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Dragon Ball Z Kai Season Two Review

Travis Bruno
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Dragon Ball Z Kai Season Two
Studio: Toei Animation
Publisher: FUNimation
Release Date: May 22, 2012
Price: $49.98 – Available Here

Overview:
Despite airing on American television over fifteen years ago Dragon Ball Z will likely always remain fresh in the minds of anime fans not only because it may have been the series which introduced them to the anime market but also because the series has often been re-released by FUNimation. With this release however FUNimation brings us Dragon Ball Z Kai Season Two which contains yet another twenty six episodes of the newly revamped series. For those curious about Season One you can find our review of it here. Does the newly revamped and filler free Dragon Ball Z Kai continue to impress with its second season?

Story:
The second season of Dragon Ball Z Kai picks up exactly where the first season left off in the middle of the Namek saga. In an effort to revive all of the friends who were killed when the Saiyans came to Earth, Bulma, Krillin and Gohan have traveled to Picollo’s homework of Namek. However upon arriving the three find out that not only has Vegeta recovered and come to claim the dragon balls for himself, but a powerful force capable of destroying entire civilizations with just a wave of his hand has invaded the planet and begun systematically killing everyone who stands in his way.

With such an insurmountable power laying waste to everything in sight and Goku yet to arrive, Gohan and Krillin have chosen to team up to try and survive against Frieza’s minions. However does their combined force have any chance against the sinister Ginyu Force? To top it off even after Goku arrives, the powerful Frieza makes his move on the surviving fighters. With his allies dying left and right, Goku’s anger swells and he becomes a being out of legend… a Super Saiyan! Can this huge boost in power give Goku the strength he needs to save what is left of his friends and destroy Frieza once and for all?

As with season one, this second season of Dragon Ball Z Kai covers another twenty six episodes of the series, effectively combining FUNimation’s previous Part 3 and Part 4 releases of the series. Ironically it is still visible on each disc’s main menu screen that these DVD’s have not been tailored for the Season Two collection as they display Part 3 disc 1 etc. As it stands however Kai still presents the most action packed and filler free presentation of Dragon Ball Z you could possibly ask for.

Season Two covers the entire Ginyu Force Saga and strangely enough ends right before the final episode of the battle against Frieza. Obviously this little cliffhanger choice may be a great way to convince buyers to purchase the next collection to see Frieza finally defeated, but it is disappointing nonetheless. Unlike the first season, not as many episodes of filler have been removed, but then again most of the Namek saga consisted of fast paced action.

As it stands there still are a number of sections removed and certain battle scenes which are cut down. This is a bit disappointing as some of the battle sections that were removed were quite memorable and their shortened length ends up impacting the enjoy ability of these fights. For what it is worth, Dragon Ball Z Kai still offers intense battle sections and dramatic moments, especially when beloved characters are killed in combat and the removal of plenty of irrelevant scenes puts fans exactly where they want to be, at the height of the action.

Visuals:
As before a large number of scenes in Dragon Ball Z Kai have been redrawn or created from scratch in an effort to fix past errors and clean up the visuals of the relatively old series. It is quite noticeable however whenever the old visuals are swapped with new touched up scenes as most of the newer scenes have fewer detail lines and appear smoother than older scenes.

It is worth noting that Dragon Ball Z still offers plenty of action and the animation quality of the fights has only improved with these touched up scenes. As before the release is entirely uncensored so blood is visible whenever one of the fighters is seriously hurt. Powerful abilities are still as impressive as ever and the struggle between two fighters as their special abilities clash is as memorable as ever, especially Goku’s first transformation into his Super Saiyan form.

Audio:
FUNimation’s release of Dragon Ball Z Kai Season Two contains both the Japanese voice track as well as the English dub. It is worth noting that, considering a lot of the cast has been readjusted and the scenes have switched around, the entire series has been given a brand new English dub. Most of the main cast, such as Vegeta, Goku and Krillin have retained their classic voice actors and most of the new cast has performed their job admirably, such as Colleen Clinkenbeard’s Gohan voice.

However nearly the entire cast of the Ginyu force has been replaced except for Recoome. Unfortunately the voice actors don’t seem to deliver the same feeling that the original voice actors did when they worked as a team, but at least the voice actor for Jeice still worked on providing an Australian-like accent for the character. As with season one, this second season features the fully English songs “Dragon Soul” and “Yeah! Break! Care! Break!” as the opening and ending songs, though the singer for these songs is consistent throughout season two.

Extras:
For the most part, Dragon Ball Z Kai Season Two contains relatively few bonus features. There are trailers for past and upcoming FUNimation releases as well as a clean version of the opening and ending songs which are shown twice, despite the fact that each song is the exact same. However there is one extra inclusion in this release and that is an interview with the English cast.

The interview with the cast is an actual visual interview and lasts for seven and a half minutes. A number of the English cast, both returning and new, gives their opinions on Dragon Ball Z Kai and a bit of the show’s background, as well as their opinions of the characters they play. This is a nice little inclusion and offers something actually worth watching in the extras.

Overall:
Dragon Ball Z Kai Season Two successfully continues the great re-emergence of Dragon Ball Z in the anime scene. Although nearly everyone has seen Dragon Ball Z in some form since it was created twenty years ago, Kai offers the most streamlined and action packed form of the series you could possibly ask for.

Season Two’s offering is as memorable as we may remember, however a number of the new English voice actors don’t deliver the same emotion as the old cast. Plus Season Two leaves viewers with only one episode left in the fight between Goku and Frieza, which is disappointing to say the least. As it stands however Season Two still presents Dragon Ball Z in its best light ever and old fans and newcomers alike will enjoy the high-risk battles between the Z Warriors and Frieza’s forces.

8-0-capsules-out-of-10

Dexter Returns For Season 7

Matthew Vella
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1

Get your blood slides ready, cause Dexter is back for Season 7! With this exciting new teaser, Showtime has told fans to brace themselves with an interesting quote from Dexter “Maybe everything is exactly how it should be”, followed by some dubstep (or “Dextep” as one Youtube commenter likes to call it) which seems to be the cool thing with trailers these days. Unfortunately the teaser only goes for 15 seconds, but it’s just enough to keep you on your toes.

Very little is known at the moment either than the fact Season 7 will premier on Showtime, September 30th, 9PM ET/PT. You can see it for yourself by checking out the interesting teaser below.

Max Payne 3 Review

Jessica Barabas-Bui
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Max Payne 3
Developer: Rockstar Games
Publisher: Rockstar Games
Platforms: Xbox 360 (reviewed), Playstation 3, PC
Release Date: 18 May, 2012
Price: $59.99 – Available Here

Overview

Max Payne has been a franchise that started in 2001, 11 years ago. The franchise also inspired a movie (which, no surprise, didn’t receive good reviews), proving just how popular the character is. With the last installment released nine years ago, there is no question that this is long awaited. There was also a changing of hands of the developers, from Remedy Entertainment to Rockstar Games. So, what do these changes and this long pause between installments mean for the game? Will it adapt and be worthy of the title of Max Payne, or is it just another revival that falls short?

Gameplay

The big thing that comes to mind when you say Max Payne is Bullet Time. That is what really set it apart from other third person shooters, and it is most certainly present in Max Payne 3. In fact, it is entirely necessary, since Max has a habit of getting in extremely sticky situations against many armed and angry men. Activating Bullet Time allows you to slow down time, enough to see the bullets flying through the air at you, and take down some of the thugs.

Shoot-dodge is another useful tactic that will send Max sailing through the air and allow him to swivel all around him to take down the bad guys until he eventually falls to the ground. Utilising these aspects into your automatic combat may take a little adjusting, but are definitely things that are invaluable to you during the bigger firefights.

Both shoot-dodge and Bullet Time are revived aspects from the previous games, and they work really well in this game as well. In fact, as mentioned previously, they’re necessary. Plus, Max falling realistically at the end of shoot-dodge is something that is pretty impressive, and speaks highly of just how much effort has been put into making it as realistic a game as possible.

Another great slow motion mode is Last Man Standing, which allows the player to take ‘revenge’. If they are killed with one painkiller left, then if they can identify and kill the person who delivered the killing shot, they use a painkiller automatically to recover energy and come back from the brink. This is really handy in the larger of fire fights, perhaps when you’re a little preoccupied with the guys bearing down on you and forget that your health is not in great condition. Plus, there’s an awesome sequence to go with it.

The storyline really rules the day for Max Payne, even if a lot of the time the immediate scenes involve you shooting at people because they’re shooting at you. Since there are no load screens, with the game loading during cut scenes, it means that you will have to sit through a lot of cut scenes. Personally I loved it, because I love when a game actually has a good story line instead of the usual go through, shoot people, don’t ask questions. However, if you’re the type who just wants to shoot at things, then you might find it annoying that you can’t skip cut scenes while the level is still loading. And those loads take a while, which is no surprise since the levels are so detailed and the loads are happening in the background of a cut scene.

The amount of detail that has gone into the game is astonishing. Just from the simple physics of each character, including the random thugs you’re shooting. They fall according to where you hit them, and if you enter slow motion due to it being the last enemy in the group, you see the bullet enter him and the exact reaction to that area being hit.

The world around you is realistically destructible. Even the places you can take cover behind. The cover mechanic has been lifted from GTA and Red Dead and allows you to snap to cover and shoot from it, which is something most people are used to doing. However, in one particular scene in an office, the flimsy cubicle walls only provided cover for a short amount of time before they were blown to pieces and Max was vulnerable once again.

I’d also recommend exploring the areas thoroughly, since you can pick up parts of ‘Golden Guns’, and once you’ve completed a Golden Gun then the gun you’ve equipped changes to gold, increases the weapon’s damage by 10% and has an increased ammo capacity for each clip. Plus you also get an achievement for collecting all of them.

Achievements are handed out pretty regularly in the game, from shooting people in the arms (Arms Dealer, because if there’s one thing Max Payne is good at, it’s puns), shooting from cover, or just plain shooting. There are plenty of achievements, including level-specific ones, so for you achievement hungry people out there, go nuts.

There are some truly, truly hectic levels. At several points I felt like my mind had been blown by the awesomeness, and the craziness of what we were doing. There really is nothing like tearing through Brazil, or New York, with a couple of guns, dangling from various forms of transport, and taking down hundreds of guys. The game is as fun as it is difficult.

Harry Potter for Kinect Announced

Roger Ma
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A brand new Harry Potter game specifically designed for Xbox 360 Kinect, ‘Harry Potter for Kinect‘ has been announced by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. Harry Potter video games on the Xbox 360 has previously dabbled in Kincet with the inclusion of some Kinect interactivity in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows Part 1.

This new Harry Potter Kinect game, developed by Eurocom, will fully feature and take advantage of Kinect’s hands free and voice recognition capabilities. Based off all eight Harry Potter  films, Harry Potter for Kinect follows the journey of Harry, Ron and Hermione as they attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and the growing threat of He Who Must Not Be Named .

Harry Potter for Kinect is set to be released exclusively for Xbox 360 later this year in Fall 2012.

 

Air Mail Review

Jared Hilliers
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Air Mail
Developer: N-fusion interactive
Publisher: Chillingo
Platforms: iPhone (Reviewed), iPad (Reviewed), iPod Touch
Release Date: May 24, 2012
Price: $4.99 USD/AUD – Available Here

Overview

Chillingo are on fire lately, infact all the games I’ve reviewed in the past few months have been from these guys, so maybe that’s a little bias. But when you look at their track record in general, they just keep publishing nicely packaged mobile games with a lot of bang for buck.  Air mail, developed by little known N-fusion interactive is no different and continues the tradition, with solid gameplay and great graphics for the platform, you’ll be hard pressed to find a much better flying game on iOS.

Visuals and Audio

Air mail is an awesome looking game for what it is, no doubt about that, you only have to have a quick look at the game to see what I mean. Inspired by the aeroplanes of old, it successfully combines colorful characters and detailed environments with iconic early 20th century technology. Some of the voice acting, cut-scenes and interface design aren’t as elegant and the frame rate will drop on the iPhone, but these are minor quarrels for what is an otherwise beautiful flying game. Immediately on your first flight, you’ll notice the size and scope of the environment around you and forget for a minute that you’re on a iPhone, I’d say it’s up there with the quality of Infinity blade. Add to that the colourful, playful nature of the animation and vibrant textures, you’ve got one nice looking game.

Sound design isn’t as impressive compared to the graphical feats Air Mail pulls off, for the most part it’s fairly spot on with the theme of the game, however there are annoying traits here and there. For example the Japanese sensei can be a little annoying and sounds pretty much like a stereotype, but that might be the intention here. Nevertheless, it’s all around solid experience for the eyes and ears. I’d definitely recommend having a try on the iPad for the full experience, you’ll get sucked in.

 

Gameplay

Air mail is difficult initially to pick up, technically there’s three different control schemes, virtual joystick style, tilting and an “advanced” control scheme that lets you do things like barrel rolls. So you’ve got choice, which is nice Personally, I thought the tilting to steer was terrible, so I opted for using my thumbs on the joysticks. Once you’ve got the hang of the controls, it’s a joy to play, the right sense of speed is present and the joysticks work surprisingly well for ducking and weaving. Unlike like similar virtual joystick games, which don’t work well at all for this scheme, Air Mail has the balance right (I’m looking at you, Max Payne). As you can imagine by the games title, there a missions based around dropping off and picking up parcels, but the game quickly moves away from that when the story and combat kicks in. In addition to this main story mode, Air Mail offers a few fun distractions, but right now sadly no multiplayer.

The highlight would be the exploration mode, which is pretty self explanatory, allowing you to fly around and search for bonus collectables. You can also replay each story mission for a five-star rating, which will please perfectionists, other than the no multi-player Air mail has quite abit to offer. The story I haven’t really detailed, but that’s because to me it was abit of an after-thought and not something I was interested in, however it didn’t seem terribly bad. You play as Scoop, who sneaks into a small aircraft hanger, and just happens to end up becoming the greatest pilot of his age. See what I mean? It does have some charm but in the end, I don’t think people will buy the game for the story, and that’s perfectly okay with me.

Overall

Air mail is everything you want in a arcade style flight sim, top-notch graphics, tight controls and value for money. While the interface, questionable cutscenes (in a strange window) and some annoying voice acting bring it down a little, you’re basically playing one of the best Flight sims in mobile gaming.

9-0-capsules-out-of-10

 

 

Of Orcs and Men Releases New Screenshots

Simon Wolfe
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0

Focus Home Interactive, with Cyanide Studio and Spiders Studio are sill working towards the Of Orcs and Men release this year, but have put up some new screenshots to more easily bridge the gap of the wait.  The screens this time focus entirely on an orc and a goblin as they apparently go inside to talk to someone, get upset about something, then go out to kill some people over it.

Overall, the screenshots, which can be checked out in the gallery below, look just as good as the last few sets and hopefully soon we’ll be able to find out just what these two seem to be getting upset about.  Of Orcs and Men is an RPG set to be released for PC, Playstation 3, and Xbox 360 at some point this year where players will get to experience life as an orc tribe’s warchief, as he goes to war with the humans.

Dragon Ball Z Kai Season One Review

Travis Bruno
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Dragon Ball Z Kai Season One
Studio: Toei Animation
Publisher: FUNimation
Release Date: May 22, 2012
Price: $49.98 – Available Here

Overview:
Perhaps no franchise in the anime world has ever reached the same height of popularity that the Dragon Ball series holds. Over the past twenty years the series has become well known all around the world. The series is so well known that even those who don’t know what anime is have likely watched parts of Dragon Ball Z.

However, despite its popularity, the original Dragon Ball Z had quite a lot of padding and filler mixed in with the action. To rectify that issue Toei Animation brought Dragon Ball Z Kai. Now FUNimation has brought over the first twenty six episodes in the Season One collection of Dragon Ball Z Kai. Is Dragon Ball Z more legendary than ever with all previous filler removed?

Story:
While nearly everyone knows the story of Dragon Ball Z by now, there still are plenty of people who may be experiencing DBZ for the first time. As such Dragon Ball Z Kai may be the best way to introduce the series to new comers and Dragon Ball Z Kai Season One kicks the series off many years after the end of Dragon Ball.

The Z Fighters have all grown a bit older and Goku has even had a child of his own named Gohan. However just as Goku meets up with Krillin, Master Roshi and Bulma for the first time in many years, a new threat has come to Earth… a threat more powerful than anything Goku has ever seen before. To deal with this threat Goku must team up with his archenemy Picollo. However this new enemy is nothing compared to the enemies that the Z Fighters will be facing off against from now on. Can Goku and his friends save the Earth and defeat every enemy that stands in-front of them?

Now Dragon Ball Z Kai Season One covers the first twenty six episodes of the Kai series and in it we are presented the entire beginning story arc with Raditz, as well as the entire showdown against the invading Saiyan Warriors, Vegeta and Nappa. In fact, season one even brings viewers into the beginning of the Namek saga.  As such it contains a decent amount of training sections with Goku and King Kai as well as Gohan with Picollo. However it does present an opportunity for practically every Z Fighter in the series to show off their abilities and enter the fray.

There are a number of pieces of filler cut out along the way, the most standout examples of removed filler includes segments of Gohan’s training, Goku’s mishaps on Snake Way and the various things that happen to Gohan, Krillin and Bulma on the way to Namek.

As it stands the removal of these extended segments present everything that fans of the series love and keep the action moving at a rather brisk pace. The beauty of Dragon Ball Z Kai is that without all the filler to slow things down, the DBZ story can keep up its action paced pace with no pit stops. This is what Dragon Ball Z was meant to be, an action packed series with practically zero downtime.

Visuals:
Besides leaving a massive amount of filler on the cutting room floor, Dragon Ball Z Kai has also seen an improvement in most of its artwork. The original series was created back in 1989 but at its time it was an amazing sight to behold. In fact the series itself is still quite amazing to watch and a large number of scenes have been redrawn or reanimated in an effort to fix any previous issues with the series.

For example the original Dragon Ball Z suffered an inconsistency with Vegeta’s original hair color appearing brown and his armor being different color. In Kai this issue is fixed and he retains the same black hairstyle throughout the show. It is also worth noting that this release of DBZ: Kai is entirely uncut which means that there will be a bit of blood here and there. Now there still is a rather noticeable switch between re-drawn scenes and older scenes that can be a bit jarring at times, but DBZ’s fast-paced fighting scenes and explosions have never looked better.

Audio:
The original dub of Dragon Ball Z occurred back in 1996 and it is quite surprising to see that after sixteen years many members of the cast have returned to reprise the same roles they played over a decade and a half ago. There are a number of voice actors who have changed however, such as Gohan’s new voice actress as Colleen Clinkenbeard instead of Stephanie Nadolny. Colleen does an admirable job sounding the same as fans will remember, though a few side-characters such as Bulma’s Father, Gregory and Korin sound remarkably different.

Interestingly enough, a number of special abilities have had their names left untranslated, such as Krillin’s Destructo Disc being called Kienzan instead. The show itself features the English translated songs “Dragon Soul” and “Yeah! Break! Care! Break!” as the opening and ending songs. The opening song’s singer changes at the halfway point of Season One, though the lyrics stay the exact same.

Extras:
Interesting enough, when the viewer reaches disk three of this collection, the menu screen displays Part 2 Disc 1, meaning that in the end this Dragon Ball Z Kai Season One is the combination of both Part 1 and Part 2 of Dragon Ball Z Kai. Interesting enough, Disc 2 of this collection contains simply a clean opening and ending song, however Disc 4 contains a clean version of both opening songs contained in this package as well as the television broadcast version as well as the ending song’s clean textless version.

In the end it still is slightly disappointing that besides some additional trailers for past and upcoming FUNimation releases, there are no other extras included in this package, with all three textless opening songs only varying slightly depending on the person singing it and two versions of the same textless closing song, being the only offering. This is disappointing as it would have been interesting to see additional extras in the form of a commentary or two at the very least.

Overall:
Ultimately Dragon Ball Z Kai Season One presents the beginning of the Dragon Ball Z series at its best. With nearly the entire main cast of characters able to show off their abilities throughout these first twenty six episodes viewers will be treated to the entire beginning of the series all the way up to the middle of the Namek saga. With barely any filler to speak of, a few reanimated segments and plenty of fast-paced action Dragon Ball Z Kai Season One’s release presents a prime opportunity to introduce newcomers to the series while giving old fans more of what they love.

9-0-capsules-out-of-10

Joy Ride Turbo Review

Simon Wolfe
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Joy Ride Turbo
Developer: BigPark Studio
Publisher: Microsoft Studios
Platforms: XBLA
Release Date: May 23, 2012
Price: 800 MS Points – Available Here

Overview:
Kinect Joy Ride was released some time ago, reviewed HERE, as an exclusive racing title that was designed as fun for the the family, but unfortunately it didn’t go over so well, mostly in terms of controls.  Well, Joy Ride Turbo is more or less the controller version of the game.  Featuring Avatar drivers in a plethora of cars modeled close to some fairly recognizable cars, does this controller enabled racing game meet up to the standards of similar ventures, or at least a better game experience than the Kinect version?

Story:
There isn’t really a story involved in the game, but there isn’t a need for one in a family oriented racing game.  There is at least some progression though, as the Championship Series’ must be unlocked in order, by first completing the car class specific races then each Grand Prix themselves to achieve the next.  This is not as easy as some might assume though, it definitely is not a pushover.  The quick races are also limited until they are completed in these Championship Series’, which is also standard fare.

Audio and Visuals:
The audio is considerably limited to the music and sound effects, as such a simple game doesn’t have any voice work.  The music is solid though, more on the rock side but that’s generally how racing soundtracks tend to go when geared for the entire family.  It all has a nice popping rhythm, that spectators can tap their feet throughout menus or if getting into the actual races.  Sound effects are highly cartoonish, as they should be, and all the cars certainly sound like good racing machines.

In terms of graphics, the game is stylized to better fit the art style of the Xbox LIVE Avatars.  There are plenty of bright colors and varied locations to provide an art rich environment, though the two major themes of locales seems to be desert and Asian architecture.  The vehicles are all very good looking as well, providing a well-rounded balance of different types of cars and trucks.

Most vehicles feature multiple variants, and all feature multiple colors, though all these must be bought separately.  Most interesting is the fun that seems to be had with some of these options, as one car’s variant is designed to look like a bunny with ears, teeth, and tail; while every vehicle and variant includes a solid gold color option, which are both silly and fun to see available.  It definitely does fit as being for the whole family though, as there really isn’t anything displayed that would be considered inappropriate besides firing missiles at other cars, but whatever.

Gameplay:
Joy Ride Turbo has fair solid gameplay, and while the power-ups are more or less balanced, in close races a single power-up does have the ability to decide a race.  So, being in the lead may come down to hanging onto a Force Field.  Gameplay is very close to other racing games in the same style, the power-ups are very close, but taking a different motif of missiles and mines.  It does have turbo for all the vehicles however that does change up gameplay a little bit.  Turbo is gained through stunts done in the air and/or power-ups and can give a necessary boost without needing to be a power-up on its own, it also provides an new dynamic in that vehicles have varying amounts of turbo that can be stored.  This way bigger, slower vehicles have at least some chance against sports and muscle cars, though not much.

As mentioned before, this game may be built for the family, but it is not a stroll through the park when it comes to difficulty.  Earlier events can be easier, but later ones require some skill, which is exactly how it should be, so that it is able to provide a varying degree of difficulty for all ages.  Though what makes the races most difficult is that there is no cop out option to restart a race, either during or after, if a race is really botched the three race series has to be restarted from scratch.  This is both a good and a bad thing, good in that players can’t just get a free pass to try until they win and bad in that in some ways that is the expected norm.

To be able to have an easier time racing in harder difficulties, getting a new vehicle is almost necessary.  The game does add a bit of depth in terms of earning these new rides by requiring the player to find three parts for each one.  Parts are distributed throughout the different races, as well as a numerous amount in the 2 Stunt Parks.  The ones in the races are actually easier to get, if the player uses Time Trial to get free range of the course, while the Stunt Parks require skill or a better vehicle to reach all of them.  In all, it makes for a pretty interesting mechanic to earn the better rides.

Overall:
In all, the game is fairly decent fun, the controller makes it much easier to play than the Kinect version.  There is also a bit of things to do in the game, but for the most part it seems designed as a party game to enjoy with a crowd.  There is Xbox LIVE multiplayer as well, but who knows how many can actually be easily found playing it, so local may tend to be the most used.  At the equivalent of $10 though, it seems to be a good choice if looking for a party-style arcade racer on the Xbox, so I’m giving Joy Ride Turbo 

7-5-capsules-out-of-10

CC Weekly News Recap – 21st-27th May 2012

Luke Halliday
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0


Is it just me or is a ghost haunting Capsule Computers this week? Oh wait, that’s just Jim Beaver! What a strange week this has been Capsule Junkies. We have seen good news from THQ for once, some exciting news surrounding the return of Toonami, Capcom and Satan want more of your money, we got to go hands on with Darksiders II and we even caught up with the cast of Supernatural. Oh and Dustin Spencer also deemed the Wii to be the Dreamcast of this Generation (Maybe?).

Here what made headlines this week:

Gaming News:
– Good THQ News? Yes, Really! WWE ’12 is a Success
– GAME Over?
– Fourscore and 30 Dollars Ago – Special Editions of Video-Games
– The Legacy of the Wii
– Company of Heroes 2 Reveal Interview
– Lost Planet 3 Preview
– Street Fighter 25th Anniversary Collector’s Set Revealed
– Darksiders II Interview with Jeremy Greiner
– Darksiders II Pre-E3 Preview
– Capcom Increasing DLC Output, Satan Buys Capcom Shares
– Hunt Yoshi in Mario Tennis Open
– E3 Ubisoft Forecast
– 38 Studios and Big Huge Games lay off entire workforce
– XCOM Enemy Unknown Preview
– WWE 13 Trailer Leaked

Pop Culture News:
– Supernatural Cast Interview
– Misha Collins Supernatural Interview
– Supernatural Convention – All Hell Break’s Loose 3 Coverage Sydney

Anime/Manga News:
– Toonami to air Deadman Wonderland and Casshern SINS on May 26
– More Tiger & Bunny dub cast revealed

Tech/Gadget News:
– Incase Book Jacket Revolution Released
– Incase Canvas Maki Jacket for the New iPad/iPad 2 Released

Reviews:
– Squids PC Review
– Over the Limit 2012 Review
– Men In Black 3 Review
– Dragon Age: Dawn of the Seeker Review
– KOTOMON Review
– Dragon’s Dogma Review
– Starhawk Review
– Sniper Elite V2 Review
– Bejeweled HD Review
– The World God Only Knows Review
– Dragon’s Lair Review
– Tiny Plane Review
– Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood OVA Collection Review
– Autumn Dynasty Review
– ARIA: The Animation Review
– Diablo 3 Review

Podcasts:
– Capsule Computers Podcast 047

See you next Sunday for the CC Weekly Recap.

Supernatural Convention – All Hell Breaks Loose III Coverage Sydney

Benjamin Webb
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2

For most people the 26th of May, 2012 was an ordinary Saturday with next to nothing, or nothing too exciting, to do. But, for the biggest fans of the Supernatural television series, this day was HUGE! The day, Saturday the 26th of April, was huge simply because it was a day that fans of the Supernatural series could get together and celebrate the show with some of the shows memorable cast members.

The day had guest appearances from Richard Speight Jr., Misha Collins, Corin Nemec and Jim Beaver, who fans will be able to recognise as characters from the series. The event also featured many contests, episode screenings and various auctions to raise money for various charities. The biggest attractions however, were the guests question and answer sessions which was where they would have one of the guest come out and then talk about some things briefly before taking questions from people in the audience.

All-Hell-Breaks-Loose-3-Event-Sydney-2012-14

The day began with the introduction ceremony taking place which involved many pieces of important information being divulged to the crowd. It then soon went into time for people to get their photos taken with various members of the shows cast. Whilst people were waiting to be allowed out to take photos (it was a system where only a few people could exit at a time to prevent congestion) various activities, like trivia, were being played in the auditorium. All the trivia winners received some prizes which seemed cool at the time. There were also entertaining clips being played from the series, as well as entire episodes to keep the crowd entertained while they were waiting for to be called out.

While this was happening, we were called out to do our interview with Misha Collins which was fairly amazing. Misha is a really funny guy and he seemed like he was enjoying his stay down here. He also ate a Crunchie, which he seemed to find unfavourable to his mouth. After this we decided to take a short lunch break.

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When we returned, it was time to watch Traci Dinwiddie’s question and answer section which was highly informative. Traci was quite energetic and talked a lot about toilet humour, which I thought was quite strange. I guess that actors are people too afterall. As a part of the crowd we were also treated to her lovely singing and drum/bongo playing and were even invited to join in as part of a chorus. It was too bad that only half of the crowd joined in, but it was still something cool to be heard.

After a short intermission Richard Speight Jr. and Corin Nemec took to the stage. These two guys bounced off each other so well as well as with all the people who participated in the the Question and Answer session. One of the biggest highlights of this Q&A session was when both Richard and Corin walked down from stage and up through the crowd as a display of some kind of Aussie sexiness meter. The further from the front you were, the sexier you would be. We were right near the back, us sexy beasts. Just remember, Australia is full of sexy people. Oh! And another great moment was when Richard did the Cossack dance on stage in response to a timid girls question about what Bobby’s favourite dance move would be (Richard approached the girl in order to see her written question when he discovered the question intended for Jim underneath).

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Jim Beaver was the next to take the stage and he was a fairly informative kind of guest. One of the best moments from his panel was when the Audience tried to goad him into doing the time-warp by taking a jump to the left and then by taking a step to the right. However, there was no hands on hips or bringing of knees in tight for this audience. Jim did however quote ‘Idgits” a few times, which is his characters signature catchphrase and one that never gets old.

From here, Jim’s Q&A session ended and it was time auction off a signed cap, which was signed live in front of the audience which gave it that much more of an authentic feel. The battle was intense and the auction war waged fiercely. However, from the flames of the war, the could only be one winner. And there was. And that winner paid over $1.5k. So congrats to the winner.

Next up was every fan-girls wet dream, Misha Collins. Misha pretty much owned the crowd as soon as he entered the room. Of course, the audience was already willing plenty for him to take control of them as evidenced by the incredibly massive cheers that went on for multiple minutes. During his question and answer segment, he frequently lamented on how he was being much more vulgar than usual, but I don’t think the crowd minded it at all. Misha was full of stories and info on the show and was easily the crowds most favourite guest (mine was Richard, but let’s not get into that). He also referenced our interview and glanced at us a few times, if I was a fan-girl, my heart would have been throbbing.

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After Misha’s question and answer segment, it was time to auction off a shirt marked by Misha for charity. Throughout the auction, Misha tried drawing on himself, then on floor and then behind a chair. I’m fairly certain that the winner of the auction ended up with a shirt with a doodle of a doodle (penis). Though this auction was quickly subverted by another in which Misha was auctioning off what he claimed to be a stolen set-piece where the proceeds would go to the charity that he did work for. I was surprised that the item sold for as little as it did, considering the larger sums the (in my opinion) lesser items received.

Afterwards, Corin returned to the stage to do a similar shirt signing and auction. For his, he doodled a representation of the male physique (abs, chest muscles) and attempted a ‘Snail-trail’. I thought the shirt was quite humourous and I’m sure that the person that ended up with the item of clothing was quite pleased.

Unfortunately due to time constraints, Luke and myself had to leave during the next auction, which was for various items from other conventions that may have been related to Supernatural. Congrats to everyone that won something from those.

Overall the All Hell Breaks Loose III convention from The Hub Productions was a fairly interesting and entertaining convention to attend. Both myself and Luke left the convention discussing all the enjoyable parts of the event and how awesome all the guests were. I think that this will be a hard convention to beat in terms of pure entertainment value and I hope that All Hell Breaks Loose IV is just as good, if not moreso.

Be sure to check out the All Hell Breaks Loose website for future conventions.

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