Loot for Oct 29-Nov 5

It probably seems like I don’t actually watch much anime or play much games. I certainly haven’t been keeping a steady flow of content here. However I figured I’d post what I’ve acquired within the last week alone to show that I do, in fact, enjoy and purchase anime and games. Scrubs too.

Click for full-size.

I’ll list what these actually are:
Row 1
-The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya: Special Editions vol 3 & 4 (Complete)
-Eureka 7 Special Editions vols 9 & 10
Row2
-Fighting Spirit/Hajime no Ippo Complete Collections vol 1 & 2 (Complete)
-Gundam the Movie: Char’s Counterattack
-Scrubs season 6 (one of these things is not like the others…)
Row 3
-Virtua Fighter 5 for 360
-Ace Combat 6 for 360
-Zack & Wiki for Wii (this game is all kinds of good. I’m thinking of making a post about it in the future)
-Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations for DS
-Flash Focus: Vision Training in Minutes a day for DS(I really like these games. Once I get bored of them, I can give them to my mom as a gift…if she doesn’t go out and buy it herself)
-Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles for PSP

So there. Eight of these items I have already seen/played to completion in previous forms. Suzumiya, Eureka 7, Ippo I’ve seen on fansub. Virtua Fighter 5 I already had for PS3. I had already played the Japanese/English version of Gyakuten Saiban 3.

Please don’t ask how much all of this cost me. I really don’t want to think about it…

Microsoft’s E3 press event

Just finished watching the press conference. All of the games that they focused on (except one) will be out this year. Before I go to sleep (it’s after 2 AM here) I’ll run through some bullet points:

-Microsoft made a Wiimote–though more in Design rather than Function (one big ‘win’ button and other smaller buttons, but no motion sensing or pointing was mentioned)
-Resident Evil 5 made an appearance, but it’s not coming out this year. Everything else Microsoft mentioned is coming out this year
-Mass Effect, Lost Odyssey coming out this year. Fable 2 was barely mentioned, if at all, so that isn’t coming in 2007.
-They showed a live-action trailer for Halo 3. A little strange, but interesting.
-Gears of War PC
-Call of Duty 4
-They featured the Naruto 360 game for a while
-Peter Moore played the ‘Rock Band’ guitar and sang a little.
-Microsoft is releasing a Spartan Green (my words, not theirs) 360 to commemorate the launch of Halo 3. Some might call it Diarrhea green.
-Assassin’s Creed continues to look darn cool
-They stressed that GTAIV will have more content on 360 than ‘other platforms’, and VF5 will be online only on their console
-They announced a bunch of XBLA games, one of the notable ones being Marathon. There were lots of other stuff, including original Sonic and Golden Axe which they said were available *now*. Nifty.
-Video Marketplace, announced partnership with Disney (which includes Miramax and some other stuff). They showed a whole bunch of movies from that group, then announced that all of the movies that they just showed were available on Marketplace *now*. Nifty again.
-Played some PGR4, showed off the bikes
-Other stuff. I’m tired, it’ll be all over the net soonish anyway.
-Closed with a Halo 3 gameplay/story trailer. Wasn’t terribly impressed, but it was fine.

I thought it was an ok show. Outside of the Wiimote and RE5 showing up, there wasn’t anything particularly unpredictable or shocking. I was watching it both through Gamespot’s live feed and on G4, but G4 kept going to commercials at the most random and inappropriate times. Mass Effect trailer? Commercial. Call of Duty 4 demo? Commercial. Halo 3 trailer at the end? ‘nother commercial. Good thing the Gamespot channel was about 15 seconds behind the G4 broadcast, so I didn’t miss anything.

Anyway. I sleep.

Virtua Fighter 5 on 360 will be online.

Sega, no doubt feeling the pressure from Namco, revealed that the 360 version of Virtua Fighter 5 will feature online play.

I have no regrets. I knew it was coming for the 360 before I picked up my PS3 and was thinking of waiting, but certain news about the PS3’s future caused me to get one early.

It’s unknown whether or not they will update the PS3 version to do this. One theory that was floating around back in the ‘no-way-vf-is-gonna-be-online’ days was that if the Console games featured online play, no one would go to play in the arcades anymore. If this was/is Sega’s way of thinking, putting VF5 online on the 360 isn’t a big deal. Japan, for the most part, doesn’t care about the 360 so putting it online there won’t eat into the arcade market.

I’ll probably buy it again for the 360 depending on what exactly is being done online. I don’t intend to do much online fighting, as my latency is horrible. But if they offer downloadable updates to costumes and stuff that the PS3 won’t see, I’ll definitely get it. Also, Achievements.

Trix is here.

I’m just a guy living in the middle of nowhere (Bermuda), who loves video games and anime. I’m also into technology related stuff, but games and anime are more of my expertise.

It was in late 2001 when I really started getting deep into video games and anime: I had some income so I bought a Gamecube, and I started downloading unlicensed fansubs of some anime. I’ve actually missed most things gaming-and-anime-related that happened before 2001.

Gaming-wise, I like to say that the NES came out the same year I did. My dad got one a few months after I was born, for himself, and that was the only console I had up until 2001, when I bought myself a Gamecube. I have had all of the gameboys, but no SNES, Genesis, PS1… you get the deal. So this means I had never played any Final Fantasy, never played Zelda, or most other big old-school games.

On the anime front, I had *seen* anime before, but didn’t know what exactly it was. There was a religious program called ‘Superbook’, that was probably my first anime. My parents didn’t let me get into Transformers, because at the time there was a big stink about Evolution and religion, and Transformers were the devil. Later on in life, I saw Dragon Ball Z on Cartoon Network, and that is what sparked my true interest in anime. It wasn’t until 2001 that my world was blasted open by the internet, and digital fansubs became a part of my life.

Still, before 2001 all I had was what was on Cartoon Network. To put into perspective how much stuff I missed, I only watched Evangelion for the first time in November of 2006.

My game/anime fandom is stronger than ever now. I actually went to Japan, by myself, in September 2006. I participated in the Tokyo Game Show (there were more people in those 3 warehouses than there were in my entire country), watched some raw anime on local TV, and took in a few of the historical sites in and around Tokyo. A few highlights were: visiting Toshogu Shrine, meeting Hideo Kojima, and beating some Japanese people in Virtua Fighter 5.
So there’s a brief history of my history. Please pardon any future comments on stuff that I may think is the newest, most innovative best-thing-ever, but has actually been around for a long time. Because I probably missed it. Your comments will definitely be appreciated, and will aid in my own education in these fields as well.