I-n-j-i-n

This is one scary, scary news concerning MGS4... Kojima is disappointed with MGS4: http://kotaku.com/381412/kojima-disappointed-with-metal-gear-solid-4 Can't get worse than this. And I really anticipated the game. I hope he's wrong, because my PS3 purchase hinged on it. Now I really might stick with the 360 with Wii on the side. Also, Kojima saying he 'overestimated' PS3's power is a major blow. For the hardware.

It doesn't have that intensely annoying 'wannabe' factor of many of the radio pop and rap hits nowadays. Those are VERY annoying and they sometimes made me physically ill.

I liked it personally. People are so damn dependent on the internet (me included... especially me actually) going back just feels ancient, quite literally. As South Park seasons go, it's the usual. The few incredibly great episodes, some in between types, some cute message episodes like the last Internet one. Also, it wasn't too long ago since their epic Nintendo Wii saga. I hope they do something like that again.

I thought Midway did some new and innovative things with their online MK games. Very playable and very fun at spurts. It's just that they don't know how to put a nice varnish on their games like in the MK1-3 days. And their production values are just weird/horrible so it makes all their games look worse than they actually may be. And they need to prune their roster like Street Fighter has (though almost all SF characters are awesome so it was almost unnecessary on that end).

Oh come on. The lameness -------> Coolness.

It's one of the most popular anime in Japan right now and regardless of opinions, it is very well made and they pumped millions into its production. Also, it seems the actual 'arrested' part might have been all rumor. But it was true that 5 minutes of the show was leaked.

The thing with leaking a few minutes in Code Geass is a bit of a special case since that show depends so much on the buzz and the gossip around 'what's going to happen next?' each and every week. I'd imagine heads would have rolled if the final six minutes of the entire series was leaked instead. But even with that small 5 minute leak, a lot of things were revealed already.

I wish they just ignore it all and just air it as planned. It's too bad it happened, but the guy was arrested. Wasn't that enough? I think the show might be getting too popular for its own good when people are starting to leak it like they kept trying to do for Star Wars and Lord of the Rings movies.

Manipulating the score though? So the destiny of a couple depended on whether you reached that score? That's sort of creepy and silly at the same time.

I still tolerate playing them except Suikoden 5 was genuinely good. It's actually my favorite behind Suikoden 2. Lost Odyssey was great. Suikoden 3 and 4... weren't. Also, the slowness of Lost Odyssey at least was attributable to its overall difficulty. Suikoden games were never 'difficult' IMO. Yeah, Luc was great, except it made Sephiroth seem like a main cast of a TV sitcom in comparison to how often Luc showed up, which was about never. I actually agree. It's just that the great big battle and conflict between the Trinity characters never went anywhere. They allied themselves in a snap of a finger which just seemed silly to me. With such politics involved, you'd think it'd go three different ways, but it didn't. For first half, I would agree. Second half, it's the usual 'big bad enemy! KILL HIM'. Maybe they should make another trinity system but with more conflict and maybe even different endings. With so many characters, you'd think there would be different outcomes every damn time you finish with certain characters. The baby-paste story of Chrono Trigger gets 20 endings and Suikoden can't? That's illogical.

All subjectivity. I really haven't seen many shows put so much into production values and let director Taniguchi Goro run amok like that. If he irked some people, then that means he succeeded in making something that truly stands out. It's almost like with Gurren Lagann. Some people will definitely be irked by the bold direction. That said, I find it hard to find too many points of criticism for the new season of Macross Frontier except the opening and ending goes from something like 'okay' to 'this sucks'. Even Macross 7 had awesome songs in comparison.

It was around $9. I do know the thing is bad relative to truly great Suikoden versions, but it's passable. Then again, I have very low expectations of Konami to actually make good RPGs nowadays. Suikoden 5 was the exception, even if it had a whole slew of problems of its own. The plot was bad IMO because it teased at a lot, but in the end, it was a MAJOR disappointment. Maybe even bigger than the 'oops, your universe wasn't real!' in Star Ocean 3. Mainly because the three stars really never had any tension between them as it should have. If the game allowed me to choose sides and kill the other stars, then that would have been downright epic, but that never happened. It became the typical 'every good guys combine forces even if all logic says they should MURDER eachother'. That just irked me to no end. All the potential and logic wasted. I never saw another RPG drop the ball quite that way. As for the mechanics, Suikoden 3 had its share of game-breaking characters too, namely Juan and Emily just dishing out 10,000 points of pain not long after you get to obtain them and letting them hit on enemies a dozen times before they get a chance to even attack. I do think some parts of Suiko 3 were fun mainly the side missions and maybe even the bath-house/theater parts and other cute little aspects. Sometimes exploiting the game engine was fun at times too, mainly because some characters are so overpowered at what they do. I wouldn't say I'm stingy with game-money, but I am on the same page as far as unknowns go. I usually don't buy games that have really bad reputations like Ninety Nine Nights or Battle Network games. I usually go for games that are said to be downright cliche but maybe decent in their own conventions. That or a lot of supposedly great games that happens to tout the $15 price tag. Though nowadays, I do that a lot for Xbox Live Arcade games where it may be cheaper at times (like Puzzle Quest. Amazing game).

I don't think just because there aren't new genres every other second in the modern gaming era, all innovative qualities are lost because games often tries to put in game-changing innovations within the games themselves (perks in Call of Duty, dual wielding in some FPS games, changing of gravity in platformers, controlling time in action games, different fighting mechanics in fighting games, etc). I also think it's a bit of an oxymoron to expect quirky games to be the norm. Seriously, the premise wasn't the reason why Final Fight or Street Fighter or Bionic Commander became so popular. It was because of the gameplay. Even with Metal Gear, that game had the most insipid and boring plotlines in terms of war spy games, but its gameplay paved the way. Also, if such wacky games become the norm, then the wackiness alone becomes the status quo. Like some others have said, the 80's had way too many insipid 'wacky' ideas that never had the lure or the gameplay to make them last very long. I don't want the industry to suffer from lack of creativity, but I don't want them to become slogs in terms of characterizations like in the 80's. Games like Shadow of the Colossus which is both innovative and has great gameplay (aside from its worst camera system ever) is nice when they come about, but I think it's silly to expect all games to meet that criteria. It IS a business after all, and I think it's perfectly fine for them to do tried-and-true types of games but while adding enough spice to make them new again. Objectively, regardless of new control schemes, SSBB really didn't do anything new. It was just a really good sequel, but yeah, it does seem hypocritical for him to say SSBB is above it, which it isn't. Especially when it's such a rote sequel to the first two games, as great as it turned out. Again, what's so different from something like Halo or Metal Gear or Splinter Cell which all seems to get better and better with each sequels? If you're talking about 'new wacky premises', then none of them really have it. But there's really nothing wrong with sequels either, as long as they try to do new things within convention.

That was rather cliche really. That was the oldest gripe of the new console generation I've heard. I do think there should be more new, wilder characters though. lol at the "Todd McFarlane = chains" idea because it's true. On the optimistic side, they do tend to create some more out of the blue ideas in games once they settle down on a console. Godhand, Okami, God of War, Sky Gunner, etc etc on the PS2 was a good example. I just wish they start doing more of that on the 360/Wii. PS3 maybe eventually.

I have yet to watch it, but I was spoiled. The show is just unembarrassingly bold in its approach, I can simply say 'fuck you' to all the people who hound this series. It seems the writers of the show is saying a huge fuck you too. I still don't consider myself some sort of a "Geass fan" who digs into all the Nordic/European backstories and philosophical warfare going on, but this show almost puts Gundam 00 to shame with how much each episode packs in the developments.

YES, watch it, if at least for the incredible first episode. Also, it's going to be a shonen/fighting type of show, so it should be a relative easy-to-digest type of show unless you have a deep seated hatred for that type of show. I can watch Naruto fillers without flinching (not too much anyway..) and besides, Studio Bones is doing Soul Eater, so it's bound to be pretty consistent.

Wow. I just watched the first episode of Soul Eater and I never thought anime could look this refined and crazy at the same time. It actually looks a shade better than Gurren Lagann for a comparison. I think there's finally a true must watch of the season, unless you really detest great animation.

I got started with a basic dictionary + kanji dictionary + some self help language books. I think you need a lot of determination to do it yourself but it worked for me. I don't understand why people say the structure is hard to grasp, because it's just in context of a language. I can somewhat agree that it's similar to French in structure, but the entire Eastern Asian continental nations have the exact same structure so it's just a matter of getting accustomed to it. The Kanji is almost fun to learn if you do it in the childrens' grammatical way of combining the radicals and smaller kanji words (there aren't too many variations. Just a lot of combinations) and it becomes easier to digest. I know maybe a hundred at most, but I need 1000 until I become almost fully literate in terms of writing/reading. If I had the money, I could have majored in it too. No big deal. I am interested in maybe Chinese and Italian, but I'm not sure I'm terribly enamored with either culture as of yet to devote my life to it. All I care about Italy is Venice and its food anyway.

Youtube comment: Wut duh ef.

Hmm. Never happened to me or I was unaware of it the few times it might have happened. I don't really care about the ranks so maybe that has something to do with it. To me it's social or bust. The ranked servers have too much angst with the kill ratio. As for the fanbase, I typically think most huge guildies and certain segment of a fanbase tends to be a bunch of pigs anyway. That doesn't really exclude the Nintendo console crowd or the PC crowd to me. Yes, but it takes such a short time to level up whatever you want in the game, I don't really see it too much as a 'grinding' than just going for the goal and points. Besides, the rewards aren't anything special. A gold/digital painted weapon isn't really a big deal unless you're really striving for it. Also, unless you're some sort of a master gamer, it's really hard to find one niche and stick with it since the after-kill camera shows how you kill someone to the enemy. So I think the parity is just really good in CoD4, grind or no grind. A fresh faced newbie stands a real chance competitively.

Sonic Heroes wasn't exactly bad, but simply not worth $50 for what seems like a beta-copy of a Sonic game. Somewhere along the line after the Dreamcast, Sega said 'screw it' to quality control. Also, Heroes makes Sonic Adventure 1 and 2 look like masterpieces in comparison. Actually, Sonic Adventure series were pretty good when you weren't climbing buildings and digging emeralds out of them.

I watch so many anime that I can actually watch most of it raw (without fansubs) and know what most characters are saying. Words I don't know, I can look it up in the dictionary. I used to not know a single word before.

^ Not a whole lot of true dating sim games though, just very fanservicey ones. Last year's 'ef a tale of memories' was a dating sim game and it was one of the most compelling watches too. Also, from what I watched so far, there's a ton of variety and quality to the season if you're willing to look beyond the genre you'd be normally comfortable with.

Honestly, this season might be one of the best I've ever seen. There's around a dozen I can follow without any reservations: Code Geass- Self explanatory in just naming it. Going to be wild, crazy and most probably, fun. Macross Frontier- Return to the old Macross style of mecha. Unless they mess it up bad at the end, it's going to be a modern classic. Itazura na Kiss- I was impressed by the first episode. The typical 'superior guy meets stupid girl' romance comedy. I thought it was funny enough. Zettai Karen Children- Japan's version of Power Puff Girls but more dynamic, a bit more mature and the action on screen is really nice. xxxHolic- Another season and it should be good enough to pass time at least. Chi's Sweet Home- Very cute but also very short cat-anime. Only 3 minutes per episode! No loss in following but I think it's a cute enough show even if it's conventional. Kanokon- Furry fanservice show but it could get good later on. I'll probably end up watching it all for the inevitable comedic romance. ToLoveRu- Space fanservice show. Same as Kanokon in reasoning. The fanservice is downright pornographic though. Tower of Druagua- Funny oldschool RPG spoof. First ep was great, not sure if it can continue. But I'm hoping. I think the Druagua game was on the NES in the 80's.... Which is pretty weird. Vampire Knight- A vampire romance drama with vampires that are actually pretty threatening. I loved the first episode. Kurenai- Very cerebral with its dialogue. Other than that, it's a mystery, but it looks great so far. Blassreiter- Generic action, but it looks nice I guess. I might follow to the end anyway. Special A- Another 'inferior girl, superior guy' scenario. First ep was very cute and funny enough. Soul Eater- Shonen/Fighting anime that is probably way better than Bleach as far as the imaginative/creative side goes. Looks like one of the best of the season actually. Nabari no Ou- Another shonen/fighting show that looks really promising. GREAT first episode. As for Bus Gamer, it's only 3 episodes and it really doesn't have the depth to it to make it noteworthy IMO. But it IS only 3 episodes..

Good to see them resort to the avatar system for adventure game aspect. Reminds me of Monkey Island the way they're drawn. And oh yeah, Phoenix Wright definitely is an 'anime lawyer' type of game. It wouldn't be the same if it was realistic or anything. Also, Edayan could or maybe even should draw some manga sometime or do character designs for anime. His Street Fighter Alpha and Rival Schools work is iconic for Capcom. Also, I won't want to see the series on home consoles other than maybe as a downloadable game. Because the game really has no replay value whatsoever except for the very best cases, and I will never pay $50 for what is essentially a great throwback to the old days. But it is still an ancient point and click adventure game.