what are ukagakas?

an ukagaka [or 何か/ghost] is pretty much just a silly little desktop buddy.. and there are lots of them and there have so many different features... such as minigames and friend mechanics and inter-ghost communication! it is really cool! they also provide useful functions such as emptying your recycle bin every now and then and checking your mail... and they all need a host... i would reccomend SSP, its the one i use!

some popular ghosts that i see flying round the 'net are:

"nanika/nini-tan"

this is one i have been seeing alot! nini-tan is one of the first ghosts to have ever existed, and is actually a parody of nise-haruna who comes from nise-personaware, which is a freeware alternative to personaware.. she has a side-kick called unyuu and from my knowledge she has the basic features that your usual ghost has!

digital witch mayura

i personally do not know much about mayura, but she is a ghost which has her own backstory! and also has a cool hat! she also has a unyuu side-kick, and did you know she has her own game? its a shoot-em-up which i was unable to 100% :[ i also tried using her once but i could not and i cant remember why! many of her shells are gone (afaik) and are therefore lost media.

the toxic waltz (busuko)

the name toxic waltz actually refers to the group of characters in the ghost, but here i am focusing on busuko. busuko loves metal, and is very bold and eccentric! she can detach her head from her body and she becomes very monstrous when angry. this ghost was cancelled in spring of 2005.

mimimi

mimimi is a very energetic, loud and chaotic person, and can run very fast. her sidekick is called damien and mimimi is apparently very powerful in the demon world. that is all i know.

ninix-aya or wine?

this is still something i am trying to figure out with friends, expect this to be updated over time and also to become a massive wall of text. so far all i know is this:

ninix-aya is very very pick and choose with what ghosts it will install and which it wont. if you can't install a ghost through the program itself, then try extracting the .nar into the ghost folder (which should be found in user/.ninix/ghost)

if when running ninix-aya, the program crashes due to that ghost, then its game over for ever running that ghost i fear.. i am not completely sure what causes this, but i hope one day i will be able to find out!!

ninix-aya is compatible with debian only so far, however there are ports to gentoo, redhat and plamo-linux. if you are not using these distros, there is no guarantee that this program will run perfectly and without issues.

running ssp through wine works and runs okay, however it can be quite buggy sometimes. check that the ghosts you use do not use "Findwin" as wine is incompatible with this, and SSP will crash if that function is called. installing ghosts through wine is less of a headache compared to ninix-aya.

mayu shoot

mayu shoot is a game developed by harukaze, and was released in august 2002. it is a side-scroller shoot-em-up game, in which you can play as either of these characters: tsuguna, ryouri, rim, mayura, alto, and sakura. the game is set in a magical fantasy world in which you must destroy enemies on-screen and get the highest score!! each character has a different shooting style, and a little pet to accompany them and act as a second attach which can damage multiple enemies on screen.

running this game

windows: run in compatibility mode

linux: run in wine, however there are a few issues

wine issues (that are known)

• opening does not play
• playing the game with the music in .mp3 format causes a really weird bug in which navigating the start menu will play the "mayu shoot!" line over and over instead of the select noise.
• most music files ingame are in .mp3 format so they will not play.. run MSConfig.exe and change the type to .wav and it should work.
• can't run the game windowed
• cannot get past the first level (not sure if this is just a skill issue)

mac: sorry

screenshots

walkthrough

to be written..