More Marvellous Manga Mania Memories

June 16th, 2008 by Brack

ISSUE 4~! OCTOBER 1993~!

IN THE UK:

  • Manga Video were releasing Doomed Megalopolis II: Disaster, Crying Freeman II: The Enemy Within and Tetsuo II: The Bodyhammer.
  • Anime Projects had Hurricane Live 2032 & 2033 out.
  • And in computer games, ICE were releasing Akira for Commordore Amiga, CD32, PC and PC CD-ROM.

    Maybe in a later issue Wil Overton will overrate it in his videogame review section. Good lord, the tat that got 7/10s in that section of the magazine, this issue has SD Great Battle II getting the videogame review “average”.

IN THE US of A:

  • There had been some Anime Conventions and they were briefly, vaguely, reported on:
  • Anime America (25-27 June 1993) - 1200 attendance listed. Guests: Haruka Takachiho, Monkey Punch, Kenichi Sonoda and Megumi Hayashibara. Described as having great events, but poorly run.
  • Anime Expo (2-4 July 1993) - 1800 attendance listed (wikipedia gives 1,693). Guests: Well I don’t know, it lists a load, then says four didn’t show, but beyond mentioning Haruhiko Mikimoto not showing, I don’t know who the other three who didn’t show were. Described as having poor events (presumably down to lack of guests), but well organised.

    Depressing thought of the day: The biggest anime-based con in the UK is now roughly at the size of the Anime America of 1993 (and has been for the last few years), and it’s idea of a guest is Monica Rial.

  • CPM/US MANGA CORPS were releasing Venus Wars, Area 88 Act II
  • ANIMEIGO had Dagger of Kamui, Urusei Yatsura OAV Vol. 6
  • DARK IMAGE ENTERTAINMENT made with Devilman - The Birth of Devilman
  • US RENDITIONS released The Guyver Vol. 4.
  • Manga releases:
  • Dark Horse Comics: Caravan Kidd, Version 2.2
  • Eternity Comics: Robotech II: The Sentinels, Robotech: Return To Macross, Robotech: Invid War, Ninja High School, Zilliion
  • Viz Comics: Battle Angel Alita, Maison Ikkoku, Ranma, Genocyber, Sanctuary, Pixy Junket, Crying Freeman, Sanctuary, Nausicaa, Guyver, Silent Mobius
  • New Society Publishers: Barefoot Gen: Out of the Ashes

IN JAPAN:

  • The Cockpit
  • Dirty Pair
  • Votoms
  • Borgman
  • Idol Defense Force Hummingbird
  • Erotic Beast High School “Climax Collection”
  • KO Century Three Beastketeers II - Chapter 3
  • NG Knight Ramune & 40 DX, Chapter 3

    The Satoru Akahori script machine in full effect here.

  • A-Girl
  • Ah! My Goddess
  • Eight Man After
  • Epic Fantasy Ellcia
  • Chameleon 2 “Siblings From Hell”
  • Machine God Corps
  • No Need For Tenchi:Demon Emperor Ryou Special - The Night Before The Festival

    Still loving that translation

  • Bad Boys
  • Moldiver

ELSEWHERE:

  • Tsui Hark announced as directing the Mai the Psychic Girl live-action film.

    Did this ever get anywhere? I remember at one point reading Sparks had the rights to make the film.

Posted in Anime, Manga, Videogames | Tags: , | No Comments »

Final Fight

April 12th, 2008 by Brack

Posted in Animation, Stupidity, TV, Videogames | Tags: , , | No Comments »

Five Awesome Links

February 8th, 2008 by Brack

Ben Ettinger writes far more than we have any right to expect to see in the English language on the Tiger Mask anime.

WFMU’s Beware of the Blog dicusses “midcore” gaming

Twitch brings the noise on 20th Century Boys.

More from Twitch! Ani-Kuri 15

The Best of Oh Word in 2007

Posted in Anime, Film, Music, Videogames | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | No Comments »

Tetris? Not yet.

August 24th, 2007 by Brack

OK, I’ve just found tetrisconcept and I am going to peruse it further before spouting the insanity I wish to propose vis a vis tetris theory. If anything at least the probabilities will have already been calculated for me. Plus I love that there is a Tetris Guideline.

Posted in Videogames | | No Comments »

I am the Vic’s Vapour Rub of the internet.

July 10th, 2007 by Brack

First up it’s arguably the oddest anime OP theme of all time. Episode 24 of 80s anime Maison Ikkoku suddenly had 70s Irish singer-songwriter Gilbert O’Sullivan delivering the theme tunes. And by episode 25 he was gone again. Apparently it was an ill-fated attempt to promote his back catalogue.

Next it’s the all-star, never completed, insane 3DO video game Duelin’ Firemen.

Quite.

Posted in Anime, Videogames | | No Comments »

Five Awesome Links

February 27th, 2007 by Brack

Sumire, Age 17! - a review of what appears to be an odd and awesome and awesomely odd manga about a strange middle-aged ventriloquist who pretends his dummy is a 17 year old girl called Sumire. Apparantly there is a sequel, Sumire 16. Which you may be able to get fan translations of here.

Dave’s World - Home Of The Games Animal - Remember bandana’d, Dominik Diamond-mocked, talking head Dave Perry from Gamesmaster? Well here’s his website. Apparantly he is the GAMES ANIMAL! An object lesson in self-promotion.

Windows version of MB/GW’s HeroQuest boardgame - Remember when Games Workshop really tried to go mainstream with HeroQuest and Space Crusade? Well here’s one of those games as a Windows program.

Japan’s Anime Culture - A Foreign Press Center Japan briefing from Ryusuke Hikawa, the presenter of Anime Maestro. Talks about animation history, before discussing Mamoru Hosoda and The Girl Who Leapt Through Time.

Lucha Wiki - It’s a wiki all about people who have wrestled in Mexico at some time or other.

Posted in Manga, Role-playing Games, TV, Videogames, Wrestling | Tags: , , , , | No Comments »

2006 - Top 5 lists

January 1st, 2007 by Brack

TOP FIVE ALBUMS

5.
Ghostface Killah - Fishscale
4. Andrew WK - Close Calls With Brick Walls
3. Lupe Fiasco - Food & Liquor
2. The Lemonheads - The Lemonheads
1. The Coup - Pick A Bigger Weapon

Except The Coup's none of them are classic albums, just the albums with the greatest ratio of good:bad tracks.

TOP FIVE ANIME TV SERIES

5. Muteki Kanban Musume
4. Ouran Host Club
3. Black Lagoon The Second Barrage
2. Black Lagoon
1. Kemonozume

It seems I've spent more time watching shows from 2005 this year (Akagi, Noein, Keroro Gunso), so Black Lagoon gets to appear twice. Regardless, those top 4 shows make this year far better than 2005, and Kemonozume makes it on a par with 2004 (which had Paranoia Agent).

TOP FIVE TV SERIES PERFORMED BY HUMANS

5. Annually Retentive
4. Man To Man With Dean Learner
3. Doctor Who
2. The Colbert Report
1. The Daily Show

The Daily Show's marked improvement in the last 4 months or so just edged it. I also liked 30 Rock, The Office, Snuff Box, QI, Psych, That Mitchel And Webb Look, The I.T. Crowd and Monk.

TOP FIVE ADULT SWIM CARTOONS

5. Harvey Birdman, Attorney At Law
4. Moral Orel
3. Tom Goes To The Mayor
2. Venture Bros.
1. Korgoth of Barbaria

Korgoth annihilates any competition on the basis of it's pilot alone, because it's actually created by animators not comedy scriptwriters. Harvey Birdman is on it's last legs though.

TOP FIVE PODCASTS

5. Comic Geek Speak
4. Fast Karate For The Gentleman
3. Anime World Order
2. The Sound Of Young America
1. Wrestlecrap Radio

CGS can be annoying at times, but they do get good interviews. FKG has a good format. AWO is pretty good even if Daryl Surat has a tendancy to talk too fast when reading from a script and Clarissa annoyingly puts upwards lilts at the ends of sentances making everything sound like a question. But you tend to get at least one piece each show you wouldn't get elsewhere. TSOYA is awesome. Wrestlecrap Radio is endearingly shambolic.

TOP FIVE COMICS BLOGS

5. The Savage Critics
4. Dave's Long Box
3. Jog - The Blog
2. Mike Sterling's Progressive Ruin
1. Chris's Invincible Super Blog

TOP FIVE VIDEO GAMES THAT I BOUGHT BUT DIDN'T NECESSARILY COME OUT IN 2006

5. Capcom Classics Collection Vol. 1
4. Marvel Ultimate Alliance
3. Lego Star Wars II
2. WoW Monthly Subscription
1. We Love Katamari

Those are also the ONLY games I bought.

TOP FIVE COMICS

5. All Star Superman
4. Captain America
3. Daredevil
2. Nextwave
1. X-Factor

TOP FIVE THINGS I DIDN'T MENTION IN THE ABOVE LISTS

5. Zach Galifianakis
4. Hellsing Ultimate OAVs
3. Danny Baker's afternoon show on BBC London
2. John Hodgman's Areas Of My Expertise (Book and Audio Book versions)
1. That fight between Superman and Darkseid in the last episode of JLU

TOP FIVE FILMS

I don't think I watched any films released in 2006 due to my switch to online DVD rentals and Peterborough Showcase being crap.

Posted in Animation, Anime, Comics, TV, Videogames | | No Comments »

The greatest moment in videogame history:

October 4th, 2006 by Brack

Posted in TV, Videogames | Tags: , , | No Comments »