What is Tiphares?

Tipha…what??

TIPHARES is a magazine ENTIRELY on CD-ROM about the fantastic world of manga and Japanese animation; the CD-ROM allows more complete information than paper alone: reviews of OAVs come with video clips, those of soundtracks with excerpts of the songs, so that readers can decide for themselves whether a work is worth their attention or not; not to mention all the columns and the wonderful Goodies.

Ok… let’s go into more detail!

The magazine comes with an eye-catching cardboard sleeve, dedicated to the author or character examined in the comprehensive themed dossier in every issue, and the CD in an elegant transparent jewel case, so that you can put it in any standard CD-ROM holder, with part of the cover devoted to the best drawing sent in by readers.

But let’s not forget the fantastic free gift that comes with the magazine: in the first two issues we gave away a splendid mouse pad, always matching the cover, to make reading TIPHARES as engaging as possible!

In the first issue the mouse pad was dedicated to “Serial Experiments Lain”, the series that left its mark on Japanese productions in recent years; in the second issue the spot was taken by one of the splendid, “shapely” heroines of Masamune Shirow, author of “Ghost in the Shell”, “Appleseed”, “Orion” and many other masterpieces that fortunately reached our Bel Paese too.

Once you put the CD-ROM in your computer’s drive, you will automatically enter the TIPHARES interface, freely inspired by Lain… not to brag, but we were told that you can fool yourself into thinking you are face to face with the N.A.V.I.!!

We want to make clear that, from a purely technical point of view, the navigation system is NOT built with static HTML pages, but is a real application created ad hoc.

The animations, the background music, the catchy graphics… all this makes the interface original and extremely intuitive. There is no need for heavy online help procedures or written explanations to navigate easily, even for beginners or for those who don’t use the Internet.

In any case, simply moving the cursor over the buttons will bring up an explanatory balloon, so that even those who… got lost can find their way back!

All this can also be appreciated in the figures at the side.

But what makes Tiphares a special and original product? What does it have that other magazines that bundle a CD-ROM with similar material don’t?

These are the main questions a buyer may ask. Well, we believe that the real strength of Tiphares is its extreme “clarity”; in fact, when you buy a magazine that reviews animation products, you often end up reading the editor’s opinion and lingering over a static image, most of the time with colours that hardly match reality.

The fact is that this translates into a greater risk of a wrong or unsatisfying purchase, since the reviewer’s opinion remains the fruit of subjective observations, determined by their own analysis of the work.

Tiphares overcomes this limit by letting readers see small previews of what they will find on the videocassette! This way the user has the widest freedom of choice and can really agree (and therefore buy the product) or disagree with what they have read.

Many of those who read us have been able to appreciate this and still admit how useful and innovative it is.

But that’s not all! In every issue we select the best Goodies (utility programs or simple programs to “embellish” the operating system) available on the freeware/shareware market. There is also always a section devoted to videos from Japan (such as hilarious commercials or Anime Music Videos), and in the links section you can find connections to the best sites on the web!

Another factor not to be underestimated is advertising. The CD-ROM medium allows far more advertising than any paper magazine without, however, taking precious space away from the magazine’s main content. Moreover, the kind of advertising that can be included is very varied: from the simple “static banner” to the most complex Flash animation, not to mention the possibility of adding interactive catalogues. All without boring the user with pages that interrupt reading or with intrusive ad space that makes you regret buying many expensive magazines!

Going back to the magazine’s content, there is an “Italy space” devoted entirely to readers’ works. Here we welcome and publish everything made by users, be it drawings or writings, without censorship (except within the limits of decency! Nobody should feel offended by others’ freedom) or cuts of any kind. In addition, the most deserving reader can aim for the “cover space”, where, in an absolutely discreet way, their work will be published. This is to reinforce the fact that Tiphares is totally on the side of all its readers and appreciates their willingness and loyalty and… knows how to reward them too!

Another space devoted to readers is the mail corner, where, in a polite way, everyone’s ideas find and will find a home.

Here ends our brief overview, well aware that we have not fully explored every aspect and potential of Tiphares.

Tribal & the TIPHARES crew