To celebrate the forthcoming release of Paramount‘s Transformers: Age of Extinction, Event Cinemas George St. and Kings Comics are bring another trivia night to the Set Bar and, you guessed it, all things Autobots, Decepticons, Dinobots and every other “bot” is the theme.
The Transformers trivia will begin at 6pm, Monday, June 23 with lucky door and best dressed prizes ready to be given away. As added incentive for pre-booking, every person who does so will be automatically entered into the running to win a Platinum Edition Optimus Prime valued at $105, pictured below. The top 3 teams will also receive amazing Transformers prize packs including toys and graphic novels amongst other items, and everyone in attendance will receive a 25% off discount on their next Kings Comics purchase.
A special ticket offer to watch Transformers: Dark of the Moon for just $10, after the trivia is over, at 9pm will be available as well. Seats are very limited, so follow the instructions on the banner above to secure your spot, and check in with the official Facebook event page.
He lives in a pineapple under the sea, and he is heading back to movie screens round the nation later this year! Paramount Pictures are bringing Nickelodeon’s lovable, excitable and yellow SpongeBob SquarePants back to the silver screen in The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water. Acting as a sequel to the 2004 theatrical release, the new film will feature a mixture of animation and live-action scenes including the original television cast, as well as some special guests like Antonia Banderas and Slash.
Not much is known about the film at this time, but we do have a brand new poster for you all to check out below. The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water will be leaping out of the ocean and into theaters December 18th, 2014 so make sure you grab your swim trunks. If you need to fill your SpongeBob urges until then though, check out the Mobile game that lets you build your own Bikini Bottom. As always, stay tuned to Capsule Computers for all the SpongeBob news as it becomes available.
Mad Catz is updating their line up for Xbox One gamers. The gaming hardware company announced at E3 2014 that they will be adding three TRITTON branded headsets to their Xbox One line up. The three headsets will be aimed at the value market, bringing high quality audio to those with small budgets.
The TRITTON Kunai is a stereo headset built for long gaming sessions. The headset is compatible with the Xbox One, MP3 players, and mobile devices. The Kunai will sell for $79.99 and is available in black.
The TRITTON Kama Stereo Gaming Headset features 40mm drivers and in-line audio controls. The drivers are tuned for a balanced sound signature. The Kama has an MSRP of $59.99.
The TRITTON Kaiken is a mono headset that can be worn on the right or left ear. The Kaiken is ideal for those looking for an upgrade over the basic Xbox One headset and costs $44.99.
Here we are, people! E3 2014! ATLUS, as part of their showcase this year, released a new trailer for the upcoming “Persona” crossover game “Shadow Of The Labyrinth” and guess what? It’s in English. Heck yeah!
There isn’t any English voice acting in but it is entirely subtitled in English so at least we’re given that. The trailer goes through a lot of what we’ve seen before but it is still worth checking out. “Persona Q: Shadow Of the Labyrinth” is set for a release on the Nintendo 3DS in North America sometime in the fall, Australian and European players can expect to see it on local shelves sometimes after that.
Anyway, head down to the featured video section below to check out the “Persona Q” English trailer and remember to stick to site for all of the E3 2014 news.
Captain Morgane and the Golden Turtleis an adventure game following the journey of Morgane Castillo as she grows from an innocent 8 year old to a pirate captain on the quest for the legendary Golden Turtle.
Interplanetaryis a strategy game currently in Early Access. Players will build their planets and fire massive artillery strikes at enemy planets, all orbiting around a common star. However, the projectiles are at the mercy of the gravitational fields.
Montasis a first person horror that will send players on a creepy adventure into the city of Montas as Joseph Walker, an alcoholic suffering from hallucinations and nightmares.
They Breathewill send players into a flooded forest as a frog with with only a limited amount of oxygen. The sunken forests carries many secrets in its watery depths, including the truth of its flooding and strange creatures who now inhabit its depths.
Sentinel is an audio based tower defense that will have players creating music with the dynamic audio system while defending against an onslaught of enemies.
Indie Gala’s Every Monday Bundle #11 can be purchased for $1.49. Be sure to snag it at Indie Gala before the price rises after the first 48 hours of the sale.
As we already know, Viz Media is bringing the entire series of Ranma 1/2 to North America completely un-cut and available on Blu-ray for the first time ever. Earlier this year they released Set 1 of the series, our review of which can be found here, and today Viz announced that Ranma 1/2 Set 2 will be available for purchase starting on June 24th.
Similar to Set 1, Ranma 1/2 Set 2 will be available both in a Limited Edition Blu-ray Box Set that features 23 episodes on 3 discs, packaged in a premium chipboard box with gold foil stamping and artwork drawn by Rumiko Takashi, a 32 page booklet with episode guides, and a collectable Ranma 1/2 card. This version fo the release also comes with the special feature We love Ranma’ Part 2 – Favorite Scenes which is a continuation of interviews following the legacy and impact of this series.
That Limited Edition Blu-ray is priced at $54.97, but a cheaper version is available in the form of a standard DVD set that costs $44.82. This DVD set does not come with the special case nor the We Love Ranma special, but it still contains the original un-cropped 23 episodes that the Blu-ray release does.
In the second set of the series, Ranma, a male martial artist who changes into a girl when splashed with cold water, is still trying to adjust to his new home and dealing with a Chinese Amazon named Shampoo who wants to love him as well as kill him. Though when Shampoo’s own suitor appears, and a perverted master who tought Ranma and Akane’s fathers everything they know, things get even crazier.
Madman Entertainment – one of Australia’s leading anime, manga, film and TV series distributors – has today announced that it has acquired the distribution rights for the highly popular web series “Street Fighter: Assassin’s Fist”.
The web series – based off of the fighting game series of the same name – premiered on Machinima in late May and has gained an amazingly positive reception from fans across the globe. Spanning twelve episodes, “Street Fighter: Assassin’s Fist” tells the story of Ryu and Ken as young students under the guidance of the great and powerful Master Goken.
Madman has plans to release this series as a full feature movie spanning 143 minutes. The release will contain an extra 13 minutes of footage not seen in the web series alongside behind-the-scenes clips, interviews, deleted scenes and so much more. “Street Fighter: Assassin’s Fist” will be hitting Australian and New Zealand shelves later this year. No specific release date has been set but you can find it here on Capsule Computers when it is announced.
Overview Despite how popular idol simulation games have been in Japan, not a single one of them have been released in the West. Even anime series revolving around idols generally go unlicensed and even with Hyperdimension Neptunia being an established name in the West, the idea of Hyperdimension Neptunia: Producing Perfection getting localized was slim to none. However NIS America jumped on the game and have given it a full English release. The question is, should you pick up this title or does its performance fall flat?
Story The world of Gamindustri is broken into four nations where each nation is governed by a CPU goddess who gains power, also known as ‘Shares,’ by having the faith of their people and those around the world. Unfortunately for the goddesses Neptune, Noire, Vert, and Blanc, despite saving the land and taking care of the people just like a good leader should, each nation’s Shares have plummeted to record lows.
The reason for this is that a group of idols, called the MOB48, which is a reference to the popular AKB48 as well as the fact that the group consists of monsters, have ensnared the hearts of the population with their singing and dancing. This means that rather than pay attention to their goddesses, the population would rather spend all their time worshiping these idols instead. To try and right this wrong all four CPUs join together to summon the best producer from another dimension in order to help them become the best idols around.
So rather than summon the best producer, they end up summoning you, an average sounding person who must now do his best to try and turn one of these girls into the best idol within 180 days. This must be done by helping raise your chosen girl’s stats as well as manage her mood and stress levels. To be honest, although the story of Neptunia PP sets itself up around the whole idol business, a lot of the enjoyment one derives from this game will come from how much they like the Neptunia series and the cast as a whole.
While it is perfectly fine for someone unacquainted with the Hyperdimension Neptunia franchise to jump into Neptunia PP blind, those who have spent time getting to learn about these characters and their various personalities over the course of past games will probably get the most out of it since whoever the player chooses to manage will be the CPU they spend a lot of time with.
Each girl has her own story events that take place, some of which are plot oriented while others simply take place over the course of the 180 days or during resting periods. In these moments players are able to learn a bit more about their chosen CPU, or even that CPU’s sister as is the case with everyone except Vert since she doesn’t have a sister, though she regularly goes after Nepgear because of this.
There are many different events to see which are almost always hilarious and worthwhile thanks to some smart writing by the localization team and some of these events even have you getting a bit closer to your CPU or her sister. By picking proper answers during story related events, players can either find themselves heading for a True End or a simple Good End. There is also a bad end but you have to literally try to fail to obtain that ending. This creates quite a bit of replay value as there are four girls to choose from, each with unique personalities, stories, and endings to see which makes for a meaty offering that fleshes out the game’s simplistic gameplay.
Gameplay The main part of Neptunia PP is Producer Mode, which is story mode. After you have chosen which CPU you want to work with, be it Neptune, Vert, Blanc, or Noire, you will then be stuck into that girl’s storyline where you will need to manage her career by placing her in various training events to raise stats, manage her stress level, earn fans, and put on performances to gain Shares to not only topple MOB48 but become the best idol in the land.
The management part of the game is very simple, there are various training events that raise stats such as vocals, rhythm, knowledge, etc that have varying success rates that boost a stat and also raise stress level. You can fail if your idol’s stress hits 100%, but generally each time you rest you will eliminate all stress from that character. You can also participate in various fan events that will try to grow the idol’s fanbase which will make it easier to earn Shares.
Every so often, and if your idol has enough Guts to perform, you will be able to hold a concert. In these concerts players can pick where their idol will stand on the stage, what type of stage effects to use, her outfit, what type of stage to perform on, and what song to sing. Each CPU has a song of their own which, if sung solo, will allow them to enter their HDD form to raise your excitement level faster, but any CPU can sing any other girls’ song once it is unlocked and if you happen to form a duo or trio then all three girls will perform.
While the girl is singing, players are in charge of the camera angles and stage effects and it is your job to try and fill a circular meter in the bottom right corner all the way up to get a ranking of “excellent” though you can even get away with simply a “good” rating at well. Raising this meter, as well as fan excitement percentage, depends on the camera angles and stage effects. Stage effect usage is best reserved for when the crowd begins chanting as it raises the meter the most while aiming the camera at various angles also gives boosts. As mentioned before, the more that meter fill sup the more fans and Shares you gain per performance.
All that said that is pretty much all there is for Neptunia PP’s gameplay. The game can feel rather barren at times thanks to this since outside of Producer Mode, the only other options are an unlimited performance where you can place objects around a stage and have any songs you like performed. This can be a bit problematic at times, since the game is meant to be played numerous times, but thankfully not only is there a button to press to skip all previously read text, say for example if you are trying for a better ending in a CPUs route, to accelerate the process and all stats and affection levels for idols are carried over into the player’s next session.
Visuals & Audio The character portraits in Neptunia PP are very impressive looking as they appear to have been taken right from the game series itself as the models are not only have various expressions but have numerous reactions and move their heads when reacting to various bits of dialogue. As for the performances, the 3D models are actually rather impressive looking, though a bit rough around the edges sometimes, considering how the player can dress each idol up in numerous unlockable costumes and even change up how their HDD modules look. Of course since you can aim the camera from numerous angles as well as zoom, there are plenty of options for some fan-service here but nothing that wouldn’t be intentional by the player.
As far as the localization goes, almost every piece of text in the game has been given English voice work to accompany said text which is a nice bonus since the voice actors for all of these characters remain the exact same as past titles, even the CPU candidates. Of course for those picky about their voice acting, the original Japanese voice track is also available. As for the songs, they are all presented in Japanese, which is for the best, but it is disappointing that there are only five in total. That being said, each song can be sung by any girl, meaning that there are four variations of the same song, meaning Noire’s Japanese voice actress will sing Neptune’s song just fine, or if they are in a pair or trio each girl will sing with one another, and even the character’s singing voice will change slightly when the character enters HDD form.
Overall Hyperdimension Neptunia: Producing Perfection is a game that is difficult to judge. As someone who is very familiar with the franchise I found it to be an extremely enjoyable game elevated by its characters, numerous story routes for multiple playthroughs, and fun performances, but limited by few actual idol management options and repetition. That being said, someone who might not enjoy these characters as much as myself might not get as much of a kick out of the game, though I can see a game like this drawing more people to actually try out the Hyperdimension Neptunia series in the end as it also serves as a great introduction to all of the characters and their fun personalities.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
During the social, sharing, now is your bathroom break part of Sony’s conference, we finally got some news on Playstation TV (once known as Playstation Vita TV), which at one time seemed like it was going to stay in Japan exclusively – but has seen a resurgence as of late. At E3, it was announced that the new device will be priced at $99 for the U.S. and Canada, with a bundle featuring a LEGO The Movie: The Game, a Dualshock 3 controller, a HDMI cord, and a memory card.
While it was only announced that “most” Vita titles will be playable, with the PS Classic catalog and the ability to play Playstation 3 titles through the Playstation 4 on a separate television, its easy to say this will be the thing to watch out of this year’s event for Sony. You add programs like Netflix and Hulu to this device, and we might be seeing the digital box break down some walls and allow us to finally toss those Rokus out the window.
Just like last year, Konami has released a new trailer for Metal Gear Solid V but this time all of the footage in this trailer is from Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain instead of being split up with Ground Zeroes. You can check out the English version of the trailer below, though even the presenter at Sony’s E3 press conference mentioned how the Japanese version of the trailer was being fought by take down notices all day.
In this video we are treated to more footage of Big Boss’ descent into evil as well as plenty of gruesome looking footage. At the moment Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is set to be released for the Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation 4.
