep philosophical moments, and her own unique spin to Bismarck’s tale. One displaying Bismarck in a more epic light.
On a side-note:
Music is indeed powerful. When done right, music can provoke various forms of responses and emotions from the listener. It can be happiness, anger, sadness, mourning, or even pride. When composed properly, it can even be something more than music; Language and an auditory trip to a new world.
The music for Azur Lane is indeed good, something which I can admire on occasions. Nothing stands out fully (still highly noteworthy), it is however enjoyable to listen to in short bursts.
For example:
– Kantai Collection Soundtrack, Rome Total War Soundtrack, Silent Hunter 3 Sountrack, Animal Crossing: New Leaf Soundtrack, Natzure – Assasssin’s Creed Instrumental, among others. If necessary, search them up on Youtube, Spotify, or any appropriate sources.
Something I admired from KanColle was the various references to real-world happenings during WW2 relating to naval warfare. It was thanks to that I was able to learn quite a lot, and now a lot more from Azur Lane. You would gain varying forms of equipment, sortie styles into maps, specific references noted in shipgirl dialogue, or just general subtle references from the event relating to a certain campaign. It’s done far more openly in Azur Lane, as such as this letter to Bismarck by U-556. This Bismarck event hit me fairly heavily, something I admire and respect Azur Lane for doing so. I also respect them heavily because of how highly I view Bismarck within the naval side of things; My constantly growing love of naval warships.
U-556 respected Bismarck highly, something which was shown in a ‘grim’ manner. Bismarck fought, fighting to the last shell. She forged her own destiny while U-556 was doing her own thing, even forced to spectate. Everything hit hard.
If you search up U-556’s letter you’ll find out it’s real.
(Reference 1) – (Reference 2) – (Reference 3)
Honestly, if Kantai Collection had a bit as much of this sort of humour it wouldn’t be as much of a “husk” as it is found to be today (2019). If it at least tried to be far more fun it wouldn’t be struggling as much as it currently is when competing with Azur Lane. Less RNG luck in world maps, more genuine ship-girl skill based fun it would actually be entertaining again. There’s dialogue mentioned in the shipgirl lines for KanColle, just not in this manner. KanColle is sadly dated, something Azur Lane can happily keep itself relevant with various event styles and dialogue lines.
Just reading these lines (ones with Tirpitz being trolled by U-556) is making me chuckle once again with how U-556 is heavily taunting the far more “teacher-like” (cold) Tirpitz. She does backflips, she has fun…. She’s having her fun teasing the far more serious Tirpitz. The purpose of a game is to have something called “fun”, something Azur Lane succeeds with. KanColle? It struggles heavily while heavily forcing World RNG. It provided fun, however in highly limited quantity. More of an elitist game, if anything. This isn’t a comparison article so this should be neither here, nor there. Just noting how much fun Azur Lane is, thus why I’m praising Azur Lane as much as I am. I STILL have a smile on my face re-reading these dialogue lines. So much respect.
I’m genuinely laughing and chuckling when it comes to Azur Lane when recalling Kaga scheming for the Commander’s love. U-556 is also memorable. Lots of fun is to be had.
Took me a nice week to obtain these two beauties again for the third, and final time on the English client. I have them proudly maxed out on my Japanese account, something they shall be on my English account. I used to love Kitsune’s heavily (Kitsune Wednesdays on figure.fm, Danny Choo’s site), something I’m willing to semi-re-hype because of how gorgeously proud they are in Azur Lane. Any foxy is a good foxy, however needing to be ‘rare’ in some manner. I’m even admiring Naka, Amagi, and even the cutely shy ‘Niizuki’.
To be respected, Kitsune’s need to be ‘rare’, ‘mysterious’, and ‘majestic’, something certain people seem to have issues understanding. Kon!~
On a Bismarck note (Sabaton’s Bismarck Intensifies):
The lead-up to this Bismarck event was glorious. I loved all the hype leading up to the tease of Bismarck, the reveal, the Sabaton music video, the fan-made video, and even how this event was handled. Bismarck gained so much more love in Azur Lane making it far more appealing. Bismarck, as proud as she was in KanColle, gained no seasonal outfits (Kai, Ni, Drei variations); No love. Makes me highly amused to see how much hype was behind Bismarck’s Azur Lane pre-event leading up to the event with Sabaton Bismarck fan-art, Pixiv fan-art, and even Azur Lane Twitter accounts (EN & JP) both using lines from Sabaton’s video. The hype was real!
I’m finding it curiously interesting how she appears somewhat similar to her KanColle counterpart. She appears to be slightly older, more mature, more composed, regal, among other similar words and terms in Azur Lane; Younger in KanColle. It’s almost as if she started off in KanColle to then be her more mature self in Azur Lane. She still contains her ‘softness’, her normal human traits. She is the leader of the ‘Iron Blood’ faction needing to wear a proud mask, thus the two personality types. Her warm respect to her comrades, one which can be seen with U-556 with the formal ceremony, and her alternate outfit.
Her alternate outfit is also quite “teaseful”. It also has that chance of having a ‘Wardrobe malfunction” when moving a certain way. Bismarck, be cautious.
She’s a stunning beauty. Salute to the mighty Bismarck o7
Canadians in Azur Lane:
Found something interesting on the Azur Lane’s English Twitter account being fairly aware of their surroundings, maybe if coincidentally at that. May have been intentional, may have been coincidental. Either way, it’s quite neat how they added Canadians into the mix with how “forgotten” and “overlooked” Canadians often are. Lame excuses & reasons also tend to follow as to why they aren’t mentioned, reasons which aren’t valid. “Minor” is not a valid reason. With that in mind, seeing this is actually quite a morale booster because it reconnects us back with reality in various ways. Makes us happy again :).
Seeing things like this (inclusion) makes the Canadian side feel welcome, something which we struggle with in WW2 games. It’s awesome seeing ‘Foxhound’ noted as being Canadian, same with Fortune. Both ‘Fortune’ and ‘Foxhound’ are Canadian, if given to us Canadians by the British when they upgraded to newer Destroyers within their fleet. They were later named ‘HMCS Saskatchewan’ & ‘HMCS Qu’Appelle’, something I’m curious to see if they’ll gain a retrofit to rename them as such.
It’s tweets like these which warms my heart because it means we have hope of seeing Canadians in Azur Lane in various forms. I would however love to see ships formally have the HMCS name, not unofficially as ‘HMS Fortune’ and ‘HMS Foxhound’. Quite a few people within that Tweet thread also desired to see Canadian shipgirls, something we’ll now have to see if Yostar shall deliver. I would love to see some Canadians also because, ‘Canadian pride’! 🙂
(I absolutely hate the Canadian stereotypes though, so corny and plastic.)
People are constantly asking and desiring for HMCS Haida, something I find awesome. We Canadians want something to connect with, gradually making that connection as years go by. We can find them in ‘Victory at Sea‘, ‘Atlantic Fleet‘, and even ‘World of Warships‘. Even as traffic in ‘Silent Hunter 3‘. When Haida arrives in Azur Lane that shall be a glorious day. Many Canadians shall be hyped! If Haida appears, hopefully we can see the following shipgirls added eventually. The three Battleship sisters shall also be promising, if considered.
Destroyer Class Tribal-Class:
– Athabaskan (& II), Huron (G24), Cayuga (R04, Iroquois (G89), Micmac (R10), & Nootka (R96).
Minotaur-Class Light Cruiser:
– HMCS Ontario (C53)
Crown Colony-Class Light Cruiser:
– HMCS Uganda (Later HMCS Quebec)
Queen Elizabeth Battleships (Planned; Plausible Research Orientated):
– HMCS Ontario, HMCS Acadia, & HMCS Quebec
(Reference 1) – (Reference 2)
The Canadian Naval Aid Bill of 1913 intended to provide the funds for three modern battleships, which most likely would have been three more members of the Queen Elizabeth class, potentially named as Acadia, Quebec and Ontario,[20] in much the same way as Malaya had been funded. The bill met with stiff opposition in Parliament, and was not passed.[21] It is unclear if these ships would have served in the Royal Navy (as with outright gifts like Malaya or the battlecruiser New Zealand), or if they would have served in the Royal Canadian Navy (HMAS Australia, an Indefatigable-class battlecruiser, served with the Royal Australian Navy).
I’m certain others could be added, though these are the “main” players. There’s of course the River-class (HMCS Skeena), among others. Whatever Yostar does, that’s up to them. Anything Canadian would be nice. They would see more love from the connected patriotic Canadians. They would make me happy as also 🙂
Until then……
Wishing for Canadians to shine brightly within Azur Lane, if given the chance and allowed to do so. Until they’re officially recognized, shall be leveling up ‘Fortune’ & ‘Foxhound’ on the side to eventually welcome any other Canadian comrades.
This was a bit long winded, though do hope you’ve enjoyed the read. Azur Lane is fine continuing on the fun KanColle has started. Loved the various events, the Mighty Bismarck event, and more.
Thanks for reading, and happy hunting! o7