To coincide with the massive revival of the Hunter x Hunter series (the return of the manga and the anime reboot), Shueisha have announced that they will be releasing compilation volumes of the series. Not only will this be quite handy for those just jumping in to the series, it’s also great for those who have yet to collect the series.
These new compilation volumes will cover each saga of the series so far excluding the Chimera Ants arc. The first release will cover the entirety of the Hunter Exam arc which has officially hit shelves across Japan today. Following todays release, will be the Heavens Arena arc compilation to be released January 13th, then the Phantom Troupe arc compilation will be out in February followed by the Greed Island arc compilation in March.
What do you think of these compilation volumes? Let us know in the shoutbox and comments section.
Capsule Computers were recently invited out to get a sneak peak at multiplayer offerings of 2K Games and Digital Extremes’ The Darkness II. Being quite the fan of the original The Darkness released back in 2007, I was quite eager to see how its sequel was shaping up.So just what can you expect from The Darkness II’s new multiplayer component?
Well from my time playing it, quite a lot actually. First thing first, multiplayer itself has been completely overhaul and revamped, with the developers throwing out competitive multiplayer in favour of four player co-op. The multiplayer component of the original Darkness was, for lack of a better word, a complete mess. It felt completely unnecessary, rushed and really just meaningless bullet point on the back of the box.
Thankfully a great deal of time and care has been put into to making “Vendettas”, the new co-op multiplayer mode that will feature its very own story which will run parallel with the main game’s campaign. Players will be able to choose one of four unique characters to play as, each of whom has their own unique abilities, weaponry and personality quirks. Alongside the Vendettas Campaign is Hit List, a sort of Call of Duty: Spec Ops mode which allows for players to skip straight into the action in purpose made scenarios based off campaign levels, along with brand new Hit List levels and scenarios.
I found it most surprising that the developers have made a completely new storyline and characters for the Vendettas mode. Like in The Darkness II’s main story, Vendettas puts players against the Brotherhood – a centuries old secret society that wants to use The Darkness for their own use. They know what The Darkness is and exactly how to fight it. And as such, these guys are far more tougher to defeat than the standard mafia goons from the first game.
As Vendettas is co-op/team focused, you will need to rely on your friend to help support you as the Brotherhood are a tough bunch to beat. Unlike Jackie who possesses all four Darknesss Powers (and more), The Darkness Powers in Vendettas have been split up amongst the four characters. Your choice of character determines the Darkness ability and Darkness infused weaponry you wield.
Inugami carries the cursed Kusanagi samurai sword. His Darkness ability is the Darkness Swarm, which summons a swarm of miniature demons to attack and immobilize his enemies
Shoshanna is Israeli Special Forces and wields the Arm of the Night, a Darkness infused shotgun. Her ability is Gun Channeling allowing her to fire multiple rounds of gunfire at one time.
Jimmy Wilson Irishman and alcoholic. Jimmy possesses the Dark Axe and the ability to summon Darklings to fight by his side.
J.P. DuMondA Witch doctor of sorts, J.P. wields the Midnight Stick and his Darkness ability allows him to summon Black Holes that can pull in enemies to their death.
These four characters make up the crack pot team that will take on the Brotherhood. Playing thought one of the earlier levels of the Vendettas Campaign and an early mission of Hit List, I can tell you now that you will definitely need to uses team work to get through these missions, especially on harder difficulties. Ammunition can be quite scarce, and you will have to rely on your team’s combined uses of Darkness Powers to get through the game.
Eating hearts is back in The Darkness II and this has been incorporated into Vendettas. Players will need to destroy the hearts of dead enemies to regain lost health and collect Darkness Essences which is sort of like the in-game currency. For every kill, assist, execution, heart destroyed etc you will gain Darkness Essences which you can then spend on levelling up your character’s skills and abilities, for example increased damage and prolonged uses of their Darkness Power.
The game itself looks and plays quite well, the ability to sprint and aim down the sights (which were missing from the first game) are a welcome improvement to The Darkness II’s overall gameplay. It will be interesting to see if there will be any crossover from the Vendettas mode into the game’s main story. This would be quite interesting to see, but so far all we know is that both campaigns run parallel with one another.
Graphically, the game has taken on a far more comic book cel-shaded art style which is quite fitting as the game itself is based off a comic book. With that said the game certainly not dropped any of its ‘graphic content’. Whist I was only able to play The Darkness II’s multiplayer offering, gameplay over all is quite tight with combined uses of gun play and Darkness Powers, with a team focuses mixed into that thanks to the new Vendettas mode.
The Darkness II is set to be released on February 7 in North American and February 10 in Europe and Australia for Xbox 360, Playstation 3 and PC.
It only took a few extra months, but at least North America has finally received a confirmed release date for Xenoblade Chronicles, so now Operation Rainfall just has two more titles to aim and get localized by Nintendo for United States release. But in the meantime, Nintendo of Europe will continue to tease US residents by announcing when European gamers can expect to see Hironobu Sakaguchi’s The Last Story.
Wii RPG fans can expect to see the title on February 24th. For those who don’t know, The Last Story will contain both a single player story mode, and online co-op and deathmatch modes for those who want some RPG fun with others.
Those who have been following the rather confusing story of Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere will be happy to hear that the anime will be getting a second season, and better than that it will be arriving shortly after the finish of the current season. Japan’s Animedia magazine has confirmed this fact with Sunrise and a user on MyAnimeList has provided the above image from the magazine.
Currently the series is airing in Japan and is available for simulcast with English subtitles on Crunchyroll for those interested in picking it up. The series itself is rather convoluted as far as the storyline goes but contains quite a large number of characters so those who love character interactions may like the show.
It appears that we now know the name of the next Alan Wake title a little bit before Remedy would have liked us to learn about it. Rather than being revealed at this weekend’s VGA on Spike TV, it seems that the German USK rating board has decided to get the jump on the announcement by rating the title. A rating popped up earlier today on the ratings board’s website which has listed a rating for Alan Wake’s American Nightmare.
Now we previously were led to believe that the next Alan Wake title title that would be on the XBLA would potentially be called Alan Wake’s Night Springs, but that may have changed. Either that or the German release of the title is going to be named differently or this could be a potentially new Alan Wake title all together. We’ll know more this weekend during the official announcement on Spike’s Video Game Awards.
Welcome to Capsule Computers’ weekly anime segment, Anime Say! Each week I will be diving into some of the biggest anime related topic of the week and having my say on anything that matters in the anime world. To top it off each episode will conclude with a recommendation from your’s truly of an anime or manga that you should check out.
This week I discuss the nature of the anime and manga industry, focusing in on the Shonen genre in particular. You can check out this week’s Anime Say! below.
Got any questions for Anime Say? Send all your queries to [email protected] and I will do my best to answer anything you can throw at me.
What do you think of the second episode of Anime Say? Let us know in the shoutbox and comments section.
The “EA Daily Deals” program continues with all new sales today on some of EA’s offering on iOS and Android platforms.
The biggest deal today being 50% off of Dead Space for iPad through December the 10th. The critically acclaimed game was recently named by Apple as the iPad Game of the Year, and usually runs up a bill of $6.99.
Today’s other Daily Deal involves the EA published Tetris, with 30% discounts on in-game T-Coins, which allow players to use power-ups and open up new galaxies in which to play. Players can also earn 15% more T-Coins and lines to improve their Tetris ranking when they join the T-Club. The T-Club is the fastest way for Tetris enthusiasts to get into the fun.
EA Mobile is promising more deals to come, including some on the popular iOS titles Mirror’s Edge and Flight Control.
Well, at least partially explained. More like assumed actually unless you can understand the Japanese that is being written in the video. Still, in the video below you can watch Patroklos learn how to use the Soul Calibur V Critical Edge system as he is taught by the director of the title, Daishi Odashima.
From what the video below shows, we are able to see that the Critical Edge system will be something similar to a special attack that can be used whenever the fighter deals enough damage to raise the meter that is next to their HP bar. Once the meter is filled the player can then use one Critical Edge attack which will deal a large amount of damage to an enemy through a spectacular attack unique to each character.
Despite peoples assumptions that the Dead or Alive 5 cast would be similar to past entries in the series, Tecmo Koei and TEam Ninja have actually only revealed two characters until now. Those two characters were Ryu and Hayate, but now they are being joined by two female fighters; Ayane and my favorite, Hitomi. To go along with this reveal the company has released a handful of screenshots showing the two fighting with one another.
Ayane is a female ninja and half-sister/cousin to Hayate and Kasumi and has been around since the very first Dead or Alive title and has even appeared in the Ninja Gaiden series while Hitomi is a German karate user who made her appearance in Dead or Alive 3. As you can see in these screenshots the amount of detail in not only the environments but the characters as well are stunning. Dead or Alive 5 is currently aiming for a release sometime in 2012 on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 and if these screenshots are any indication of quality, it looks like it will be the most visually stunning fighting game ever.
Now see, why can’t we have nice video game advertisements like that outside of Japan? But in all seriousness it seems that Dynasty Warriors Next and Pepsi Nex (Japanese name for Pepsi Next) are forming a little marketing campaign in Japan since they both have the word Next in their titles… or something like that.
Tecmo Koei and Suntory International have teamed up to provide this little collaboration between the PlayStation Vita’s launch title Dynasty Warriors Next and Pepsi Next by releasing the above image which can be downloaded in high-res as a wallpaper. Plus the Japanese Pepsi website will be giving away 50 copies of the title but it doesn’t seem to be open to outside of Japan entrants.
It seems that Pepsi Nex has taken quite a unique marketing approach lately, now they are advertising with one of the memorable characters from Dynasty Warriors Lu Bu but earlier this year they had a bit different advertisement using anime as their sales driver.
To coincide with the massive revival of the Hunter x Hunter series (the return of the manga and the anime reboot), Shueisha have announced that they will be releasing compilation volumes of the series. Not only will this be quite handy for those just jumping in to the series, it’s also great for those who have yet to collect the series.
