Ah, the spring is now behind us and the summer stands before us, and that means that new anime series will begin to grace their presence on japanese tv sets and homelike monitors.
And this season start was like I witnessed the birth of Frankenstein, not in the campy (i.e. good, enjoyable, funny) way. No, this is just an abomination compiled out of my worst fears.

Let's start with the good and then move on the horrific bastards.

Aoi Hana
The animation studio that produced "Honey & Clover" is returning with Aoi Hana! And while I'm not extremely interested in the premise, made this premiere a short lasting impression on me. The story revolves around a bookworm, whose problem is her shyness. On the other side, is a red-haired girl with capricious attitude, that starts to go to a new school. Both girls fortunately meet at the station and talk after the junior helped the bookworm with a molester. After the encounter an interesting plot unfolds itself to the audience.

What makes or breaks a story like this for me is the characters and their decisions in certain moments. And everyone of them didn't dissapoint me, even though there are some japanese stereotypes represented in the story. The next thing that speaks for the anime is the animation itself. The backgrounds are plunged in soft watercolors (paradox?), the movements look sleek and tender and the character have an distinct look.

If you want to see one of the new animes, then pick this one!
Ah, I forgot to say, that the main characters are possibly hooking up (girl + girl = the new, old hotness!).


Sea Story
Oh, crap. I hate Lolicon. I think it's a bad image for anime and diminishes its recovered respect as an art form. In the days were Murakami's are sold like hot cakes and Ghibli movies have it easier to reach their western audiences, is the "loli-movement" a bad relic that persisted to long.
It's off-putting, and that's how I felt whenever the little sister in Sea Story appeared. She's dressed in a laughable tiny swimsuits, and while it seems to fit to the story, doesn't it make it easier to watch. It might be that it just sticks out to me and it doesn't really is a loli character, but when I look back at the last two or three I see a weird and annoying uprising trend concerning lolicon. The series itself is mediocre and made a passable impression.

Needless
First of all, this must be the most fitting title in anime history. Ugh, the "story" is about the baddies trying to kill of the needless, yeah, I'm not even kidding. So, the needless, naturally, fought back with a resistance group, that was no more after a confrontation with enemy. To be clear, I'm for the "bad" people. However, one kid survived and ends up being taken care from a group of anime clichés. Oh, yes, there we have it, stupid characters! We really need less of them. The hero is a typical unsecure and whiny type, while his counterpoint is leather jacket wearing coolio named "Blade" (sounds familiar, doesn't it?). And you thought that was bad? Well, it seems this anime needed an even more stupid character. Sadly, as if there weren't enough badly written female character, is this one a really stupid girl with so little substance that it hurts writing about it. She's like the whole anime totally needless! Even worse is that she gets constantly beaten by Blade, and I mean kicked, punched and freaking elbowed!

So, let's recount the various points. Bad character, uninspiring story and questionable writing. Why not put a cherry on this turd and serve this piece of shit with a little plagiarism? Here you have it. The look of this anime consists of Gurren Lagann, FLCL and typical shonen anime bits threwn into the mix.

And don't bother making it bearable by making it good. I mean, if you're already stitch your series from various parts, then make at least the efforts and hide the seams. Save your time and watch the animes they took their "inspirations" from.

This blog post will revolve around the independet open-source shooter "Warsow" and is intended as a little introduction to the game, rather than a review, because it seems that not many people know about this game.

"Warsow" was released in 2005 and was developed by various programmers and artists. The game is based on the famous "Quake"-series, to be more exact on Quake II, and is consequently a multiplayer focussed first-person shooter.
The thing that immediatly sticks out is the graphic. It uses, like another favorite game of mine, the Cel-Shading look and invigorates it by chucking lovely details left and right.
Other nice graphical effects find their way into this beautifully crafted game like bloom for lightning, which not-so-tech-savvy gamers know mostly from Shadow of Colossus were it was heavily utilized. The maps have a mainly cyberpunk feel to them, which influence can be traced back to a online published novel named "Chasseur de bots" [Hunters of Robots] by Fabrice Demurger, whose influences anon are Otomo's "Akira".

Sadly, do the models pale in comparison to the maps, but that doesn't hurt the overall look of the game so much since your opponents will be passing you by like steamrollers.

Which leads me to the gameplay, this game is really fast! It's a blast to rush through the map for the third time and shooting your enemies without noticing their guts hitting the bottom. In return, though, isn't it as fun to get shot every few seconds.
And even if it isn't as bad in reality, is Warsow a really tough game to master. There are a lot of basic and advanced movements that take a considerable time to learn, and even longer to fully grasp, but when you do like in every other game it's sweet. The second important thing in Warsow are the weapons. The weapon designs are following the same theme as the maps by sticking to the sci-fi look, albeit there just a new skin on old and beloved weapons such as the shotgun (Riotgun) and the rocket launcher.


An aspect in which this game still fails are the bots, those freaking mad virtual placeholders are just to imbalanced, and that's in every meaning of the word. Their skill level ranges from ludicrous to Mr. Miyagi, no joke! I advise you, if you check this game out, not to train using those bots if you want to really get better at this game and not Metal Gear. Sneaky bastards -__-).

Did I actually ever mentioned, that this game is free? Yeah, this game is free and for hobby programmers is the possibility to create on maps, models and huds by using their SDK that is also free to download on their website: http://www.warsow.net/


Warsow was really an innovation and more known in Europe and Japan, where it has a little and avid fanbase that is always growing. And albeit it is still a beta, is Warsow [currently at version 0.42] accepted at tournaments such as the ESL and spawned own little cups like ESW: Warsow.
Lastly, I hope I could do this game justice by giving you [yeah, that's you!] a interesting peek into this fabulous game!

[Sidenote: Some screens were made on a low resolution so that they'll still look okay after the resizing. Plus, not every screen was made on high graphic settings.]

After reading the Anthony's article about “Blueberry Garden”, I googled the creator and found his blog that showcased his games previous to his newest project. One of his earlier projects that caught my eye was “World of Pong”, which is Pong as a MMO. And it sounded interesting enough to give this one a whirl.

Let's start with the core of the game, the gameplay. It's really simple. You basically play Pong with a bunch of other people and a couple of balls. For every ball contact you get another level, thus becoming a little faster.
It seems that the game hasn't a level limit [info: I'm currently something over level 300] and, albeit there's a point counter, seems to be pretty much infinite.
At first you choose your name and a side. You'll only have this one avatar since there isn't main menu that lets you choose a different one. The game offers just Pong with other players, but fails to let you play with other people. There's only this shallow husk of a concept, which is fine since this is only an experiment, however I would've liked to have a stable chat and no lags.


The visuals are very minimalistic and fits to the basic and simple game. The only difference is that your paddle is red in order to distinguish yourself from the other players. Which oddly enough reminded me off the movie “Noriko Dinner Table”...

In conclusion, is the game a nice experiment without a real result and a little too much faults than it has traits.

Eden of East

This one gone awry, very much so that I'm worried about the shows story. But lets recap what happened before. We got to learn more of the Selecao and the rules of their group. And while the audience slowly inures to the plot and the characters, things go awry. I talk about the last half of the seventh episode. WTF! The female Selecao was cutting male genitalia of as a part to help the mankind? Isn't there some direct social problem the writer could tackle instead something so outlandish?

And what was the black wings shit? I don't know what I should expect next. Anyone watching this show?

K-On

The last two episodes made something clear to me about this series. The outcome of their first show decided on how would view the show in the future. I love Beck, because it's shows pretty realistic (okay, as realistic as a anime can be) picture of the music scene and how it's to be in a band. And I wished the same of K-On just with an insight on how women experience those steps of becoming a musician in a band.
Suffice to say, that K-On will be a lighthearted anime and never reach a real profound depth of other animes, but that doesn't make the anime a bad one.

Every episode yet was solid to very good, plus the animation are sharp and colorful and certify K-On for the best anime in this season.

However, only for this season, then I'd doubt if I ever would watch the series after it's finished.

Tori no Uta (eng. The song of the bird.)

What a bore. I'm really starting to think that Mr. Amano's paintings don't work when there are animated. Plus, it gets worse when the animation looks like flash. The story is mediocre and seems
decent, but the animation fails to deliver some gravitas to both, the characters and the story.
Sorry Amano, I'll continue to be in awe for your work but not when there presented like this. Why
don't you do another design for, lets say, Gatchaman?


Gunsmith Cats

I bought the OVA when I was pretty young and probably wasn't allowed to buy. Nonetheless, I had a chance to watch it again, and realized how well this series was produced. I knew of Sonoda's passion for weapons and cars, but this series is practically "Lethal Weapon".
...
Really, it is. Look at it again after you considered:

- ...that Rally and Minnie are partners with same characteristics as Murtaugh and Riggs. One of them just wants to settle down, and the other one is always teasing her with this exciting and dangerous side of their lives.

- They don't really care when they kill someone.

- Every harmless case evolves into this large scale mission to save the day and the city.

I know that these are pretty general arguments and that, considering what the show is trying to capture, it's logical to see some connections to famous action movies of that time, but just watch it again with that in mind. And you'll say everytime: "Shot 'em, Riggs!", as your watching it.

The genius of that show is that it shares the same universe with the (superior) Riding Bean and that should say enough. It's frikkin' Riding Bean. The guy with the hair, finesse, style and the motherfuckin' car! Speaking of cars, the fact that Sonoda's original is full with detail suffers a little bit in the animation. Some of the details are slightly reduced, however the weapons and cars still look very realistic. In short summarization, Gunsmith Cats is one of those hidden gems in animation and hold up pretty stellar to its contemporaries.

Plus, the group has 6 tits. Chew on that.

The preface, or an introduction to the four elements:

I love music. I love good music and certainly one musical genre. And while everybody laments her death, I, myself, find her in my everyday life. Mostly in my mp3-player, movies and on the blogosphere, but sometimes I can spot in her in the world of games. If you didn't realize I'm writing about Hip Hop.

Hip Hop consists out of four elements: Bbyoing, Emceeing, Djing and Writing. And for me the culmination of those four elements is probably the closest that comes to a transcendence experience, and to experience that in a game is almost impossible. Sometimes they get the music, sometimes the style but never the vibe.
There were a heap of those games, but just a handful games gave people, that were alien to Hip Hop before, an insight into this rich subculture. One of those games was Jet Set Radio.

Jet Set Radio was released on the most cursed console ever known to man, the Sega Dreamcast, and saw the light of the world in 29. June 2000. It subsumes to the other creative and exclusives titles such as Chu Chu Rocket, Ecco the Dolphin and Seaman. The game never had commercial success, albeit it received much praise from critics and was later on sold bundled together with the X-Box.
Noetheless, Jet Set Radio (= JSR) is also the proof that commercial success doesn't say anything about the quality of a product. This game was unique and one of the first games that featured the cel-shading look, and layed with this new style, the ground for some of the most enticing places in gaming history.

Mcing, or the art of Storytelling:

We know that a peculiar Englishman called Slick Rick basically brought storytelling to the Hip Hop. His stories mostly revolved about stick up kids, who'd try their luck in the crime world.
GG's, the gang in Jet Set Radio, isn't about doing crimes in particular, their just writers (Hip Hop lingo for graffiti artist) that collide with the mights of Tokyo-To.
At first, though, your try to claim back your turf, which then later degenerates into saving the world.
The story isn't trying to ape MGS or another high-spirited game, but rather is the accumulation of different styles and influences, which articulate more clearly in the graphics.

“To be a graffiti writer […] , is like […] the gangs don't like you, the cops dont like you. So, you're in middle of some fucked up shit.”
Word. Nothing is more apparent in Jet Set Radio, albeit the shiny, flashy anime look, than the fact that everybody wants to stop you from spraying. The police takes drastic measures, other gangs are competing with your gang, and lastly, and probably unintentionally, the traffic.

It seems that the world in Jet Set Radio hasn't much to worry about, since they must spend a shit ton of money to thwart the malicious and hip writers. I take it as a satirical view on various undertakings of law to stop graffiti. For example, when in San Francisco the bill 'Proposition 21” was passed, and allowed the law to prosecute vandalism as felony. Meaning, that spraying was now on the same level as raping! All those things seem a little bit unreal and remind me of a videogame, and it's probably just fortuity that the police in JSR is as extreme with their measures, as their real counterparts.

Most of the Narration is done by Professor K., a DJ that hosts a pirate radio channel in Tokyo-To. And when you know your Hip Hop history, you might feel remembered of two things. Firstly of energetic and remarkable radio hosts such as Bobbito Garcia, and secondly of the pirate radio channels in the UK. The latter was specifically in grime an aggravating movement, and adds to the subtext of JSR. Apart from that, doesn't Professor K. remind you of 'Del Tha Funkee Homosapien'?


Lastly, there is the influential businessman Goji, who looks like a typical villian for Tony Stark, plays the antagonist of your crew and lets his crew spray rhinos all over the city. The interesting aspect of this, is the fact that a businessman chooses a rhino as his logo much like Mark Eko. Eko is
also known as writer and Hip Hop aficionado. Intended? I don't know, but it's interesting though.


B-Boying, or finding yourself in the B-boy stance in the middle of a night:

Every now and then, I have the possibility to bust a move in my life, and horribly fail. Nevertheless, it isn't about the dancing, rather about the characters. B-boys and B-girls is a term often used to describe hip hoppers, whether they're dancers or not. It was a way to overcome race and relate on a new and fair level where the one with the best skills gets the most respect from his peers.

And that's the motivation for most of the characters in JSR. The exception are Combo and Cube, who set up the plot for the second half with the introduction of Goji, and their goal to rescue their friend Coin. The rest is pretty much in their B-boy stance, always ready to compete with anyone in order to prove that they are the best in town.

Djing, or I hope that sample is cleared:

DJs are often forgotten and thus lack of enough appreciation. However, that doesn't mean they stopped existing. A lot of them experiment and add new flavours to the sometime homogenous stew that is Hip Hop. The art of digging for the weird, old and rare stuff brought a lot of interesting vibes to the game. In JSR, the use of various styles is a recurring theme in almost every aspect of the game, and so is also in the soundtrack.

The sountrack is mainly done by Hideki Naganuma, who I didn't knew till then, and comprises out of sundry brake beats and mixes them together into a blend of funk, hip hop and techno. The funk part is the one that sticks out, though. It gives the game the ethereal and eclectic vibe and makes almost the whole atmosphere of the game.

Writing, or home is where your heart is:

Writing. Is nowadays respected as 'Street art' and is to be found at every urban landscape. The range of styles got wider over the last decade and is steady growing. From writers such as Claw to Saber, the art of writing is maintained by evolving the art and withal insisting on the roots.

JSR was one of the first games to utilize the cel shading look and became an instant mark in game graphics, even though its not really the first game to make use of this graphic style. The exceptional thing about cel shading is, that the graphics are basically have an outline and gives the characters and objects a distinctive comic look. Also, next to the characters are the tags & pieces, that combine the different styles such as wildstyle, bubbles and funk, one of the most beautiful features of the game.


But what sticks out the most are the locations, and one in particular I'm very fond of. Kogane-Cho.
First of all, the overall look of the location is very japanese with few exceptions. The bus stations, the huge bicycle stands and the little gutters full with cardboard boxes are something that you can see in Tokyo.

But for me is Kogane-Cho the most diverse part in JSR. It looks like a mix of Venedig and Tokyo, and is bathed in orange light. Everything looks like the musical essence music video, and your pieces fits perfectly and adds to ambience. It's sometimes the solely reason why I pop in JSR and play a round to immerse into the world and experience something slightly transcendent.

The cover:
“We can see Akuma sitting in front of a cherry blossom tree with Apocalypse. He sits next to him and offers him sushi, while Apocalypse tilts his head and smiles genuinely happy. Also, there's a caption that says: “Lovers torn by two different universes. Will they ever meet again?”

Page 2: Previously...

I wrote already about the X-Men and will instead of repeating myself talk about Street Fighter comics. Most might know the few comic series by “Udon”, who also contributed the re-drawn sprites for SF: II HD Remix, and done mostly the confusing story of Street Fighter more than justice. But before there was something so bad, so ugly and so goddamn awful, of course I'm talking about the Malibu comic's version of Street Fighter 2.

First, let me give you a little background information on Malibu comics. In the early nineties were comics introduced to some new ways of making comics (i.e. digital coloring), and while Marvel and DC decided to stick to their old way did other publishers make a lot of money by garnering new readers with first issues and glossy paper. Back then glossy paper was the shit!

Marvel quickly reacted by buying Malibu comics, but not for their series rather than for the coloring studios that the company possessed. What was left from Malibu is now incorporated in Marvel's multiverse, and to be more exact in Earth-93060.

But before all those business was Malibu just another young and fresh publisher who tried to establish an own continuity with the money they got from producing comics about licenced properties. Sadly, one of them was Street Fighter.

There were a lot of bad moments in this short lived series. It's an abomination, but also a testament of everything that went wrong in the decade of comics. And again, I don't try to malign a whole decade just because it's quite common, but just look at it, please.


Nuff' said. About the story, geez, it's like someone saw the movie beforehand and thought that you could do it as a comic just a bit more ret-art-ed. You idiot.
The scenes, that make every fan of the series hurl their intestines through their mouths against that heresy of a comic, are amazingly frequent from Shenlong's appearance to Ken's bloody new hairdo.
Whatever you take from this comic with you, don't let it make you judge anything that it tries to represent, whether comics nor Street Fighter, this is just a shit pressed into a distributable form.

Page 5: "Tits and giggles!"

I like Role-playing, Action-adventure and Horror games, and I love two dimensional Fighters. Maybe it's the timeless graphics and the diverse characters, or maybe it's the fact that fighting games are the most basic form of competition based gaming. In the end, it might be just the amalgamation of all those things. However, nothing is more satisfying than to find a new, challenging and fun fighting game. And for me this experience came about when I first layed my hands on “X-Men vs. Street Fighter”.

Seventeen fighters that include Akuma, Magneto, Sabretooth and Cammy in that weird outfit. The Street Fighter cast was mainly the version from the “Alpha” spin offs, and was overall a good selection even if there are too many Shotokan based fighters.


On the other side, is the characters from the X-Universe, which is full of noteworthy characters. From the additions to the cast (Rogue, Sabretooth and the motherfuckin Juggernaut), is Rogue probably the most interesting. Her powers enable her to absorb the powers of everyone she touches, mostly in tow with traumas and long trips to the south. In the game are her powers activated, when she kisses somebody. After that you're able to use a special attack from the respective character.

Which brings me to the powers of the X-Men. In most cases the powers were handled very poorly or mediocre at best, never did fans have an opportunity to experience to go berserk like Wolverine.
Until “Children of Atom” the arcade game that was the first fighting game to ever star the X-Men. However, I dislike the game, because it was too slow and unforgiving.
“X-Men vs. Street Fighter” was everything what Atom should've been. It was fast, flashy and fucking furious! The way you blasted, shocked, slashed and smashed your enemies was just exciting and felt like many always envisioned from the comics.

The best part is, that the end boss is Apocalypse, and that he melts when you beat him.


Best. X-Men. Game. Ever.

Page 25: Ads

Is this game better than the X-Men and the “Udon” Street Fighter comics? Yes, when you take to account that their both represented at their best and provide you with a vivid experience. If you want to interest your friends in X-Men, then I can only advise you to let them play the game presupposed you possess the “Sega Saturn” version because the “Playstation” one was utter shit.

The good version can be found and is currently sold on Ebay for approximately 20 bucks, which is, considering that this is a great game, a nice deal. If you've no “Sega Saturn”, then I would look for more financially viable ways to get to play that game, or just play the equally awesome “Marvel vs. Capcom 1&2”.


It's a wrap! For this time being I'm finished with my little series. I'll probably make another season later on, but for now I'll concentrate on contemporary games.
(Like always is feedback appreciated!)