Fans of the anime Ore no Imouto ga Konnani Kawaii Wake ga Nai (or Oreimo for short) will be happy to know that three OVA specials will all be airing on the same day two months after the final episode of the second season.
Episode 13 will air on the 30th of June and the OVAS are set to air on the 18th of August, the official anime page for Oreimo will be streaming all episodes and have also provided links for international viewers on where they can watch the simulcasts. Click hereto check out the official site. Currently the anime show is being simulcasted by Crunchyroll, who will also be simulcasting the OVAS in August with the help of Aniplex.
This year marks the end of Oreimo for both the anime and the original light novel; the 12th and final volume was released earlier this month and was meet with extremely mixed reactions from its fans. Speaking as someone who already knows the ending (don’t worry I won’t give any spoilers), I predict this will get more rages from people than the whole Aku no Hana debate.
Let us know what you think of Oreimo by commenting down below (no spoilers please).
Ready for sixteen new mini-games, new ways to use that Gamepad, and a lot of flatulence? Well you are in luck as today, Game & Wario has hit the Wii U, killing the drought of new titles with the returning mischievous brother of Mario, Wario.
You can pick up this title via the eShop or at your local retailer, but while you wait – you should also check out the new trailer released down below, as it shows off some of the many mini-games you will be playing, as well as the unique Gamepad usage that comes with each experience. So watch the clip, and show this other-other brother from the Mushroom Kingdom some love as Game & Wario is ready to make it’s mark on Nintendo’s new platform.
Not too long ago, we brought you news that UFO Interactive and Tragnarion were planning on bringing the popular third person shooter Scourge: Outbreakto the Xbox Live Arcade and have completely overhauled the original, with new features such as a four player co-op mode, achievements, and more hitting the platform.
Today, it is time to take a closer look as a new trailer has been released, detailing one of your squadmates known as Victor “Stonewall” Dantrix.
Here are some details on this Echo Squad leader:
A former US Ranger and sixth generation Army Officer, Victor “Stonewall” Dantrix has his crosshairs on the Nogari Corporation for a research experiment gone wrong. Compelled by the promise of having his named cleared once and for all, Stonewall was framed for a catastrophic airstrike “cleansing,” which left him as the only survivor out of hundreds. Dishonorably discharged and disgraced, Stonewall was sentenced to execution only to escape for a life on the run. Now he must keep Echo Squad together and eliminate Nogari.
Specializing in mid-range assault and tactical combat, Stonewall can take a beating and easily pay one back in double. While he may not be a tank like Mass, or nimble like Amp, Stonewall is 100% mission-oriented and determined to eliminate enemies efficiently. His Zen-like balance of recoil control and accuracy gives him a keen trigger finger, particularly when equipped with an assault rifle. Naturally, Stonewall is perfect for close combat situations. Never giving an inch of ground, his Ambrosia Suit’s Static Shield locks into place, allowing Echo Squad to return fire and decimate enemies from safety. Additionally, Stonewall’s Static Shockwave will let Nogari know he means business. Once he’s in range, he makes sure nobody gets away.
For just 800 points, I would say Scourge looks like it will fit right in on the Xbox Live Arcade and seems to be quite refreshing for the service due to the lack of third-person shooters on the service. Scourge: Outbreak launches on July 3rd, but you can check out the shiny new trailer down below.
Neverwinter is the newest free-to-play MMO on the block from Cryptic Studios and Perfect World Entertainment. It takes place in the Dungeons & Dragons universe that so many RPG fans may remember from Neverwinter Nights. Is this just another World of Warcraft clone, or does this one have the chops to stand on its own?
Join Capsule Computers editors Joe Morgan and Joshua Moris as they introduce you to the world of Neverwinter. They’ll show off questing, leveling, and more, ultimately culminating in a five-player run through of one of the game’s first major dungeons.
We will be livestreaming the footage to our Twitchpage. We’ll be sure to upload it to our YouTubepage later for those that missed the livestream as well. Also be sure to follow us on Twitter, and Facebooksince we’ll let everyone know when a livestream begins that way. Be sure to leave a comment here or head on over to our YouTube page and leave a comment so we know what you think of our newest feature.
Be sure to check out the video below!
*Note* – We apologize for the technical difficulties we had, but we were able to work through it. Thanks for your patience. Hope you enjoy the video!
Star Trek fans were in for a treat this year at Supanova, with Anthony Montgomery doing a Q&A right after Manu Intiraymi. Known for his role in Star Trek: Enterprise, Montgomery ran to the stage with great cheer and applause. Upon getting on stage he began telling a story of a woman he met in Australia back 2001 who had a Star Trek: Enterprise tattoo. To his surprise, he quickly learnt that woman was at the panel where he thanked her for her support and said that she was his “hero”. The panel was off to a great start!
Montgomery wanted to spend a lot of his time on stage promoting his new graphic novel, Miles Away, which he began back in 2001 while Star Trek: Enterprise was still on the air. Miles Away is set to be a transmedia franchise with an animated series and possibly a live action show in the works as well as the graphic novels. For more information on Miles Away, fans can check out the official website or purchase it here. He also told a story about how the previous night while watching a rugby game he was told he would not leave Australia alive if he didn’t go for the Wallabies and that he thought Australian Football was much more violent than American Football.
Montgomery was more than happy to talk about his time in Star Trek: Enterprise answers many fan questions. When asked about working with Scott Bakula, he said Scott was one of the nicest people he’d ever met and considered him a mentor as he was a big fan of his film Quantum Leap. He also made a strong point that he tried to avoid embarrassing moments as he did whatever possible to make sure he was never the reason why a production wasn’t moving forward. He also made mention that his favourite moments in the series was when the whole cast were together because he felt those moments were rare in the series and he felt like they were a family. He also said the episode “Horizon” was a favourite of his as Travis’ backstory was explored quite a bit and he “really got to do something.”
When asked about what he’d like to see with the future of Star Trek, Anthony Montgomery gave some rather interesting answers. His suggestion was perhaps after another movie, maybe they would do another TV series. His idea was that these new movies might be to excite fans about Star Trek again, then bring it back to a TV series format. Also, it was mentioned that when Star Trek: Enterprise was cancelled because “the fans needed a break” he felt that “we all knew that was BS”. Montgomery felt that they wanted to do something “different” they needed to “get rid of Rick and Brandon”. Again this is just what he felt, but he did say he knew other reasons why it was cancelled but he couldn’t share them. Anthony Montgomery left with the final thoughts that he was grateful that the new J.J. Abrams films showed homage to older series and he was a part of the franchise, concluding with that Star Trek will still be here long after we’re all plant food.
For more on Anthony Montgomery, you can follow him on Twitter or like his Facebook page.
Gloomy Hollow is a point and click style action-RPG that takes inspiration from Diablo and other dungeon crawlers. Instead of the traditional point and click controls, you navigate your way through the game’s worlds, killing enemies, gathering loot, improving your characters and retrieving mystical crystals using a series of simple gestures. The game is let down by clunky controls and a few nagging audio and visual problems, but none the less delivers a solid experience.
Story
Gloomy Hollow was once a place where the spirits of the dead could live happily and peacefully for all eternity. However, times have long changed the Hollow and it is now a dark, evil, twisted version of its former self. Demonic beasts have arisen, and it is up to a band of three wayward souls; Mustache Jim, Smithy and Rosie to the defeat the beasts, and gather the 5 Crystals of the Underworld in order to return Gloomy Hollow to its former glory.
The story is entertaining, and told through the realm’s various characters such as The Mayor and the old sage; Bulbazar the Wise. However, it isn’t the be all and end all of the game Gloomy Hollow can be enjoyed in its entirety even without reading all of the dialogue. This is accomplished by the game being very clear on your objectives – pointing out which level you should be traveling to next, as well as highlighting any enemies that may need killing in order to fulfill the game’s side-missions.
Having the game be perfectly playable without reading the text is a benefit. Some of the dialogue feels a little broken and disjointed, so being able to skip it without the fear of getting lost down the track is great.
Gameplay
Gloomy Hollow is an Action RPG/Dungeon Crawler. The control scheme draws its inspiration heavily from point and click action games (especially Diablo). While it takes this inspiration, the game’s play style is made unique by replacing the traditional “mouse” controls with simple iOS gestures. The main gesture that you use is tapping; you tap where you want your character to move, and tap enemies and objects in the world to attack them. Pinching and three-finger swiping are also used, but these are mapped to your character’s skills.
Aside from the varying skill-trees found for each character, there is also a loot-based system, where you will constantly be finding weapons and armor for the three characters. The plethora of loot, combined with the ability to upgrade your gear allows for a deep and rich RPG experience. Although each character has six skills (three primary and three secondary), I found them largely redundant in combat, and as such mostly reserved them for getting to otherwise inaccessible areas.
I personally am a fan of games that make the most out of touchscreen controls instead of relying on the often unreliable virtual joystick and buttons. However, for those out there who do prefer the joystick/button combo, it is also included as an alternate control option. While both controls are decent enough and cater to whatever preference you have, one thing that both have in common is that they can be rather clunky.
Tapping on a part of the screen will sometimes have your character walking into a wall or other object and having their movements completely halted. At the same time the joystick can seem unresponsive and slow. Moving away from the controls, the game uses an old mobile game standard mechanic; the “three star” point system for each level. This system is seen in almost every iOS game imaginable, but Gloomy Hollow has an interesting twist on the mechanic that offers an incentive for players to achieve the maximum score.
The game replaces the traditional stars with keys. These keys are attained in each level by: completing the goal, killing 100% of the enemies, and collecting all five blue espers hidden through the map. The keys are then collected and kept in your inventory where they are used to open doors and gates to otherwise unreachable areas.
This is a great addition that adds a sense of replayability to the game. This is especially true as you progress further in the game and you need more keys than you have in order to reach areas. At the same time, you normally cannot 100% complete a level (and thus get all of its keys) without entering these locked gates.
Visuals & Audio
The visuals for Gloomy Hollow are not the best the app-store has to offer, but they are by no means the worst. Using a subtle colour pallet that is primarily filled with cooler colours (blues/purples/greens/greys etc), you get a sense of the dread, despair and otherworldliness that the game presents. The cooler pallet also gives the title a sense of blandness, but it works well in with the themes of death and the afterlife.
The character models and animations are all different and unique from one another but many of the enemy designs are rehashed over and over again. You will often find yourself facing off against the same few enemies for worlds at a time (the entire first world only has three different enemy types across 10 levels). As a silver lining, the repeated enemy use means that you will never be struggling to find your demonic prey. You will always be able to find that last enemy that you are hunting down without having to second-guess yourself every few seconds.
The audio in Gloomy Hollow suffers similar problems to the visuals. Although the music has the ominous, afterlife feel, it doesn’t take too long to realise that no matter where you are, it is just the same song played on repeat. While re-used enemy design is one thing, having the same song repeat over and over like a broken record becomes very detracting from the overall experience.
The sound effects in the game all serve their purpose well. Each action has a unique, corresponding sound so that you will never be surprised if a monster is coming for you… at least in theory. In practice, the sounds can often misplay, and you may hear the sound of an enemy approaching, only to be left waiting. Most people play their iOS games with the sound off, and Gloomy Hollow is one of those games where you wont miss much by doing so.
Overall
Despite its few nagging problems, Gloomy Hollow is a game that certainly delivers. With its deep RPG mechanics, combined with traditional iOS game elements, this game is recommended for anyone who is a fan of Diablo, a fan of action RPGs in general, or who is looking for something on their i-device that will keep them coming back. Even with the game’s clunky controls and nagging audio and visual issues as it is still an enjoyable experience.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
The final day of Supanova Sydney 2013 was a huge one! The Film Ink Features stage took off with a blast with Manu Intiraymi of Star Trek: Voyager fame. While Intiraymi had only a short time to talk with his fans, he managed to get quite a lot of laughs out of the crowd and made sure to leave an entertaining and memorable impression. Beginning with greeting the audience and expressing his excitement about being down under, Intiraymi quickly moved on to encourage the audience to check out a recent film of his called Fortress (2012) that didn’t get an Australian cinema release. Before he could continue however, he discovered a screen behind him projecting his image. Intiraymi then began joking that he had “gotten fat”, has been eating “too much cheerios” and “…candy isn’t as good anymore.”
Next up Intiraymi spoke briefly on the up coming Star trek: Renegades and his return to the franchise. The film is set to feature several other former Star Trek actors in a plot that takes place ten years after Voyager. He also said the story will be much darker and deal with a lot of corruption within Starfleet and seemed very excited to reprise his role as Icheb. The conversation then shifted towards Star Trek: Voyager where he admitted he still likes to watch episodes he was in. He even went as far as to say that it was some of his best acting as a result of working with other great actors and learning from them. His saids his thoughts when watching Voyager tends be “Damn! I used to be good!” When asked what it was like working with Jeri Ryan he joked “It’s hard to hide an erection in a Star Trek uniform” and said Ethan Phillips was easily the funniest person on set. One story he shared was during the filming of the episode “The Haunting of Deck Twelve”, Phillips was filming a scene where he was reading to some children.
Without warning, he changed his line to “I’m gonna read you this book kids, My Pet Duck Farts Too Much” and the children would not stop laughing. As a result it took forever to complete the shot as the kids kept laughing because of it. Intiraymi said he tried to get away with jokes like Phillips but could never pull them off as well. Old school Star Trek fans were in for a treat, as Intiraymi’s Q&A was directly followed by Anthony Montgomery.
While he only had short time to talk and answer questions, Manu Intiraymi kicked off the day with high energy and kept everyone laughing on a cold and coffee-less morning. Fans wanting more from Intiraymi can follow him on Facebook and Twitter.
Alex Saviuk brought to Supanova 2013 a memorable seminar that covered the webs of his artistic history since 1977, drawing masked superheros in the comic book industry, from freelancing The Green Lantern at DC Comics to establishing his career at Marvel as the key Spiderman artist.
Before the host could introduce the guest star, Alex began telling the audience about his special comic project opportunity, offered by Marvel’s previous art director, John Romita Sr., which led to him drawing a 32pg sequential art story of Spiderman, involving a green goblin and a dentist. Alex mentioned, “at that time free comic books were given with toothpaste at the dentist”. Definitely the best way to attract new customers.
Not long afterwards, in 1986, Alex left DC Comics for Marvel, to undertake more work and help out with projects, such as Jim Shooter’s ‘New Universe’, created in honour of Marvel’s 25th Anniversary. I was surprised to discover that Alex turned down an assistant position to work on The Phantom newspaper comic strip with Sy Barry. However, during this period and for the next 7 years, Alex worked on inking and pencilling Spiderman in the issues Web of Spiderman, Adventures of Spiderman and The Amazing Spiderman.
The seminar ended with Alex discussing his current work on The Phantom, his most favourite comic book character, within Australia for Frew and in Sweden for Egmont. With the success behind this incredible comic book artist, it made perfect sense for his Phantom logo to appear on this year’s Supanova t-shirts.
Don’t miss out on Alex Saviuk’s latest published stories and comic artworks, follow him on twitter here.
Weta Workshop and their SFX division Weta Digital are basically the kings (and queens) of props and practical/special effects in film and TV. Based out of Miramar, New Zealand, the company became a household name after their amazing work on The Lord of the Rings: the Fellowship of the Ring back in 2001. They have since also become synonymous with director Peter Jackson, working on numerous of his other projects thereafter.
At this year’s Supanova Pop Culture Expo, designer Daniel Falconer – who joined Weta Workshop in 1996 – held a presentation looking at the history of the company in the business, and exploring the processes of some of their most recognisable works. It was great to attend for anyone interested in the field or movie-making in general. Here is a rundown of what was covered, including some quotes (partially paraphrased) to help convey what is better translated through visual language.
I apologise in advance for not being able to capture good shots of the powerpoint slides, but I have included some examples of Falconer’s work. At the outset, Falconer gave us all a digital tour of Weta’s fine work; mostly films that we will all recognise: The LOTR Trilogy, The Last Samurai, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, The Legend of Zorro, King Kong and many more, before explaining how a gig is typically landed for the team and other SFX houses;
When a studio needs a firm, what happens is we bid on that movie and say “we can do ‘x’ amount in this amount of time for this amount of money”.
Then, he got into specifics on certain projects and set pieces – of which one in particular may interest our fellow gamers out there. You’ll know it when you read it;
On The Legend of Zorro: The biggest part of principle work was building the train. We built a 1:4 scale steam train and placed a V4 engine inside it. […] We had one take and filmed with four different cameras as it blew up.
On the Halo movie: I worked for over a year designing on a Halo movie that in the end got canned. It was a real shame as it was shaping up to be an amazing film, and I’m sure it will be made some day. On the back of the movie falling over, we were able to provide the weapons, armor and warthog for a bunch of short films made for the games that you may have seen.
On Avatar: By the time we were brought on, the Na’vi themselves had already been designed, as were the bulk of the environments. […] But we did all the Earth forces; they wanted us to design all the weapons, the body armour the guys wore and tech – including all the amazing big tanks that the Avatars would roll inside, which we actually made full size.
Daniel also recalled his time walking around the set of the film;
I got to walk around in the Op Centre and while some of the digital displays are holographic (those were all in CGI) they did have a lot of big glass screens with stuff projected on them and you really felt like you were walkin the bridge of the Enterprise or something like that. That set was incredible.
Daniel then touched upon the critically acclaimed District 9 – an instant cult classic. Apparently, the original plan for the “Prawns” was much more labor intensive;
We were gonna do the prawns as physical suits but in the end they ended up going digital, which was probably for the better, but we built all the physical suits for them as well. I think the only part of the movie where they used the physical suits in were those really dodgy shots on the magazine covers of Wikus in compromising positions with prawns.
He also spoke about the crew’s workaround to using real chainmail for The Lord of the Rings trilogy;
We pioneered a technique on LOTR to make lightweight plastic chainmail so that the actors wouldn’t be wearing 50kgs of metal as it would be impossible to act in. So we created the lightweight plastic chainmail using a long pipes and we had a machine that would slice it really thin and then we had two guys sit down in a room and put together the rings one by one by one…they were slightly mad when they started, and slightly more mad when they finished. But, they had no fingerprints left so they could’ve gone off to a life of crime and never get caught.
The seminar as we should call it was not all business as Daniel shared a funny story with us;
Stu was one of our armor makers – absolutely nuts! I think it helps to be slightly nuts to work at places like Weta because you have to be very, very intense about your work […] I still remember one weekend, Stu was off to a re-enactment one time and he was just picking up his armor from work and he’s got this beautiful big ol’ black vintage car that he drives around…and I see him walking down the street in full platemail armor – helmet and everything – loading stuff into his car. He jumps in the car, closes the door, down goes his helmet and off he went. I thought, holy crap man you better not get pulled over by a cop!
A colleague of his even wore his armor on a flight (only one hour long) because he couldn’t add any more weight to his luggage or another bag, in pre-9/11 days of course.
Peter Lyon is a sell-taught sword-maker. He had a desk job originally and h wold go jousting on the weekends and attend re-enactments with his friends. And he started making his own swords for that purpose […] More and more, he was doing these things for commission until eventually it became such a big business for him that he quit his day-job and just became a professional sword-maker! […] But we hired him and brought him down to New Zealand and he now makes swords for us for a living. The swords that he made for LOTR are truly exquisite items and they are now exhibited in the Leeds armory in the UK and I’ve been told that he’s the only living swordsman who has his work on display there.
Gollum in the Main Eatery of Wellington Airport
The final piece of in-depth production information naturally focused on The Hobbit. The crew had learnt a lot from their past experiences on the epic LOTR Trilogy, and adapted with new techniques to make things easier, smoother and more convenient;
For LOTR we had to make hobbit feet; each could only be used once and sometimes we would go through two pair a day – you can imagine how many of those we had to make. They were basically like slippers; you’d put your foot into them and they’d glue around the ankle and the top of the foot and then the hair was put on and that kind of helped hide the seams…but that was very labour intensive. […] For the Hobbit we pioneered another new technique whereby the feet were actually more like gumboots in that you pull them all the way up and they secure up above the knee and they’re really tight so they hold themselves on; we didn’t need to use any glue, so they were reusable and there was no edge that had to be blended.
And then we got a whole bunch of those toe-shoes and we added hard rods at the end of the toes. The actors would slip their feet in and they could wiggle their toes and those little rods would wiggle the actual toes at the end of the Hobbit feet.
And of course with all the facial prosthetics, which on the Dwarves were huge… you’re probably talking about delivering 5-6 items per dwarf each day; 13 dwarves, plus scale doubles, plus stunt doubles, plus picture doubles in some cases, so we’re talking about delivering to set every day 50-something prosthetic pieces.
Daniel wrapped up the seminar by showcasing Weta’s work outside of the usual medium – they even built a large animatronic dragon for a nightclub! – and playing a pretty comprehensive showreel. Other than the obvious talent and hard work that goes into creating these masterpieces, I also took away from the seminar something I should’ve already grasped – just how big LOTR is in New Zealand! I mean, that giant Gollum in Wellington Airport is insane! I want to stop over there just to see it live!
This year at Supanova, Nintendo had a strong presence in the form of an interactive booth where fans could come along, sit down and play some video games. What was interesting about this particular booth was that instead of making it about Nintendo’s lineup, it was instead made into a social area where gamers could just come along and relax. Although, that isn’t to say that Nintendo weren’t actually showcasing any of their latest titles, they were and they had a good showing.
At the booth, we were fortunate to get an interview with the Product Manager of the upcoming Pokemon X & Y videogames, Tom. We spoke with him briefly about Nintendo’s presence at the event. You can see our interview in the box below.
