It has been announced that residents in Australia will be able to take part in a special competition for Sony‘s upcoming PlayStation Vita exclusive, Killzone: Mercenary. The contest allows fans to submit their own “contracts” which will detail what they would do or how far they would go for a reward of $10,000 Australian Dollars. You can read about our hands-on time with the game here.
Any applications will be judged on creativity, originality, skill and passion for the Killzone franchise as well as the PlayStation Vita. The person who wins will be flown to Sydney to carry out their contract under supervision before they are given their reward. The contest ends on August 16th and can be entered here.
That’s right folks, Sega are interested in buying Atlus and gaining the rights to all of their series including the Shin Megami Tensei franchise, much like how they previously brought Platinum Games under their pretty old umbrella.
As you may or may not know, Atlus’s parent company has been a bit of a silly goose when it comes to their finances and has hit some pretty dire straits. As such, Atlus is now up for sale and as Bloomberg reports, Sega is one of twenty companies interested in getting their hands on the company.
It seems that the sale will be finalized by the end of this month with an expected sale price of 20 billion yen, which is about 203 million USD. Sega certainly seems to be the front runner for the acquisition of Atlus but that of course remains to be seen until the news breaks later this month. Maybe if it does all go ahead we can see a Shenmue x Shin Megami Tensei crossover? Or maybe the long awaited sequel to My Disney Kitchen? Only time will tell.
Haganai: I Don’t Have Many Friends Studio:AIC Build Publisher:FUNimation Format:Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack Release Date:August 13, 2013 Price:$69.98 – Available Here
Overview Usually in anime, a main character is presented to viewers with either a slew of friends from the start or is able to quickly attract friends or allies due to their unique personalities. However what happens when a number of misfits come together? Well that is what the anime Haganai: I Don’t Have Many Friends, also known as Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai, explores. Now that the first season of the anime has made its way to North America, is it worth checking out?
Story Kodaka Hasegawa has had no luck finding friends after transferring into a private Catholic school. Not for lack of triyng of course, since despite his best intentions everyone around him seems to think he is nothing more than a brute and gang member. This may be due to his naturally dirty blonde hair (a common Japanese “gang member” sign) and angry looking demeanor which causes even teachers to shrink in fear from him.
Whenever he tries to spark up a conversation with someone, they usually always run away in fear before he can explain himself, causing numerous rumors of his ruthlessness to circulate throughout the student body. Finding himself friendless and alone, he suddenly finds his fellow classmate Yozora Mikazuki standing alone in a classroom talking to herself. It turns out; she wasn’t talking to herself, but an “air friend.”
After some discussion where the two find out that neither of them have any friends, Yozora creates the “Neighbor’s Club,” a club for people who have no friends to try and find ways to make some, though she does so in such a way that only those desperate enough for friends will apply. It just so happens that within minutes, a new girl appears wanting to join the club. Much to Yozora’s chagrin, it happens to be the most popular, talented and busty girl in the entire school, Sena Kashiwazaki.
It turns out that although boys fawn all over her, Sena has no real friends of her own since guys only want to be near her for her looks and the girls all hate her because of her unwavering popularity. The club grows in number throughout the rest of the season, seeing the inclusion of a Rika, a brilliant but isolated scientist who admits that she is a complete pervert who only cares to join the club for Kodaka, the “bullied” and feminine looking Yukimura who wants to be Kodaka’s lackey to become more manly, the club’s advisor, Maria who happens to be a ten year old nun who is highly intelligent, but has a habit of simply calling everyone poop and even Kodaka’s little sister, also lacking in friends due to her obsession with an anime that sees her dressing up in gothic clothing, speaking like a vampire and wearing a red contact lens.
Every time that the Neighbor’s Club comes together, they try out numerous activities that one would do with their friends, including playing video games, singing karaoke, going swimming at the pool or beach and even staying at a camp overnight to tell ghost stories. While each of these activities usually would be run-of-the-mill in a standard anime, the fact that each of these characters are so broken makes each activity unique in its own way.
Haganai is clearly presented as a harem comedy as it quickly becomes apparent that most of the characters have feelings for Kodaka, even if the man himself is too dense to realize it. Thanks to the fact that most of these characters have never had friends before, their awkward interactions with one another and attempts at the simplest tasks create numerous hilarious scenes. It also helps that thanks to the broken nature of their characters, they each have running-gags throughout the series which are constantly played for laughs.
Sena and Yozora are always at odds with one another, often with Yozora tormenting Sena about her breast size or sheltered lifestyle (though the venomous Yozora does take things too far at times), Maria and Kobato (Kodaka’s younger sister), devolve into child arguments as they fight over Kodaka, Yukimura’s feminine body and Yozora’s purposely misleading advice and even Rika’s constant perversion all create a highly entertaining series that takes a light-hearted tone throughout much of the series.
It is worth noting that while the series does place all of these misfits together, it doesn’t do much else beyond that. While hilarious more often than not, there is little in the way of progression for any member of the group and while there is some character development for the three main members of the cast, the misfit group remains just as they were even as the final episode on the release plays. While a second season has already aired in Japan and will likely see release in the West, the “status quo” nature of this first season will leave viewers wanting much more by the time everything ends.
Visuals Perhaps one of the first things I should mention about Haganai is the fact that the series has quite a lot of fan-service accompanying it. One of Sena’s highlighted traits are her large breasts, which usually are the focal point of many camera angles, including shots at the characters’ butts and numerous swimsuit appearances. There are also numerous suggestive looking scenes where no nudity is shown, as well as a handful of sequences where a girl’s breasts are fully exposed with nipples, including the loli characters. This is by no means a negative to the series, since it is a harem comedy, but it is worth noting for those who may not appreciate such a focus on fan-service.
Anyways, Haganai features some rather well designed looking characters, each with a unique look and numerous outfit changes throughout the season. The character animation does suffer a bit at long-range and even at mid-range, but everything is smooth looking and impressive. This includes the numerous background scenes that are shown throughout the season, including a number of religious looking areas since the school is meant to be a Catholic institution.
Audio Since this is a FUNimation release, Haganai has been given an English dub to accompany the original Japanese voice track. Surprisingly enough, the English voice work is quite impressive given the range of characters and the back-and-forth that most of them have with one another. It is worth noting that Yozora’s “Meat” nickname for Sena is retained but shifted out occasionally with other jabs at Sena’s large breasts, but outside of that their interchanges are unaltered and presented clearly in English.
There are a number of inserted songs including a handful of songs sung by the English cast inserted into the anime which is a nice touch, especially considering the fact that the background music used throughout the series is basic at best. The opening theme for this first season is “Zannenkei Rinjinbu” and it is sung by all of the female members of the Japanese cast and the ending theme is “Watashi no Ki-mo-chi” which is sung by Yozora’s Japanese voice actress. Both of these themes are nicely animated and also enjoyable to listen to, making them hard to simply skip past.
Extras As far as bonus features go, Haganai: I Don’t Have Many Friends comes with a standard set of extras, though it is padded out a bit with some extra Japanese promotional footage. Included on the disc are Blu-ray and DVD spots, original commercials, promo videos, and TV spots in Japanese as well as the US trailer, trailers for other FUNimation releases, clean versions of the opening and ending theme as well as two commentary tracks.
The first commentary track is for episode 2 and features Jad Saxton, the voice of Sena, Whitney Rodgers, the voice of Yozora and Jerry Jewell, the voice of Kodaka. The three spend most of the commentary discussing random things as well as events in the episode itself, including Sena’s nickname and the obvious fact everyone watching the series will figure out by the series ends. The second commentary is for episode 8 and features Zach Bolton, the voice director, Alison Viktorin the voice of Kobato and Kristi Kang who voices Maria. These three spend the nearly all of the commentary discussing the episode itself though they do spend a bit of time focusing on Kobato in particular.
Overall Haganai: I Don’t Have Many Friends offers a hilarious first season with such a broken cast of characters that it will be impossible to forget about them once the last episode airs. With great visuals, an over-abundance of fanservice and a nicely handled English dub, Haganai brings a lot to the table but unfortunately doesn’t do a whole lot with it beside give viewers plenty of laughs. This is great for what it is but will leave some viewers hoping for some actual development whenever the second season heads stateside.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
Black Lagoon: Roberta’s Blood Trail Studio:Madhouse Publisher:FUNimation Format: Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack Release Date:August 6, 2013 Price: $39.98 – Available Here
Overview Many fans of the anime industry have likely heard of the series Black Lagoon, which was originally given its first two anime seasons six years ago. While FUNimation recently released a complete set of the Black Lagoon anime, the review of which can be read here, the series hasn’t been given any form of continuation outside of the manga which was on hiatus for many years until recently. Now four years after Black Lagoon’s anime debuted, a collection of OVA episodes was released and has finally made its way to North America. By shifting the focus a bit, does Black Lagoon: Roberta’s Blood Trail offer what fans of the series have been looking for?
Story
Since Roberta’s Blood Trail is an OVA set, it is worth noting that all of the events that occur in this release occur after the final episode in the main Black Lagoon series. Even the episodes are numbered as if they were a continuation of the main series, though since these are OVA episodes, they run a bit longer than your standard television episode.
Anyways, the story begins with an unknown, but well-equipped organization detonating an explosive during a political rally in South America, killing the head of the Lovelace family who had been gaining influence in the area. The titular Roberta has been working as the maid for the Lovelace family ever since she left her newly revealed past of a ruthless revolutionary who would kill everyone in her path.
With her young master, now head of the household, Garcia Lovelace distraught over his father’s death, Roberta sets out after the group of men that took her master’s life. The various crime syndicates and residents of Roanapur still remember Roberta as being a ruthless psycho maid who possessed near super human abilities and cared little for anyone’s life but her masters’. As such, when it is revealed that Roberta has made her way back to Roanapur in pursuit of the men who killed her master, every organization in the city begins to move to put an end to her life or get her out of the city by any means possible, for her goal could lead to the end of their city once and for all.
When Garcia also appears in Roanapur, he asks the Black Lagoon Company, or more specifically Rock, to assist him in tracking down Roberta. With the body count already in the double digits, the true identity of the forces Roberta is hunting is revealed. Rock agrees to assist Garcia, even if it means gambling with the life of the young master and the rest of the groups in Roanapur to do it.
It is pretty clear from the get-go that the main focus of this OVA series will be about Roberta and not the Lagoon Company. In fact, outside of bringing in some old faces, briefly confronting Roberta and receiving some minor backstory, Revy plays almost no part in this arc outside of a foil to Garcia’s personal maid, Fabiola. Instead the only one given any semblance of development from the Lagoon Company is Rock, and even then this is squandered thanks to the unchanging nature of Roanapur.
Instead viewers are presented numerous moving pieces with the factions of Roanapur being mostly fodder for Roberta to chew through as she hunts down the men she is seeking revenge against. As viewers follow Roberta along her blood trail, they’ll be able to see her go from someone simply seeking revenge to a lunatic haunted by her past and slaughtering anyone in her way, regardless of the damage she receives in the process. Though much more focused than anything else presented in Black Lagoon up to this point, Roberta’s Blood Trail still falters a bit due to having too many pieces moving at once, but everything is wrapped up nicely, giving viewers more to look forward to if another Black Lagoon anime or OVA set is ever announced.
Visuals Considering this is an OVA series, as well as the fact that it was created four years after the original series aired, the animation quality of Roberta’s Blood Trail has seen quite a spike. Character designs remain the same but have been improved from what they were and the devolution of the seemingly calm and collected Roberta as the OVA continues is nicely handled. The numerous gunplay sequences and even hand-to-hand combat scenes are impressively animated and the amount of blood spilled on screen is just what fans of the series have come to expect.
It is worth noting that there is some very minor nudity here as well as a couple of sequences that may make viewers uncomfortable, but nothing pushes the envelope too severely and one such sequence involves a character’s past, making it a required part of the story. Outside of that, viewers will be presented with a handful of familiar areas in Roanapur as well as new nicely drawn settings, including one incredibly presented battle in a jungle.
Audio Considering it has been a number of years now since the original Black Lagoon dub was produced, one would be justified in being concerned about the English cast of Roberta’s Blood Trail. Thankfully, that concern can be put to rest because FUNimation has brought back the original English cast to retain their roles and the OVA set benefits greatly because of this.
As far as the OVA’s soundtrack goes, there are numerous background tracks which do wonders for the action sequences, making each one memorable in their own way. The opening theme is slightly modified this time around and is called the “Red Fraction IO Drive Mix” by Mell and the ending theme is the old, likely familiar, war theme “When Johnny Comes Marching Home” which is used effectively thanks to the fact it begins playing before the episode ends, usually during a dramatic ending scene.
Extras As far as bonus features go, Black Lagoon: Roberta’s Blood Trail offers pretty much nothing of note. There are trailers for other FUNimation products as well as the US trailer for this release. Accompanying that is a clean version of the ending theme, but since the ending theme always played before the ending of an episode, almost the entirety of the clean ending is simple black screen. It is also worth noting that the clean version of the revised opening theme and animation is not provided in any form.
Overall Black Lagoon: Roberta’s Blood Trail is a return to form from a series many fans enjoyed over five years ago. While some may be disappointed on the lack of focus on the Lagoon Company, watching Roberta’s revenge fueled path of blood makes for an interesting experience. Nearly every old surviving face makes a return of some sort in this OVA set, and while there do tend to be too many pieces in play at one time, this story is wrapped up nicely. With over-the-top action stemming from a cold-blooded maid with enough weapons to trigger a small war and countless bodies piled up, Black Lagoon: Roberta’s Blood Trail is exactly what fans of the series have been looking for.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
DAISUKI have today confirmed that they will begin streaming the Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ anime series through their free anime streaming service. The series had its first episode premiere on August 5th, 2013 on the DAISUKI website.
This is the first time that Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ will be available for English language viewers. The series is available world-wide with Japanese audio and English subtitles.
More episodes are planned to be released, however there does not appear to be a set structure for release of episode for this series as of yet. DAISUKI have for the most part opted for a wait-and-see approach towards series updates, as there is no real set timing for new episodes at this point for any series. This may change in the future, however it is unknown at this point when that will be.
You can check out Gundam ZZ and all of DAISUKI’s other streaming anime at their official website DAISUKI.net.
Universal Pictures’ Kick-Ass 2, the sequel to 2010’s bloody, violent and gritty superhero movie will be hitting cinemas across Australia on August 22nd, and thanks to EVENT Cinemas George St, Sydney-siders can be amongst the first in the country to check it out!
Kick-Ass 2 features a star-studded cast is lead by Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Chloë Grace Moretz, and Jim Carrey, and follows on from the events of the first film. Inspired by Kick Ass’s (Taylor-Johnson) masked crusade against crime, more ordinary citizens are donning capes, cowls and domino masks to fight for justice. One of these new vigilante’s is Col. Stars & Stripes (Carrey) who is forming a team, and wants Kick-Ass to join.
Opposing them is Kick-Ass’ one-time ally (but not really) Red-Mist, who now goes by the title of The Mother F***er. The Mother F***er is building a team of his own to avenge his father. The growing criminal element is enough to bring Hit Girl (Moretz) out of retirement and back into her purple mask.
EVENT Cinemas will be hosting the advanced screening on 9PM Monday the 19th of August at their massive George Street Cinema. Tickets for the event are available now for $23 and can be purchased online here, or in-person at the George St box office. This isn’t just an ordinary screening though, as prizes will be given out for best-dressed patrons, as well as lucky door prizes just for showing up!
Kings Comics will also be a part of the celebrations, as they are hosting the first of their comic-book Trivia Series. Trivia starts at 7PM, so if you think you know your way around a comic book, or you just want to see how many obscure facts people know about their favourite super heroes, then you won’t want to miss out on this.
Are you ready to Kick Ass? Then head over to EVENT Cinemas’ Facebook Event and show your support. Then grab your ticket and get excited! If you don’t know anything about this movie, then check out the film’s red-band trailer below (Red Band trailers contain swearing, violence and all the other good bits that most trailers can’t show). If you need some further Kick-Ass goodness, then grab the books that inspired the movie; Kick-Ass Volume 2 and Hit Girl.
EVENT Cinemas George St are always putting on awesome events like these, so if you want to make sure you are always in the loop then make sure you like their Facebook and follow them on Twitter, as well as staying tuned to Capsule Computers for all the Kick-Ass and EVENT Cinemas news as it becomes available. We here are ridiculously excited for this one and we hope you are too. See you on the 19th!
Today, we had a great opportunity to speak with the wonderful, generous and talented Cleveland, Ohio native Bill Watterson – voice of Lost Planet 3‘s main protagonist Jim Peyton; a miner on a NEVEC contract to join the crew on E.D.N. III, drilling for the natural resource known as T-Energy.
We spoke for over an hour, talking about his work on the game, first experience with video game performance capture in L.A. Noire, collection of He-Man action figures, unadulterated love for Marvel and of course, what makes his character tick and just why fans will come to love him in the upcoming Capcom published, Spark Unlimited developed title. Did you know early on in development – talking vertical slice/pitching days – this prequel to the original Lost Planet had a more stylised look? Imagine an almost cel-shaded Lost Planet?! (although we’re sure it wasn’t planned to be that cartoon-ish).
We also found out how he thinks he would actually fare in the extreme conditions of the icy planet. All around, it was a fun interview with a real down-to-Earth bloke – yes, we declare him an honorary Aussie now. Check out our audio interview with Bill below and let us know what you thought of it in the comments section!
Audio Interview with Bill Watterson, Lead Actor on Lost Planet 3
Be sure to listen to our past CC Unplugged episodes here.
Lost Planet 3 will be available on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC August 27th in North America, August 29th here in Australia and Japan, and August 30th across Europe. Follow Bill on Twitter @BillTweeterson! And come August 20th, wish him a Happy Birthday!!
Indie Royale is going a little Van Gogh with their new bundle, The Starry Nights Bundle. For one low price, buyers can snag Kerberos Productions’ Sword of the Stars: The Pit, Tale of Tales’ Bientôt l’été, Supervillain Studio’s Tower Wars, Glassmoon’s Sentinel, Hermit Games’ QRTH-PHYL, and an unannounced title. Those who pay more than $8.00 will receive a copy of Ser Flash’s video game inspired dance album Project 2012.
Indie Royale works on a pay what you want format with a moving minimum price. As buyers pay only the minimum, the minimum price will rise for future buyers. Those who pay $10.00 or more will lower the price for other gamers.
The standalone zombie epic of DayZ may still be in the mill, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t get a sneak peak of how the process is moving along. Bohemia Interactive recently posted up a gameplay video featuring over 15 minutes of footage for the game originally built from ArmA 2 – while discussing how the current state of the game is coming along.
It is a pretty interesting video nevertheless, and the game is looking nicely thus far. Also explained is why the “Alpha” build is not readily available, as well as a few other burning questions that the community has had. Check out the clip below, and soon enough – DayZ will be launching in full for the PC down the road so stay tuned.
Paramount Pictures and Skydance Productions have just confirmed – after rumours surfaced just the other day – that writer/director Christopher McQuarrie (The Usual Suspects) will direct the next Mission Impossible movie, reuniting with Tom Cruise, whom he directed in last year’s novel-to-film adaptation, Jack Reacher.
The screenplay for M:I 5 is being written by Drew Pearce, with Cruise reprising the iconic role of Ethan Hunt, who was first introduced to movie-goers back in 1996. J.J. Abrams’ production company Bad Robot will continue to serve as producers, alongside Tom Cruise Productions and, of course, Paramount. Co-financiers and executive producers of the last instalment – M:I: Ghost Protocol – Skydance Productions, will now become more involved, working closely with the team in both the development and production process.
Cruise stated;
I am thrilled to reunite with Chris for the latest instalment in the Mission series. I began producing the films with the goal that a different director with his own vision would make each one. Chris is an extraordinary filmmaker who will deliver the heart-pounding action and thrills that audiences around the world have come to expect from the Mission: Impossible franchise.
Adam Goodman, President of Paramount Film Group, added that; “the Mission series is special for its signature directors; Chris McQuarrie keeps this tradition thriving.” The franchise is obviously showing no signs of slowing down, with Ghost Protocol raking in nearly $700 million worldwide – Cruise’s highest grossing film to date in his storied career – taking the series’ overall lifetime box-office haul to $2 billion+.
