Loot from Mandarake

Bought some stuffs from Mandarake this month which serves well as my own Christmas present. I bought myself Armor Plus Sol Tekkaman 1 and Riobot Orgun which i got for 60% worth of the original price not too bad i would say. I think i will not be ordering stuffs from Mandarake like i used to do since they won't ship SAL to Australia at least for a long time due to some new regulations. Luckily my order went through just few days before the rule comes in effect and shipped without problem. From a short glance of the items, Armor Sol Tekkaman 1 is meant to be paired with Sol Tekkaman 2 since it got some parts that need Sol Tekkaman 2's as well. I am abit sad with Riobot Orgun though because the figure is small compared to my Tekkaman Blade though it should be a great pairing for the Figma Tekkaman Blade but nevertheless articulation is very good. I will probably take a while to post reviews for these but you can anticipate something within 3 months.

Completed my Armor Plus Tekkaman series yay!

Valvrave the Liberator

人間をやめますか？

If Code Geass and Gundam Seed ever has a kid together Valvrave is likely to be the outcome, truly a mixed bag from the beginning until the end. I have marathoned the series from 2 weeks ago until the last episode of the second season that i watched today. I have expected the Valvrave to be disappointing as Sunrise doesn't make any good mecha anime anymore but i am rather sad the good mecha designs are wasted in some worst possible way. Valvrave just shows how High school hijinks and mecha does not mix really well and while the main character is Beta guy, he still got some redeemable factors with him whereas the main heroine represents every worst thing in the anime. Valvrave could have been a decent mecha series but unfortunately most of the aspects in the anime are ended prematurely thus the anime does not have any lasting impression that it could give and i feel the story direction is rather indecisive.

Nevertheless Valvrave still got some redeeming values which is why i said at the beginning it is a mixed bag, L-elf is rather well written character which unfortunately paired with Beta protagonist and the fist fight between them on 22nd episode is some of the best scene in the series. The Valvraves itself is rather good looking mecha and kinda remind me of Aquarion for some reason though i really feel the true power of each Valvraves are not shown in the anime. With how the 2nd season wrapped up it seems there is a possibility for continuity of the series but i am not too optimistic about that either. Nevertheless if Sunrise ever make another mecha series better they abandon the high school BS or else it will not be a good mecha title ever.

Legend of Galactic Heroes Quotes: Galactic Empire

In every age

In every place

The deeds of men 

Remains the same

 As promised from me few months ago, i present the Quotes of the LOGH casts as Christmas present from Realm of Darkness! I think this is the only series i bothered to do this thing to pay a respect for a great masterpiece that anime will unlikely ever see again. As i do my second run of LOGH, i write down the noteworthy quotes by episodes and in total i did like more than 9000 words of document from the quotes which just show something. At first i expect Free Planet Alliance side will have the greatest number of quotes because of Yang Wenli but as i progress through the Word document, in the end Galactic Empire got the highest amount of quotes with Reinhard came into equal number with Yang with each of them have 3 pages worth of quote. Also due to the nature of the quotes, you better watch the series first before treading into this post. Probably i missed some of the quotes but i think i do write down most of the good ones.

 You can check the Quotes for Free Planet Alliance characters here

 

Utawarerumono: The One being Sung

Another VN that i revisited from my past collection and this is probably the first proper post for the series for my blog. For those who don't know about the series, Utawarerumono is fantasy themed VN by Leaf with heavy Ainu influence and kemonomimi where the story revolves around amnesiac masked man named Hakuoro who will greatly change the fate of a war torn land. The VN got Strategy RPG element in it which is passable and i have some hard time pulling out full combos.

 I got into Utawarerumono from the anime first six years ago and then give the VN a run which should be in the first 10 VN i have read. Back then i played the VN halfway but in the end stopped halfway being distracted with other stuffs. I have to say i got really nostalgic with Utawarerumono with my second run and this is certainly one of the good VN title out there. My favorite part from Utawarerumono is the slice of life which i believe the main charm of the series and feels like a fleeting dream. While the VN is made around 2003, the quality is surprisingly very good and compared to the anime, VN is still better since some of the parts are more coherent. However Utawarerumono is one of the few VN that have good anime adaptation. What makes me prefer the VN version is that Hakuoro is more badass in the VN which you should see yourself. Recently i watched the special edition episode of the anime and the OVA which includes some of the slice of life scene from the VN that didn't make into the anime and that scene where Touka beat the hell out of Oboro is really hilarious. As for now i think i will give PSP version of Utawarerumono a run and hope there will be more news about Utawarerumono 2. I also hope Aquapazza got ported into Vita somehow and meanwhile have Eruruu singing Musou uta

Space Battleship Yamato 2199

No doubt this the best anime that Japan has airing from the past 2 or 3 years and i can see how the original series affect the anime industry back in the past. Marathoned the series after catching up to the latest episode of Valvrave which i will share my thoughts about it as well once the final episode come out. Anyway i will say Space battleship Yamato 2199 is a good reboot as a person who never watched the original series considering the series have solid story and characters who drive it. Along with the epic series opening it is good enough to make me interested to make the original series get into my watchlist.

The story of the series is basically about when Humanity face the brink of destruction as the Earth as they fought losing battle against Sentient Alien race called Garmillan and have the surface of the Earth become uninhabitable. During these darkest hour, mankind managed to create a powerful battleship called Yamato which is tasked to travel to distant planet Iskandar where the ruler of the planet promised a technology to restore the Earth back to its former self. However the journey will not be easy as the crews of Yamato will face alot of trials and attack by the Garmillan in order to reach Iskandar.

While Yamato itself is Scifi rather than mecha series, i can see how it have profound effects to series like Gundam due to theme of "One Ship become the hope of Humanity" which inspired ships like White Base, Macross or Nadesico and definitely Zentradi are definitely based from Garmillans(wonder if they will get Deculture if Yamato has Basara/Minmai on board). Okita Juzo, the captain of Yamato is one of most badass ship captain i have seen, because he shows how a man can overcome any odds with his willpower and probably he got auto iron-wall seishin every turn. My only complain with the series is that it lacks fleet to fleet battle which makes it less epic than LOGH and Hadou Cannon could be less broken and finally Desler should have been portrayed to be less reckless because he should be a Sympathetic villain. Otherwise Space Battleship Yamato is a very good anime and my personal favorite episode is the 9th one.

Max Factory 1/72 Dougram

Well it is abit late for a pre-release thread but there are things i want to talk about this Dougram kit. It has been more than a decade that Dougram got any kit treatment and thanks to Max Factory a new version of the kit is available for the nostalgic fan of the series. The kit will be released on this December with price around 3300 yen. The kit will be 1/72 scale which will be around the same height as HG kit and the proportion is really faithful to original Okawara proportion. Dougram is a prototype Combat Armor developed by anti earth government rebels in Deloyer to spearhead their revolution from oppressive rule of Earth. Dougram proved to be a very powerful Combat Armor as it outperforms most Combat Armor like Soltics and the cannon on its back capable to one shot any Combat Armor. Dougram itself is piloted by Crinn Cashim who is a son of prominent politician of Earth as he decided to fight for Deloyer's cause after seeing the atrocity that Earth done to Deloyer.

This i's what Dougram would roughly look like if the series air in the present and no doubt Randgrith from SRW is a homage to Dougram. As i discussed before, the main appeal of Dougram is not the mecha itself but the political intrigue which is something that you won't see on average mecha anime in 80s and i can guarantee it is comparable to LOGH. The conflict of the Deloyer also kind of remind me what Sirius uprising from LOGH will look like in mecha flavor considering they share same theme. Lastly while i doubt Max Factory will release all combat armor, i think Soltic would be a possible release and a mass produced dougram would be cool to see as well.

Warhammer 40k: Ultramarines movie

I never played the Warhammer 40k tabletop game but i do read the lores of the series which is massive and fascinating despite being over the top. So it has been more than 20 years that the 40k running as tabletop games and naturally being one of the biggest of its kind, they should have a movie adaptation which they got few years ago. So the first CGI movie of 40k features the poster boy of Space Marine which are Ultramarines AKA Ultrasmurfs not my favorite but probably the most well known Chapters in the public. The story is very straightforward, a group of Space Marines goes for their first real mission as fully fledged Space Marine where they are rescuing fellow Astartes from another chapter and things happens as they are facing Chaos Marines and a  Demon Prince in the mission and two of the Ultramarines will become heroes from this trial. If you are going to watch the movie, don't expect the animation quality is as good as Hollywood stuffs or even on par with Dawn of War CGI considering the animation quality of the movie is barebones expecially the background, though the power armor details of the marine are quite nice. I can't really say the movie represent 40k series as a whole really well since it only focus at Space Marine Vs Chaos and none of other major factions from 40k like Eldar or Ork that makes the 40k Verse massive show up at all. But still if you are Space Marine players i think you will like the movie but still this is not a good gateway to the series.