title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: In addition, Saudi Arabia and Iran—as competitors for regional hegemony—supported Afghan militias hostile towards each other. According to Human Rights Watch, Iran was assisting the Shia Hazara Hezb-i Wahdat forces of Abdul Ali Mazari, as Iran was attempting to maximize Wahdat's military power and influence. Saudi Arabia supported the Wahhabite Abdul Rasul Sayyaf and his Ittihad-i Islami faction. Conflict between the two militias soon escalated into a full-scale war. A publication by the George Washington University describes the situation: "[O]utside forces saw instability in Afghanistan as an opportunity to press their own security and political agendas."


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Owing to the sudden initiation of the war, working government departments, police units or a system of justice and accountability for the newly created Islamic State of Afghanistan did not have time to form. Atrocities were committed by individuals of the different armed factions while Kabul descended into lawlessness and chaos as described in reports by Human Rights Watch and the Afghanistan Justice Project. Because of the chaos, some leaders increasingly had only nominal control over their (sub-)commanders. For civilians there was little security from murder, rape and extortion. An estimated 25,000 people died during the most intense period of bombardment by Hekmatyar's Hezb-i Islami and the Junbish-i Milli forces of Dostum, who had created an alliance with Hekmatyar in 1994. Half a million people fled Afghanistan. Human Rights Watch writes: "Rare ceasefires, usually negotiated by representatives of Ahmad Shah Massoud, Sibghatullah Mojaddedi or Burhanuddin Rabbani [the interim government], or officials from the International Committee of the Red Cross, commonly collapsed within days."


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Southern Afghanistan was not under the control of foreign-backed militias nor was it under the control of the government in Kabul; instead, it was ruled by local leaders such as Gul Agha Sherzai and their militias. In 1994, the Taliban (a movement originating from Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam religious schools for Afghan refugees in Pakistan) also developed in Afghanistan as a politico-religious force, reportedly in opposition to the tyranny of the local governor. Mullah Omar started his movement with fewer than 50 armed madrassah students in his hometown of Kandahar. When the Taliban took control of the city in 1994, they forced the surrender of dozens of local Pashtun leaders who had presided over a situation of complete lawlessness and atrocities. In 1994, the Taliban took power in several provinces in southern and central Afghanistan.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: In late 1994, most of the militia factions (Hezb-i Islami, Junbish-i Milli and Hezb-i Wahdat) which had been fighting in the battle for control of Kabul were defeated militarily by forces of the Islamic State's Secretary of Defense Massoud. Bombardment of the capital came to a halt. Massoud tried to initiate a nationwide political process with the goal of national consolidation and democratic elections, also inviting the Taliban to join the process. Massoud had united political and cultural personalities, governors, commanders, clergymen and representatives to reach a lasting agreement. Massoud, like most people in Afghanistan, saw this conference as a small hope for democracy and for free elections. His favourite for candidacy to the presidency was Dr. Mohammad Yusuf, the first democratic prime minister under Zahir Shah, the former king. In the first meeting representatives from 15 different Afghan provinces met, in the second meeting there were already 25 provinces participating. Massoud went unarmed to talk to several Taliban leaders in Maidan Shar, but the Taliban declined to join this political process. When Massoud returned safely, the Taliban leader who had received him as his guest paid with his life: he was killed by other senior Taliban for failing to execute Massoud while the possibility was there.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: The Taliban started shelling Kabul in early 1995 but were defeated by forces of the Islamic State government under Massoud. Amnesty International, referring to the Taliban offensive, wrote in a 1995 report: "This is the first time in several months that Kabul civilians have become the targets of rocket attacks and shelling aimed at residential areas in the city." The Taliban's early victories in 1994 were followed by a series of defeats that resulted in heavy losses. Pakistan provided strong support to the Taliban. Many analysts like Amin Saikal describe the Taliban as developing into a proxy force for Pakistan's regional interests which the Taliban deny. On 26 September 1996, as the Taliban, with military support by Pakistan and financial support by Saudi Arabia, prepared for another major offensive, Massoud ordered a full retreat from Kabul. The Taliban seized Kabul on 27 September 1996 and established the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: The Taliban imposed on the parts of Afghanistan under their control their interpretation of Islam. The Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) stated: "To PHR's knowledge, no other regime in the world has methodically and violently forced half of its population into virtual house arrest, prohibiting them on pain of physical punishment." Women were required to wear the all-covering "burqa", they were banned from public life and denied access to health care and education, windows needed to be covered so that women could not be seen from the outside, and they were not allowed to laugh in a manner that could be heard by others. The Taliban, without any real court or hearing, cut people's hands or arms off when they were accused of stealing. Taliban hit-squads watched the streets, conducting arbitrary brutal public beatings.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: The Taliban began preparing offensives against the remaining areas controlled by Massoud and Dostum. The former foes responded by allying to form the United Front (Northern Alliance) against the Taliban. In addition to the dominantly Tajik forces of Massoud and the Uzbek forces of Dostum, the United Front included Hazara factions and Pashtun forces under the leadership of commanders such as Abdul Haq or Haji Abdul Qadir. Prominent politicians of the United Front were Afghan Prime Minister Abdul Rahim Ghafoorzai and the United Front's foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah. From the Taliban conquest in 1996 until November 2001 the United Front controlled roughly 30% of Afghanistan's population in provinces such as Badakhshan, Kapisa, Takhar and parts of Parwan, Kunar, Nuristan, Laghman, Samangan, Kunduz, Ghōr and Bamyan.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: According to a 55-page report by the United Nations, the Taliban, while trying to consolidate control over northern and western Afghanistan, committed systematic massacres against civilians. UN officials stated that there had been "15 massacres" between 1996 and 2001. They also said "these have been highly systematic and they all lead back to the [Taliban] Ministry of Defense or to Mullah Omar himself." In a major effort to retake the Shomali plains, the Taliban indiscriminately killed civilians, while uprooting and expelling the population. Kamal Hossein, a special reporter for the UN, reported on these and other war crimes. Upon taking Mazar-i-Sharif in 1998, about 4,000 civilians were executed by the Taliban and many more reported tortured. The Taliban especially targeted people of Shia religious or Hazara ethnic background. Among those killed in Mazari-i-Sharif were several Iranian diplomats. Others were kidnapped by the Taliban, touching off a hostage crisis that nearly escalated to a full-scale war, with 150,000 Iranian soldiers massed on the Afghan border at one time. It was later admitted that the diplomats were killed by the Taliban, and their bodies were returned to Iran.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: The documents also reveal the role of Arab and Pakistani support troops in these killings. Osama Bin Laden's so-called 055 Brigade was responsible for mass killings of Afghan civilians.<ref name="Ahmed Rashid/The Telegraph"></ref> The report by the United Nations quotes eyewitnesses in many villages describing Arab fighters carrying long knives used for slitting throats and skinning people.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Pakistan's ISI, wanted the mujahideen to establish a government in Afghanistan. The director-general of the ISI, Hamid Gul, was interested in an Islamic revolution which would transcend national borders, not just in Afghanistan and Pakistan but also in Central Asia. To set up the proposed mujahideen government, Gul ordered an assault on Jalalabad with the intent on using it as the capital for the new government Pakistan was interested in establishing in Afghanistan. The Taliban were largely funded by ISI in 1994. The ISI used the Taliban to establish a regime in Afghanistan which would be favorable to Pakistan, as they were trying to gain strategic depth. Since the creation of the Taliban, the ISI and the Pakistani military have given financial, logistical and military support.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: According to Pakistani Afghanistan expert Ahmed Rashid, "between 1994 and 1999, an estimated 80,000 to 100,000 Pakistanis trained and fought in Afghanistan" on the side of the Taliban. Peter Tomsen stated that Pakistani military and ISI officers along with thousands of regular Pakistani Armed Forces personnel had been involved in the fighting in Afghanistan. In 2001 alone, according to several international sources, 28,000–30,000 Pakistani nationals, 14,000–15,000 Afghan Taliban and 2,000–3,000 Al Qaeda militants were fighting against anti-Taliban forces in Afghanistan as a roughly 45,000-strong military force. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf – then as Chief of Army Staff – was responsible for sending thousands of Pakistanis to fight alongside the Taliban and Bin Laden against the forces of Massoud. Of the estimated 28,000 Pakistani nationals fighting in Afghanistan, 8,000 were militants recruited in madrassas filling regular Taliban ranks. A 1998 document by the U.S. State Department confirms that "20–40 percent of [regular] Taliban soldiers are Pakistani." The document further states that the parents of those Pakistani nationals "know nothing regarding their child's military involvement with the Taliban until their bodies are brought back to Pakistan." According to the U.S. State Department report and reports by Human Rights Watch, the other Pakistani nationals fighting in Afghanistan were regular Pakistani soldiers especially from the Frontier Corps but also from the Pakistani Army providing direct combat support.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: In 2000, Human Rights Watch wrote: "Of all the foreign powers involved in efforts to sustain and manipulate the ongoing fighting [in Afghanistan], Pakistan is distinguished both by the sweep of its objectives and the scale of its efforts, which include soliciting funding for the Taliban, bankrolling Taliban operations, providing diplomatic support as the Taliban's virtual emissaries abroad, arranging training for Taliban fighters, recruiting skilled and unskilled manpower to serve in Taliban armies, planning and directing offensives, providing and facilitating shipments of ammunition and fuel, and ... directly providing combat support.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: On 1 August 1997, the Taliban launched an attack on Sheberghan, the main military base of Dostum. Dostum has said the reason the attack was successful was that 1,500 Pakistani commandos took part and that the Pakistani Air Force also gave support. In 1998, Iran accused Pakistani troops of war crimes at Bamiyan and claimed that Pakistani warplanes had, in support of the Taliban, bombarded Afghanistan's last Shia stronghold. The same year Russia said, Pakistan was responsible for the "military expansion" of the Taliban in northern Afghanistan by sending large numbers of Pakistani troops some of whom had subsequently been taken as prisoners by the anti-Taliban United Front.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: In 2000, the UN Security Council imposed an arms embargo against military support to the Taliban, with UN officials explicitly singling out Pakistan. The UN secretary-general implicitly criticized Pakistan for its military support, and the Security Council "expressed deep distress over reports of involvement in the fighting, on the Taliban side, of thousands of non-Afghan nationals, some of whom were below the age of 14." In July 2001, several countries including the United States, accused Pakistan of being "in violation of UN sanctions because of its military aid to the Taliban." The Taliban also obtained financial resources from Pakistan. In 1997 alone, after the capture of Kabul by the Taliban, Pakistan gave $30 million in aid and a further $10 million for government wages.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: In 2000, British Intelligence reported that the ISI was taking an active role in several Al Qaeda training camps. The ISI helped with the construction of training camps for both the Taliban and Al Qaeda. From 1996 to 2001 the Al Qaeda of Osama Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri became a state within the Taliban state. Bin Laden sent Arab and Central Asian Al-Qaeda militants to join the fight against the United Front, among them his 055 Brigade.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Dostum and his forces were defeated by the Taliban in 1998. Dostum subsequently went into exile. Massoud became the only leader to remain in Afghanistan and who was able to defend vast parts of his area against the Taliban. In the areas under his control, Massoud set up democratic institutions and signed the Women's Rights Declaration. In the area of Massoud, women and girls did not have to wear the Afghan burqa. They were allowed to work and to go to school. In at least two known instances, Massoud personally intervened against cases of forced marriage. To Massoud there was reportedly nothing worse than treating a person like an object. He stated: "It is our conviction and we believe that both men and women are created by the Almighty. Both have equal rights. Women can pursue an education, women can pursue a career, and women can play a role in society — just like men."


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: In "Massoud: From Warrior to Statesman", author Pepe Escobar writes "Massoud is adamant that in Afghanistan women have suffered oppression for generations. He says that 'the cultural environment of the country suffocates women. But the Taliban exacerbate this with oppression.' His most ambitious project is to shatter this cultural prejudice and so give more space, freedom and equality to women — they would have the same rights as men." While it was Massoud's stated conviction that men and women are equal and should enjoy the same rights, he also had to deal with Afghan traditions which he said would need a generation or more to overcome. In his opinion that could only be achieved through education. Humayun Tandar, who took part as an Afghan diplomat in the 2001 International Conference on Afghanistan in Bonn, said that "strictures of language, ethnicity, region were [also] stifling for Massoud. That is why ... he wanted to create a unity which could surpass the situation in which we found ourselves and still find ourselves to this day." This applied also to strictures of religion. Jean-José Puig describes how Massoud often led prayers before a meal or at times asked his fellow Muslims to lead the prayer but also did not hesitate to ask a Christian friend Jean-José Puig or the Jewish Princeton University Professor Michael Barry: "Jean-José, we believe in the same God. Please, tell us the prayer before lunch or dinner in your own language."


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Human Rights Watch cites no human rights crimes for the forces under direct control of Massoud for the period from October 1996 until the assassination of Massoud in September 2001. One million people fled the Taliban, many to the area of Massoud. In its "Inside the Taliban" documentary, "National Geographic" states: "The only thing standing in the way of future Taliban massacres is Ahmad Shah Massoud." The Taliban repeatedly offered Massoud a position of power to make him stop his resistance, but Massoud declined. He explained in one interview: "The Taliban say: 'Come and accept the post of prime minister and be with us', and they would keep the highest office in the country, the presidentship. But for what price?! The difference between us concerns mainly our way of thinking about the very principles of the society and the state. We can not accept their conditions of compromise, or else we would have to give up the principles of modern democracy. We are fundamentally against the system called "the Emirate of Afghanistan." In another interview, he was quoted as saying: "There should be an Afghanistan where every Afghan finds himself or herself happy. And I think that can only be assured by democracy based on consensus." With his proposals for peace, Massoud wanted to convince the Taliban to join a political process leading towards nationwide democratic elections in a foreseeable future. Massoud stated: "The Taliban are not a force to be considered invincible. They are distanced from the people now. They are weaker than in the past. There is only the assistance given by Pakistan, Osama bin Laden and other extremist groups that keep the Taliban on their feet. With a halt to that assistance, it is extremely difficult to survive."


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: In early 2001, Massoud employed a new strategy of local military pressure and global political appeals. Resentment was increasingly gathering against Taliban rule from the bottom of Afghan society including the Pashtun areas. Massoud publicized their cause of "popular consensus, general elections and democracy" worldwide. At the same time he was very wary not to revive the failed Kabul government of the early 1990s. In 1999, he began training police forces specifically to keep order and protect the civilian population, in case the United Front was successful. Massoud also addressed the European Parliament in Brussels asking the international community to provide humanitarian help to the people of Afghanistan. He stated that the Taliban and Al Qaeda had introduced "a very wrong perception of Islam" and that without the support of Pakistan and Bin Laden the Taliban would not be able to sustain their military campaign for up to a year. On this visit to Europe, he also warned that his intelligence had gathered information about a large-scale attack on U.S. soil being imminent. The president of the European Parliament, Nicole Fontaine, called him the "pole of liberty in Afghanistan".


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: On 9 September 2001, Massoud was the target of a suicide attack by two Arabs posing as journalists at Khwaja Bahauddin in the Takhar Province. Massoud died in a helicopter taking him to a hospital. The funeral, though in a rather rural area, was attended by hundreds of thousands of mourning people. The assassination was not the first time Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, the Pakistani ISI—and before them the Soviet KGB, the Afghan Communist KHAD and Hekmatyar—had tried to assassinate Massoud. He survived countless assassination attempts over a period of 26 years. The first attempt on Massoud's life was carried out by Hekmatyar and two Pakistani ISI agents in 1975, when Massoud was only 22 years old. In early 2001, Al-Qaeda would-be assassins were captured by Massoud's forces while trying to enter his territory.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: The assassination of Massoud is considered to have a strong connection to the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, which killed nearly 3,000 people and which appeared to be the terrorist attack that Massoud had warned against in his speech to the European Parliament several months earlier.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: John P. O'Neill was a counter-terrorism expert and the assistant director of the FBI until late 2001. He retired from the FBI and was offered the position of director of security at the World Trade Center (WTC). He took the job at the WTC two weeks before 9/11. On 10 September 2001, O'Neill allegedly told two of his friends, "We're due. And we're due for something big... Some things have happened in Afghanistan (referring to the assassination of Massoud). I don't like the way things are lining up in Afghanistan...I sense a shift, and I think things are going to happen...soon." O'Neill died when the South Tower collapsed.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: After the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, Massoud's United Front troops, with American air support, ousted the Taliban from power in Kabul in Operation Enduring Freedom. In November and December 2001, the United Front gained control of much of the country and played a crucial role in establishing the post-Taliban interim government of Hamid Karzai in late 2001.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: The U.S.-led war in Afghanistan began on 7 October 2001, as Operation Enduring Freedom. It was designed to capture or kill Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda militants, as well as replace the Taliban with a U.S.-friendly government. The Bush Doctrine stated that, as policy, it would not distinguish between al-Qaeda and nations that harbor them. Several Afghan leaders were invited to Germany in December 2001 for the UN sponsored Bonn Agreement, which was to restore stability and governance in their country. In the first step, the Afghan Transitional Administration was formed and was installed on 22 December. Chaired by Hamid Karzai, it numbered 30 leaders and included a Supreme Court, an Interim Administration, and a Special Independent Commission.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: A loya jirga (grand assembly) was convened in June 2002 by former King Zahir Shah, who returned from exile after 29 years. Karzai was elected president for the two years in the jirga, in which the Afghan Interim Authority was also replaced with the Transitional Islamic State of Afghanistan (TISA). A constitutional loya jirga was held in December 2003, adopting the 2004 constitution, with a presidential form of government and a bicameral legislature. Karzai was elected in the 2004 presidential election followed by winning a second term in the 2009 presidential election. Both the 2005 and the 2010 parliamentary elections were also successful.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: In the meantime, the reconstruction process of Afghanistan began in 2002. There were more than 14,000 reconstruction projects, such as the Kajaki Dam and the Salma Dam. Many of these projects were supervised by the Provincial Reconstruction Teams. The World Bank Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund was set up in 2002, which was financed by 24 international donor countries and spent more than $1.37 billion as of 2007. Approximately 30 billion dollars were provided by the international community for the reconstruction of Afghanistan, most of it from the United States. In 2002, the world community allocated $4 billion at the Tokyo conference followed by another $4 billion in 2004. In February 2006, $10.5 billion were committed for Afghanistan at the London Conference and $11 billion from the United States in early 2007. Despite these vast investments by the international community, the reconstruction effort's results were mixed. Implementation of development projects was frequently marred by lack of coordination, knowledge of local conditions, and sound planning on the side of international donors as well as by corruption and inefficiency on the side of Afghan government officials. On the provincial and national level, projects such as the National Solidarity Programme, inter-provincial road construction, and the U.S.-led revamping of rural health services met with more success.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: NATO and Afghan troops led many offensives against the Taliban in this period. By 2009, a Taliban-led shadow government began to form, complete with their own version of mediation court. In 2010, U.S. President Barack Obama deployed an additional 30,000 soldiers over a period of six months and proposed that he would begin troop withdrawals by 2012. At the 2010 International Conference on Afghanistan in London, Karzai said he intended to reach out to the Taliban leadership (including Mullah Omar, Sirajuddin Haqqani and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar). Supported by senior U.S. officials Karzai called on the group's leadership to take part in a loya jirga meeting to initiate peace talks. According to "The Wall Street Journal", these steps were initially reciprocated with an intensification of bombings, assassinations and ambushes.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Many Afghan groups (including the former intelligence chief Amrullah Saleh and opposition leader Dr. Abdullah Abdullah) believed that Karzai's plan aimed to appease the insurgents' senior leadership at the cost of the democratic constitution, the democratic process and progress in the field of human rights, especially women's rights. Abdullah stated: "I should say that Taliban are not fighting in order to be accommodated. They are fighting in order to bring the state down. So it's a futile exercise, and it's just misleading. ... There are groups that will fight to the death. Whether we like to talk to them or we don't like to talk to them, they will continue to fight. So, for them, I don't think that we have a way forward with talks or negotiations or contacts or anything as such. Then we have to be prepared to tackle and deal with them militarily. In terms of the Taliban on the ground, there are lots of possibilities and opportunities that with the help of the people in different parts of the country, we can attract them to the peace process; provided, we create a favorable environment on this side of the line. At the moment, the people are leaving support for the government because of corruption. So that expectation is also not realistic at this stage."


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: According to a report by the United Nations, the Taliban were responsible for 76% of civilian casualties in 2009. Afghanistan was struggling to rebuild itself while dealing with the results of 30 years of war, corruption among high-level politicians and the ongoing Taliban insurgency which according to different scientific institutes such as the London School of Economics, senior international officials, such as former United States Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff Admrial Michael Mullen, believed the Taliban was backed by the ISI.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: At the end of July 2010, the Netherlands became the first NATO ally to end its combat mission in Afghanistan after 4 years military deployment including the most intense period of hostilities. They withdrew 1,900 troops. The Atlantic Council described the decision as "politically significant because it comes at a time of rising casualties and growing doubts about the war." Canada withdrew troops in 2011, but about 900 were left to train Afghani soldiers.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: In February 2012, a small number of American service members burned several copies of the Quran. Some Afghans responded by staging massive demonstrations and riots in Kabul and other areas. Assailants killed several American military personnel, including two officers in the Interior Ministry building following this event. On 11 March 2012, an American soldier, Robert Bales, killed 16 civilians in the Kandahar massacre.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: According to ISAF there were about 120,000 NATO-led troops in Afghanistan per December 2012, of which 66,000 were US troops and 9,000 British. The rest were from 48 countries. A process of handing over power to local forces has started and according to plans a majority of international troops will leave in 2014. On 24 November 2013, Karzai held a loya jirga and imposed a ban on NATO house raids. This ban was put in place, and NATO soldiers were instructed to adhere to it. In December 2013, a house raid in Zabul Province was exceptionally carried out by two NATO soldiers. Karzai condemned this in a highly publicised speech. On 3 January 2014 a bomb blast was heard by NATO soldiers in a base in Kabul; there were no reported casualties or injuries. The day after, a bomb hit a U.S. military base in Kabul and killed one U.S. citizen. The bomb was planted by the Taliban, and the American service member was the first combat casualty in Afghanistan in that year. The Taliban immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: On 1 May 2015 the media reported a scheduled meeting in Qatar between Taliban insurgents and peacemakers, including the Karzai, about ending the war. In 2016, the government signed a peace deal with Hekmatyar's Hezb-e Islami, which was at the time the second largest anti-government insurgent after the Taliban. The deal proved controversial, and several sectors of Afghan society protested against it because of the Hekmatyar's alleged war crimes.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Tensions between the U.S. and Pakistan worsened as U.S. President Donald Trump accused Pakistan of harboring the Taliban. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani offered unconditional peace talks to the Taliban, offering them legal status as a regular political party, alongside the release of Taliban prisoners. Over 20 nations and organizations backed the deal, but it was rejected by the Taliban who refused to negotiate with the Afghan government. The Taliban insisted on only negotiating directly with the United States and only upon a full U.S. withdrawal from the country—a demand the U.S. rejected.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: An unprecedented three-day ceasefire was negotiated in 2018 around the Eid al-Fitr celebrations, with Taliban members openly approaching and talking to civilians and government forces. The ceasefire was widely celebrated, and Ghani announced it would be extended by ten days, with some societal leaders calling for it to be made permanent. The Taliban, however, rejected the extension and relaunched their military campaign against the government at the end of the original three-day period.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: As the Afghan government had fallen into a major dispute over the 2019 Afghan presidential election, in which both Ghani and his rival Abdullah Abdullah claimed victory, a power-sharing deal between the two men was signed, which assigned responsibility for the peace negotiations to the latter.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Eventually and after several years of back-and-forth negotiations, the U.S. Trump Administration struck a major deal with the Taliban in 2020, known as the Doha Agreement. The deal provided for a full but staggered U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in exchange for a Taliban pledge not to allow Al-Queda to reestablish itself in the country and commit itself to talks with the Afghan government (which was not a party to the agreement). The deal also required the Afghan president to release 5,000 Taliban prisoners in exchange for a Taliban release of 1,000 captive Afghan soldiers. Ghani, having never agreed to the deal, rejected the prisoner release, stating that it was not a U.S. prerogative and adding that he would reject any other releases as a prerequisite to Taliban-Afghan government talks. The Taliban replied by reiterating that they would not start any talks with the Afghan government until the 5,000 prisoners were released.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: The situation led to an increase in Taliban attacks, with the group having launched more than 4,500 attacks on government forces during the 45-day period following the signing of the Doha Agreement—a 70% increase compared to the same period during the previous year. As the U.S. had stopped conducting airstrikes on Taliban targets as part of the agreement (in exchange for a halting of Taliban attacks on U.S. forces), Taliban casualties dropped by about two thirds during this period. Following what was described as some of the bloodiest fighting in 19 years, the U.S. conducted several airstrikes against the group in early March 2020. Ghani agreed on releasing 1,500 Taliban prisoners, so long as those prisoners signed a pledge not to return to combat once released. The Taliban rejected this move, insisting on the full and unconditional release of the full 5,000 prisoner list. By August, the government agreed to free the 5,000 Taliban captives but stated that it could not release 400 of them, as they had been accused of serious crimes against civilians, calling a loya jirga to decide their fate. It ruled in favor of release, and all of the prisoners were freed. Following these developments, the first intra-Afghan talks between the Taliban and Afghan government were held in Qatar.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: In April 2021, the newly inaugurated U.S. President Joe Biden announced that all U.S. troops would withdraw from the country by 11 September 2021, the 20-year anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. He later brought this date forward to 31 August. As U.S. forces started to withdraw in May, the Taliban stepped up attacks on the Afghan government. The group began by first capturing the countryside to surround regional capitals, then taking those capitals without facing any major resistance. The United States Intelligence Community warned in July that the Afghan government was likely to collapse 6–12 months after the U.S. withdrawal. Biden stated that he would not cease or delay the withdrawal, regardless of the situation.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: By 15 August, almost the entire country was under the control of the Taliban, who had already encircled and were preparing to enter the nation's capital. Ghani fled the country to Tajikistan, and Kabul was captured that same day, with the entire political and military apparatus of the Islamic Republic having collapsed. The remainder of the NATO forces in the country occupied the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, evacuating hundreds of thousands of servicemen and civilians. In their last act while in Afghanistan, coalition forces destroyed or damaged most of what was left behind in the airport to prevent it from being used by the Taliban, totalling 75 aircraft and over 100 vehicles and other equipment, alongside the airport's anti-air defences, before definitively leaving the country on 30 August, thus meeting Biden's withdrawal deadline.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Biden defended his decision, stating that he did not wish to prolong the "forever war" and blamed the Afghan authorities for not having found a political settlement and fleeing the country for the collapse of the country's government, adding that the collapse had nevertheless "unfolded more quickly than anticipated". According to Biden, the American mission in the country had never been nation-building, but instead a pre-emption of attacks on the U.S. homeland, which he considered to have been a success. Following the coalition's withdrawal, Taliban forces captured the airport and announced they would form a new government shortly thereafter.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Despite the call to have some refugees admitted to the U.S. after the withdrawal of NATO troops, only a tiny percentage of vulnerable Afghans seeking to move to the United States under a refugee resettlement program were admitted to the U.S. Refugees admitted through the P-2 criteria by the State Department's pre-existing Priority 1 program had the only option to be referred to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees or a designated NGO.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: As the Taliban took over Kabul, a Coordination Council was formed to transfer power to the Taliban, consisting of former mujahideen and Hezb-e Islami commander Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, former President Hamid Karzai and political leader Abdullah Abdullah. The latter two then met with Taliban representatives with the stated goal of ensuring safety and returning normalcy to the capital. However, it was reported that the two would likely not be a part of the future Taliban government. The New York Times reported that Karzai had been forced out of his home after the Taliban disarmed his guards and took over security at his residence, instead moving in to live in Abdullah's house. According to a source cited by the CNN, both had effectively been placed under house arrest, with their security details removed and at the mercy of the Taliban.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Following the Taliban's victory across Afghanistan, the Islamic Republic's vice president and long-time opponent of the Taliban, Amrullah Saleh, cited provisions in the 2004 Constitution of Afghanistan which would make him acting president of the country. In doing so, he appealed to a sense of continuity of the Islamic Republic, which would lend him political legitimacy. As Kabul, alongside the vast majority of Afghanistan, was under Taliban control, he joined forces with Ahmad Massoud, son of former mujahideen commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, in declaring the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (also known as the "Panjshir Resistance"), an anti-Taliban coalition based in the Panjshir Valley. In turn, he was recognized as president by Massoud, as well as Defence Minister Bismillah Khan Mohammadi. A small-scale uprising led by the group in August 2021 succeeded in ousting the Taliban from three districts, establishing its own control in the valley.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: The front, often compared to the Northern Alliance, reached a ceasefire with the Taliban shortly thereafter. The ceasefire did not last long and by the start of September the Taliban had launched an assault against the Panjshir resistance. By 3 September, the Taliban claimed to have defeated the resistance, establishing Taliban control over the entirety of Afghanistan for the first time in the country's history. These claims were dismissed as lies by resistance forces, which in turn claimed they were still in control of much of their positions and were actively fighting the Taliban. Fighting continued into the following day, and Mark Milley, Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned that the situation could develop into a full-scale civil war.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: At the same time, notable regional leaders Tajik Atta Muhammad Nur and Uzbek Abdul Rashid Dostum (the PDPA-era commander who turned on Najibullah in 1991 and formed his own Uzbek-dominated and relatively left-secular political movement Junbish) fled the country to avoid what they dubbed conspiracy as Mazar-i-Sharif fell to the Taliban. The two had been bitter political rivals but joined forces in the face of the Taliban advance. According to Nur, the local equipment of the armed forces had been handed over to the Taliban in a "cowardly plot" intended to entrap him and Dostum, which led to the fall of the city. The two joined with other regional strongmen and politicians in creating a front for negotiations with the Taliban, in which they would hope to achieve concessions from the predominantly Pashtun group for their respective local movements and ethnicities. The two stated that they would never accept a surrender and were preparing for armed anti-Taliban resistance should the talks fail, prior to the ultimate fall of the Panjshir Valley to the Taliban the following day. Both Saleh and Massoud fled the Panjshiri capital but remained in the province.


title: Afghanistan conflict (1978–present)

text: Afghan–Iranian clashes occurred in December 2021, overlapping with the Republican insurgency in Afghanistan, between the restored Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and Iran in Nimruz over border checkpoints. It resulted in a "de facto" Taliban victory, with the Islamic Emirate capturing various border checkpoints. However, the Taliban later withdrew from the checkpoints and things returned to status quo ante bellum.


title: Empire Distribution

text: EMPIRE Distribution, Records and Publishing Inc. (marketed as EMPIRE) is an American distribution company and record label founded in by Ghazi Shami with offices in New York City, London, Nashville, and Atlanta. It has released albums in various genres but it is predominantly focused on hip hop music. Many prominent companies and artists have partnerships with EMPIRE (see below), with music being distributed across platforms such as iTunes, Google Play, Amazon, Deezer, Spotify, SoundCloud, and Rdio, along with physical CDs and vinyl being distributed to traditional record stores.


title: Empire Distribution

text: EMPIRE has supported the debut albums and early singles of a number of early artists, frequently signing young talent. In the Atlanta scene, orchestrated by their SR. Marketing Executive , John Hill they were the first label to release Trinidad James, Rich Homie Quan, Migos, Rocko, and K Camp. In Los Angeles, they have distributed and/or are still distributing artists such as Kendrick Lamar, Schoolboy Q, Problem, Snoop Dogg, and Crooked I. They've also been involved in New York with releases from Fat Joe, Styles P, Cam'ron, and Busta Rhymes. On the R&B side, they have signed artists such as Eric Bellinger, Jacquees, Jesse Boykins III, Jonn Hart, and Lyrica Anderson. EMPIRE has also had several chart topping reggae albums including reggae artist J Boog's album "Backyard Boogie".


title: Empire Distribution

text: A number of albums and singles distributed by EMPIRE have charted on "Billboard", including "Taste" by Tyga featuring Offset, "Look at Me" by XXXTentacion, "All the Way Up" by Fat Joe and Remy Ma, "Broccoli" by DRAM, "Flex (Ooh, Ooh, Ooh)" by Rich Homie Quan, "Might Be" and "OTW" by DJ Luke Nasty, "Malibu" by Anderson .Paak, "Section.80" by Kendrick Lamar, "Gas Pedal" by Sage the Gemini, "Phantom and the Ghost" by Styles P, "#IWantDat" by Mindless Behavior, "Knock Madness" by Hopsin, and "Stoner's EP" by Snoop Dogg.


title: Empire Distribution

text: EMPIRE was founded in 2010 by CEO Ghazi Shami, a music technology graduate of San Francisco State University and the former Director of Urban Music at INgrooves. In operating the company, Shami was joined by Nima Etminan, an MBA graduate in Media Management from Hamburg Media School. Etminan, co-founder of the hip hop platform DubCNN.com, worked to expand the mission and services and as of 2011 was handling Marketing and A&R. Etminan now serves as Vice President of Operations and A&R.


title: Empire Distribution

text: One of the label's first charting releases was "Authenticity" by hip hop duo The Foreign Exchange, released on October 12, 2010. It peaked at #145 on the US "Billboard" 200, and #23 on the US R&B chart. Rapper ScHoolboy Q's album "Setbacks", released on January 11, 2011, also charted, reaching #100 on the "Billboard" 200. "Longterm Mentality" by Ab-Soul, released the following April, peaked at #32 on the US "Billboard" Top Heatseekers. In November 2013, Hopsin's "Knock Madness" album peaked at #76 on the Billboard 200 and at #1 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart.


title: Empire Distribution

text: Nima Etminan soon signed California hip hop artist Kendrick Lamar to the distribution company, and as of early 2012 Empire began handling distribution for all the projects by Top Dawg Entertainment, including Lamar's "Section.80." Released on July 2, 2011, the album reached #113 on the US "Billboard" 200 and #1 on the "Billboard" Top Heatseekers Albums.


title: Empire Distribution

text: 2012 saw releases by artists such as Slum Village, Trinidad James, Snoop Dogg, and Freddie Gibbs, several of which charted. In 2012 the label helped organize a 2013 tour between Trae tha Truth and J. Stalin. Also in 2013, Empire distributed the album "Still Goin In (Reloaded)" by Rich Homie Quan, which was named tenth best mixtape of 2013 by "Rolling Stone". Recent albums include "Phantom and the Ghost" by Styles P, released on April 29, 2014. It charted at #74 on US "Billboard" 200, and #14 on US "Billboard" Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums.


title: Empire Distribution

text: In 2013, Empire established its recording division, with Fairfield, CA native Sage The Gemini being the first signee.


title: Empire Distribution

text: In 2017, it was announced that Rayya Lioness launched a new Independent label called Lioness Music Style Records, LLC, which will be distributed by Empire. LMS Records is home to such artists as Albino Redz, BLK XLNZ, and more...


title: Empire Distribution

text: In 2018, it was announced that record producer and label executive L.A. Reid founded a new label Hitco Entertainment, which will be distributed by Empire. In the same year, Australian and rapper Iggy Azalea announced her own record label originally titled "New Classic Records" and later renamed to "Bad Dreams" with its distribution being handled by Empire.


title: Empire Distribution

text: On August 5, 2021, Blackground Records signed a distribution deal with EMPIRE to re-release its discography, most notably the catalogue of singer Aaliyah.


title: Invictus

text: "Invictus" is a short poem by the Victorian era British poet William Ernest Henley (1849–1903). It was written in 1875 and published in 1888 in his first volume of poems, "Book of Verses", in the section "Life and Death (Echoes)".


title: Invictus

text: When Henley was 16 years old, his left leg required amputation owing to complications arising from tuberculosis. In the early 1870s, after seeking treatment for problems with his other leg at Margate, he was told that it would require a similar procedure.


title: Invictus

text: He instead chose to travel to Edinburgh in August 1873 to enlist the services of the distinguished English surgeon Joseph Lister, who was able to save Henley's remaining leg after multiple surgical interventions on the foot. While recovering in the infirmary, he was moved to write the verses that became the poem "Invictus". A memorable evocation of Victorian stoicism—the "stiff upper lip" of self-discipline and fortitude in adversity, which popular culture rendered into a British character trait—"Invictus" remains a cultural touchstone.


title: Invictus

text: Latin for "unconquered", the poem "Invictus" is a deeply descriptive and motivational work filled with vivid imagery. With four stanzas and sixteen lines, each containing eight syllables, the poem has a rather uncomplicated structure. The poem is most known for its themes of willpower and strength in the face of adversity, much of which is drawn from the horrible fate assigned to many amputees of the day—gangrene and death.


title: Invictus

text: Each stanza takes considerable note of William Ernest Henley's perseverance and fearlessness throughout his early life and over twenty months under Lister's care. In the second stanza, Henley refers to the strength that helped him through a childhood defined by his struggles with tuberculosis when he says "I have not winced nor cried aloud." In the fourth stanza, Henley alludes to the fact that each individual's destiny is under the jurisdiction of themselves, not at the mercy of the obstacles they face, nor other worldly powers.


title: Invictus

text: Those who have taken time to analyze "Invictus" have also taken notice of religious themes, or the lack thereof, that exist in this piece. There is agreement that much of the dark descriptions in the opening lines make reference to Hell. Later, the fourth stanza of the poem alludes to a phrase from the King James Bible, which says, at , "Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it."


title: Invictus

text: Despite Henley's evocative tellings of perseverance and determination, worry was on his mind; in a letter to a close companion, William Ernest Henley later confided, "I am afeard my marching days are over" when asked about the condition of his leg.


title: Invictus

text: The second edition of Henley's "Book of Verses" added a dedication "To R. T. H. B."—a reference to Robert Thomas Hamilton Bruce, a successful Scottish flour merchant, baker, and literary patron. The 1900 edition of Henley's "Poems", published after Bruce's death, altered the dedication to "I. M. R. T. Hamilton Bruce (1846–1899)," whereby "I. M." stands for "in memoriam."


title: Invictus

text: The poem was published in 1888 in his first volume of poems, "Book of Verses," with no title, but would later be reprinted in 19th-century newspapers under various titles, including:


title: Invictus

text: The established title "Invictus" was added by editor Arthur Quiller-Couch when the poem was included in the "Oxford Book of English Verse" (1900).


title: Industry Baby

text: "Industry Baby" is a song by American rappers Lil Nas X and Jack Harlow, released on July 23, 2021, through Columbia Records. The song features co-production by American rapper and record producer Kanye West and production duo Take a Daytrip. It is the third single from Lil Nas X's debut studio album, "Montero" (2021), following up the international success of lead single "Montero (Call Me by Your Name)". The song debuted at number 2 on the "Billboard" Hot 100 for the week of August 7, 2021, and became Lil Nas X's third and Harlow's first number-one single on the chart on the week of October 23, 2021 after a massive gain in digital sales. On October 9, 2021, an extended version was released that features a short verse from Lil Nas X during the outro.


title: Industry Baby

text: In March 2021, Nike, Inc. filed a lawsuit against the art collective MSCHF, who designed the Satan Shoes as promotion for Lil Nas X's song, "Montero (Call Me by Your Name)". The case was settled in April, though on July 16, Lil Nas X posted a video on TikTok claiming that he had an upcoming court hearing regarding it on July 19. The date of this supposed court hearing, however, turned out to be the release date of the teaser for "Industry Baby" in the form of a skit parodying the lawsuit, with him ostensibly appearing on trial for the Satan Shoes, but quickly shifting focus towards his sexuality. The teaser was accompanied by a website.


title: Industry Baby

text: In late June, a demo version of the song with slightly different instrumentals was leaked online. The demo version included no features.


title: Industry Baby

text: Ahead of the song's release, Lil Nas X shared a letter addressed to his 20-year-old self noting that the song is one "for us". Among other things, he writes of his stagnation during the COVID-19 pandemic, ostracization due to his sexuality, and staying strong in the face of adversity to witness his future success.


title: Industry Baby

text: Alongside the release of the song and music video on July 23, 2021, Lil Nas X also partnered with the non-profit organization The Bail Project through the "Bail X Fund", raising money with the goal of ending cash bail in the United States in mind.


title: Industry Baby

text: "Clash" described the song "as a bubbling piece of pop-edged rap". "Billboard" described the song as an "expertly crafted rap anthem". The song is written in the key of E-flat minor with a tempo of 150 BPM with a time signature of 4/4 in common time, using a iv-V-i chord progression. It was originally planned to feature a guest appearance from Nicki Minaj; however, Lil Nas X did not receive a response from her.


title: Industry Baby

text: The trailer video for "Industry Baby" was released on July 19, 2021 on YouTube. The story was written by Lil Nas X, and he also plays all the main roles in the video (judge, attorney, prosecutor, himself, as well as an audience member).


title: Industry Baby

text: The video is a fake "Nike vs. Lil Nas X" trial taking place in the Supreme Court, in reference to the Satan Shoes Court case. It starts with Lil Nas X's attorney saying that his client has "nothing to do with this", before the prosecution passes around one of the Satan Shoes while asking the singer about his sexuality. Lil Nas X starts to counter that his sexuality has nothing to do with the case, before admitting that he is gay. The judge then proceeds to sentence him to 5 years in Montero State Prison - a fictional prison named after the singer's real name, Montero Hill.


title: Industry Baby

text: The music video for the song "Industry Baby" was uploaded on July 23, 2021 on Lil Nas X's YouTube channel through Vevo, and as of May 9, 2022, it had more than 341 million views (341,095,155). It was directed by Christian Breslauer and produced by Andrew Lerios, based on a story by Lil Nas X. Other credits include Luis Caraza as the video editor and Bryson Pintard as the art director. The video starred Lil Nas X, Jack Harlow, Colton Haynes as head of security and Vanessa Buchholz as a prison guard. Jason Momoa lookalike Phil Brandt is also visible in the prison yard. The dancing was choreographed by Sean Bankhead. According to the video credits, it also incorporated 20 dancers, 9 "prison guards" and 29 "prisoners".


title: Industry Baby

text: The video starts with Lil Nas X being incarcerated in the Montero State Prison, 3 months after being sentenced in the prelude video. He is seen polishing his musical awards, walking around the prison and lifting weights in the courtyard, surrounded by the other inmates wearing bright pink uniforms. Jack Harlow brings a "Book of Montero" to Lil Nas X which contains a hammer, and the singer uses it to dig a tunnel in his cell wall. He manages to knock out the security guard, who is distracted by the Montero (Call Me by Your Name) music video playing on his phone, and pushes a button to open all the prison cells. The video switches to Harlow, who walks calmly through the prison as all the inmates escape. The video ends with the inmates leaving the prison aboard a prison bus, driven by Harlow and with Lil Nas X sitting on its roof, the prison in flames behind them.


title: Industry Baby

text: The video pays homage to the 1994 film "The Shawshank Redemption" and the 1979 film "Escape from Alcatraz".


title: Industry Baby

text: Five days later, on July 28, 2021, Lil Nas X trolled fans by releasing the "uncensored" version of his "Industry Baby" music video. The title refers to the censoring of the naked shower dancing scene from the original. This version starts the same as the original, but when the shower head is shown just before the dance starts, the video appears to buffer, showing a spinning circle. The video stays this way for the remaining duration of the music video, never actually showing the rest of the video or uncensoring the censored scene.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Development began soon after the American release of "Sonic Adventure" in 1999 and lasted 18 months. "Sonic Adventure 2" was produced in commemoration of the "Sonic" series' tenth anniversary and was designed to be faster-paced and more action-oriented than the original. The development team also expanded upon the presence of the Chao creatures and other player characters. Its locations were influenced by American locations such as San Francisco and Yosemite National Park. Sega announced "Sonic Adventure 2" in October 1999 and exhibited it at E3 2000. It was released on June 19, 2001 in the United States, then worldwide on June 23, 2001.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Sonic Adventure 2" received generally positive reviews for its gameplay variety, visuals, and audio, though some criticized its camera, voice acting, and plot. An enhanced port for the GameCube, Sonic Adventure 2: Battle, was released in late 2001 in Japan and early 2002 in North America and Europe; it features improved textures and multiplayer options. Together, the Dreamcast and GameCube versions sold more than copies worldwide. "Sonic Adventure 2" was also released as a downloadable game for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Windows in 2012.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Sonic Adventure 2" is a 3D platform game divided into two campaigns: Hero and Dark. In the Hero campaign, players control Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles, who fight to save the world; in the Dark campaign, players control Shadow the Hedgehog, Doctor Eggman and Rouge the Bat, fighting to conquer it. Each campaign cycles through levels of its three characters, telling different sides of the story. Levels have a variety of themes (such as cities, jungles, desert pyramids and outer space), with some followed by boss fights. The two campaigns' stories occur in parallel; completing both campaigns unlocks a Last Story with all six characters, culminating in a final boss fight.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Sonic and Shadow play fast-paced levels, emphasizing platforming. Their homing attack can lock onto robots created by Eggman and G.U.N., and they can grind on rails. Tails' and Eggman's levels are slower and oriented towards multi-directional shooting; they are confined to mechs in which they can jump short heights, hover and shoot enemies. Knuckles' and Rouge's levels are open and feature action-adventure gameplay with treasure hunting; in each level, they must find three shards of the Master Emerald. Their search is guided by radar and puzzle-based clues from harmless robots. Knuckles and Rouge can glide, defeat enemies with punches and kicks, and scale walls, digging into them to find power-ups.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Adventure 2" has the health system found in many other "Sonic" games. The player collects rings scattered throughout the levels; being hit by an enemy while holding rings causes the player to drop them all, while being hit without rings causes them to lose a life. Tails and Eggman have health bars, which are slowly refilled by collecting rings. Dying with no lives results in a game over screen. The characters can obtain permanent upgrades that grant them new abilities; for example, one allows Sonic and Shadow to dash along a sequential trail of rings to reach distant platforms, one gives Tails and Eggman hover jets that slows your descent in order to cross large gaps, while another lets Knuckles and Rouge dig into the ground to uncover treasure and Master Emerald pieces.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Separate from the main campaigns, the player can raise Chao as virtual pets. They have five attributes (Swim, Fly, Run, Power and Stamina) and a moral continuum from Hero to Dark. From the moment they hatch their stats can be increased with Chaos Drives or small animals, found in the main stages, which empower them to compete in karate and racing minigames. Their alignment gradually changes, based on their affection for the characters; for example, a Chao which likes Tails will gradually become more heroic. Playing with Chao increases affection, and when a Chao becomes fully Hero or Dark it assumes that form permanently. Although Chao eventually die, if they receive enough affection during their lives they reincarnate.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Adventure 2" has 180 emblems, earned for a variety of tasks. Each level has five missions; only the first is required to continue the campaign, and other missions include completing a harder version of a level and collecting 100 rings. The player earns emblems by completing missions and other tasks, many related to Chao raising. Collecting all the emblems unlocks a 3D version of the Green Hill Zone stage from the original "Sonic the Hedgehog".


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: The game has several two-player modes. Players may race on foot through new (or altered) levels, have shoot-'em-up battles in mechs, hunt for Master Emerald shards or race in go-karts. A few characters are playable in these modes, but not in the main game; Tikal and Chaos from the original "Sonic Adventure" are playable in the treasure-hunting game, as are Amy Rose and Metal Sonic in the foot-racing levels and mechs piloted by Chao and Big the Cat (replaced by a Dark Chao in "Battle") in the shooting levels.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Learning of a secret weapon from the diary of his deceased grandfather, Professor Gerald Robotnik, Eggman infiltrates a high-security G.U.N. (Guardian Units of Nations) facility and revives it using a Chaos Emerald. The weapon – a black hedgehog and self-proclaimed "Ultimate Life Form" named Shadow – offers to help Eggman conquer the world, telling him to rendezvous at an abandoned space colony, ARK, with more Chaos Emeralds. Shadow goes to Central City, encountering G.U.N.'s forces after stealing an Emerald. Shadow has vowed to fulfill a promise to a girl, Maria, which he interprets as one of revenge. Shadow blasts through the military force and meets Sonic. After a brief confrontation, Shadow escapes and G.U.N. captures Sonic, whom they mistake for Shadow.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Meanwhile, Knuckles encounters Rouge and Eggman, who try to steal the Master Emerald. He stops them by shattering the Emerald and searches for the scattered shards. Rouge, spying for the government, heads to Eggman's base and the ARK. There, Shadow shows Eggman the Eclipse Cannon, another superweapon created by Gerald, and discloses his plan: to charge the cannon with Chaos Emeralds and use it to take over the world. Rouge appears, offering them a Chaos Emerald to gain their trust.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Tails and Amy infiltrate G.U.N.'s island base and rescue Sonic, while Eggman, Shadow and Rouge collect three Emeralds on the island. Eggman makes a global broadcast threatening to fire on the Earth in 24 hours if his demands are not met, demonstrating the cannon's power by using it to destroy half the Moon. Sonic, Tails, Amy, and Knuckles use a Chaos Emerald in their possession to track down the other six. They infiltrate Eggman's base, boarding his shuttle shortly before it launches into space. Knuckles' Master Emerald shards are spilled along the way, and he leaves to collect them. He fights Rouge again, but when he saves her from falling into a lava pit, she relinquishes her shards and he restores the Master Emerald.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: On the ARK, Tails reveals he has made a counterfeit Chaos Emerald to destroy the Eclipse Cannon. As Sonic is about to use it, Eggman tells him that he has captured Tails and Amy, forcing him to return and rescue them. Sonic tries to trick Eggman with the fake Emerald, but Eggman sees through the plan and jettisons him in an escape pod rigged with explosives. Tails, thinking Sonic is dead, defeats Eggman. Sonic uses the power of the fake Emerald to escape; Shadow is sent to intercept him.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Regardless of who wins the fight, Eggman sneaks away from Tails and Amy with the last Emerald and arms the Eclipse Cannon. The entire colony suddenly starts falling and a prerecorded message from Gerald is broadcast globally: he programmed the ARK to collide with Earth if the Emeralds were used, destroying it in revenge for the government condemning his research and killing his colleagues, including his granddaughter Maria. Everyone, but Shadow, works together to access the cannon's core and neutralize the ARK using the Master Emerald.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Amy pleads for Shadow's help, allowing him to remember what Maria really requested of Shadow: for him to help mankind. Shadow catches up with Sonic and Knuckles in the core as they encounter the Biolizard, a prototype Ultimate Life Form. Shadow repels it, allowing Knuckles to deactivate the Chaos Emeralds with the Master Emerald. The Biolizard uses Chaos Control to fuse with the cannon, becoming the Finalhazard and continuing the ARK's collision course.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Sonic and Shadow use the Emeralds to transform into their super forms, defeating the Finalhazard and using Chaos Control to teleport the ARK back into stable orbit. This depletes Shadow's energy and he plummets to Earth, content in fulfilling his promise to Maria. The people on Earth celebrate as the heroes return home and Sonic bids Shadow farewell.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Sonic Adventure 2" was developed by Sonic Team USA, a former American division of Sonic Team, and published by Sega. It was directed and produced by longtime series contributors Takashi Iizuka and Yuji Naka respectively. Development began shortly after the release of the American version of "Sonic Adventure" in September 1999, and lasted 18 months. It was designed to be more action-oriented than the slower, more story-based "Adventure". The development team ran the game at 60 frames per second with "tempo", giving Sonic a variety of actions rather than focusing on speed alone. Its levels facilitated this flow, making Sonic seem faster. All six playable characters have roughly equal gameplay time (unlike "Adventure", in which some characters had short stories).


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: The levels and environments were inspired by San Francisco, where Sonic Team had its office, and other American locations, such as Yosemite National Park (where the team vacationed) and the San Francisco Bay Area. Compared to "Adventure", the sequel was intended to have "more of an American flavor". Although the level design prioritized the frame rate, it was more streamlined than "Adventure" because of the team's experience with Dreamcast hardware. Whereas Sonic Team had tried to include as much content as possible in "Sonic Adventure", for the sequel they only concentrated on the elements they deemed necessary. Naka said "Sonic Adventure 2" was also easier to develop, as Sonic Team could now "tap the full power of the console and deliver a much better experience".


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Iizuka described the Chao as a "relative neutral entity" in "Sonic Adventure". In the sequel, the developers expanded their presence, adding the ability to raise "Hero" and "Dark" Chao to reflect the conflict between good and evil. Chao have the ability to socialize, so they resemble a "real artificial life form".


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Sonic Team showcased "Sonic Adventure 2" with a trailer at E3 2000, and uploaded the trailer to its website on June 30. Sonic Team posted a trailer and a number of screenshots on May 30, 2001, with Sega promoting "Sonic Adventure 2" as the last "Sonic" game for the Dreamcast and as marking the series' 10th anniversary. Sega held a 10th-anniversary party for Sonic in June 2001, at which attendees could compete in a battle tournament; the winner played against Iizuka.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: As with "Sonic Adventure", Jun Senoue served as sound director and lead composer. Additional music was contributed by Fumie Kumatani, Tomoya Ohtani, and Kenichi Tokoi. The soundtrack is primarily melodic rock, with some hip hop and orchestral tracks. As in "Adventure", each character has a musical theme. The game features performances by returning vocalists Tony Harnell, Ted Poley, Marlon Saunders, Nikki Gregoroff and Johnny Gioeli, and new vocalists Tabitha Fair, Todd Cooper, Paul Shortino, Everett Bradley, Kaz Silver and Hunnid-P. Crush 40 (consisting of Senoue and Gioeli) debuted on the game's main theme, "Live and Learn". Production of the music lasted from April 2000 to February 2001; after this Senoue, along with others, created sound effects.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: The team wanted "Sonic Adventure 2" audio to stand out, rather than merely serving as background music. Senoue felt that some of "Sonic Adventure" tracks were not as memorable as others. He and the Wave Master musicians made a pact with them "to write songs that promoted the game's speed and situations while keeping the best tempo of the stage". Senoue wrote each track before producing a demo version, and mixed them with a Yamaha digital console and Mackie analog mixer. He edited tracks using a Macintosh. After Sonic Team approved the music, Senoue finished sequencing it and sent it to the musicians for production.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Several soundtrack albums for the game were released. "Sonic Adventure 2 Multi-Dimensional Original Soundtrack" was released in Japan by Marvelous Entertainment on September 5, 2001. "Sonic Adventure 2 Vocals Collection: Cuts Unleashed", an album with character theme tracks by Senoue and Tokoi, was released by MMV in Japan on August 21, 2001. For the 20th anniversary of the "Sonic" series, "Sonic Adventure 2 Original Soundtrack 20th Anniversary Edition" was released on iTunes on June 22, 2011. On October 29, 2014, a two-volume original soundtrack was released on iTunes. The soundtrack was also released as a vinyl LP by Brave Wave Productions in January 2018, and includes interviews with Senoue and Iizuka.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: In January 2001, Sega departed the console business to be a software publisher. "Sonic Adventure 2" was ported to the Nintendo GameCube as Sonic Adventure 2: Battle on December 20, 2001. "Battle" has more detailed textures and additional geometry, and adds multiplayer options including new abilities, upgrades, and exclusive characters. Big the Cat is replaced by a Dark Chao in multiplayer mode. "Battle" also upgrades much of the Chao system, with a Chao's stats viewable within the game, and the option to transfer Chao from "Sonic Adventure 2 Battle" to the Tiny Chao Garden in "Sonic Advance", "Sonic Advance 2", and "Sonic Pinball Party" with the GameCube – Game Boy Advance link cable. If a Game Boy Advance is connected without a game, a version of the Tiny Chao Garden can be copied temporarily into the Game Boy Advance memory. This version also introduces the Chao Karate feature.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: In Europe, "Battle" was marketed and distributed by Infogrames, following a deal to distribute Sega's games on the GameCube and GBA.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Sonic Adventure 2" was re-released in high definition on the PlayStation Network in North America on October 2, 2012, in Europe on October 3, 2012 and in Japan on October 4, 2012. It was released worldwide on the Xbox Live Arcade on October 5, 2012 and on Windows via Steam on November 19, 2012. The additional "Battle" content is available as downloadable content. On November 30, 2017, the Xbox 360 version was made backward compatible with the Xbox One, and was later extended to the Xbox Series X/S.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Sonic Adventure 2" received "generally favorable" reviews. Critics appreciated the game's multiple playing styles. According to "Edge" and reviewer Four-Eyed Dragon of "GamePro", the core game's three styles and bonus features such as Chao gardens made the game engaging. Johnny Liu of "GameRevolution" praised its replay value of multiple playing styles and 180 different goals. Anthony Chau of "IGN" called it one of the best "Sonic" games: "If this is the last "Sonic" game in these declining Dreamcast years, it's satisfying to know that the DC didn't go out with a bang, but with a sonic boom." In 2022, IGN would rank the title as one of the best Dreamcast games.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: The camera was largely panned. Shahed Ahmed of "GameSpot" criticized the "cardinal sin" of 3D platform games: forcing players to jump to an out-of-frame platform. Although players can re-orient the camera with the trigger buttons, it reverts when the character moves. According to Chau and Liu, this made searching cramped sections of Knuckles' and Rouge's levels frustrating. "Edge" found camera problems permeating the game, with no significant improvement from "Adventure".


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: The visuals received positive reviews. Liu called the graphics "sweet, sweet eye-crack." Four-Eyed Dragon wrote that the game "is simply jaw-dropping beautiful," citing its detailed backgrounds and scenery and the characters' extensive color palettes. According to Chau, the game had "some of the best textures ever seen" and was one of the most beautiful Dreamcast games. "Edge" was impressed by the texture detail and draw distance, and Chau, Liu and Ahmed praised its 60-frame-per-second rendering speed.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Senoue's soundtrack garnered a positive reaction. According to Ahmed, the music was an improvement over "Adventure" "campy glam-rock and J-pop soundtrack," with less emphasis on lyrics, and Liu appreciated its more "understated" approach. Four-Eyed Dragon called the music "an eclectic mix of orchestrated masterpieces, guitar tunes, and melodic hip-hop voices" that "gracefully fill the game's ambiance to a perfect pitch." Reactions to the voice acting were divided; according to Ahmed, "the voice acting, and the lip-synching in particular, is executed quite well," and Liu and Chau thought the English voices were inferior to the Japanese ones.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: The plot was derided, although its presentation was well received. Ahmed wrote, "Throughout the game the plot becomes more and more scattered and lackluster," not focusing long enough on one element to execute it meaningfully. Although Liu agreed that despite the game's ambitious scope and themes it failed to advance the series' core plot beyond the Sega Genesis "Sonic" games, "Edge" appreciated the story's presentation from both perspectives: hero and villain.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Despite high review scores for the Dreamcast version, the GameCube version released six months later received mixed reviews: respective Metacritic and GameRankings scores of 73 percent and 72.33 percent. Critics generally felt that it was not significantly improved from the Dreamcast original. However, Shane Bettenhausen of GameSpy saw "Battle" as noticeably superior; in addition to its upgrades, its action was better suited to the GameCube's controller than the Dreamcast's.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: The Dreamcast version of "Sonic Adventure 2" sold around 918,000 copies in the US, and 108,480 copies in Japan.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Sonic Adventure 2 Battle" for the GameCube sold almost 50,000 copies during its first week in Japan, where it went on to sell 192,186 units . In North America, it was the best-selling GameCube title between January and August 2002, with 465,000 copies sold during that period. By August 2002, "Battle" had sold more than copies worldwide. By July 2006, it had sold 1.2 million copies and earned $44 million in the United States. "Next Generation" ranked it as the 42nd highest-selling game launched for the PlayStation 2, Xbox or GameCube between January 2000 and July 2006 in that country. It sold 1.44 million copies in the United States , making it one of the best-selling GameCube games and the best-selling third-party game for the system.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Sonic Adventure 2 Battle" also sold more than 100,000 units in the United Kingdom, for a total of over units sold worldwide for the GameCube. This adds up to a combined total of more than 2,758,666 units sold worldwide for both the Dreamcast and GameCube versions.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Sonic Adventure 2" received several accolades, including the 2001 IGN's Editors' Choice Award. ScrewAttack called it the fifth-best Dreamcast game, and GamesRadar rated it the tenth-greatest Dreamcast game out of 25: "Despite trailing off significantly in recent years, the 3D side of the "Sonic the Hedgehog" franchise had a surprisingly stellar start with the "Sonic Adventure" entries, and the 2001 sequel really amped up the action." In February 2014, "IGN"'s Luke Karmali called "Battle" his tenth-favorite game of all time. In a video interview with Takashi Iizuka, he says "Sonic Adventure 2" is his favourite Sonic game.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: Shadow and Rouge, who debuted in "Adventure 2", have become recurring characters in the "Sonic" franchise. Both appeared along with new character E-123 Omega as "Team Dark," one of the playable character teams, in "Sonic Heroes" (2003), the follow-up to "Adventure 2". A Shadow spin-off, "Shadow the Hedgehog" (2005), expanded on the "Adventure 2" plot and featured a similar 3D platforming gameplay.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: With a few modifications, the plots of "Adventure" and "Adventure 2" were adapted into the second season of the anime "Sonic X" (2003–06). American licensing corporation 4Kids Entertainment hired an entirely new voice cast for the English dub, but the Japanese cast from the games reprised their roles in the original version of the show.


title: Sonic Adventure 2

text: "Sonic Generations" (2011), released to mark the series' twentieth anniversary, contains gameplay elements and levels from various "Sonic" games. Elements from "Sonic Adventure 2" included a remake of the City Escape stage in the console versions and a remake of the Radical Highway stage in the Nintendo 3DS version. Shadow also appears in a re-creation of his boss battle, and the Biolizard boss is re-created in the 3DS version.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Brahms: The Boy II is a 2020 American supernatural horror film starring Katie Holmes, Ralph Ineson, Christopher Convery and Owain Yeoman. A sequel to the 2016 film "The Boy", it is directed by William Brent Bell and written by Stacey Menear, the respective director and writer of the original film.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: "Brahms: The Boy II" follows a young boy who, after moving into a mansion with his parents following a traumatizing incident, finds a lifelike doll he becomes attached to. It was released in the United States by STX Entertainment on February 21, 2020, and was panned by critics, many of whom deemed it inferior to its predecessor. The film was also a financial disappointment, grossing $20million worldwide against a budget of $10 million plus advertising costs, less than a third of the first film's gross.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Liza and her son Jude survive a home invasion by two masked men, but are left traumatized by the event. Liza is plagued by nightmares while Jude develops mutism, and is left communicating through a notepad. Liza's husband, Sean, suggests they relocate to the countryside to recuperate. The family move to a manor, unaware of its dark history.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Arriving at the manor house, they explore the property and Jude finds a porcelain doll buried in the ground. Liza and Sean explore a nearby mansion. Realizing that Jude is missing, Liza searches for him and finds him in possession of the doll. Encouraged by Jude's connection to it, Liza cleans-off "Brahms," making the doll look new.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: The next day, Liza and Jude take a walk around the property at Jude's request. They meet Joseph, the property caretaker, and his dog. Tensions fray when Sean urges Liza to talk about the events of the burglary, and she will not.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Back in the house, Liza and Sean overhear Jude talking in his room. They ask if he is talking to Brahms and Jude writes 'yes' in his notepad. Weird events occur around the house, and Sean and Liza discuss a change in Jude's behaviour with their therapist.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Joseph talks to Jude about his dog being missing, but no one appears to have seen the dog. Liza finds disturbing pictures, and assumes they have been drawn by Jude. Later that evening, the family has dinner and Jude writes in his notepad that Brahms' plate is missing. Liza, upset about earlier, says that Brahms does not eat because he is a doll. She and Sean argue in the kitchen and Sean leaves the room. She goes to sit with Jude at the table and tells him that he needs to stay at the table until he eats. He writes on his notepad that she is making Brahms mad. She leaves the dining room and hears a loud noise. She and Sean run into the room, finding the dining room table and chairs overturned. Jude, scared, wrote that he told Liza not to make Brahms mad. Arguing about Brahms and Jude, Sean and Liza disagree about the mysterious things that are happening.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Jude leaves for the nearby mansion with Brahms in hand, leaving a note that reads 'You should have followed the rules'. Joseph finds Sean and Liza in the mansion and tells them briefly about a family that had lived there prior. He says that a boy named Brahms had lived there; he had killed two people, and did not leave the mansion for 30 years.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Shortly after, Sean's brother and his family come to visit. Will, Jude's cousin, gets mysteriously injured during the visit. Liza becomes even more upset. Liza later hits Joseph in the head, and she begs to know where Jude is. Joseph tells her that it will be over soon and that "Brahms and Jude are gonna be one". She gets loose and goes to look for Jude in the mansion.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Sean finds Liza and Jude in the basement and hits Brahms with a croquet mallet, revealing a demonic, rotting area under his face. Joseph then starts to get scared and says that "It will never be over" and that Brahms will take out the family's failure to "follow the rules" on him. A furnace then explodes, killing Joseph but leaving the family unharmed. Jude grabs Brahms, and throws him into the fire.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Liza, Sean and Jude are soon back at their home in the city, and everything seems normal. However, when he is left alone in his room, Jude walks over to his dresser and puts on a porcelain mask. He wishes Brahms a good night, and says that everything will be fine if his family follows the rules.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: By October 2018, it was announced that a sequel was in development, with Katie Holmes joining the cast of the film, William Brent Bell returning to direct and Stacey Menear back to write the script of the film, respectively, with Matt Berenson, Gary Lucchesi, Tom Rosenberg, Jim Wedaa and Eric Reid serving as producers, under their Lakeshore Entertainment banners, and STX Entertainment producing and distributing the film.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: In November 2018, Christopher Convery, Ralph Ineson and Owain Yeoman also joined the cast of the film.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Principal photography began in January 2019 and wrapped that March. Parts of the sequel were filmed in Victoria on Vancouver Island, located in British Columbia, Canada.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: The film was theatrically released in the United States on February 21, 2020. It was previously scheduled for July 26, 2019, and then December 6, 2019.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: "Brahms: The Boy II" grossed $12.6million in the United States and Canada, and $7.7million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $20.3million, against a production budget of $10million.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: In the United States and Canada, the film was released alongside "The Call of the Wild" and "" as well as the wide expansion of "The Lodge", and was projected to gross $5–8million from 2,151 theaters in its opening weekend. The film made $2.2million on its first day, including $375,000 from Thursday night previews. It went on to debut to $5.7million, finishing fifth at the box office. In its second weekend the film dropped 55% to $2.6million, finishing sixth.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of based on reviews, with an average rating of . The site's critics consensus reads: "More likely to induce boredom than quicken the pulse, "Brahms: The Boy II" is chiefly scary for the way it undermines the effectiveness of its above-average predecessor." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 29 out of 100, based on 13 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews." Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "C−" on an A+ to F scale, and PostTrak reported it received an average 1 out of 5 stars from viewers they polled, with 24% of people saying they would definitely recommend it.


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Benjamin Lee, writing for "The Guardian", gave the film one star out of five, describing it as "so punishingly dull to watch, filled with dry, perfunctory dialogue from Stacey Menear's consistently uninventive script and shot without even a glimmer of style," adding that "even at a brisk 86 minutes, it feels like unending torture..." with a finale "that buckles under the weight of its own stupidity, as well as some god-awful CGI."


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: Katie Holmes was nominated at the Golden Raspberry Awards as Worst Actress (for her appearance in this movie and also in "").


title: Brahms: The Boy II

text: In August 2022, Bell stated that he has plans for a third installment. The filmmaker stated that his intentions are to round out the character of Brahms, with the completion of a trilogy. While the second film centered around the porcelain doll "Brahms", the potential next movie would once again continue the story of the character from the original release. Later that month, Bell expounded on his ideas for potential future installments including a sequel and possible prequel options. When discussing the future of the series, the filmmaker stated that had Jason Blum collaborated on the movies, the third installment would have been released by the time the second was. Bell continued that the next movie will reveal that Brahms Heelshire survived the events at the end of the first installment, and that it will reveal what he has been up to; while expressing plans for the character and his doll counterpart to appear in the film. He stated: "...there’s a lot of great stories and there’s prequels. ...[It's a] rich world that lends itself to a lot."


title: Noragami

text: A 12-episode anime television series adaptation by Bones aired from January to March 2014. A 13-episode second season, titled "Noragami Aragoto", was broadcast from October 2015 to December 2015.


title: Noragami

text: Hiyori Iki was a normal middle school student until she was involved in a bus accident while trying to protect a stranger. This incident causes her soul to frequently slip out of her body, and she becomes aware of the existence of two parallel worlds: the Near Shore, where regular humans and creatures reside, and the Far Shore, where phantoms (demonic beasts) and human souls linger. Through her soul, she meets the strange, nameless god without a shrine, Yato. Yato is determined to make a name for himself out there by accepting any wishes for 5 yen coins , including Hiyori's to fix her body. Along with Yato's Regalia — a weapon from a spirit (dead human’s soul), and named by the god in question — Yukine/Yuki, the trio go through many adventures struggling with their friendship, identity, and pasts.


title: Noragami

text: "Noragami" is written and illustrated by Adachitoka. The series premiered in Kodansha's "Monthly Shōnen Magazine" January 2011 issue, released on December 6, 2010, and has been compiled into twenty-five "tankōbon" volumes between July 15, 2011 and June 16, 2022. The ninth volume was released simultaneously with a limited edition, bundled with a drama CD. Volumes 10 and 11 were released simultaneously with limited editions, each containing an anime episode on DVD. Extra chapters of the series have been published in the spin-off publication, "Monthly Shōnen Magazine +" since 2011. In November 15, 2013, the first seven chapters were compiled into one volume under the title . Several other chapters were bundled as add-on content to volume 20, released on February 15, 2019.


title: Noragami

text: Both the main series and spin-off series have been licensed in North America by Kodansha USA, under the title "Noragami: Stray God" and "Noragami: Stray Stories" respectively. The first volume of "Noragami: Stray God" was released on September 2, 2014, with twenty-four volumes released as of July 5, 2022. The first volume of "Noragami: Stray Stories" was released in December 2015. The second volume of "Stray Stories", which comes with the special edition of volume 20, has not yet been released in English, and there are currently no announcements of a planned future release.


title: Noragami

text: The "Noragami" television series adaptation is produced by Bones and directed by Kotaro Tamura with character designs by Toshihiro Kawamoto. Prior to the series' television premiere, its first episode was screened at 2013's Anime Festival Asia on November 10, 2013. The anime began airing in Japan on January 5, 2014, on Tokyo MX and later on MBS, BS11 and TVA, running for 12 episodes. Besides the television series, two additional episodes were released on DVDs bundled with limited editions of the 10th and 11th manga volumes, published February 17 and July 17, 2014. The opening theme song is , performed by Hello Sleepwalkers. The ending theme song is with composition by Supercell and performed by Tia.


title: Noragami

text: Funimation licensed the anime for streaming in North America. Following Sony's acquisition of Crunchyroll, the series was moved to Crunchyroll. Madman Entertainment licensed the anime for distribution in Australia and New Zealand.


title: Noragami

text: A second season, , aired for 13 episodes from October 2, 2015 to December 25, 2015. The opening theme song is by The Oral Cigarettes, and the ending theme song is by Tia.


title: Noragami

text: A mobile game titled "Noragami ~Kami to Enishi~" (lit. "Noragami ~Gods and Fate~") was released by developer Sakura Soft for Android devices in October 2015. An iOS release became available on November 16, 2015.


title: Buddy Guy

text: George "Buddy" Guy (born July 30, 1936) is an American blues guitarist and singer. He is an exponent of Chicago blues who has influenced generations of guitarists including Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Page, Keith Richards, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Jeff Beck, Gary Clark Jr. and John Mayer. In the 1960s, Guy played with Muddy Waters as a session guitarist at Chess Records and began a musical partnership with blues harp virtuoso Junior Wells.


title: Buddy Guy

text: Guy has won eight Grammy Awards and a Lifetime Achievement Award, the National Medal of Arts, and the Kennedy Center Honors. Guy was ranked 23rd in "Rolling Stone" magazine's "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time". His song "Stone Crazy" was ranked 78th in the "Rolling Stone" list of the "100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time". Clapton once described him as "the best guitar player alive". In 1999, Guy wrote the book "Damn Right I've Got the Blues", with Donald Wilcock. His autobiography, "When I Left Home: My Story", was published in 2012.


title: Buddy Guy

text: Guy was born and raised in Lettsworth, Louisiana. His parents were sharecroppers, and as a child, Guy would pick cotton for $2.50 per 100 pounds. He began learning to play the guitar using a two-string diddley bow he made. Later he was given a Harmony acoustic guitar which, decades later in Guy's lengthy career, was donated to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.


title: Buddy Guy

text: In the mid-1950s, Guy began performing with bands in Baton Rouge, including with Big Papa Tilley and Raful Neal. While living there, he worked as a custodian at Louisiana State University. In 1957, he recorded two demos for a local DJ in Baton Rouge for Ace Records, but they were not issued at the time.


title: Buddy Guy

text: Soon after moving to Chicago on September 25, 1957, Guy fell under the influence of Muddy Waters. In 1958, a competition with West Side guitarists Magic Sam and Otis Rush gave Guy a record contract. Soon afterwards he recorded for Cobra Records. During his Cobra sessions, he teamed up with Ike Turner who helped him make his second record, "You Sure Can't Do" / "This Is The End", by backing him on guitar and composing the latter. After two releases from Cobra's subsidiary, Artistic, Guy signed with Chess Records.


title: Buddy Guy

text: Guy's early career was impeded by his record company, Chess Records, his label from 1959 to 1968, which refused to record Guy playing in the novel style of his live shows. Leonard Chess, Chess Records founder, denounced Guy's playing as "just making noise". In the early 1960s, Chess tried recording Guy as a solo artist with R&B ballads, jazz instrumentals, soul and novelty dance tunes, but none of these recordings was released as a single. Guy's only Chess album, "I Left My Blues in San Francisco", was released in 1967. Most of the songs were influenced by the era's soul boom, with orchestrations by Gene Barge and Charlie Stepney. Chess used Guy mainly as a session guitarist to back Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Little Walter, Sonny Boy Williamson, Koko Taylor and others. As late as 1967, Guy worked as a tow truck driver while playing clubs at night.


title: Buddy Guy

text: During his tenure with Chess, Guy recorded sessions with Junior Wells for Delmark Records under the pseudonym Friendly Chap in 1965 and 1966. In 1965, he participated in the European tour American Folk Blues Festival.


title: Buddy Guy

text: He appeared onstage at the March 1969 "Supershow" in Staines, England, which also included Eric Clapton, Led Zeppelin, Jack Bruce, Stephen Stills, Buddy Miles, Glenn Campbell, Roland Kirk, Jon Hiseman, and the Misunderstood. In 1972, he established The Checkerboard Lounge, with partner L.C. Thurman.


title: Buddy Guy

text: Guy's career was revived during the blues revival of the late 1980s and early 1990s. His resurgence was sparked by Clapton's request that Guy be part of the "24 Nights" all-star blues guitar lineup at London's Royal Albert Hall. Guy subsequently signed with Silvertone Records and recorded his mainstream breakthrough album "Damn Right, I've Got the Blues" in 1991.


title: Buddy Guy

text: As of 2019, Guy still performs at least 130 nights a year, including a month of shows each January at his Chicago blues club, Buddy Guy's Legends.


title: Buddy Guy

text: While Guy's music is often labelled Chicago blues, his style is unique and separate. His music can vary from the most traditional, deepest blues to a creative, unpredictable and radical gumbo of the blues, avant rock, soul and free jazz that changes with each performance.


title: Buddy Guy

text: Guy has played numerous guitars over the course of his career and continues to use multiple guitars in concerts and recordings, but he has become known for his custom model Fenders with their characteristic Polka-dot finish. In a June 2022 interview, Guy explained that the Polka-dot pattern was a tribute to his late mother, and to remind him of a lie he told her when leaving home to start his career in Chicago: The original guitar was based on the Eric Clapton Custom Shop Stratocaster that Guy had been playing in the late 80s and has since been developed into its own line of Buddy Guy Signature models that Fender sells to the public. Various models of the Polka-dot guitar and Polka-dot motif feature in the artwork for a number of his albums since 1994's Slippin' In.


title: Buddy Guy

text: When inducting Guy into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Eric Clapton said, "No matter how great the song, or performance, my ear would always find him out. He stood out in the mix, simply by virtue of the originality and vitality of his playing."


title: Buddy Guy

text: Beck recalled the night he and Vaughan performed with Guy at Buddy Guy's Legends club in Chicago: "That was just the most incredible stuff I ever heard in my life. The three of us all jammed and it was so thrilling. That is as close you can come to the heart of the blues."


title: Buddy Guy

text: On February 21, 2012, Guy performed in concert at the White House for President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama. During the finale of the concert, he persuaded President Obama to sing a few bars of "Sweet Home Chicago".


title: Buddy Guy

text: Guy has won eight Grammy Awards, for his work on electric and acoustic guitars and for contemporary and traditional forms of blues music, as well as a Lifetime Achievement Award.


title: Buddy Guy

text: In 2003, he was presented with the National Medal of Arts, awarded by the President of the United States to those who have made extraordinary contributions to the creation, growth and support of the arts in the United States.


title: Buddy Guy

text: By 2004, Guy had also earned 23 W.C. Handy Awards, "Billboard" magazine's Century Award (he was its second recipient) for distinguished artistic achievement, and the title of Greatest Living Electric Blues Guitarist.


title: Buddy Guy

text: Guy was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on March 14, 2005, by Eric Clapton and B.B. King. Clapton recalled seeing Guy perform in London's Marquee Club in 1965, impressing him with his technique, his looks and his charismatic showmanship. He remembered seeing Guy pick the guitar with his teeth and play it over his head—two tricks that later influenced Jimi Hendrix. Guy's acceptance speech was concise: "If you don’t think you have the blues, just keep living." He had previously served on the nominating committee of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.


title: Buddy Guy

text: In 2008, Guy was inducted into the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame, performing at the Texas Club in Baton Rouge to commemorate the occasion.


title: Buddy Guy

text: In October 2009, he performed "Let Me Love You Baby" with Jeff Beck at the 25th anniversary concert at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.


title: Buddy Guy

text: On November 15, 2010, he performed a live set for "Guitar Center Sessions" on DirecTV. The episode also included an interview with Guy by program host Nic Harcourt.


title: Buddy Guy

text: On December 2, 2012, Guy was awarded the 2012 Kennedy Center Honors. At his induction, Kennedy Center chairman David Rubenstein said, "Buddy Guy is a titan of the blues and has been a tremendous influence on virtually everyone who has picked up an electric guitar in the last half century". In a musical tribute to Guy, blues vocal powerhouse Beth Hart, accompanied by guitarist Jeff Beck, sang a rousing version of “I’d Rather Go Blind.” Also honored that night were actor Dustin Hoffman, surviving members of the rock band Led Zeppelin (John Paul Jones, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant), comedian and late-night TV host David Letterman and prima ballerina and choreographer Natalia Makarova.


title: Buddy Guy

text: In 2015, Guy received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences.


title: Buddy Guy

text: "Born to Play Guitar" won a Grammy Award in 2016 for Best Blues Album. Also in 2016, Guy toured the US east coast as the opening act for Jeff Beck.