Warning: Wikipedia contains spoilers
Tsunami Channel is a manga-style web comic authored by Akira Hasegawa[?] that updates 5 days a week.
The name Tsunami Channel is actually a group header for Akira's, as well as his sister Romy's various works, especially the on-going series Experimental Comic Kotone and Magical Mina.
Experimental Comic Kotone (or ExCoKo) follows the story of Kotone, a young android girl designed by Professor Hasegawa, who is attempting to fit into society and does so very well.
The comic originally started as a series of 14 script in a semi-interactive format created between June 26 and September 14, 2001, designed in such a way as to be a dating game. The comic now has more than 280 strips.
- Kotone is the lead protagonist in the comic (as stated by Akira himself, and hinted at by the name of the comic). She claims to be 18 years old, but is generally considered 12 by most of the other characters in the comic, due to both her apparent mental age, as well as her appearance. She has an extensive collection of stuffed animals that she enjoys playing with.
- Onii-chan or Player is the secondary protagonist in the comic (and it often appears as if he is the true lead character in many of the comics), and is well-known for his powers of quick healing, his clueless nature around girls, and his "Love Sim Syndrome", which causes him to attract girls to him without his knowledge. He currently attends Carnegie Mellon University and is majoring in Computer Science and works on projects for Professor Hasegawa.
- Laika is a Japanese girl who is an expert swordswoman. In earlier comics, she was extremely violent, and is known to be part oni causing her to occasionally lose control and potentially go on a murderous rampage if not kept in check with an oni seal on her arm. She works on the same projects that Onii-chan does for Professor Hasegawa. Her incentive, however, is a promise by Professor Hasegawa to remove her Oni genes following the successful completion of the project, hence her continual insistence that Onii-chan help her complete the project.
- Konstantin, one of two characters in the comic with real life equivalents, is well-known for his bishounen appearance and hentai personality. He is often quoted for his attraction to "anything that moves." His weakness however is that he cannot tolerate catgirls, eternally causing problems with Anya's relationship with him. It is because of Konstantin and his comrade-in-arms Professor Hasegawa that Tsunami Channel has a large cliquish following of hentai followers.
- Haruna is the daughter of two beatniks, but was raised by her traditional Japanese grandmother, owner of the large Japanese conglomerate Kurahashi Corporation. Because of Professor Hasegawa's desire for funding while in Japan, he barters with the Kurahashi family for Onii-chan to marry Haruna in exchange for funding. Haruna is extremely traditional and cannot speak English. This does not cause any problems with Onii-chan any more, despite the fact that he knows no Japanese. Initially, Haruna fell in love with Onii-chan due to his similarity to her dead fiancee Mamoru, but she now loves him for who he is, and not for who he resembles.
- Anya is a catgirl who, after having been saved by Konstantin from being run over by a truck, has now fallen helplessly in love with Konstantin. Konstantin's fear of cats, however, has repeatedly caused problems with their relationships, and he often must make a quick escape when she appears.
- Lisa, Anya's sister, is a kitsune, and true to form, she is a trickster and often plays tricks on various characters, particularly Onii-chan, who must be careful to avoid her occasional attacks. She often shapeshifts into other forms, but has recently become rather confused, as most of the characters have been able to identify who she is, despite being in a different form. This has caused problems, due to an old animal-people legend that states that one's true lover can tell who the animal-person is regardless of the form they take.
- Alex is a young boy who also loves stuffed animals, and in this fashion has quickly become one of Kotone's good friends.
- Professor Hasegawa is the not-often-seen force behind the scenes, often causing problems for Onii-chan, such as leaving Kotone behind upon his leaving of the United States for Japan, sending Haruna to marry Onii-chan, and other similar things. Professor Hasegawa is based on the real-life author, except that he is much more hentai than the real Akira is.
- Tsunami, who is Professor Hasegawa's computer, is not only the namesake of Tsunami Channel, but she also serves as a "computer fairy" who helps him design computer programs and other projects. Together with Konstantin, the Professor seeks to corrupt Tsunami, and she consistantly hammers the Professor with mallets for ecchi behavior.
- Fuuka is Laika's older sister and gave Onii-chan the first oni seal that Laika wears.
- Mamoru is Haruna's previous fiance who died soon before her arrival to Onii-chan's house. In order to soothe her sadness, an agreement was made between Professor Hasegawa and Haruna's parents to send Haruna to America to meet Onii-chan.
- Junichi is another bishounen who has a popular fanbase, who appeared during the Haruna's Parents arc as Haruna's planned fiance after the Mamoru debacle.
- Shion is a ghost girl who Professor Hasegawa planned to send to America to haunt Onii-chan as another potential girl. She has a popular fanbase, but only one comic has been made with her.
Magical Mina (or MaMi) is an action/magical girl manga that follows the story of Mina, a girl who has gained magical girl powers from creatures programmed by Professor Hasegawa. Mina, however, is hardly your normal magical girl, as she is cool, calculated, and quite smart and strong.
It was originally codenamed Magical Project H, and currently has four chapters, after having recently completed the last one.
- Mina is a 12-year-old girl who is rather smart and has gained magical girl powers from various programs programmed by the Professor, and his students Onii-chan and Laika. She commonly has to fight battles to gain powers, but these battles are consistently against stronger creatures than expected, often causing problems for Mina.
- Mulder is Mina's stuffed animal sidekick who almost never gives Mina accurate information about her enemies.
- Arc is Mina's sidekick who has also received magical powers from Professor Hasegawa. He helped Mina defeat fire by using a Light spell.
- Professor Hasegawa and Tsunami both appear in the first chapter.
- Sarah, a character created by Akira for the scripting section of the Tsunami Channel site will supposedly appear later on in the series.
(Note: These are all in order of Mina's acquisition)
- Sword is made of plants and can be as sharp as necessary. It has no initial form.
- Armor is the first creature Mina acquires through defeat. Its initial form was that of a bug. Armor provides a shield for Mina.
- Wind was the first creature Mina acquired after the initial chapter. Its initial form was that of an imp with wings. Wind provides Mina with the ability to cast wind attacks, as well as to grow bat wings to glide in the air (she is not strong enough to fly from a standing start).
- Water was the next creature Mina acquired. Its initial form was that of a shark. It was mainly used as a distraction in the battle with Fire.
- Fire is the creature Mina has recently finished fighting with. Its initial form was that of a dragon, enhanced with powers from Armor and Wind.
Initially, Tsunami Channel was also known for the ability of fans to create their own adventures with the characters through the Script Writer Akira had used in part for the initial Tsunami Channel scripts. In addition, Akira had previously scripted several Japanese language lessons.
Tsunami Channel also includes a art contest that has recently been more separated from the comic, but is still quite popular.
Tsunami Channel also has a number of fan-led projects, including a fan-fiction site, a voice acting project (including a radio drama, Ask the Professor (a series in which people can ask questions of Professor Hasegawa, played by Xuanwu, his voice actor), and Dr. Konstantin (a planned series in which people can ask relationship questions of Konstantin, played by RivaL, his voice actor.)).
- Tsunami Channel (http://tsunamichan.keenspace.com/) - The main comic site.
- Tsunami Channel Voice Projects (http://tsunamichan.linuxpals.com/voice/) - The site for the various voice acting projects for Tsunami Channel.
- Tsunami Channel Art Contest (http://tsunamichan.linuxpals.com/) - The site for the various art contests sponsored by Akira.
- Tsunami Channel Scripting Page (http://www.fstream.net/~akira/project/) - The site for the various scripts Akira has made, including the Script Writer and its fan-made scripts, Akira's original ExCoKo scripts, and Akira's Japanese lessons.
- Tsunami Channel Forums (http://www.ponju.net/index.php?act=SF&f=23) - The fairly active forums for Tsunami Channel, where the most vocal parts of Tsunami Channel fandom discuss various topics.