4chan, an anonymous image board, is nearly twelve years old and is close to featuring its two billionth post. It has been announced that Hiroyuki Nishimura, the founder of the Japanese image board 2channel, has taken over Moot’s position as the new owner of 4chan.
Hiroyuki Nishimura created 2channel in 1999. The success of the site led to the founding of Futaba Channel, which in turn inspired 4chan. Moot and Hiroyuki Nishimura met in 2011 and quickly became friends. Moot is confident that Nishimura is the best person to lead the site into the future.
Moot announced this January that he would be stepping down as the administrator of 4chan. Following his departure, the lead developer, managing moderator and server administrator have managed the site.
AnimEigo founder Robert Woodhead made a post on Twitter recently that suggests that there will be an announcement made about the 1989 OVARiding Bean at the Anime Weekend Atlanta 2015 convention this weekend. AnimEigo’s panel will be held between 6:30pm and 7:30pm this Saturday, the 26th of September, in Williams Ballroom E at the Cobb Galleria.
Over three months ago, when the first stretch goal for the Otaku no Video Kickstarter project was met, Robert Woodhead revealed that AnimEigo’s next project will be the Riding Bean “High Octane Edition”. It is likely that it will be a Blu-ray release.
AnimEigo has previously released this OVA in North America on DVD with Japanese audio, English audio and English subtitles. Bandai Visual released it on Blu-ray in Japan on November 21, 2008.
Overview The Hyperdimension Neptunia video game franchise has been expanding into various genres over the last few years and the rush of games with the cast isn’t slowing down, with there already being three titles released in North America this year and three more being developed for release in Japan. As such it didn’t come as too much of a surprise back in 2013 when Hyperdimension Neptunia: The Animation debuted and now that the anime has been released in North America, how does this video gaming parody series translate into an anime?
Story It is worth noting that for the most part, unless you have at least played one entry in the Hyperdimension Neptunia series, you will be fairly lost right off the bat as the anime only explains a little bit about the way the world of Gamindustri works. This is likely due to the fact that the series attempts to cram the three original games into one twelve episode season while tossing in some original elements to help spice things up for fans.
Anyways, Hyperdimension Neptunia: The Animation begins with the four CPU Goddesses, Purple Heart, Black Heart, White Heart, and Green Heart signing a friendship pact in order to put an end to the long violence between their nations of Planeptune, Lastation, Lowee, and Leanbox respectively as they have always previously fought one another in order to take Shares, the source of energy for a Goddess as it determines the populace’s belief in their CPUs, from one another.
Shortly after the four nation celebration, the CPUs revert to their human forms of Neptune, Noire, Blanc, and Vert before beginning to part ways as “friends.” Weeks pass and Neptune continues to laze around her Basilicom, she and her little sister Nepgear (a CPU Candidate), begin to visit the other nations in order to turn Neptune’s personality around but as the group grows larger and visits each nation, it becomes apparent that there are dark forces at work. To complicate things further, a stranger from another dimension appears and a force from the past begins to cause trouble for the newly bonded together CPUs.
In case you missed the name references, the four girls and their respective nations represent the console industry, with Noire standing for PlayStation, Lowee for Wii, Leanbox for Xbox, and Neptune for if Sega had still managed to stick around in the industry. Hyperdimension Neptunia debuted back in 2010 and with the anime airing in 2013, the series blitzes past the story from the first game that underwent heavy re-writes when an enhanced version was released, and mostly focuses on the events from Mk2 and Victory.
This means that unless you’ve spent time with the series in the past, there will likely be some disconnect here and there as the series’ execution is primarily focused on the fluffy aspects of the character interactions with occasional issues rising up here and there. The common enemy throughout the early half of the series, Arfoire, regularly rears her head in order to take down the CPUs but the only time she really serves as any type of threat is quickly turned into a development device for Nepgear and her fellow CPU Candidates, Noire’s little sister Uni and Blanc’s twin little sister’s Ram and Rom, to transform into their CPU forms and break past their fears.
Various enemies quickly rise and fall throughout the course of the series, most given barely any screen time compared to the rolls they played in the original games and even the anime’s heaviest attempt at drama with a certain young girl fails to pack any real emotional punch due to the way it is handled. Thankfully the series’ humor managed to make the transition into the anime in all of its forms.
As mentioned earlier, the Neptunia series is known for being a parody of many elements of the gaming industry and the massive amount of jokes taking shots at games remains just as true in the anime as it was in the games. Characters will freely make references to well-known games and often quote lines from them as well. If you happen to be a gamer then this will leave you laughing quite often as there are plenty of jokes and gags here to keep you going, especially in regards to the R18 Island and the way mysterious beams of light are lampooned or Arfoire resorting to buying a eggplant farm to try and exploit a newfound weakness in Neptune.
It always helps that the characters themselves remain as fluffy and lovable as ever with their personalities from the games translating quite well into the animated format. Although this may take away from the action scenes and does damage the drama element at times, some of the best moments come from the girls taking jabs at one another or messing around in some form. This means that while the series doesn’t really go to any deep or meaningful place, it still remains as fun as ever for fans while newcomers will likely feel quite lost due to the anime adaptation haphazardly plucking major events from Mk2 and Victory with very little explanation.
Visuals The animation studio, David Productions, has done a great job bringing the cast into the new anime format which is a significant plus. The character designs are exactly as fans will remember and are fairly unique looking for those who aren’t familiar with the series. Whenever the girls transform into their CPU forms the transformation sequence is handled far better than the games have shown in the past, with many of the girls undergoing various physical changes due to their goddess forms being more adult versions of themselves, with the CPU Candidates and Vert being the exceptions.
It is worth noting that there is a decent level of fan-service present in the series as the girls’ CPU forms all happen to be skin tight suits but it rarely goes above in that regard outside of a few jokes poking fun at how large Vert’s chest is or the tininess of Blanc’s. The various action sequences are nicely stylized with all of the characters making use of their signature attacks quite often in combat though I must say that despite the amount of effort put into a lot of these fights, there rarely is any feeling of danger due to the lighthearted nature of the series.
Audio When it comes to putting together an English dub for a property that already features an English voice cast in other formats it usually is a toss-up on whether or not the publisher will try to bring in the original cast and thankfully FUNimation has managed to gather almost all of the original cast to reprise their roles in the English dub for the series while, of course, the Japanese track retains all of the same voice actors from the games. As mentioned before, the series is packed with plenty of gaming references in the dialogue and the cast really helps deliver on these jokes and many more.
The standard background music throughout the series is fairly standard, with a few tracks sounding like they were pulled from the games, though I must say that there are a couple of vocal insert songs that were directly taken from either the opening themes or cutscenes in the games and these songs work wonders for the series, especially for fans who will appreciate the use of familiar music. The opening theme “Dimension Tripper!!!” is sung by Nao, the singer for most of the series’ music and is very fitting while there are a handful of different ending themes with “Love & Peace” by Ayane standing out the most, though the primary ending theme is “Neptune Sagashite” by Afilia Saga and, while catchy, pales compared to the temporary ending theme.
Extras The bonus features contained on Hyperdimension Neptunia: The Animation’s discs are fairly standard with there being a clean version of the opening theme as well as all of the ending sequences. This is followed by promotional videos for the series, a three minute long compilation featuring all of the transformation sequences, and trailers for other FUNimation series.
It is also worth noting that the series’ OVA is also included in this release though it is mostly treated as the thirteenth episode. The OVA explores the bad ending that players could potentially achieve in the game and Neptune and Vert’s efforts to reverse the changes that have occurred in the world by traveling to another dimension.
Overall Hyperdimension Neptunia: The Animation manages to successfully re-produce the charming characters and oft hilarious dialogue that the series is known for but unfortunately attempts to cram too much into such a short time frame that any dramatic moments attempted end up falling flat as a result of poor build up and execution. This results in an enjoyable and fluffy show that fans of the series will likely enjoy despite its issues as a number of extra character interactions are included here while newcomers will probably want to turn to the Re;Birth releases for the real thing.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
Sentai Filmworks has just announced their acquisition of Re:␣Hamatora, the second season of the Hamatora anime series. This season will be dubbed into English and then released on DVD and Blu-ray in North America on January 26, 2016. Sentai Filmworks describes this season as follows:
The first season was enveloped in mystery and came to a shocking end — but that was only the beginning. It’s been three months since the Yokohama Riots, and the Hamatora detectives believe things are back to normal. But these troubled characters, still reeling from the events of last season, will have to reply when a mystery that was cloaked in darkness comes to light.
Seiji Kishi, director of the first season of Hamatora, returned as the director for this season. Series composition was provided by Jun Kumagi, Satoki Iida handled the sound direction and Lerche produced the animation. This series is based on an original concept by Yuki Kodama and Natsu Matsumai.
Fans of Corpse Party had likely given up hope that the Corpse Party: Tortured Souls OVA episodes that were released two years ago in Japan would ever be released in the West despite the games they are based on receiving quite a bit of support.
Thankfully it seems like Sentai‘s Maiden Japan has acquired the license and is planning on releasing the four episode OVA series on Blu-ray and DVD on January 26, 2016. It is worth noting that this OVA will not be for the faint of heart as the anime is going to be incredibly gory and feature a number of gruesome deaths if the games are anything to go by.
A summary of the OVAs has been provided by Maiden Japan below:
The horrifying events that occurred on the unhallowed grounds of the Heavenly Host school were so gruesome and shocking that the entire school was razed in an attempt to wipe the events from memory. But, foolishly, a new high school, the Kisaragi Academy, was built in Heavenly Host’s place, and all true evil needs is an invitation. So when a group of students innocently perform a charm intended to bind them as friends forever, the nightmarish evil is unleashed once again.
Transported into a living hell where Heavenly Host still stands and undead horrors stalk the bloodstained halls, the students are now the prey in the most brutal test ever designed by inhuman minds. What follows isn’t for the squeamish or weak of heart, as they are hunted down in a savage orgy of torture, murder, and insanity.
Agent 47 is trying to be so stealthy that his latest game won’t be making its December release date, in fact he will be showing up three months late. Square Enix has announced that Hitman is now going to be released in March 2016. The reason for this delay is due to the fact that, despite the title originally being set for December, it was going to launch with only a small amount of content that would be expanded for free over the course of the year.
The content updates will still be free, but IO Interactive has stated that the Hitman delay is to “add more launch content to the launch content of the game, more than we had originally planned, and then follow with a tighter frequency of updates.”
The Pilot’s Love Song Premium Edition has been released in North America today by NIS America. This series, which is set in the same world as the anime movie The Princess and the Pilot, first debuted in Japan back in 2009 as a light novel and was given an anime adaptation in early 2014.
The Pilot’s Love Song follows the story of a Kal-el Albus and his sister Ariel as they begin attending the Flight Division of Cadaques Military High School where the students search for the fabled “End of the Sky.” Throughout the series Kal-el forges a number of new friendships and even falls in love but as he learns more about the school and those attending it, the horrors of war begin to take their toll on the students as they are thrust into the middle of battle.
The premium edition release includes the thirteen episode series on two Blu-ray discs and comes with a hardcover art book and a chipboard slipcase featuring art from the series. Those who wish to purchase the anime can do so from NIS America’s online storefor $51.99.
Although Tite Kubo’s Bleach is still being published in Japan through Weekly Shonen Jump, it has been a few years now since the anime adaptation of the series was ended.
As such it has given Viz Media enough time to catch up completely with the anime and now the company has announced that they are going to be releasing the final set of Bleach anime on September 29th.
Bleach Set 26 as it is called will cost $44.82 when it is released on DVD and will feature the final twelve episodes of the series where Ichigo is still training under Ginjo in order to master his Fullbring powers while Chad and Orihime begin to look into attacks around the area.
However when Ichigo’s training ends, he returns home to find that his family has started to accept a new enemy as if he was a family friend and turning on Ichigo, leaving him dazed and confused as he struggles to put a stop to this new villain without hurting those close to him.
Koei Tecmo has announced that the PlayStation Vita version of Dynasty Warriors 8: Empires will be released in North America and Europe as a digital download exclusive. This handheld version of the game will feature touch screen support, a new co-op mode available through ad-hoc, cross-save and cross-play with the already released PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 3 versions, as well as all the DLC released for the console versions.
The Dynasty Warriors 8: Empires Vita release will be released in Japan on November 26th while the aforementioned Western releases will see the game coming to North America on November 24th and Europe on November 25th.
With Persona 4: Dancing All Night set to be released in North America next week for the PlayStation Vita Atlus USA has decided to release a handful of new videos for the game, one of which happens to be an unboxing video of the retail release of the game while the other two are English character trailers for the two confirmed DLC characters Adachi and Marie.
Both of these characters will be $4.99 at launch and you can check them out in action below, though you may want to check out the new screenshots as well since it seems that a certain leek loving Vocaloid will be also coming to the West as DLC.
