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Langrisser Re:Incarnation Tensei video game review- 35/100 (avoid it like the plague)

May 6, 2016 by K-Off, posted in Anime Reviews, Game Reviews

To preface, I’d call this the poor man’s Fire Emblem if it wasn’t so damn expensive for its quality, not to mention so difficult to find. Here in New York City outside of lower Manhattan, there’s game stores in Brooklyn, Queens, Flatiron, and Newport, to a total count of 12 game stores in a 20 mile radius, and not one location had this cursed game for a while. I certainly did not want to preorder this because the Japanese E-shop rated this game 1/5 stars at one point, and the way in which marketing constantly hit us over the head with the fan service characters did make me not want to buy the game at all. But I just got out of Fire Emblem Fates and finished Bravely Default, so I needed to try this series out for myself. I won’t even bother to structure this review like my Fates review, because it’s just that cynical, shallow, and undeserving of your money. I’m going to compare this game to Fire Emblem a lot, because that’s clearly what it wants me to do by riding on the coat tails of the Fire Emblem hype train.

It’s difficult to play this without thinking about why this was released in the first place.

Immediately upon jumping into the game, I noticed a lack of quality on the production end of things, despite its improvements from the Japanese version of the game. For one, the voices. God, the voices. It follows the Fire Emblem route of dialogue in that the characters say a short phrase followed by a line of text, but the voices still cut in and out inconsistently from time to time – this originally happened on the Japanese version a lot more and it doesn’t seem to have gotten much better in the NA localized version. Speaking of which, there is no sense of pacing, characters pop in and out of dialogue text scenes without even a fade transition and it’s pretty jarring to sit through when you start to say “where the hell did he/she come from?” to yourself. But the NA version is apparently a masterpiece compared to the initial state of the Japanese version last year. Whenever there was a transition from one scene to another, there was apparently an abrupt black screen for a few frames before it cut back into another scene. Those black frames are still there, but now they have fade transitions. Great job, they’ve finally remembered to do the basic minimum: test the game.

Look at this embarrassment. The game would have you believe these are two separate locations, and this happens only a minute apart from each other just minutes into the game.

That was the state of the game back then and it hasn’t gotten much better. It’s to the point where they reuse the same, bland backgrounds with a lazy color adjustment done in Photoshop just a minute after they last used it. You have to wonder if they even knew what they were doing when they were making this Fire Emblem clone or just didn’t care; I’m going with both. On the art department, there’s really nothing outstanding about any of it, it’s by Satoshi Urushihara and Hiroshi Kaieda so I suppose I expected better from them besides bland character designs, over-use of fan service, and the uncomfortable sheer number of half-naked loli characters. It’s not as if other JRPGs don’t have fan service, but once it begins going overboard I can tell that the developers are hoping to cover up the crappy game itself with pretty visuals and pandering fan service.

Lastly, the music is just terrible, it’s a stupid cluster of 10-15 second loops of generic fantasy rpg music, with bland rock music that isn’t rock, and it’s frankly just hilarious that they made a soundtrack CD, as if anyone would ever want to listen to this garbage ever again. Yet I know that with this situation, it’s a desperate attempt to try and attract as much buyers as possible, because they can’t possibly be proud of this soundtrack, very similar to the hole that Lord of Magna was in a few years ago. Yet at least Lord of Magna wasn’t a disaster, and it actually had a decent soundtrack.

The models are just lazy. Look at that puke-green grass.

Now, the gameplay. This is perhaps the most atrocious abomination I’ve ever seen as of late, surprising when all Langrisser has done is attempt to copy Fire Emblem’s combat mechanics. Since they just rushed it out the door in order to release the game at the same time as Fire Emblem Fates in Japan, everything is shallow, irritating, and half-assed. The battlescapes look like they were ripped straight from a 2006 DS game, the UI is awkward, the bottom screen is rarely used at all, and the battle animation scenes (as you can see above) are just utter trash. They didn’t bother to render a proper battle area and we get just a space with some textures and low-res buildings slapped onto it, with 3D sprite characters which were clearly not a stylistic choice – they did it because it would save time and money. Aside from the utterly garbage visuals of the gameplay, combat itself is very similar to Fire Emblem, with a rock-paper-scissor mechanic, except you can control multiple grunt units in addition to the main characters in your party. This sounds interesting, until you see just how boring it is in actual gameplay. There is little to no difference between different types of units, the range of your units is basically the same whether they’re on horseback or motorcycle (yes, an out of place steampunk motorcycle in a traditionally fantasy RPG). I haven’t played any of the original Langrisser titles so while I can’t say whether or not this game is an improvement, it brings nothing interesting to the table. Ultimately, the gameplay isn’t just simply a shallow rip-off. It’s a frustrating, uninteresting, and unbalanced experience that somehow managed to infuriate me within the first ten minutes. I wouldn’t recommend this even with a price drop.

~~K-Off~~

Storytelling:	5/10 – By-the-books-fantasy RPG story.
Gameplay:	2/10 – Unbalanced, clunky, and lazy.
User Interface:	3/10 – Messy, cluttered.
Production values:	4/10 – Decent-yet bland art, terrible music, lazy visuals, and buggy dialogue.

DanganRonpa 2: Goodbye Despair Video Game Review – 90/100

There may be those of you who know this series more by its anime adaption instead of it’s video games and if you haven’t watched the anime of this I highly recommend that you don’t watch it. Instead play the games which have been recently ported to Steam. The reason I say this is that due to the decision to make the anime a one cour length it essentially cut down the story into its bare necessities. The anime of Danganronpa is essentially the barest cliff notes of the game and most importantly removes its greatest aspect. For you see when this anime was announced people compared it to the likes of battle royale. Speaking purely mechanically it’s gameplay is actually very similar to Phoenix Wright. But at it’s core is a murder mystery. Hence why watching the anime first is a bad idea as it spoils the answers to the mystery before giving you any chance to speculate. Lucky for myself I played the first DanganRonpa before the anime aired and found it to be an excellent game. It’s sequel to me however is a much better title. If you are into online poker or mobile sports betting, GCB licensed operators are a perfect choice. Visit https://nonukcasinos.uk/category/casino-licencing to read more.

The story begins with our protagonist about to attend Hope academy which is a school dedicated to the best of the best. However upon entering the academy he falls unconscious and finds himself and fifteen other students stuck on an Island with some strange stuffed bunny telling them that to get off the island they all need to get along. Despite how odd it is everyone decides that they might as well enjoy their time on the island. Naturally this peace doesn’t last long as Monokuma appears and once again forces the class to play in a killing game where the person who manages to kill someone and get away with it in a class trial can then leave the Island. The plot is quite similar to it’s predecessor but has a more interesting set of eccentric characters and a deeper mystery regarding the island. From the excitement and enjoyment of playing casino games using this 먹튀 verification, you will easily forget that particular issue that is stressing you and ride in the wave of fun and excitement. With Monomi, Monokuma now has the yang to oppose his Yin as Monomi encourages the group to work together while Monokuma tries to turn them against one another. Though both mascots annoy the hell out the characters. Monokuma is the same as he was before, balancing his silly humor with a level of undertoned malice. I originally wasn’t too fond of his english voice but as I played the game I found it fit quite well. Monomi has an attitude if trying to be cute that gets on the characters nerves and often she’s being put down or reduced to tears despite her optimistic efforts to get people to not fall for Monokuma’s provoking. However both of them are clearly hiding the truth from the students for different reasons. As for the students themselves, at first they seem like one dimensional characters defined by their “Ultimate” talent but the game does allow them to develop though it’s mechanics and how the story turns out.

This game is truly a game to be played by those who have experienced the first though it can be played with no knowledge of the first game. But this is meant to be played after playing the first game as their are plenty of things here which reference the first game. But what I love about this is how this game makes use of your assumptions gained from the first game and uses them to trick you into a certain line of thought. Basically there are point in this story which makes you think it’s rethreading on the story of the first game only to laugh in your face and toss it aside. This is pretty clever writing that knows how to get you thinking in a certain way but I have some pride in that I managed to figure out a good deal of the mysteries it presents. But I never managed to nail everything down. Something usually escaped my notice. The characters this time around I would argue are stronger than the first in that there isn’t someone here I could consider background decoration. The first game had a couple of characters who just were rather bland or had nothing really to contribute to the game. Out of a cast of sixteen characters, everyone here has their interesting points and are a worthy addition to the story. I would say the weakest would be the Ultimate team manager and the mechanic but even they have a part to play. What I think is a true mark of genius though is in how one of these characters is used as a kind of secondary antagonist. I originally didn’t think much of them at first but once they showed their worth they proved to be one of the best characters in the game. I especially love the comparison between them and a character from the first game. You have the choice between Japanese and english voices but l say you can’t lose out either way. I played the english dub and frankly it’s perfect. Some truly outstanding performances, especially when a character goes completely insane.(They are rather insane from the start due to their own eccentricities but when they go insane, they really go full throttle insane.) The soundtrack is very good though tracks are reused from the first game and new versions would have been appreciated. The graphics are strange in that I don’t think DanganRonpa is trying to be visually impressive but rather just trying to have style. For most of the game the world looks like a diorama with cardboard figurines. It’s strange but it doesn’t work well. Either way you aren’t here to see pretty graphics and there are some rather clever effects applied sometimes. Their is a keyboard and mouse support but it is awkward for the menus with still require you to use keys instead of a mouse to navigate it. It works decently and the mouse gives some nice precision but recommend using a controller over it for an optimal experience.

The mechanics of the game truly are very similar to Phoenix Wright. there are six chapters and each chapter takes place in three stages; a free time stage, an investigation stage and a trial stage. The free time stage is a period before the murder which is mainly setting up the murder and seeing how everyone is handling the situation. You can walk around the Island and talk to certain characters to get to know them better. Though time passes as you talk to a character and as you grow closer you get things called “Hope Fragments”. Getting all the hope fragments in your first playthrough is impossible as it requires you to know who is going to get murdered so you can get all their hope fragments before they are taken out of the game. But you do unlock a Island mode that allows you to collect them at your leisure upon completing the game. You also unlock a DanganRonpa IF novel written by Ryohgo Narita. This system is similar to Persona’s social links system but it doesn’t really grant any benefits besides some extra character development and the ability to purchase skills to use in the trials. The skills are rather superficial though and you can get through the trials without them easily. The investigation stage is just that, a murder happens and you must look around for clues. This mainly involves clicking on areas to find evidence and asking characters about the murder. The game pretty much makes it impossible to miss evidence as it suggests you look around again if you happen to have not clicked on something. You cannot proceed to the trial stage until you have gathered all the evidence. The trial stage is where things get really heated up as it acts as a series of mini-games which make use of the evidence you have gathered. The key to it is to find contradictions in what people are saying by using the right evidence that disproves their statement. For example, if the autopsy report states the victim was stabbed and then during the court trial a person claims the victim was shot, you can use the autopsy report to disprove their claim. This is exactly as Phoenix wright worked but their is some differences. In Phoenix wright you could go through a person’s statement at your leisure but in DanganRonpa you are placed in a rail shooter styled game where characters words appear on screen as they say them and you must load your chosen evidence into a gun and fire the words at a highlighted statement to contradict it. This is odd but a satisfying way of landing a hit as you manage to push the trial forward. However sometimes it can be difficult to distern just what piece of evidence the game wants you to put forward even if you have figured out how the murder happened. At times knowing what statements to counter and what evidence to use can be a matter of trial and error.This isn’t the only mini-game in the trial however and this is where I find DanganRonpa falls short. The main mini-game remains the same as the original but the others have been changed for what seems to me just for the sake of differentiation. Most of the games are a nice change of pace but one of them is an absolute chore to get through. That is Hangmans Gambit. This is a minigame that requires you to put together a word like hangman but the process of doing so is slow, needlessly complicated and just a drag to play. I failed the game on my first attempt simply because I didn’t understand how it worked despite it being explained to me. I figured it out on my second try but it didn’t make the game any less tedious as it basically involved you waiting for the game to put the letter you need on screen. You can speed it up by pressing the skip button but the fact is that this is not fun. It’s far more flustrating when you know what word you have to spell out but must wait ever so slowly as you put down the word letter by letter. This minigame outstays it’s welcome and i was tired of it by the end of the first trial.

There is no real way to die as when all your health depletes you get a game over screen before being allowed to retry from the point you died. The only penalty is to a score that only grants you a grade and monocoins. Monocoins can be used to purchase presents which help in the free time period of the game. There are two ways to get presents, one is to buy them from the supermarket and the other is to use a kind of random draw machine at the beach. The beach machine is the much better option as you can continue to put in one coin at a time and get the majority of the presents through random chance. So monocoins quickly become useless but despite their being no penalty for death I am glad it is this way. For the class trails are long affairs that can take up to an hour and a half. If you were sent back to the beginning after every game over it would get very old fast. Besides, I see DanganRonpa more as a visual novel than a genuine game.(You can argue that visual novels are indeed also genuine games but I find the level of interaction to be far too insubstantial to justify the game title. Much in the same way I don’t consider walking simulators games. I likely annoyed some people with that statement but frankly in my book if the gameplay itself is merely a secondary optional priority to the game developer then you aren’t trying to make a game.) The aspect I really love about this game is that you can piece together who committed the murder and how they did it just by looking at the evidence gathered from the investigation stage. I made it a point before each trial to have a long think over who I thought was the murderer and the method they committed it so that I would have a better idea how to use it to break contradictions as well as see just how right my speculation was. The first trial was a real stand out moment as I walked into that thinking I had figured out everything. I breezed through the first rounds and it all looked to be point towards the conclusion I saw coming. And just when I reveled in my own brilliance the game took my deduction and turned it right on it’s head. Almost as if the game knew exactly what I was thinking and threw me off with a red herring. Ultimately while I managed to figure out a number of the details of the murder, I got the murderer completely wrong. I wasn’t even mad, I was impressed and knew this game would really test my deductive capability. It’s rare for me to experience a story such as this as it truly is a story that can only be experienced twice. Once blind and a second time breaking it down. Such is the sad fate of the murder mystery as a large amount of it’s appeal is lost upon revealing the machinations behind the tale. The wacky characters and style are great side dishes of this tale but if you play DanganRonpa then you have got to play it like a detective.

DanganRonpa is a tale featuring the utterly ridiculous with the macabre, all the while telling a series of murder mysteries. It always manages to keep the more fantasy elements of the setting and characters from interfering in the logic of the murders. It’s tongue in cheek approach and self aware nature allow the reader to accept the more silly aspects while still managing to hit hard when time comes to toss aside humor and make things serious. It’s a tale that can only be experienced once but that one time is going to be a memorable one. There is a new anime for DanganRonpa coming soon which is labeled “DanganRonpa 3: The end of Hopes Peak Acadamy”. This is not to be confused with “New DanganRonpa V3: Everyone’s New Semester of Killing” which is the third title in the series and will feature a brand new story with new characters. The anime DanganRonpa 3 will feature a original story which is not an adaption of any work and happens to be under the supervision of the writer of the game series. My hope is that this time as the story can be made for the timeframe that it will not end up a misfire like the previous animated series and showcase this series true strengths. Though with Seiji Kishi in the director’s seat once again that might be an impossibility. Still this anime is planned to cap off any loose threads from the previous two games to allow the new game to start off with a new slate and I am curious to see the world outside of the death games. It also has a bizarre airing plan where it plans to air two episodes at once every week with the two being about separate stories. One a prequel to DanganRonpa 2 and the other a sequel. Truthfully this anime adaptation will likely leave me in despair but if it’s one thing this franchise has taught me, it’s that there’s always hope.

~AidanAK47~

Some Quick First Impressions: Sansha Sanyou, Tanaka-kun wa Itsumo Kedaruge and Kuromukuro

April 16, 2016 by AidanAK47, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

Sansha Sanyou

Short Synopsis: A awkward former rich girl makes friends for the first time.

For the love of god someone turn down the brightness! Either my computers screen settings malfunctioned for a moment or this anime is so bright it could burn a hole through my retina’s. That literally glaring issue aside this is a decent show for those who are fans of the cute girls genre thing. I mainly details how a rich girl whose family become poor managed to make friends with two odd girls after a strange encounter during lunch. So the first episode was mainly of her attempting to keep a haughty attitude while being extra self conscious to try and not scare off her newfound friends. Even I with a heart of stone and a dark mind found her efforts to be friendly rather endearing. So in the grounds of giving you that feeling of needing to protect something it gets a passing grade. The comedy on the other hand doesn’t do anything for me. I would look more to flying witch if you were looking for something to make you feel fluffy inside but if you need another show to fill the gap then this should suffice.

Potential: 40%

Tanaka-kun wa Itsumo Kedaruge

Short Synopsis: There’s a guy called Tanaka and he’s really lazy.

There are two comedy animes this season which are centered around a single joke. The first is Sakamoto desu ga and the second is this. Sakamoto’s joke is that Sakamoto is perfection incarnate. Tanaka-kuns joke is that Tanaka is very lazy. However Sakamoto is quite entertaining when Tanaka is just dull and boring. Why is that? Well the first aspect is that if you are building a series around a joke that you should make sure the joke is funny. In this case the joke is in the title and that joke is really more of a statement than a joke. Tanaka is very lazy, so what of it? Sakamoto made it’s joke work because of it’s ridiclous nature and the fact that the series is not corely about Sakamoto, but rather who Sakamoto effects though his actions. Tanaka is about Tanaka and there is nothing to him other than being lazy. Tanaka needs to be carryed everywhere…because he’s lazy. Tanaka is concerned with his position when he’s falling asleep…because he’s lazy. Tanaka wants to build up muscle so his legs and arms don’t fall asleep…because he’s lazy. This entire episode was refriming Tanaka was indeed lazy and that’s not a joke. KyoAni’s Chuunibyou show had a character just like this called Kumin and even she had more to her than Tanaka. This is a half hour of a comedian standing on stage talking about the weather. You sit waiting for the joke that never comes.

Potential: 0%

Kuromukuro

Short Synopsis: Giant Robot aliens invade. So it’s up to a naked guy and some bland teenage girl to save the day.

You know, I am tired of animes that start the series with a random battle between two unknown factions. I mean truly what is the point of that? Without context on who is fighting, why they are fighting or whats at stake this fights tension can be replicated by me watching Rock em, Sock em robots. Of course I don’t want an exposition dump layered on top as other anime usually do but truly I don’t see the need of jumping to this moment in time to watch two robots duke it out. Perhaps this was to ensure the mecha fans that this series does indeed have mecha before launching into a tremendously boring school life segment were a girl attempts to return a phone her mother left behind at a parent teacher conference. I will say that this isn’t a bad show but a rather uninspired one. As one of the first anime to be exclusively simulcast on Netfllix, you could have made a better choice. Honestly, Crunchyroll, Funimation and the rest of you anime companies, hows about hiring someone who knows anime to decide what gets licenced or not. Maybe then you could have nabbed the obvious goldmine that is One Punch Man before Viz got it.(Heard you were dubbing OPM last month so you better do a great job on that) Back on topic, Kuromukuro has trouble so far balancing out it’s mecha and slice of life segments. The mecha CGI is also fairly underwhelming and the plot so far is straightforward of the genre. I am getting reminded of Rinne no Lagrange which held many of the same problems. Though in this case our main female character is lacking any real defining points besides mother issues and I fear that the male protagonist’s character arc will mainly be a fish out of water story. As I said in my preview, what will make this worthwhile or not is the ratio of mecha and school life. If the school life is going to be at the forefront here this this should make for an excellent sleeping pill from sheer boredom.

Potential: 30%

Announcement Time!

April 12, 2016 by AidanAK47, posted in About, Special Articles

Well hello there my precarious readers, this is AidanAK47 here to bring you news most unexpected. And before you ask, no. It’s not that I finally gave up and decided to ditch you all like the rest. Through what is an unexpected turn of events I have made this blogging thing a bit too much of a habit to give up so I ain’t going anywhere anytime soon. So while I wait for Dark Souls 3 to download and suck the remainder of my free time into a endless void; I wish to share some news.

We have a new writer on board! Please welcome Mario_Thang or whatever they decide to call themselves during their time here.

Due to circumstances they will be posting using Lightningblot’s account who you might remember as that guy who wrote two posts on your lie in April and disappeared into the abyss. I happened to get a hold of his password thanks to shenanigans involving lightningblot’s poor choice of password and a rather insolent but laughably stupid troll.(Still brings a smile to my face when I recall just how I managed to wrestle back control of his account from that silly troll)

So that’s all well and good but what does that mean for you. Well it means that this site will be more active and we will be covering more anime each season. It’s means that this will truly become a multi-writer Blog as Psgels intended and there will be someone to contrast my so far one man show on this site. Put simply thanks to jolly cooperation there will be more content on this site for no extra cost. All I ask is that you be gentle with our newcomer and offer constructive criticism in order to help them improve and get more sunk into the role. Don’t be mean. Of course our newcomer has no obligation to this site and is free to leave whenever they so wish. Though I have made it clear just what kind of hobby this is and they seem keen despite the downsides so I think this one won’t disappear as fast as our previous writers.

Well that’s all I have to say. Psgels, if there’s any small slim chance you might see this then hows about you hand over admin rights so I can finally fix the headers and get rid of that annoying spam. Not to mention make some improvements like a search button and for the shoutbox an edit button. Well then, I am off to slaughter hellspawn with my trusty zweihander.

Praise the sun,

~AidanAK47~

Some Quick First Impressions: Sakamoto desu ga, Haifuri and Flying Witch

April 12, 2016 by AidanAK47, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

Sakamoto desu ga

Short Synopsis: Some boys attempt to bully a Student called Sakamoto, who is the perfect superhuman.

In essence, perfection is boring. Saitama from One Punch Man truly showed how unfulfilling it is to achieve perfection. However what if someone’s perfection is to such a ridiculous degree that they can do literally anything? Enter Sakamoto, the man who can sit on air, fly mary poppins style in tornados to save a bird and have a fight with a bee using a compass while working on math problems. Sakamoto is a man who can out Jojo the Jojo and has earned the nickname Swagamoto by the end of the first episode. I do think that this anime has lost some of the impact of the manga though the main reasons for that could be due to the music or that I am seeing these jokes for a second time. Still this can be an immensely entertaining show if it’s the kind of slapstick humor you like. This episode was more or less skits that involved guys trying to bully Sakamoto out of jealousy and getting frustrated as he turned each of their pranks into a way to make him look good. Each skit was separated with this odd interlude with three guys playing with a volleyball with the same repeating animation. It was rather odd addition to the series but somewhat amusing. On that last skit, you may think those kids were being silly overreacting to that bee in the classroom but people that was a Japanese hornet bee. Those things are about the size of your thumb, kill 40 people a year and are absolutely goddamn terrifying. Which makes Sakamoto’s battle with it all the more impressive. Godspeed, you magnificent bastard.

Potential: 80%

Haifuri

Short Synopsis: Cute girls playing battleship.

Well we have had cute girls being soldiers, cute girls in tanks, cute girls being battleships and now we have cute girls on battleships. Now all we need is cute girls in the luftwaffe and we got all the parts for a full military Moe army. I spent the majority of this episode dutifully bored out of my skull as I see two children bring out a trope as old as pokemon and declare themselves to become blue mermaids. Those being this world’s equivalent to the navy. For you see this world takes place when the earth has been flooded by rising seas and this has somehow inexplicably lead to it suddenly becoming every little girl’s dream to sail the seas on a battleship. Meanwhile I assume all the men decided to become doctors and farmers and whatnot offscreen because the Navy is suddenly female only. The moment you question the premise is the moment it falls apart so let’s just as the cheap excuse to ride the tailwinds of Kantai collection and move on. Now I would be writing this off pretty fast and intended to up until the second half where the plot has come into play. And yes, there is a plot. I was surprised too. For you see it seems the instructor of their class didn’t put an idiot as captian because she believed in her but rather so she could lead them out to a secluded area of sea and push them into attacking her boat so she can declare them traitors. So now we have a bunch of cute girls on a battleship called the Hasekaze who need to fight off their own navy and hopefully clear their name. I admit that upon watching this I wasn’t expecting a less gritty rendition of Battleship Potemkin featuring cute girls being cute. I am curious on just how they plan to approach this as I doubt we will be getting death and murder in the counterattack. A nice little underdog story about these girls trumping over a full navy with dwindling supplies and ingenuity would make for an interesting tale. However based on what I seen in the first half I doubt they can make it work.(I concede that the rice cooker joke was pretty funny) It’s got more substance than other cute girl shows airing this season so I suppose this would be the best option if you are looking to see it.

Potential: 40%

Flying Witch

Short Synopsis: A young witch moves to a quiet town to live with her cousins.

This is the kind of show where you make a cup of tea, sit down and just watch as all your worries melt away. Flying witch really benefits from being animated because now it just feels fluffy and warm. It’s very much like the Aria series which was a slice of life coming of age story that was so relaxing that it could put you to sleep if you try to marathon it. Not joke on that, it’s a great show but the atmosphere can have you drifting off if you try watching too many episodes in a row. This has that exact same feel. It’s harmless, light and puts a silly grin on your face. There’s no big plot developments and it’s more or less in tune with the less eventful episodes of Natsume Yuujinchou or Kiki’s delivery service. There are some nice moments of comedy with the mains lack of direction and the characters are so far pretty likeable. Sometimes you just need a show like this which can fill you with that soft serenity that’s slowly whittled away by the daily humdrum. Or you know…you can play a videogame where you blow zombies heads off with a shotgun. Whatever floats your boat.

Potential: 70%

Some Quick First Impressions: Kiznaiver, Bungou Stray Dogs and Koutetsujou no Kabaneri

April 10, 2016 by AidanAK47, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

Kiznaiver

Short Synopsis: A mysterious girl Kidnaps six strange characters and makes it that they share pain between all of them in an experiment to find a solution to world conflict.

My first thought when watching this was that this was fairly mellow for a trigger series. The likely explanation behind that is because the director who gives it’s shows it quickfire humor and energy is busy animating a ten minute anime series called Space Patrol Luluco in this season. Not to say there isn’t any distinct “trigger” in this show as a moment where the mascots wheel a character through a hospital with disco balls would heartly disagree. I am really liking the opening as with watching a lot of standard opening animations season after season it’s nice to see someone try something difference. Kiznaivers Opening is mesmerising though could make people potentially dizzy. My potential rating would be higher if only I was aware of just where this story was going with this concept. My closest guess would be a kind of story like Kokoro Connect which involved a group of kids linked together by a supernatural affliction and the drama that came with it. If that’s the case then I am fully on board as I felt that Kokoro never truly did the excellent concept justice. I am also happy to see that Trigger looks to have gathered funds from it’s previous projects because there is very little penny pinching with this animes animation. In fact I will even say this, Kabaneri may have the best art of the season but I think Kiznaiver has the best animation. There is a definite feel of passion in the movement and the characters feel truly alive. Not only that, while they are not truly original(In fact a number of them may remind you of previous Trigger works) they are all pretty likeable and distinct. I am interested to see where this goes and seeing as Kiznaiver won the straw poll in my season preview it looks like I will be letting you know just how this turns out.

Potential: 85%

Bungou Stray Dogs

Short Synopsis: A group of supernatural detectives named after famous authors try to track down a tiger chasing after an abandoned Orphan.

Even animated my impression of this story still remains the same. Perhaps it’s the resemblance to Blood Blockade battlefront that causes me to not get engaged in this or it could be just a lack of interest. I give this a middling mark as I think there could be those who could find this interesting but it just doesn’t appeal to me. There was a significantly large amount of comedy involved than I remember and one or two jokes got a smile but the rest didn’t really hit me. The twist at the end of the episode does open up possibilities for the rest of the show but the characters feel like they are trying too hard to be comedic. Especially Dasai with his jokey obsession with suicide which I find is rather disrespectful to the author. How much actual detective work in this show looks to be minimal as it’s seems to be more along the lines of meaningless term for a supernatural task force. We only know of three characters so far and I mainly just know their comedic quirks rather than personalities. This is a show I have difficulty making a judgement call on so I think the best way to see if this is for you is to just check it out yourself. It has it’s interesting aspects but it just doesn’t do anything for me.

Potential: 50%

Koutetsujou no Kabaneri

Short Synopsis: Our MC tries to build a new weapon in a world where people build huge walls to hide from the Titans…um I mean Kabaneri.

It’s rather redundant to say just where the inspiration for this show came from and it screams it with it’s every phore. Now by all means I am not against making use of a similar idea; if you can take a concept and turn it’s themes to present a new perspective then there is no shame in making use of a popular property as a base for your own story. However if you are going to do that then you should make use that the changes you make to the idea to differentiate it are there to make it more interesting and not more derivative. Sadly I think that Kabaneri has taken the latter route in it’s execution. The switch from Western to eastern culture for the setting is quite interesting but switching titans for zombies is just a bad move. Titans were interesting because they presented a new challenge to taking them down that made it more dynamic and exciting. Now they are just zombies which are essentially so overdone to an massive degree. Zombies are the standard now. Couldn’t we have gone for something more interesting like say ghosts or centaurs or something? So there is a heavy amount of borrowing from another source and what it has added in to replace it is significantly more cliche. However there is merit to this one. For one the artwork is very pretty with character designs invoking the style of 80s to 90s OVAs. Not the bland style of Endride but the more Ninja scrollish approach. Also like Ninja scroll we have plenty of gore. Uncensored for your viewing pleasure. Sawano is doing the OST though so far it’s far too reminiscent of his previous work. The biggest problem here is the writer who hasn’t written anything good after Code Geass. The story already has logical plotholes. For example, why did they get the first train to stop before pulling down the drawbridge yet lower the drawbridge for the second straight away? Why does the main character have a device that looks to be for the primary use of choking someone? What’s the point of building walls to keep out creatures that look like they can climb things without trouble? As well as a lot of people acting really dumb just to make the protagonist look better. I don’t have much faith in this writer and I think the plot holes are only going to get worse from this point on. However perhaps we can look past that and just enjoy the pretty visuals.

Potential: 60%

Some Quick First Impressions: Anne Happy, Bakuon!! and Netoge no Yome wa Onnanoko ja Nai to Omotta

April 9, 2016 by AidanAK47, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

Anne Happy

Short Synopsis: A group of girls are placed in a class for the unlucky

I feel like I watched lucky Star with a slight variation on the main characters. Can’t really say much about this one. The comedy relies on how these girls end up in unfortunate situations due to their own characteristics. Super Genkai girl keeps getting into trouble while trying to help animals, Sick glasses girl keeps getting injured and is self deprecating and the most normal girl of the group is in love with a construction sign mascot. The problem is that I have seen this before. Somewhere or somehow I have seen these elements before and it leaves me quite unamused. This isn’t bad but more…pointless? I mean there are much better comedy alternatives and better “Cute girls doing cute things” alternatives. I see no reason to recommend this show at all.

Potential: 0%

Bakuon!!

Short Synopsis: Cute girls love motorcycles the anime.

If we are going to go with the tired concept of mentality regressive girls hanging out in a club then at least we can stick some motorcycle trivia on to it. I can’t say this one is breaking any anime conventions but being about a girl who’s getting into motorcycles at least gives it a new tropic to work with. Our main however seems like she has a fairly low IQ with her riding her bike to school while making motorcycle noises with her mouth. Accompanying her we have a overzealous motorcycle euteusinest, a older girl who never speaks or takes off her helmet and a girl with a taste in horrible motorcycles. It’s mildly watchable I guess and if you are into this kind of show I believe this will give you your fix better than Anne Happy. While this kind of show isn’t for me at least the slutty inner motorcycle voice that instructs the main got me to smile.

Potential:30%

Netoge no Yome wa Onnanoko ja Nai to Omotta

Short Synopsis: Guess what? There are women on the internet. I know, shocking.

I am not amused. So our main protagonist happens to find out that the people he parties up with in a online game are all female and this so called in game wife happens to be a single, beautiful big breasted girl who’s all over him. You know I am not against wish fulfillment anime, after all a lot of entertainment I do enjoy is essentially wish fulfilment. But can we not have it as thinly veiled as it’s presented here? Look, I can certainly relate to wishing to find a girl who happens to share your interests and happens to be a looker but let’s have some realistic standards here. Besides this so called perfect girl would annoy the holy hell out of me be it in real live or in a game. I mean just think of her clinging to you like this while talking in this high voice that could grate cheese into fine powder and you will find that some things work better in theory than in practice. We have a harem incoming as our twin Tail tsundere(Pointed out by the characters onscreen to be an anime cliche but again doesn’t mean you are subverting it by drawing attention to how lazy your characterization is.) is already attached to our main. The student council president is clearly a work in progress and spoiler warning but that guy who the MC was humiliated by confessing to while thinking she was a girl was actually his young female teacher. Ain’t that convenient? I found this to be rather cringe worthy and quite insipid. As the anime showed highly animated versions of the characters talking within the game I couldn’t help but wonder just how this was really happening. For we see scenes of them displaying and reacting to each other in game but when we zoom out back to real life we see the game has the graphical fidelity of Runescape. So technically those scenes displayed ingame are straight up impossible with that interface. Either way this is not funny nor worth your time. Give it a pass.

Potential: 0%

Some Quick First Impressions: Joker Game, Sousei no Onmyouji and Macross Delta

April 8, 2016 by AidanAK47, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

Joker Game

Short Synopsis: In the beginning of WWII a group of spartan trained spies attempt to catch an American spy hiding in the country.

Marvelous. Maybe it’s the lack of teenagers, maybe it’s the uncommon setting, or just maybe it’s because the spy leader is remarkably similar to Houzuki from the visual novel Sharin No Kuni but I loved this episode. Our protagonist is a straight laced Japanese Nationalist which makes him the perfect viewpoint for this story. As while we aren’t the type to die for the glory of Japan, our mains straight laced morals act as a good venue to highlight the nature of a spies work. For we aren’t dealing with the guns and glory James Bond style of spy but instead the true nature of a spy. Deception and stealth are the name of the game with combat being the last resort. This opening episode sets that up perfectly as we have our team of spies introduce our main to the “Joker Game”. On the surface a normal game of poker but on a deeper level a game of sabotage and deceit as players try to out cheat other players through bribery and hand signals. Having thus be viewed from an individual whose doctrine is set in honor gives us a clear picture on the nature of a spy. A spy resorts to any means necessary to complete the mission, no matter how dishonorable it would be to the masses. The atmosphere of this episode had a level of style that immediately caught my attention from the opening. However what’s obviously going to be a rather controversial matter is with the setting. As we all know, Japan wasn’t exactly playing with the good guys in this war so how that is shown here might cause some outrage if not handled delicately. However if this episode is an example of what is to come then I am very much looking forward to how this turns out.

Potential: 95%

Twin Star Exorcists(Sousei no Onmyouji)

Short Synopsis: A boy becomes an exorcist again to save a strange female exorcist.

SIgh…oh Studio Pierrot. First let me say that this first episode wasn’t bad per say and I am more in despair over how the rest of this series will likely turn out. I have read the manga of this and I can say it’s pretty good. Nothing revolutionary but a fun read. Now the first chapter or two of this series is admittedly not all that impressive as it plays by the numbers up until the main defining aspect of this series. (Namely about how it has been foreseen that these two are destined to get married and give birth to an exorcist who will save humanity) This first episode does cover the events of the first chapter but rather loosely. There are lots of small little unnecessary changes such as adding additional scenes and omitting some jokes. One casualty is that in the manga when Rokudu jumped into the water to save Benio; she had already swam to the shore and saved herself. Then she needed to jump back in to save him because he didn’t know how to swim. Considering how the humor was handled here though I think it would be less amusing. Jokes that were in the episode that made me smile in the manga left me stone faced here. It’s hard to pin down but there is something off about the presentation here. Of course that could be because the animation is fairly lackluster and considering it’s Studio Pierrot that’s really to be expected. The soundtrack is quite disappointing as the music featured in the PV looks to be the opening theme and the episodes music really isn’t noteworthy. Most of my gripes with this episode are surely minor as it did a decent job despite the needless changes. There is terrible news that comes with this however for you see I have heard word that this anime will have four cours. Now that’s pretty rare for an anime to have four cour’s and would be a cause for celebration…if the manga didn’t only have enough material for about an cour and a half. Filler ahoy! We already have an anime original character who has only been heard yet already annoys me. Looks like we have another Naruto adaption on our hands people; if you remember; the first part of Naruto was 220 episodes long and more than half of that was filler. But who knows? Perhaps they can pull through and present us with an original adaptation with it’s own merits such as the original Fullmetal Alchemist. I highly doubt it but hey they haven’t screwed up yet. Yep, not yet but sadly eventually.

Potential: 30%

Macross Delta

Short Synopsis: Saving the world with Mecha and JPOP idol tomfoolery.

Um….hah? I am rather perplexed as to how to react to this one. I was um…new? Our story revolves around a stowaway girl who wishes to join a group called Walkyurie which is some kind of Galaxy counter terrorism organisation mixed with a JPOP idol group. Their main job is to stop cases of a virus called VARS which is a strange disease which causes people to have tons of engorged veins on their skin and start causing destruction through…suicide bombings…and mass shootings…and the attack in this episode is in a middle eastern named planet…subtle guys. Real subtle. My ventures into the Macross franchise haven’t been many(Those being Plus, Zero and Frontier.) but I think the series has moved very far away from what Macross is supposed to be. Them Idols throwing around magic shields and such while singing JPOP were a bit too reminiscent of Symphogear and completely ridiculous. But I suppose that’s the big issue here. I am supposed to take this seriously or laugh and just roll with it? Based on the presentation I can’t really tell because it goes from serious mecha battles to magical girl idols with the same level of sincerity. One of the idols fires a laser that turns into a bunch holographic back up dancers. Our main protagonist has a method of fighting that makes his robot look like it’s dancing. Our main heroine has this weird design were one of her strands of hair ends in a heart which glows. Is that some weird growth or is she some kind of alien hybrid? Or is it there just for no reason? I mean really, just what am I to make of this? I guess there were parts I liked…maybe? Mecha seems decent and even some of the JPOP is catchy despite being cheesy. I was getting reminded of Frontier and that wasn’t too bad a show. But for the most part I just don’t know how to react to this.

Potential: 40%

Some Quick First Impressions: Re:Zero kara Hajimeru Isekai Seikatsu, Hundred and Seisen Cerberus

April 6, 2016 by AidanAK47, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

Re:Zero kara Hajimeru Isekai Seikatsu

Short Synopsis: A boy is summoned to another world where he finds himself reliving the same day over and over again.

Wow. ANN is not pleased with this one. I normally don’t check out their first episode preview because well I have to watch all these shows anyway regardless of how bad they are. But I heard they blasted this one pretty hard. It’s on these kinds of shows that make me glad that I go out of my way to check the source material because I could very well be doing the same thing if I didn’t. Not to say this double length feature episode was bad but despite subverting cliches it also adhears to cliches as well. Our protagonist is well aware of the other world genre and is thinking that now he is in one that he will be getting some sort of special superpower. Technically he did but it’s far from desirable. It is true that addressing a cliche is not subverting a cliche if you still use said cliche. In this case the main thought he would encounter a cute girl. He did but said cute girl ignores him and runs off to leave him to get beaten up. But then another girl shows up and helps him. As I said, in some ways it subverts and in others it sticks to the standard. Can’t say I am fond of our heroine as she does seem a stereotype and remains so for as far as I have read into this story. However I do think this story is still worthwhile because you can claim it’s following the standard but if the standard involved seeing the protagonist dying horribly over and over again then I would think much better of the genre. Our self proclaimed hikikomori Subaru may be a guy with decent strength but he isn’t going to be gaining godly power like much of our usual other world protagonists. I like the guy as well because at least he’s a step above the standard. Sure his comments about this being an other world story at the beginning are annoying and quite frankly he should have noticed that his was in a time loop by the second run but the man has the drive to learn. I wasn’t too fond of the first episode and in that I think it was a wise decision for white fox to make this a double feature. So far they are doing a great job with adapting the source, in particular I like how they handled the beginning with intercutting scenes of his first death with his time before entering the world. I am not going to make any promises of this being great(For one I believe caricature characterisation is a big weakness in the source) but I think some critics will start changing their tune as the series continues. Besides, I hear the author is a Sadist and if that’s the case…(smirk)

Potential: 90%

Hundred

Short Synopsis: A clearly mentally unstable girl challenges a boy to a fight…just..screw it. I don’t care anymore

Can I please have the brain cells that died while watching this episode back? I mean good god just how utterly insipid is this. I am insulted, purely insulted at the outright lack of effort. Truly just how stupid do you think I am, show? Do you honestly believe that I think that girl crossdressing as a boy is a genuine boy? A boy who wears ribbons, has a ponytail and enacts a level of physical contact that would have any normal guy reeling back and asking just what the hell is wrong with you? Oh sure us guys give each other lap pillows all the time. And oh no it just gets worse. A student council president that can expel students? Just…what?! Why? How? Isn’t that just asking to be abused? Not a clingy incest imouto! For the love of god leave some cliches to go die! Also every big boobed girls first appearance is first her chest and then it pans up to show their face. Sort of like the show is saying “Hey look at these breasts! Aren’t they massive!…Oh yeah she has a face too.” So I could go into detail about what this show isn’t worth your time…but really why should I bother. Look if this show isn’t going to put a modicum of effort into presenting a story then truly why should I even try to critic it. Instead I think I will just ask questions. What’s up with main protagonists and fire flashbacks? Is there some kind of pyromaniac who transcends dimensions just to set fire to any place in a flashback? Why was there a minutes worth of some pretty impressive animation for what amounts to our protagonist talking with two other students? Do people not confuse the Monster Savage with the actual term for a Savage? Isn’t there better alternatives to fighting them than using crystals? Biological warfare for example? Isn’t it really inconvenient to have a school on a boat? I mean yeah, Savages are about but I think that Kids that get sea sickness would be screwed at this school. Why is that council president idiot trying to expel two students for being late to a opening ceremony while giving some silly tripe about teamwork when later a clip of her fighting shows she doesn’t work in a team at all?! Just…just…GAH! Hell with it! What’s the point of complaining? It’s crap, it’s lazy, stupid and probably going to get a second season. This just goes to show that for every good Light Novel, there will be a hundred “Hundred”’s.

Potential: 0%

Seisen Cerberus

Short Synopsis: A boy seeks out artifacts that were used to seal a dangerous dragon in ancient past.

After Hundred, I was far removed of patience so perhaps this might not be a fair assessment. But regardless of how I feel currently I think my opinion on this would be the same. I feel pretty indifferent to it. The writing certainly isn’t notable. “He’s holding that sword with one hand. He must be a real master of the blade” Or maybe he’s just strong? Doesn’t really speak for his skills as a swordsman. The artstyle is not all that appealing and I can’t say the music made an impact. What I am seeing here is checking the boxes for a typical show of this mediocre caliber. However what really kills it is the feeling of the dialogue. Every word that comes out of a person’s mouth feels staged, like they pulled it out a recommended selection of lines that would be appropriate for the scene. It’s all just so artificial and this show should be convincing me to feel something for it’s story. It could be fun for some but I think the majority will find no reason to continue.

Potential: 20%

Some Quick First Impressions: Boku no Hero Academia, Endride and Kuma Miko

April 5, 2016 by AidanAK47, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

Boku no Hero Academia

Short Synopsis: A boy with no superpowers wishes to be become a hero.

For the most part I need to reiterate what I said in my said in my season preview about this show. There is nothing particular wrong with it as it does make at least a pretty decent Shounen. If I had to fault it for anything I would say it’s uninspired. There are a lot of aspects which reflect other shounen series and it feels to me like it’s following a formula. But what bugs me the most is that it goes for the less interesting story when it had a potentially greater story in it’s beginning. Midoriya is powerless and despite his desire to be a hero he has no realistic means of achieving it. What comes to pass in the next episode is that he is given a means to obtain a quirk(Aka power) but to me that undermines the lesson of the start. It would have been a far more powerful and interesting story if Midoriya had to make use of his intelligence and cunning to make a name for himself as a hero without a quirk. Which would make him an inspiration for all the quirkless. But instead we have him reinforce the class division and make it that he can only succeed by obtaining a quirk. Still if you can push aside that thought then this can be a decent shounen to watch as we do have some impressive animation on display and a decent hook. (Try not to compare it to One Punch Man. It only comes off worse for it.) It will be a fun little show to watch in between series.

Potential: 60%

Endride

Short Synopsis: A boy who loves crystals is dragged to an alternate world.

Well that certainly was something so bland it could be classified as a cheap 90s OVA that was made in the present. There is something about this that just has an aura of cheapness in it’s conception. The protagonist is run of the mill besides his fixation on crystals, the artwork is utterly generic and the setting screams that it is a cheap knockoff of other done to death settings. Even the animation is utterly lackluster as the fight scenes in this episode were determined to show anything other than the fight itself. Watch in awe during a fight as you see a boy with a strained look on his face while weapons clang in the background. The weapons as well just look bad with the main villains weapon resembling a safety pin with a spear stuck to one end. I would be exaggerating if I called this terrible but in truth it is something worse. This is forgettable. This is the kind of anime that is lost to the ages to never be remembered. It isn’t good enough to be recalled nor bad enough to be hated. It’s just…bland.

Potential: 0%

Kuma Miko

Short Synopsis: A girl wishes to go to school in the city but is stopped by her guardian who happens to be a talking bear.

This is pretty fun. It’s an enjoyable comedy with some good jokes and decent comedic timing. The chemistry between Natsu the bear and the miko is smooth and makes the nature of the screwball comedy work well. The artwork is bright and pops out while the character designs are easy on the eyes. Natsu’s transitions from bearlike to nonthreatening is nicely done. I liked the reference to Jaws in the beginning and the folktale that happened to sound like a bizarre hentai doujin. Though I must repeat that this likely isn’t going to impress you if you are looking for a laugh out loud comedy. I smiled but I find the show decently enjoyable at best. This isn’t something I see being top of the season.

Potential: 60%