Real Steel

While i don't really post Hollywood movie stuff in my blog, there is one movie called Real Steel which i find interesting to talk about. The movie used typical theme of Hollywood movies with some mechas and it turns out to be fun to watch. Surpirisingly the characterization of the main characters are great for action movie and the main focus of the movie which is the mecha action doen't disappoint. Simply to say the mecha actions are amazing since the CG animations are just really well made. Probably my favorite moment is the final battle where the lead character's mecha Atom landed a punch to Zeus while jumping. Personally i think this movie has really good mecha action just like Transformers movies but the overall story is much better. If you are a mecha fan i think this movie will worth your time. I hope the rumored sequel will still have the charming point of this movie.

1/144 Brasta

After the small announcement of Brasta plamo from Kotobukiya on last October, finally some sample model is revealed by Kotobukiya! The kit will be released on May this year which is a month after Saisei-hen released and it will cost about 5800 yen(which is as expensive as a Granzon). While the definitely make my wallet weeps, i will be getting one for my collection. The Brasta kit will have most of the gimmicks that Brasta had in Hakai-Hen which include the detachable shield and sniper rifle parts though no Spigot. The kit will also be getting effect parts which looks like for Bayonet spiker rather than EAGLE shot. Brasta itself is the original unit of main protagonist of SRW Z2 Hakai Hen, Crowe Burst. Brasta is specialised for fighting against Jigenjuu or Dimensional monsters though it is still weak when it is compared with Virgola Glory or Gunleon. I am curious if Saisei-hen will give Brasta an upgrade?

New Frame Arms model announced!

Slow but sure, Kotobukiya's original lineup of Frame Arms steadily grows in numbers. Out of the many informations from the latest Hobby Japan,, a new design for the Frame Arms lineup really piqued my interest. So far no name has been given for this particular design but from what the scans tell this new Frame Arms is designed as a Heroic type mecha. What makes me really interested with this design is that it really has close resemblance with ACE 3 Exbrau and SRW W Valhawk from what i see. But it is no surprise since the designer of Frame Arms is the one who designed those original mechas who is no other than Takayuki Yanase who is most well known to be one of the lead mecha designer of Gundam 00. I will be keeping an eye with this mecha and i will just throw the lineart of Exbrau and Valhawk as references.

SRW Alpha 3 2nd playthrough cleared!

Spanish Kunoichi is really awesome!

1/60 M9 Gernsback

While Alter mainly produce high quality figurines, they also sculpted some great high-end mecha toys. After they released Linebarrel toy few while ago, now they are going to release one of the well known Arm Slave from FMP which is no other than M9 Gernsback. The toy has been announced around 2 months ago and planned to be released on April this year with the price tag of roughly 12000 yen. The toy is sculpted with 1/60 Scale which is about the same height with 1/144 HG Gundam kits. Despite i will not be getting this toy since i had completed my Uruz team collection and the toy is too small for my preference i think this 1/60 M9 Gernsback is worth to get for FMP fans. You will notice that the toy comes with lots of weapons which i think never appear in TV series and seen a few time only in the FMP Sigma manga. If you had 1/60 Arbalest which was released by Alter back when Aoshima haven't started making one i would say this toy is a must get.

Breaking News! SRW Z2 Saisei Hen announced!

After roughly 8 months Hakai hen released, finally Banpresto decided to shed some light on second chapter of Z2 called Saisei Hen. The game will be released 5th April this year which is roughly the same time with the release of Hakai Hen last year with the price of 7000 yen and no limited edition announced yet. There will be also 2 new series that will be joining Z2 casts so far which are Yokoyama Mitsuteru Tetsujin 28 and Macross 7 Dynamite(OVA one). I hope there would be some more casts joining up later and hopefully we can see Macross Plus joining up since i see a silhoutte of Yf-21 or Yf-22 in the scan. Probably the battle system remain the same with Hakai-hen though it is not confirmed yet that whether the original cast of SRW Z who are Setsuko and Rand will be joining in the team. There is also a good chance of Brasta Plamo kit will be released at the same time with Saisei-hen which could mean something...

Source: 2chan

Fate/Extra Finished!

Throughout my second playthrough of SRW Alpha 3 i managed to spend some of my spare time to Fate/Extra. At first i thought this game is just another cheap milking attempt of Typemoon with its Fate franchise but it turns out to be rather decent game. Fate/Extra is a RPG game loosely tied with Fate/Stay Night and there is no any direct relationship with the predecessor. Fate/Extra pits the main character in a Holy Grail War where he will fight other 7 masters with his/her own servant in order to win omnipotent wish granting Holy grail. The battle system is rather unique as it use rock-paper-scissor system which seems to be hard at first but getting better later on.

 In my first playthrough, i used Archer who is no other than EMIYA since it is the easiest way to relate Fate/Stay Night with this game. Just like in F/SN Archer is cynical guy but really caring though i should have used FeMC for better interaction. Throughout the game, my journey is quite smooth though i spend quite some time with Lancer(Rani's route) which i find more troublesome compared to Gawain. I am quite disappointed that the Unlimited Blade Works in this game is nothing much than attack buff unlike in the original series though the awesome tier music is still there.In the end my experience throughout the game is just like a Rollercoaster as the game had rather weak ending.

Currently i am doing my second playthrough with Caster who is definitely not the best character to use in the first playthough due to being really fragile. However i think i am going to really enjoy her route as much as Archer's at least and slightly disappointed not to preorder her 1/8 Figure back then. Anyway If you don't follow Fate series probably you will find this game is just a mediocre RPG series with slightly unique battle system but you will probably have a pleasant ride throughout the game if you are a fan of the Fate series. I am quite curious what Fate/Extra CCC will be offering?

Super Robot Chogokin Big Volfogg

For the recent addition of Bandai's Super Robot Chogokin lineup, the last Yuusha series GaoGaiGar definitely get some nice treatment. Next after ChouRyuJin, it is Big Volfogg that gets SRC treatment. The SRC is planned to be released on April this year with 4000 yen price tag. The SRC include some effect parts for 4000 magnum and the iconic giant shuriken "Murasame Sword" which is the main weapon of Big Volfogg.

Volfogg is one of the team member of GGG who specialise in intel also serving as Mamoru's bodyguard. Big Volfogg is the more combat oriented version of Volfogg which is the combination result of Volfogg with Gunglue and Gundober. In SRW W Big Volfogg is really powerful unit while the Alpha 3 version is a solid support unit. With the price tag of 4000 yen it is obviously that there won't be any symetrical docking gimmick which would have been lovely if there is one. I wonder if Bandai ever plan to release GekiRyuJin which is the brother unit of ChouRyuJin to complete the GGG set though it would be awesome if Bandai ever decided to release SRC for Genesic GaoGaiGar which will be instant get for me.

Mechatalk: My top 3 Mecha Designer

My Top 3 favorites and some honorable mentions.

Hourglass of Summer

 Well maybe it has been about 8 months already since i played my last VN and now i just recently finished one which is Hourglass of Summer. Hourglass of Summer or Natsuiro no Sunadokei is one of the translated VN title by now defunct Hirameki. The game format is in Hirameki's infamous Interactive DVD where you played the game as if you are running a DVD movie. At first i rather had high expectation as i heard good things about this VN but in the end i find the series pale in comparison with series like Ever 17 or Yume Miru Kusuri.

The main plot of the story is about a certain guy who possess ability to jump through time for a period of time after having a strange encounter. From his time jumping he sees a future where the girl he had a crush with and will become his future girlfriend had a tragic incident. After seeing the horrible outcomes he tries to save the girl and possibly become her lover as well though throughout his timeskip he might find other possible romantic interest as well. I have finished all 5 possible routes in the game and overall i find the plot is mediocre. Probably the greatest weakness of this series is the ending which i find rather weak. However my biggest disappointment from this game is the media form of the game itself. Hirameki idea about Interactive DVD for the VN media might be a great idea but poorly executed and perhaps it js one of the many reasons that the company is bankrupt. I really have hard time in bactracking the game since there is no saving system just like usual VN but you get Password system which is rather inflexible. The game have some serious compatibility issues as well since you won't be able playing this game with your normal PC media player indicating that the game are not tested properly. If you want to play this game, either you get a DVD player which is rather awkward media to play a VN or use certain media player which i use PowerDVD and it works rather well.

Overall Hourglass of Summer is decent VN and it shows you how stereotypical VN looks like and don't expect something epic like Ever17 going to happen in this game. If you are playing the game i would suggest to finish the main heroine route at least since the main story focus on her. Probably the next VN i plan to play are either Katawa Shoujo(which is free!) or Daibanchou.

Super Robot Wars J Thoughts

Mediocre series with awesome Originals.

Realm of Darkness 2011 Yearly Review

Overall thoughts of the year and some to-do list for 2012.

Mechatalk: Real Robot or Super Robot

Not really a mechatalk post but in this blog post i will discuss about Super Robot and Real Robot in relation with the Poll that had been up for a while in this blog. First of all i have to thank everyone who had participated the poll for over 6 months. From the poll results out of 41 polls 29 prefers Real Robot which sums up to 70% of the total polls while Super Robot only account for 30% of the poll. The reason why i decide to put up the polling is to see which niche i should focus with for the blog in the future but it does not mean that i will neglect one niche over another.

Personally i am a real robot fan myself since Real Robots were the dominant niche in my time as it slowly take over Super Robots. Super Robots is quite unpopular to the current generation of anime fans considering the niche gradually become more obscure after seeing its Golden Age in 80s. One of the common things that i see from Super Robots that cause them to be unpopular despite having great mecha design are either having lackluster plots in their series, significant quality problems and overstretched plots which are rather common for 80s mecha series. Some of the good of example of these cases are Zeorymer, Dancougar and Aquarion which SRW series definitely help to contribute for their popularity.

While there are some gray area in distinguishing Real Robot with Super Robot considering some of mecha series takes several aspects of both niches and the series is taken into one niche if it mainly focus on the aspects of that niche. Out of many Real Robots series that i watched/read, some of the series that depict the characteristics of Real Robot really well are Full Metal Panic, Votoms and Patlabor which i will leave to future discussions how they manage to become the best example of the niche. Now it is time for me to prepare my review of the year

Gundam Seed Battle Destiny announced!

At last Vita got its first Gundam games made by Artdink which is well known for its Gundam Battle series. This time Vita get Gundam Battle series as well which features Gundam Seed series including Astray. It seems Bandai promotes SEED series rather intense for the HD Remaster of the series or perhaps there is something else that Bandai had in mind. From the first look, the graphics greatly improved from the PSP counterpart of Assault Survive at least and probably the gameplay will take some elements from Battle Memories. Personally this is not a game that urge me to get Vita soon as i am still skeptical with the gameplay due to Artdink's habit of over reusing materials and my bad impression left by Assault Survive which is a total grindfest. I am still waiting for the PV for clearer look on this game but my expectations wouldn't be high. I hope this game wouldn't suffer Bamco treatment of abusing DLCs and i wonder which mecha game will be coming next on VITA.

After Wars Gundam X

A promising yet really underrated Gundam series - Revised February 2026