How To Screw Up An Ending In Three Easy Steps
First off, let it be known that THIS BLOG ENTRY WILL HAVE LOTS OF SPOILERS for various series, the endings of which I will use as examples of either good or bad endings to series. It's been a rather alarming trend that a lot of the shows I've been watching have: the really, REALLY bad ending to a really, REALLY good show. This has been popping up everywhere recently, and it's been bothering me a lot. So, to hopefully help better understand the mechanics of an ending, I'll be laying out what I think makes an ending good or bad (mostly bad) as well as examples of each. Again, THIS BLOG ENTRY WILL HAVE SPOILERS IN IT. Consider yourself warned.

1: Characters Out Of Nowhere

The foundation of a good show is a well-defined cast of chracters. Any good show will have its viewer feel as if they know everyone involved, and each of the characters will be a well-developed, deep backstory. However, every once in a while, a show feels the need to just randomly throw new characters into the mix near the end, and have them be major villains to be defeated by the heroes for no real reason. Most recently, the three shows that were most guilty of this were Berserk, Real Bout High School, and most notably, Trinity Blood. In Berserk, the last two episodes were so vastly removed, including a new villain (the king of the demons) who had come to turn Griffith into the lord of Midgard, the land in which Berserk takes place. This would be okay... if the show had even HINTED at this from the beginning. However, it never even tried to give its audience a hint of how the show would end, which was just confusing beyond belief. In Real Bout High School, a villain popped up in the last 15 minutes of the show, with no backstory and no real reason for existing, got jumped, and was defeated by the heroes. And in Trinity Blood, Cain Nightlord, Abel's world-destroying brother, decided to show up without warning and start destroying stuff all over the place. Introducing characters out of the blue is a BIG no-no, and really tends to screw up endings. There's only one show where it was pulled off effectively- Elfen Lied. The legendary third-generation Diclonius that was one of the big villains showed up. However, they spent the better part of an episode going over her story, and made her a major part of the ending, which was a good way to handle a late arrival in a show.

2: Just say no to the Deus Ex Machina

Deus Ex Machina literally means Device of the Gods. It refers to how in ancient plays, when things looked bleakest, one of the Gods would roll up on everyone and fix everything. The Deus Ex Machina is actually really quite a cheap play, a way to fix things without even trying. When the writers really can't think of any other way to fix the screw-ups that they've unleashed on the main characters, the Deus Ex Machina makes it all better. Trinity Blood was quite guilty of this in the end of the show. A bad judgment call leaves Abel on the wrong side of a vicious attack, which quite abruptly ends our hero's life. Yet, when things look bleak, Cardinal Sforza manages to conjure up some black liquid from Abel's mother (another character that never really gets explained) to bring him back to life, just in time to stop Abel from destroying everything. Nothing about this black liquid is ever explained: Where it's from, what it is, what it does, how it works... only that it brings Abel back to life at full power somehow. Cheap beyond belief. Berserk does the same, but in the opposite. Things are going smoothly... up until the point in time where the "Egg of Kings" turns out to summon a bunch of demons to take over the world and make Griffith the lord of the world. No warning, just LOL SUP DEMONS.

3: Backstory, Backstory, Backstory

Backstory is the explanation of things that happen before the beginning of a show. Some shows, like Gungrave, are ALL backstory. The entirety of the show is a flashback, with the exclusion of the first two and last 4 episodes. Backstory is one of the ways that late arrival characters can be reconciled, by showing what makes them so evil or good or powerful or whatever they're supposed to be. Trigun does this well. Knives shows up four episodes before the ending, but the second to last episode, Rem Saverem, is ENTIRELY constructed out of the backstory between Vash and Knives. Trinity Blood, however, seems to just ignore this. Cain shows up, and they go into a small backstory sequence. This sequence introduces new characters that have never been seen before, as well as some odd plot points. The point of backstory is that it ANSWERS questions that come up in the introduction of new characters. Yet the backstory behind Cain and Abel does nothing but create new questions that never get answered.

Next time, I'll be going over how a series can end correctly, as well as more examples of good and bad endings. Until Next Time...
01:28 PM PST Permalink |

Trinity Blood- Yet Another Disappointment
I'm sensing a trend here. A trend that is rather alarming, unfortunate, and just tends to get on my nerves. This is the third series that has done this to me recently, and has really annoyed the hell out of me recently. Series' that are AWESOME throughout, then get to the end, and suddenly and mysteriously ruin themselves, either by adding new characters out of the blue, using convoluted plot points that make no sense in the context of the show, leaving out key details of backstory, or leaving relationships unresolved after everything is said and done. Most unfortunately, Trinity Blood, the latest series that I set my sights on, is guilty of all of these sins that make an excellent show fall apart in the home stretch.

Armageddon has occurred, and much of the world has been thrown into turmoil. All would have been lost, were it not for the guidance of the two great powers in the new world- The Vatican, seat of power of what appears to be the new Holy Roman Empire; and The Empire, land of the Methuselah, a race of vampires residing in the area that was once the Middle East. An uneasy peace holds between the two sides, a kind of Cold War where petty conflicts in the buffer countries that prevents a full-blown invasion on either side. This uneasy peace is held together by members of the AX, a team that could be considered the "Special Forces" of the Vatican- While the Inquisitorial Committee could be considered a broadsword, a weapon with great power but little precision, the AX would be considered more of a scalpel, a directed team with the skill to handle whatever may come their way, but also the diplomatic prowess to keep the peace and make sure that a conflict doesn't come to blows (though they don't exactly demonstrate that much in the show).

There are a number of agents of the AX, but one of the higher-ranked ones would be Father Abel Nightroad, a clumsy, foolish priest with a consistent lament for his lack of money, and a penchant for tea so sugared up that it resembles something more similar to a syrup than an actual beverage. And yet for all his seemingly inefficient style of investigation, Abel tends to be incredibly useful in the clutch. He goes from ditzy to serious at a moment's notice, and when things look grim, he always shows up to save the day. This is bolstered by the fact that Abel has a powerful secret that gives him the power to protect those he holds dear. Abel, seemingly being a relic of a greater time, is a Cruznik- a being made of flesh fused with Nano-machines to create a kind of uber-vampire, capable of drinking the blood of other vampires, as well as brandishing a massive scythe to cut down those who stand against him.

This show was absolutely AMAZING from start to... almost finish. But the last story arc brought with it all of the errors that I stated in the first paragraph, and those are just so damning that I can't say I advocate this show. It's excellent, but be prepared for a bit of a hollow ending.

Until Next Time...
01:29 PM PST Permalink |

Super Smash Brothers Brawl: The Next Generation of the Nintendo Beat-em-up
Every console has a defining game that makes people go out and snap it up as quickly as they can. (Except for Sony- that's one of their crippling failures). As Halo 3 was for the XBox 360, so is Super Smash Brothers Brawl for the Wii. Easily one of the best games for a new console by FAR, Brawl is one of the most hyped game releases in a very long time, eclipsing many of the other big releases of the year. Not that it doesn't deserve to be- it's one of the best games of the year, easily. The third in the series of popular games, Super Smash Brothers Brawl is based on a very simple, very effective idea. Take all the various heroes, villains, and main characters from all the most popular games, throw them into an arena, and have them beat the hell out of one another. Simple in concept, flawless in execution, the Super Smash Brothers series has been a major part of the Nintendo franchise for a long time coming, from the original Super Smash Brothers for the Nintendo 64, to Super Smash Brothers Melee for the Gamecube, to Super Smash Brothers Brawl for the Wii.

I went to a release party at the local Game Crazy, and it was absolutely massive, Over 400 copies had been pre-ordered, and about half of them were to be picked up at the stroke of midnight when the game first went on sale. They had a huge tournament, where the winner got a free copy of Brawl. Some excellent play went down. The winner won his best 2 out of 3 match with absolutely excellent play of Marth and Bowser. I got to get some decent play in, playing for the first time in about a year. I wasn't THAT rusty, playing a decent Captain Falcon, Samus, and Marth, but I really could have done quite better. In any case, I really hope to finally buy my Wii and grab a copy of Brawl ASAP.

Until Next Time...
02:09 PM PST Permalink |

Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney - The New Generation of Justice
I'm such a liar.

I swore up and down that I wouldn't like this game. I mean, it had so much going against it. First off, they decided that the best way to make the series fresh was to almost entirely discard the cast of the Phoenix Wright games in exchange for a new set of characters. No more Edgeworth. No Gumshoe. None of the Fey family... In my mind, it was a recipe for disaster. Fixing what isn't broken never worked well for any game series. And yet, despite the fact that I was so vehemently opposed to the IDEA of Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, I found myself last week in my local Game Crazy once again, plunking down the 35 dollars for the game.

And you know what? It wasn't that bad. It was actually a lot better than I'd expected it to be. They created a thoroughly decent cast of characters that, while not as amusing as the cast of Phoenix Wright, still add a lot to the game. Apollo is (as expected) the same kind of nervous, inexperienced, not very confident attorney. Trucy is just too freakin' cute... and while she's probably my favorite character of the game, I'd take Maya any day over her. Phoenix pops up again, sort of in the same role that Mia played in the PW games. And the new detective, Ema Skye, is one of the few returning characters from the old games, being the sidekick character for "Rise From The Ashes," the DS-only case that was added to the first Phoenix Wright game.

However, here's the part of the review that I've been dreading writing. My first problem... is that the game is short. WAY short. To put it in perspective, I spent more time beating the final case of Trials & Tribulations than I did beating the entire game of Apollo Justice. This is a devastating weak point, given that the game has absolutely nil in replay value. My second real qualm with the game is just how... not compelling the last case is compared to the last cases of the other games. Each of the other cases has had a main villain- the real murderer- who is just such a reprehensible human being that when you finally lock them away... And that just isn't there in the last case of Apollo Justice.

But by far, my biggest issue is the prosecutor. I actually liked Klavier Gavin... and therein lies the problem. Edgeworth was always condescending, overconfident, and knew what you were going to say before you even said it, and already had an answer. Manfred... was everything Edgeworth was (like mentor, like student), but to a MUCH greater degree. Franziska was abusive, yet was always able to shut down your case to such a great degree that recovery seemed impossible. And Godot... was consistently so aloof, never being bothered by anything, and always knowing exactly where the weak point of your case was, and exploiting that to the fullest. Compare that to Gavin... He almost seemed to be COACHING you through the case.

In any case, Apollo Justice is a decent addition to the series. It may not live up to the high standard set by the other games, but it's still decent in its own right. Until Next Time...
02:43 PM PST Permalink |

Your Webcomic is Bad, and You Should Feel Bad
No, I don't mean you specifically. However, it's pretty easy to spot bad ones... most of the time.

Good thing there's John Solomon, the man behind Your Webcomic is Bad, and You Should Feel Bad. Your Webcomic Is Bad is a blog written by John Solomon (a pseudonym) that searches the internet for webcomics of mediocre or bad quality, then posts long, involved rants about why each webcomic is bad. Now, anyone can talk down about a webcomic, but the thing that sets this blog's reviews apart from others is that the author actually takes the time to read through the comic and write about specific instances of bad writing, art style, and general lack of depth in character development and dialog. Combine this style of writing and reviewing with his standard anger and hate-filled rants, and it becomes an incredibly amusing blog.

One of the excerpts from his blog on Dominic Deegan, one of the worst webcomics that I've ever read:

"Dominic Deegan is a webcomic so bad you'd think it was hosted on an ancient Indian burial ground. It's so unwaveringly terrible it might as well be a universal constant. It's so bad that it spoils milk. It's so bad that your computer will physically smell when you load the page, an aroma of brimstone, decaying meat and burning feces that will linger for days afterward. It is so bad that none of what I have just said does justice to how bad it is."

Check out the rest of his work at Your Webcomic is Bad and You Should Feel Bad. Until Next Time...
02:20 PM PST Permalink |

Manga As The New Medium
Manga and Graphic Novels have exploded in popularity in the past couple years. Acting as a revival of the popularity of old-school comic books, but integrating complex stories with heavy action in order to create an atmosphere that draws in readers. This atmosphere has recently found itself not only used as a source of entertainment, but also as a way to make old ideas accessible to a new audience. To this end, Ajinbayo Akinsiku has released The Manga Bible: From Genesis to Revelation, a graphic novel version of the Bible aimed to make the original text much more accessible to a younger audience. With a greater emphasis on action and faster pacing, Akinsiku hopes to bring the Bible to people who are normally too intimidated to take the first step.

One notable part of the Manga Bible is its presentation of old characters with modern interpretations. Characters such as Noah are given a fresh model. During the counting of the Ark's animals, a miscount leads Noah to exclaim, "That'€™s 11,344 animals? Arggh! I'€™ve lost count again. I'€™m going to have to start from scratch!" On the other side of the coin, Christ is shown as a touch of a revolutionary, stirring up trouble and acting like a general tough guy rather than the traditional savior that he's portrayed as.

You can read more about this in this NY Times article. Until Next Time...
05:53 PM PST Permalink |

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann- Drilling Through To The Heavens
Once again, I'm constantly on the lookout for new and cool Anime series to watch. Unfortunately, my sources are dwindling. However, I sometimes come across a couple amazing finds now and then... Case in point? Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. An anime so excellent that despite the fact that it hasn't actually been released in America yet, it's still managed to find its way around the internet, garnering incredible amounts of praise everywhere it goes. Eager to see if the hype was actually true or not, I went and grabbed one of the many fansubbed versions floating around on the net. What I found was that Tengen Toppa is an excellent series that deserves all of the praise it gets (something that I rarely can say about many Anime).

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann takes place in a bleak world where every human being is confined to underground villages, forced to live on meager resources and dig their way through the ground to expand their village and get more ground for their insubstantial lives. However, there is one that wishes to break free of all of this: Kamina, a fiery-spirited warrior whose own short-lived experiences on the surface create in him a hunger to return and make his mark on the world. The problem is that Kamina's viewed as a troublemaker by everyone in the village. Everyone but Simon, that is. Simon is Kamina's trusted friend, as well as one of the premier diggers in the city. But when he finds a mysterious drill pendant, and a small robot to which the pendant seems to act as a key, Simon and Kamina's luck turns around.

As this is happening, the peace of the village is disturbed by a couple invaders- Yoko, a woman from the surface wielding a gigantic rifle, and a gigantic robot called a Ganmen. The two arrive locked in fierce battle, and things are looking grim for Yoko- that is, until Simon shows up with his newly-found Lagann (The name given to the mini-Ganmen found by Simon) and defuses the situation. Of course, this is the chance that Kamina's been waiting for to bust through to the surface and make his mark. But when Simon and Kamina get to the surface, they find that even existing on the surface is a monumental task, as the Ganmen, robots controlled by the beastmen who run the surface world, mount daily attacks on the last pocket of resistance on the surface. Recognizing this as his chance to make his mark, Kamina devotes himself to freeing the surface world from the beastmen, whatever it takes. Dragging along Simon for the ride, the fight for survival on the surface may have the strength to launch a counter-attack.

While the show seems straight-forward, there's much more to it than my meager plot synopsis can show. Tengen Toppa is a lot more than your average mecha anime, and it has EASILY earned a place in my top ten anime of all time. It does, however, have that "Trigun" feel to it, where it's all fun and games up to the turning point, where the real drama kicks in. Still, there are twists and turns around every corner in Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, and this makes it a phenomenal series to watch. I eagerly await its release in North America.

Until Next Time...
02:21 PM PST Permalink |

Immaterial and Missing Power- Touhou Shooter-Fighter Hybrid
I have a friend that is always up on the oddest games. In addition, he's a HUGE fan of all the fighting games that are out there. (King of Fighters, Street Fighter, Dead Or Alive, and especially the fan-made general fighting game console MUGEN) So every once in a while, he tells me about a game that I should play, and I usually humor him. I've never been that much of a fighting game fan, so I'm usually skeptical of his suggestions. But every once in a while, there's a gem that he tosses me. The most recent of those is Immaterial and Missing Power, a shooter-fighter hybrid from the Touhou Project, a series of arcade-style shooting games. While the main game is in Japanese, almost all of the menus are in English, so it's not impossible to maneuver through the game.

Immaterial and Missing Power, or IaMP for short, is primarily a fighting game. However, what sets it apart from other fighting games is the control system. All of the characters are rather slow in melee- at least slower than in most fighting games. However, when you are a certain distance away from your opponent, your controls fire projectiles rather than using melee attacks. Using projectiles requires energy that regenerates quickly, but if you fire too many projectiles at the same time, you'll be too drained to use any more, as well as reducing your ability to block effectively. Projectiles can be grazed (avoided) by either using certain attacks with grazing frames or dashing through them. For this reason, the gameplay of Immaterial and Missing Power is a balance between being able to mix it up effectively in melee and fighting well at range. Each character has their own moveset that emphasizes their own strengths and weaknesses, and each character is different to master. There are 11 characters in all: 6 standard, four secret, and one extra.

Reimu Hakurei- Generally balanced between melee and ranged. Very maneuverable. A good beginning character.

Marisa Kirisame- Another generally balanced character, with slightly more emphasis on melee attacks.

Alice Margatroid- Fights using puppets. For this reason, many of her attacks have significant windup, so it takes a bit more skill to use her effectively. Very effective if used correctly.

Sakuya Izayoi- Fights using thrown knives. A good balanced character, focusing on speed and agility. Works on the principle that you can't hurt what you can't hit.

Patchouli Knowledge- VERY good projectile ability, but incredibly slow and weak in melee. The key to using her is to fight at a distance as much as possible, wearing the enemy down over time.

Youmu Konpaku- Incredibly effective in melee, and very maneuverable. However, slow and not very powerful in range. The key is to get in close and fight up in the opponent's face.

Remilia Scarlet- The first secret character. Easily the fastest character in the game, and thus very effective with hit-and-run attacks. Medium power at range, but the ability to switch between melee and ranged quickly and seamlessly covers this weakness.

Yuyuko Saigyouji- Very, VERY slow movement, but great power and area in her attacks, with decent execution speed. Hard to get used to, but very strong.

Yukari Yakumo- Decent movespeed with slow, powerful attacks. If used correctly, she's rather strong, but outclassed by a number of other characters.

Suika Ibuki- The drunken oni, and boss of IaMP. Rather slow attacks, but VERY powerful. Unlike Yukari, though, she's quite fast and maneuverable, and generally has a better time landing her hits. While many of her moves are hard to hit with, if they hit, they do excellent damage.

Hong Meirin- The extra character- has no story mode, and an odd moveset. Most of her projectiles are more useful in close, so it's hard to use her effectively, as there's a VERY small window between where her projectiles kick in and where they can hit. Powerful, but hard to get used to.

The single-player is divided up into Arcade Mode and Story Mode. In Arcade Mode, you just fight your way through the characters. However, in Story Mode, you have to fight through a pre-determined set of opponents. Furthermore, these opponents have "story mode spellcards" which give them additional movesets to fight you with. Story Mode is much harder than Arcade Mode for this reason, but it's an excellent challenge. Also, through use of an open-source program, you can fight with friends over the internet. An excellent game, Immaterial and Missing Power is a fun hybrid that is sure to please any fan of either genre.

Until Next Time...
03:50 PM PST Permalink |

The Black Belt Testing

Yesterday, I completed one of the biggest milestones in my life: Getting my Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do. I've been taking Tae Kwon Do for around 10-11 years, and I've been working up to this day for most of my life.

Generally, testings aren't that big a deal: First off, it's not really a test. All of the actual testing is done beforehand in class the week before. Second, all the testing usually is is a glorified class where the people testing show off what they've learned in class. However... the Black Belt testing is different. It's basically an endurance run where over three hours, your body is taxed to its limits by drills, forms, sparring, board breaking, and the like. Somewhere in the middle of this insane ordeal, the teacher asks the question that you want to hear the least: "Why are you doing this?" Now, normally, the question would be obvious. However, the placement of the question is directly after the most difficult part of the testing, placed such that if, just for a split second, you wonder why you're actually doing it. The temptation is there to say that you don't know or that you just want to give up. But the point is that even when it comes to that, you'll still go on.

Notably difficult parts include doing all fourteen (?!?) forms back-to-back. It's hard enough to keep a couple forms in your head, but to get the black belt, you have to know ALL of the standard forms. And while each form may not be tiring in and of itself, when you put all 14 of them together, it's quite the challenge. Next comes the moment of truth. There's a kick in Tae Kwon Do, a martial art known for its kicks, where you have to step behind to do a spinning roundhouse kick. Now, while incredibly powerful and rather fast, this kick is tiring beyond belief. And... for the test, I had to do 70 of them. Seventy. Back to back. And, after only a short break, I had to do my final form. There are not words for the difficulty of this task. However, I struggled through it, and managed to make it to the end. The final test is something my father refers to as the "Circle of Death." Basically, I'm in a sparring ring, and three Black Belts are outside the ring. One at a time, they come in, rotating, so while I'm tired out, they're always fresh and ready to go. The rotating continues on for about three minutes, until one by one, the remaining two black belts come into the ring, and I have to fight all three of them off at the same time, in a small space, without being cornered or surrounded. As tough as that sounds, I actually did rather alright given the circumstances.

And at the end of it all, I can now look forward and say that no matter what I have to come up against in the future, it won't be harder than the Black Belt Testing. Until Next Time...
03:42 PM PST Permalink |

The Legend of Zelda: The Phantom Hourglass- A New Twist On An Old Franchise
There's been a long-standing fight between the various console makers for control over the large Video Game market, especially with the price of a console going so high that often it comes down to choosing between one or the other. So in the end, each console has to come up with gimmicks to make it more fun. To this end, each major company has solidified their hold on the market with their specific strong suits. The XBox 360 has all the amazing, high-intensity action games- Halo 3, Call of Duty 4, etc. Sony decided to create an entire multimedia experience- High-definition video for all of their games, Blu-ray video for the PS3, and the UMD for the PSP. However, Nintendo decided to go in a different direction. "How can we change the nature of the video game, and make it more fun?" The answer? New controls. Between the Touch Screen of the DS and the motion-sensor Wii Remote and Nunchuk, the Wii and the DS have changed the way games are played.

The best example of this is the latest offering in the age-old Legend of Zelda series: The Phantom Hourglass. Controlled entirely by the touch-screen (odd for a real-time RPG), Phantom Hourglass makes full use of every single new feature of the DS to play. You yell into the microphone to call out to characters, blow on it to blow out flames and fill windmills, you can write on your map, and there's even a part of the game where you have to close the DS in order to mimic pressing the pages of a book together.

It being a Legend of Zelda game, The protagonist is, of course, Link. And, as always, you're rescuing the beautiful Princess Zelda. However, the setting has changed dramatically. Link is a young swordsman under the command of Terra, a pirate captain. Terra just so happens to be Princess Zelda, though, so it works out. Or at least it would, if she hadn't been kidnapped by an evil Ghost Ship that has been abducting people. After Link finds himself unable to board the Ghost Ship and save Terra, he washes up on an island that is home to the mysterious Oshus, who teaches Link swordplay and sends him on his way. After meeting Linebeck, the stingy, cowardly, treasure-obsessed captain of the S.S. Linebeck, Link embarks on a journey that will take him to all the corners of the map in search of the Ghost Ship, his friend Terra, and the great evil that controls the fate of all the lands.

An amazing addition to the Legend of Zelda series, The Phantom Hourglass truly shows what the DS is capable of, in grand style. Until Next Time...
11:17 PM PST Permalink |

Texhnolyze- From The Mechanical To The Spiritual
I've never been much for the mainstream Anime. Chances are, if it's been on TV, and there's a huge following, I hate it. This leads me to seek out the lesser-known shows, in hopes that the lack of hype is hiding an above-average show. What I found was an odd, off-beat drama that takes a while to start up, but once it does, becomes a complex and involved story.

Texhnolyze takes place in the dark city of Lux, a city wracked with gang warfare. The reigning power is the Orugano, a group that uses a mineral called Raffia, which is not produced anywhere but Lux, to make the integration of robotic limbs into the human body possible. This process is called Texhnolyzation, and is pioneered by a mysterious doctor obsessed with using Texhnolyzation to perfect the human form. To this end, she bestows a pioneer new model of Texhnolyze Limbs on Ichise, a former pit fighter who loses an arm and a leg in a dispute with a local gang. Through this act of charity, Ichise finds himself indebted to the Orugano, which is becoming splintered due to infighting between the various council members. And behind the scenes... there is Ran, a mysterious young girl who evidently has the power to see one of many possible futures for a person.

This show reminded me somewhat of .hack//SIGN, in that it has no real comedic value, and is light on the action, but concentrates more on the philosophical aspects and dramatic buildup of character, which can act as a turn-off to many people. And as much as I'd like to recommend this series entirely, I must say that the first couple episodes are INCREDIBLY drab and boring, and it's tough to get through them. There's barely 3 lines of dialogue in the whole first episode. However, if you can get through the first disk, the rest comes easily. Until Next Time...
05:05 PM PST Permalink |

Heroes of Mana- Strategy Hybrid For The DS
I'm always looking for new games to play, too. This Christmas brought me a $25 Gift Card to Game Crazy, the offshoot of Hollywood Video that buys, sells, and trades new and used games for all consoles. I used the gift card to pick up Heroes of Mana, the latest game in the long-standing Mana series that goes back all the way to the Super Nintendo. Of course, with the advent of the DS has come a number of interesting new control possibilities, and Heroes of Mana takes advantage of them very well.

The main character is Roget, a scout in the Peddan army, on a recon mission to the nation of the Beastmen. However, when the scouting party arrives, they find that instead of a simple scouting mission, they are acting as a diversion for a surprise strike on the capital. Now finding themselves on the opposite end of their country, the five members of the scouting party- Roget, Yurchael, Qucas, Gemiere, and D'Kelli must seek out allies from all the countries and unite to defeat the corrupt Peddan Lord, whose actions herald a far greater catastrophe about to befall the world of Mana.

The game plays out with a style similar to an odd hybrid of Fire Emblem and Command and Conquer. You control Leader Units, which are stronger-than-average units that lead your troops on the battlefield. However, unlike most Strategy RPGs, your leaders are not your main fighting force. You are equipped with the Nightswan, a carrier that has the unique ability to build summoning structures and use them to summons combat units. Your leader units give a bonus to these summoned units, and by using them in tandem, you can create a capable fighting force to take on your foes. To keep up your army, you must gather Gaia Stones for building structures, and Treant Berries to summon units. Control is entirely touch-screen-based, though you can use the D-pad to move your view around.

Certainly a unique game, Heroes of Mana is fun for anyone that likes a good RTS. It's easy to learn, hard to master. Until Next Time...
05:11 PM PST Permalink |

Howl's Moving Castle- Slipped Under The Radar
Every once in a while, I wonder how it's possible for me to miss certain movies, but they just tend to slip through the cracks from time to time. This is one of those times. I was recently over at a friend's house, when she decided to show me a movie she'd picked up from the library. I was pretty stunned that I'd never gotten around to watching it: Howl's Moving Castle. One of the works from Hayao Miyazaki of Studio Ghibli, Howl's Moving Castle is a charming movie with just as much appeal for kids as for adults.

Sophie, the main character, works in a hat shop in her home town of Kingsbury. Though still in her youth, she acts as though she is an old maid, and has decided to work in the hat shop for the rest of her life as a service to her father, who originally owned the shop. However, when a chance encounter with the nefarious Witch of the Waste leaves her struck with a powerful curse that locks her into the body of an elderly woman, she decides to leave the town and hunt the Witch in an effort to regain her lost youth. Her journey takes her out into the wilderness, where she finds refuge in a great mechanical castle owned by a powerful wizard named Howl. However, when she learns of the fact that Howl is similarly cursed, she vows to find a way for him to break the curse and regain his lost heart.

One of the best parts of Howl's Moving Castle is its excellent vocal cast, including Christian Bale voicing Howl, Lauren Bacall voicing the Witch of the Waste, and Billy Crystal as Calcifer, the fire demon bound to Howl's service, who performs all the tasks of keeping the castle in order. While animated movies are usually geared for the kids, this movie has far more subtle plot points that make it a better choice for adults. A thoroughly charming and excellent movie, Howl's Moving Castle has a lot going for it. Until Next Time...
05:55 PM PST Permalink |

Stateside At Its Finest- The Simpsons Movie
It's one of the amazing miracles of television that a show like The Simpsons has lasted so long given its premises. It's always amazing to see an episode that you've never seen, and always find it to be new, fresh and entertaining. So when I heard about the Simpsons Movie, I was a touch worried. Can such an amazing show such as The Simpsons stretch itself out into an hour and a half long movie, and have all the humor of the original series?

I'm pleased to say that The Simpsons Movie was vastly better than I had expected, which is saying a lot, considering that I was already incredibly excited about the idea of a movie of The Simpsons. Featuring a souped-up title, fully redone intro, all the returning voice talents that give The Simpsons its charm, and a storyline befitting of the title, The Simpsons Movie is an excellent addition to the series.

Springfield finds itself in a crisis- massive amounts of pollution have turned the lake into a toxic waste dump. In order to quell the situation, the corrupt head of the EPA puts into effect a quarantine- a glass dome around Springfield, cutting it off from all outside contact. In an effort to fix the mistakes of their community, the Simpson family must find a way for Springfield to escape from its Snow-globe-esque existence, and save their community from a corrupt official.

With excellent humor, new characters that breathe life into the show, and gags ranging from Bart's naked skateboard ride through Springfield to Homer's adventures with "Spider-Pig," The Simpsons Movie delivers in all aspects. Until Next Time...
01:08 AM PST Permalink |

Jessica Renslow- Linguistic Wizard of Studiopolis Inc.
In the past several years, Anime has turned into a massive television industry, rapidly becoming one of the most popular forms of entertainment. All of this is due to the work of companies such as ADV and Viz, which search out new Anime and prepare it for release in the states. But with all of the hustle and bustle, flashy shows and star voice actors, it’s easy to forget about the people who make it possible for us to experience these new sights and sounds: the translators. On a daily basis, these linguistic wizards take what would be incomprehensible to many of us and transform it into media for the masses.

Jessica Renslow is one of these skilled translators, working as a "Resident Translator/Production Coordinator" for Studiopolis Inc., which works with Viz, TV Tokyo, Shonen Jump, Cartoon Network, Disney, and other animation and Manga companies. Born on Thanksgiving Day, 1980, in Gary, Indiana, she now lives in North Hollywood. "I live in a predominantly Latin neighborhood in North Hollywood, CA. It’s good practice for my Spanish!" An avid traveler, she has driven cross-country six times in the last year, in addition to a number of excursions to Europe and Asia, one of which found her living and working in the town of Pippu on Hokkaido, the northern island of Japan, from 2003 to 2006.

Read the full article on ThingsAsian.

Until Next Time...
11:39 PM PST Permalink |