Danny Choo ANIME Hellsing, Elfen Lied, the Storm Trooper In- Hell Girl and Deadman Wonderland All on One Vades Japan Page

Home , 2009 in Japanese music, 60s 70s 80s, African Office Worker, Ai Shimizu, Akina Nakamori, Alucard (Castlevania)

Halloween Issue 25 November

ALL OTAKUMagazine ALL OTAKU TOP 10 SCARIEST Danny Choo ANIME Hellsing, Elfen Lied, The Storm Trooper in- Hell Girl and Deadman Wonderland all on one vades Japan page.

Mimiru Surprise Surprise

k_miyuko Features in our Cos- play of the Month

Kim Bussiahn tells us what inspires her in our SA Artist of the Week interview Editors Letter

As we all know doing something once out of excitement is easy. You look at something and say wow that looks like fun and generally people call it beginners luck when you get it right the first time. But most of us also know that the second time can also be daunting. So this month we are proud to present to you our Halloween edition!!!

We bring you the best in gore games, anime horror and all round creepy stuffs. From our Top Ten Scariest Anime to our “Zombie and Horror Only” game reviews. We also feature spreads on Elfen Lied and Kim Bussiahn, and take a look at what is hot in anime this month (see the Anime Board). This month we also announce our new mascot/vocaloid MIMIRU AYU- MU!!! She will be the face of All Otaku and maybe appear at events hosted or attended by All Otaku staff. We also do a history check on Asian super start DANNY CHOO, take a look at Megatokyo, feature great cosplay outfits in our Cosplay of the month, find out what J-pop is all about and start looking at what we are doing in our own country. The SA Anime Directory features not one but two cosplays in SA this De- cember, and is a great place to find out if there are any events happening or societies forming in your area. As I will continuously remind you PLEASE!! let us know what you want to hear about in our magazine and if there are any pages you think we are missing drop us an email.

Other than that we hope you have a freaktastic Halloween.

Regards from the Editor Joannah Stewart

“Video games are a conduit for the soul. They expand our lives, channel our imagination, test our skillz. Games exist as a channel for the boundless energy of people all over the world. It is a medium you are incapable of understanding.”

4 ALL OTAKU WELCOMES MIMIRU This month we welcome our mascot to the team. Read all about her on page 3

7 JAPAN’S VERY OWN STORM TROOPER We take a look at the life of an anime legend in the making.

20 MEGATOKYO The history and story line behind one of the wests biggest anime 6 How to cosplay endeavours. 10 The Anime Board 25 SA ANIME DIRECTORY Our latest addition to the magazine brings you the happenings and 12 Elfen Lied Spread review- Master news in SA. From Anime societies to events and contacts. Get it here. piece or gore fest?

14 J-pop. The Complete History

17 This week we REBOOT.

18 Halloween Special- All Otaku’s Top Ten Scariest Anime

21 Artist of the Month

23 The News Box

29 Cosplay of the Month

30 The Gaming Corner

31 Mimiru’s Anime Class

32 Featured Game

3 4 5 All Otaku Magazine Introduces MIMIRU to the team Physical stats Height: 160cm Weight: 47kg While cooking up a storm of craziness Body-type: Slender one evening the team and I realised we Hair-color: Pink Eye-color: rose pink needed a bit of help with our image. We sat a pondered as to what it was that we could do to get the masses to bow down to Personality our ever growing awesomeness, and after She is an out going fire cracker a while came up with the idea to release a who likes to make friends. new UTAUloid. Not shy at all With that I quickly got to work on the new Likes: Anime, music, fireworks, muse of All Otaku. She took a while to crowds, pizza, and cats cultivate but I soon had something that we could work on. So It is with great pleasure Dislikes: Fish, stupid people, and pride that we introduce to you South dogs, doing dishes, and gore. Africa’s first official UTAUloid and All Otaku mascot Mimiru Ayumu!! Mimiru is SA born from a Japanese family. She loves to be outdoors. Her goal is to bridge the gap between Japanese animation and SA animators.

MIMIRU Ayumu How to cosplay C ally likeally but is cool. think than acharacter that you don’t re- you admire or is similar to you are. It is to easier play some one a character that to you who speaks one knows you who are. find Also most amazing Rosette out and no It totally sucks you when make the crowdthe you are cosplaying for. count budget, and skill personal get. Butwill into take also ac- anime,the morethe wow’s you It that is more true the obscure acharacter toChoose cosplay Step one finishthis of hard the all work previous inthe steps ifyou don’t of you, and it would terribly be shameful and awaste Folks to pose. Learn are going to want to pictures take Step Six Study your character. Watch how char they Step Three oftypes things. Find out where you can get these buy and things you can make Now make a list of things you can And Your Type? Body This wear?do they Does Suit You What make-up and accessories How hair? their style dothey What character this does wear? outfit. you Sketch up illustration adetailed of Step Two something specific. Cosplay is about not fun, forced being to do not compulsory feel so tofree do as you like. one like character their not acts and every it is like character the you have chosen. However tition judged you be on will ability this to act Ifto speak. you are entering acosplay compe- costume is that you are putting on ashow, so wayhalf there.thing The about having a good phrases are. Once you can copy you then are moves,acter how re-act, what they catch their your favourite character’s being.” “Cosplay is atime-consuming, DIY hobby that entails creativity, crafts, singleof knowledge aspect and adetailed every of to make your cosplay absolutely great for events. these Cape Town Cosplay on 3rd the and A.IFest on we 10,so here the afew tips on how This year we havetwo of our cosplayown competitions coming December,up in andideas costumes with eachother. down festivals to smaller the and like Rage icon gather people still to share their offsomewith kick-ass photo opps. and From evenbooks. and Con Comic Dragon (my Con favourite :D) escapism of playing favourite their characters from anime, manga, games cosplay fests around year world the to enjoy every excitement the and osplay has quickly become abig of part anime the culture. Fans flock to . - make it perfect. change things and adjust your costume to over effect is. all Nowwhen is you get to Time to put it together all andwhat see the Step Seven achieved making something by yourself. warding, once you are finished, to have at and you all find in fact will it quiet re- how now isto time the It’s learn. not hard If andterial sewing. start you don’t know Make anything that you can’t buy. Buy ma- Step Five etc. tacts, things likewith ribbons, small the con wigs, - Start buying things for your costume. Start Step Four cosplay.html http://www.cosplayhouse.com/halloween- cloth/#more-81 nowledge-for-cosplay-costumes-about- http://www.cosplayclasses.com/basic- watch?v=gnTqYXYvLwI https://www.youtube.com/ http://www.squidoo.com/howtocosplay blog/30210651/ http://hetalia-cosplay.deviantart.com/ it’s fine. around legs with hairy inaminiskirt with. As long as it is isn’t aguy running forespecially girls, that to is fun play Cross Cosplaying an is option, also strength for application. particular this and havesymmetrical better holding Instead,wigs. hair use pins, are which straight on other the to clip on your on appearwhich one crinkled sidebut Note that you shouldn’t bobby use pins, overthe for look all abetter cosplay. pressions and right. looks This finishes 2. Focus on getting that characters ex- firsttime easy.go difficult characters thisbut if is your am not saying that you should not play usually hard to create acostume for. I or most unique character are as they off ratherthan finding thestrangest possibilitythe of pulling that cosplay concentrate more on character the and 1. When choosing your character factor in: difficult step. There things are two to acharactersSelecting is most the characters from. to choose you have actually alarge of selection to your favourite actors or singers, so games,comics, movies, tv/commercials one you like, from anime, video Just remember you can cosplay ANY Tips andTricks www.otakuvillage.net. 6 A memorable moment while on a shoot in the sticks for a documentary about fireworks for the Discovery Channel was when a bi-plane flew by the cast and camera crew at low speed and altitude. It was a clear blue evening and the sight sent a tingle down my spine. Was an inspiring Danny Choo sight that made me want to do something with this life. The Storm Trooper invades Japan

Born in 1972, Danny is the blog author of and the founder of Mirai Inc., best known for his exploits as a Star Wars Imperial stormtrooper exploring and dancing in the streets of Tokyo.

As a child Danny Choo was unfortunate enough to shop asking for a Japanese speaker to each him and who be put into foster care and passed around like a doll. he could teach English. He was successful and he was soon His life was filled with bullies and beatings from all able to take His Japanese Language Proficiency Test and after the tests he found a Japanese speakers club called Axel. sides and his only joy were the weekends he got to see his mother or father. His anime obsession soon led him to a company called As a form of escape Danny would watch TV, or Manga Entertainment who decided to let him be Editor for what little he was allowed at the time, and soon a fan club magazine called “Mangazine”. This meant that stumbled upon his first anime in the form of Gat- he would have to review manga and anime before it was chaman (or G-force as it is known in the west). Lit- released in the UK. But they paid him nothing and so he “The result of that call was that in tle did he know at the time but that was to be his would work, part time, for his father at the Metropolitan. July 1999, wifey and I packed up future. While working for his dad, Jimmy Choo (yes the world stuff from our friends place to dump His school life too was a nightmare. He was bullied renown shoe designer), Danny learned everything about frequently and his lack of interest in class gave him the shoe design and manufacture process. He learned to at mums place (^^;) and picked up bad grades. design, cut patterns, stitch and last Uppers too. our one way tickets to Japan. He was also lucky enough to work with fashion journals My dream came true. I was going like Elle and Vogue, attending fashion shows and sourc- to live and work in the land of the I ended up living with a white, black ing model shoes. But he never stopped learning Japanese or forgot about his passion for anime. And after realising rising sun. All the hard work over and then with an Indian family for that working part time for his dad would not allow him to follow his dreams he quit. the previous few years paid off. Dis- what seemed like an eternity. cover and live your passion and the rest will just follow - it always does. To make up for his lack of cash flow he signed up with an agency and worked on TV dramas, ads and Never give up. Don’t make barri- As he got older his parents could afford to let him stay documentaries, he also helped translate Japanese ers for yourself and especially don’t with them. He stayed with his dad for a few years and then letters and documents while studying business at let barriers that other people put in moved in with his mother, at which point he began to make School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS). friends outside of school. He was a fan of Kylie Minogue at your way stop you. Listen to your the time and so found other people with the same interests He also worked at a Japanese restaurant called heart and forge forward. by waiting outside the BBC or at Kylie’s recording studios. Benihana, as a waiter. This was his first step towards making it to the land of the rising sun. While work- We had saved enough money in the Somewhere in between he discovered Sega Megadrive - a Japanese 16 bit game machine. Wanting to know as much ing here he could speak Japanese as much as he bank to start out our new life. All as he could about the consols latest games be took to raid- wanted and he could save up money for a flight to we needed to do now was to pack a ing Japanese book stores in London. His lack of internet Japan. back then these stores were his only way of finding Japa- With in a year he had enough money to go to Japan. couple O suitcases and say goodbye nese material. The Japan Center was one such shop, here to dad.” he discovered anime and manga.

He was luck to have made friends in Japan who of- Choo Danny fered that he stay with them. At this point things changed from Kylie to Anime. Like a lot of us he was overwhelmed by the animation, stories, mecha and cute girls, and he wanted more, not just in While there he bought a microphone and recorded These days after I eat at a restaurant, I usually anime but in any aspect of Japanese culture. the sounds of Japan, upon his return to the UK he Soon he was so captivated by Japanese culture that he de- set up speakers around his room and played the wipe the table and stack up the dishes for the cided to learn Japanese, picking up scraps here and there sounds as motivation to make it back to Japan. He waiter/waitress as I know exactly what it’s like from dictionaries and text books he learned the basic made it back many times and his group of Japanese to serve in the halls. grammar. friends grew very fast. He also learned a lot from manga like Ranma 1/2 and In between his trips to Japan he stayed at Benihana Crayon Shin-chan. The more he learned the more he want- where he met his wife. ed to know and while he managed to get deals on older anime he didn’t care how long they had been out as long as After Graduating From SOAS he was offered a job he got a glimpse of Japan. Often he would just let the anime at Japan Airlines as a Computer Engineer for their play in the background as he did home work or record the computing division, JAL Avionet. It was his first full voices and listen to them on the train. He had become the time job... ultimate Otaku.

After a while of learning by himself he decided he wanted But while he was happy with the job he still wasn’t to speak with others so he took a Japanese evening class in in Japan, so as time passed he started searching for Angel. But when his teacher told him to forget his dreams jobs in Japan and found one as a web marketeer in of working and living in Japan he quit and found other Tokyo. He went for an interview, and after impress- ways to speak with other people. ing the HR he was sent to Tokyo for a week’s trial and seven days of pressure he was asked to wait for So he put up an ad on the community board at a Japanese their decision. He got the call that Sunday...

7 While working for Nature, Danny was put ing, selection analysis and ASIN (SKU) in charge of marketing as well as process metric systems. subscriptions, building portal sites, check translations and launch journals in the While Danny loved the work he was doing region. in Seattle he found it difficult to get used to American life. He spent much of his The couple moved into a small place on time wishing he was back home, and after the outskirts of Tokyo in a place called Hi- months of consideration he took another gash Fushimi. leap of faith and quit his position. He and his wife headed back to Japan A year there after Danny created dan- where he stayed at Amazon and was put nychoo.com. The sites’ original intention in charge of a new website called Joyo.com was to act as a testing ground for his self taught programming and graphic design. So how did Danny Choo go from a typical Life was good and Danny reminds his Asian guy behind a desk in a square office viewers that he has gained a lot by work- to one of Anime’s most loved culture blog- ing for Nature and many ways but at that gers in history? point he realised that he was in the “comfort zone”. He no longer had any motiva- Well when he was in Seattle he created a The best thing that my dad has ever done for tion to achieve his dreams. His life was blog function for the site, but it wasn’t re- content but not fulfilling and so he did ally until he got back to Japan that he start- me was to let me achieve and earn on my own. what not many people would have in his ed to blog regularly. At first the blogs were situation, he began to look for another job. mostly about Gundam, figures and Japan, but thanx to his computing skills he was During the many interviews he set out to able to create a template for his blogs to endure he discovered a recruitment com- optimise search engine results and build a Living with Illness pany called Job Dragon, which he placed fan base faster. His pictures also attracted his CV with. A day later they called him a lot of attention causing readership to and asked him to come in for an interview grow overnight. and he was hired. “As long as we live, we will encounter illness. Some of these illnesses come and go like the common cold but About three months after his employment some of us have to live with these illnesses for the rest with them they had to lay him and a few of our life. And then there are some of us who are born others off due to financial difficulty. But But then I started to realize that with illnesses. because Job Dragon was a recruitment agency they offered to find Danny a job. I had fallen into one of the most He was offered two major jobs. One from dangerous situations that one can Not sure whether I was born with Asthma (both par- Amazon Japan and one from ebay Japan, ents have it) but remember carrying around an inhaler despite ebays enormous salary Danny ever be in - something that I call as a wee lad. Hardly use the inhaler these days though. chose to go with Amazon. A little while the Comfort Zone. Also remember a time where I had my chest pumped later ebay Japan folded and left the coun- to get rid of some sort of fluid which accumulated in try. my lungs. While working for Amazon Danny often Due to Danny’s huge success as website The illness that I wasn’t born with however was Spinal got requests from other clients to create manager he was often rewarded with big Hernia which I was diagnosed with back in 2008. websites for them. Being happy where he bonus’, but his hectic schedule meant that was in his job he paid little attention to the he no longer had time to work on his site requests. Instead he sent back a message A few discs in my lower back region have ruptured and or his computing experiments. are sticking into the nerves which extend from the spi- He was the youngest member of the Ama- saying: nal cord. This causes pain which goes down to my legs. zon management team, earning three times what he did at Nature. The pain used to come and go but for the past year its “OK if you really want a website then been permanent. The discs in the spine wear away anyway but mine are kinda already screwed ^^; In 2003, when Amazon launched Amazon its going to cost you X million yen.” Web Services (AWS) - an API which al- As you can see from my MRI scans above - most of the lowed any developer access to Amazons To his surprise most of them agreed to discs are dark in colour where they should be white. catalogue data in XML format. With AWS, his prices and with 1 million yen being As the discs wear down, the spinal cord starts to get one can build online shops filled with the equivalent of 10 000 dollars he was affected which causes pain where in some cases it leads Amazon products- Danny took the op- willing to spend much of his spare time Danny Choo Danny to the inability to walk. portunity to build Japans first IAWS pow- programming until the early hours of the ered site. It was called Mitsukatta and was morning. I was devastated when I was diagnosed with the illness used as an example in a press conference and remember being depressed about the prospect of when the service was officially launched He often banked just shy of what he made in Japan. not being able to walk one day. But then after brood- in a year at Nature and the requests just kept on coming in. Soon he was unable to ing about it for quite a while, I made the decision to But he still wanted to work on the project handle the work flow without affecting his just keep living, working and playing as hard as I could and see if he could improve it, he started full time job and so with the help of Goog- until I maybe eventually end up in a wheelchair. If I’ve learning server side caching and Search le he started to seek out developers from only got a certain amount of time left then I’d rather Engine Optimization and with permission over seas, he ended up with development enjoy it instead of waste it being depressed. he placed Amazon associates tag in links to products on the Amazon site allowing teams in India, Romania and the US. He I remain optimistic and am aware that not all Spinal him commission from Amazon. worked remotely with them, via email or Hernia leads to the inability to walk and many folks over the telephone, and required half the Danny began to realise that AWS as an in- payment from their clients up front with with the illness don’t experience pain anymore after re- ternal tool for Amazon and save months which he paid his developers. For the first habilitation. My rehab however doesn’t seem to work of development and man power, reducing time he was managing his own group of but its not something I get depressed about anymore the work time to just a few days. And so he staff. as I’ve learned to live with the pain - but sneezing is a began working on proto-tyes, which were killer! I guess its like sailing a boat with a damaged rud- discovered by the CEO of Amazon, Jeff der - still sails though ^^” Bezos. Jeff then offered him the chance to work in Seattle building internal tools for But life is not about being finan- the company. cially comfortable - its about living Danny accepted his offer and in July of 2004 they packed up and hoped on a plane a passion which was not what I to America. was achieving in Seattle. There he worked on competitive monitor- 8 “But everything in life happens for a reason and ture with the world and provide a means to every event is a piece of a jigsaw puzzle that one Another significant increase in traffic oc- do so. They help Japanese business’ expand curred in 2007, around the time of the first collects during their journey in life.” overseas and develop characters for compa- Tokyo Dance Trooper video, pushing its nies like Sony. traffic rank from around 40,000 at the time, to almost 5000th in the world as of March In 2005 Danny decided that he had learned 2008. Page views for July 2007 was over 10 all he could from Amazon and so handed in million served to over 50,000 unique users his resignation with them, for a short time he per day. worked on projects for random people before On September 13, 2007, Danny Choo was he made his way into Microsoft Japan. He a panelist at Imprint 2007 at the National was hired as a Consumer Generated Media Center for the Preservation of Democracy (CGM) Product Manager, he was in control in Los Angeles, California. of services like blogs, favourites, maps and so forth. On July 24, 2005, Danny Choo purchased an Imperial stormtrooper costume on eBay This ,too, ended up with Danny leaving the and blogged of his intention to wear it in company, but by this time he had saved up the streets of Tokyo. Over the next year, he enough money to start up his own business. posted pictures and video clips of himself But while money wasn’t an issue what do with “And for the folks who wearing the costume in public and visiting it was a bit of a blur. He know that he would are wondering - I have no businesses in Tokyo. On September 24, start off with web consulting and began using intention of taking over 2006, he uploaded a video of himself wan- the third floor of their house as office space. dering the streets of Tokyo in the costume Through his large network of connections he dads business - I already to YouTube, which has been viewed more was able to get work, and eventually he ended have my own company than 11,000 times. A second video, filmed in up consulting for companies like Disney and Yokohama, reached a similar audience. Columbia Japan. and I love what I’m doing. Besides - could not bare In 2009 Danny and British engineer, Chris Gaunt, got together to continue a platform the thought of working called Marai Gaia. It was one that Danny had in a field that has zero 2D started years before which involved creating girlies! My company gen- a platform that could do everything from e-commerce to publishing to communities, erates enough money to much like the templates we use in sites like provide my wife and I with the one we use for this magazine. This meant a comfortable life and to that the only difference between client A and client B’s site are a bunch of basic settings, CSS grow our business - that’s and PHP templates. But things were not go- all we need. ing as smoothly as Danny had planned which almost left him bankrupt. The company had I have no idea if I’m going one main client at the time and Danny did a to inherit anything but if I lot of free work for major companies with the do then its going to go to belief that it would get them more clients. Choo Danny building schools for some The company is now involved with anime and of the less fortunate kids in game companies like Good Smile Company, the world.” Kadokawa, Bushiroad, King Records, Dentsu, Sega Sammy and Ascii Media Works. Their goal is a simple one - to share Japanese cul- Anime Post

This month we have added a little something for our readers to play with. Every month from now on we will be adding a funny picture somewhere in the magazine and you guys will have to send us the funniest caption you can come up with. For now it will be for the hell of it but once we have enough readers we will be giving out monthly prizes.

Send us your posts at fanmail@all-otaku. co.za

9 The Anime Board High School of the Dead Deadman Wonder Land

For those of you with a real taste for gore this is for you. While I will say it is not as bad as something like Gantz in the gore department, the twisted reality that is Deadman Wonder Land makes things seem worse on an emotional level. I found that this series managed to burrow into my brain and force me to feel what the characters were feeling. Each character is so well built and dynamic that it’s hard not to believe in their plight. The part that got me the most is how helpless the characters are, trapped in this little globe of torture and torment, unable to break free not by some kind of mental block but simply because it is impossible. And while I Steins;Gate am not a gore fan by ANY means I can appreciate the gravity of the situation that Ganto is in. The animation and style of art is equally applaudable, the movement is smooth but graphic and the world around them is very vivid. Jelly boobs!!!!! If there is one thing that this series The year is 2023 and Japan has been hit with something called a the Red Whole that destroyed most of Toyo and has it is definitely jelly boobs. However this show surrounding areas. It is now a few years later and Japan has started to repair itself. The restricted areas are being does have more to offer than just a bunch of girls opened and Tokyo is seeing it’s first tourists again. Our tale starts with a young boy, Igarashi Ganta , and his class mates in school when “The Red Man” attacks, killing all of his class mates and two best friends. The Red Man with big knockers that seem to defy gravity like a jumping castle with a fat kid bouncing on it. Nope. This is a story about a group of kids fighting for survival as their world and The Mystic Archives of Dantalian everything they know Genres: Action, zombie. Studio: Madhouse crumbles around them. Year : April 27, 2011 Set in the early 1900s, Huey Disward has just inherited his grandfather’s estate. His grandfa- The story follows a group ther, a known collector of ancient and magical of high school students, the high school’s nurse, books, has left to Huey’s care the Bibliotheca and a young girl as they fight their way to safety de Dantalian and it’s keeper, the young Da- through the deadly streets of Japan during a world- lian. The pare are instantly put to work in find- wide catastrophic event known as the “Outbreak”. ing these Phantom Books and stopping them As the cast tries to survive the zombie apocalypse, they must also face the additional threats of societal Genres: action-adventure, from causing chaos contemporary fantasy, fantasy, in the old English collapse, in the form of dangerous fellow survivors, magic, summer 2011 country side. These and the possible decay of their own moral codes. Episodes: 12 books, written un- Each character brings their own special something Publisher: Kadokawa Pictures der unusual circum- Inc. to the team and while some of the backing char- Year : 2011 stances by extraordi- acters lack depth the main characters are very real Air Date: Jul 15, 2011 to Sep 16, nary people, contain people that you can relate to. 2011 knowledge that allows certain readers Over all the animation and design are amazing, to tap into a power beyond that of our world’s own. with one of the best zombie ass kickings ever in Little do they know that other Bibliotheca and episode 5. their keykeeps exist. Some believe they must then implants Ganta with a blood crystal leading destroy these books others try to use it to their to him blacking out on the floor. When he comes The story line, although not the most original, is own advantage. to he is horrified to find that he is being blamed The series is a little rough at first with sudden leaps for the murders and with the help of his crackpot still rather entertaining with enough fan service on in the plot lines and slow animation that makes you lawyer he is sent to Deadman Wonder Land, a pri- board to keep your nose bleeding non stop. think you are in a dream but the promising story line vately owned prison/amusement park used, sup- gets you thinking there is more to be had here. And posedly, to try and fund the rebuilding of Tokyo there is, it just seems to lack a little when compared to city. In reality however it is a gore fest for spectators others in it’s genre like Chrono Crusades. who believe that the entertainment is fake. Here Ganta is fitted with a collar that injects poison into his blood stream, the only way to neutralize the poison is to take the anti-dote in the form of candy. While in the prison he meets a strange girl named Shiro who doesn’t seem to be a prisoner there, or even human for that fact. Ganta quickly becomes obsessed with The Red Man and exacting revenge that he begins to unlock the power within him attracting the attention of the jails assistant warden Tsunenaga Tamaki the main antagonist. Ganta soon discovers that there are more like him and that they are being forced to fight each other for sport in a tournament called the Corpse Car- nival.

Genres: action-adventure, dystopia, sci-fi, science fiction, shounen, tragedy, violence Publisher: Kadokawa Pic- tures Inc. Year : 2011 Air Date: Started Apr 16, 2011 10 FREEZING

Set in a slightly futuristic world, Earth has been invaded and is at war with aliens from another dimension called the Nova. In order to counter them, Pandoras and Limiters, genetically modified girls with super fighting skills and their male partners who use special “freezing” powers to limit their opponent’s mobility, are made to fight against the Nova. The series focuses on Kazuya Aoi, a Limiter whose late sister was a Pandora, and Satellizer el Bridget, a powerful Pandora with a cold personality, both who are enrolled at the West Genetics Academy, one of the many academies where Pandoras and Limiters are trained. In spite of the warnings of all his friends about Satel- lizer, who has intense aphephobia, Kazuya decides to be her friend and Limiter. The story follows Kazuya’s friendship with Satellizer, the students of the Academy and Earth’s war against the Nova. At first glance, Freezing appears to be your typical fanservice filled show with pretty animation. And in a way, that’s exactly what it is. The animation is shiny and the animators obviously took the time to include all of the detail to make the world seem life-like and a place you can immerse yourself in. The expressions of the characters vary from intense to goofy, just like any other anime. However, it’s the fight scenes that really draw you in. Each fight is expertly choreographed and the animation is fluid and overall enjoyable to watch. Even when the characters are not being serious, the animators are able to get their emotions across very clearly.

Ao no Exorcist Steins;Gate After the death of their mother Rin Okumura and his twin brother Yukio are raise by Father Shiro Fujimo, perish priest of a small church in Japan. But when Rin Taking us back to 2010 Steins;Gate tells the story of the finds out that he is the son of Satan things start to go “Future Gadget Laboratory” run by Mad Scientist and self bad and the father is killed. At Shiro’s funeral, Rin proclaimed evil doer Rintarō Okabe. At first he gives the has an encounter with Mephisto Pheles, head master impression that he is greatly deluded, engaging in manic of True Cross Academy, who agrees with Rin’s wish laughter, always wearing a white lab coat and talking in codes to become an Exorcist like his guardian to avenge to himself over the phone. But as his little “club” grows he his death. With this unexpected turn of events he is tends to soften up. quickly excepted into the prestigious school where he After an incident in the first episode him and his two lab part- his and brother are to study to become exorcists. The ners, Mayuri Shiina (childhood friend and lover of all things True Cross Academy is the Japanese branch of an inter- anime) and Itaru “Daru” Hashida (the super hacker, geek national organization dedicated to protect the human all round perv of the team) discover that they have invented realm, Assiah, from demons and other creatures from a time machine, Shortly after, they are discovered by Kurisu the their realm, Gehenna. Little does he know that his Makise, a time travel genius with daddy issues, who’s curiosity brother has been studying as an exorcist since the age forces her to stick around and put up with Okabe calling her of 7 and that he is the youngest exorcist in existence. his assistant all the time. Yukio ends up becoming one of Rin’s teachers and with At the time there are rumours of a man who was able to send the help of his class mates and the Kurikara, a sword information to the past named John Titor. He informs the that restrains his demonic powers when sheathed, he defeats the evil that threatens to invade the world that the future is a dystopia in with a company called school and his world. Rins powers unfortunately means that he is permanently in demon form SERN rules the wold. The team com up with the idea to hack with fangs, pointed ears and a tail, but he also has the power to ignite himself into blue flames that into SERN’s systems and discover a code that can only be can destroy anything they touch. deciphered by an IBN 5100, an old computer from the 80’s. Over all the concept and feel of the series is an exciting one but it lacks a little in animation. How- After it’s discovery the group begin to experiment with the ever the story will keep you satisfied from the very beginning all the way till the end of this season. time machine and realize they can only send sms’ back in time to affect the time line. It turns out that Okarin has is the only one with the ability to retain his memories once the time lines have changed. Shangri-La But the team believe that they should experiment more and Set in the near future where the markets are ruled by the amount of carbon a get friends to join them in sending messages to the past. country can create, Shangri-La starts with Hojo Kuniko who is in line to inherit Needless to say Okarin begins to doubt whether what they are Metal Age, her father’s land. After her release from Juvi she returns home only doing is right but before he can have an attack of conscience to be thrown into a global conflict between governments, nations and hack- he begins to receive sms’s from an unknown source threaten- ers. Unlike most female characters in anime Hojo is no whiny “please-save-me” ing his life. Now the group and all those involved must try type, she is strong, inquisitive and intelligent, and like all of the characters in this series she is unique with a rich and believable history. Her friends are a and figure out how to stop the evil SERN while not being bunch of trannies, one of which has to be one of the best characters in anime, captured by them in the process. nay, in any show I have ever seen, with his innuendo filled jokes he fights bad guys by flirting with or whipping them. There are a couple of OTT old guy anime pervs and even a father figure for Hojo. And while you may be thinking “Seriously” you will find that the story is so well written that everything comes together in a symphony of action, mystery, suspense and wicked humour. To add to the list of dynamic characters we are also introduced to an albino girl who kills any one who lies to her, she’s the leader of a religious cult, there is also a little blond girl who happens to be a financial and technical genius attempting to take over the world, and a really beautiful women who seems to monitor all happenings on the market. She is like the Carbon Market Administrator. As the story unfolds you each faction seems to have their own agenda but as the story progresses you discover that each person has a connection to the next and that they are all stuck in an always evolving and apparently supernatural spider web. With out having to give anything away the only thing I had a problem with was that time was a little distorted to the Viewer. You often wonder how long something has taken as there is no reference, but if you are an avid fan of anime that make you think and presents you with a mental challenge you HAVE to watch this. For those of you who follow Naruto and one piece please don’t even bother. 11 Review of the Month Elfen Lied Master Piece Or Perpetual Gore Fest? ritten by Lynn Okamoto, the story takes place in Kamakura, Japan, focusing on Nana to is a diclonius, but is very against violence. She is sent Written by: Lynn Okamoto Lucy, a Diclonius: a creature similar to human beings but different on a genetic out by her “father” (director kurama) to retrieve Lucy, but fails Published by: Shueisha level who wield strong telekinetic powers represented by arms. Due to this dan- when she has her arms and legs cut off. When Nana is returned Demographic: Seinen gerous power, they have been captured and isolated in laboratories by the gov- to the institute, she was supposed to be killed but instead, Kura- ma makes her fake arms and legs which are controlled by her Magazine: Weekly Young Jump ernment. To add to her destructive force Lucy is psychotic and has a burning hatred towards W vectors. She soon becomes good friends with Mayu and was Original run: June 2002 – November humans. This hatred was developed by the way she was treated as a child when school children adopted into Kouta’s inn by both Kouta and Yuka. 2005 killed her dog right before her eyes. Slowly you can begin to understand her reasoning behind Meanwhile Director Kurama believes that he has to find Lucy her being such a sadistic character. and in doing so we discover that in his first experiments one of Volumes: 12 (List of volumes) However, the series starts off with copious amounts of gore and destruction when Lucy es- the test subjects, Sanban, escapes. As she made her way through TV anime capes from Kanagawa Prefecture, killing everything that moves by ripping them to pieces. If the institute she touched researchers with her vectors giving Directed by: Mamoru Kanbe you are any kind of squeamish you would have stopped watching by now but for those of you them the vector virus. When Kurama’s and another scientist’s Studio: ARMS with a little more stomach, the show must go on. As she escapes she is hit in the head with a wives gave birth to diclonius children, he realized that Sanban .50 BMG round that ricochets off the metallic helmet encasing her head, which causes her to had infected them with genetically manipulated offspring. Licensed by: AEsir Holdings Before he could kill their baby, his wife, who had given birth develop a secondary, child-like personality known as Network: AT-X and had to have surgery due to cervix cancer, tried to stop him, Nyu. Now a little girl in an 18 year old’s body, Nyu is but because she was fresh out of surgery the day before, she Eng network: Anime Network washed up on shore where two locals, Kohta and his died. So Kurama makes a deal with the head director of the Propeller TV cousin Yuka, find and take her in. institute indebting himself to the institute forever. In the final Animax Having forgotten his childhood due to the trauma of episode, Kurama meets Mariko and decides that because he let seeing his father and sister being killed, Kohta doesn’t her live, so many lives had been lost. He decides that the only Original run: July 25, 2004 – Octo remember Nyu or that they had met many years ago. true option is to kill Mariko. He then orders the bomb inside ber 17, 2004 He is roughly 19 and in exchange for looking after Mariko to be blown up. Both he and Mariko die in the explo- Episodes: 13 (List of episodes) his extended family’s closed down restaurant he is al- sion. The group soon become subject to numerous attacks and at- OVA: 10.5: Regenschauer lowed to stay there while he attends university. Due tempts at recapturing Lucy by the Special Assault Team and Directed by: Mamoru Kanbe to his need to look after the women around him Nyu’s various other Duclonius, who shift from oblivious to deadly as Studio: ARMS infantile appearance makes him want to protect her. quickly as Nyu does to Lucy. She cannot speak or do things on her own but as the While the animated series ends with Lucy confronting a large Licensed by: ADV Films (dropped) story progresses he teaches her to say words and form team of SAT members and disappears, the manga continues Released: April 21, 2005 sentences, eventually learning to speak and function by showing the mad plans of Kakuzawa, leader of Diclonii re- Runtime: 25 minutes properly in the manga. Despite her insatiable hatred search, and his ultimate failure. The world itself is endangered. for humanity Lucy is in love with Kohta and had While the story behind it is interesting it’s not interesting been since she first saw him as a child. As a result of enough to warrant the amount of violence in the show. But if you are the kind of person who is sold by violence then this is a this and her guilt for killing his family she won’t kill him or harm those he cares about. Kohta, great series. Although short lived it had a lot of impact on those although more forgiving in the anime, also has feelings for Lucy, trying his hardest to look after who watched it and if a movie is defined by the impact it has her and protect her from those who would hurt her. But Lucy’s lack of empathy often scares then this is truly a masterpiece. him and leads to his discovery of the truth about their pasts, which he is less forgiving about. However he realises that he is in love with her and continues to take care of her. Yuka on the other hand, is Kohta’s cousin and has a long standing crush on him since the age of ten. They last saw each other during the summer before Kohta’s father and sister were murdered, but when Kohta moves to Kamakura and begins to attend the same university as her, she decides to move in with him at Kaeda House Inn. Yuka becomes upset by how close Nyu and Kohta become and is often angry at Kohta for not understanding her feelings toward him. She secretly hopes that they will finally be together once Nyu and Lucy are out of the picture. Mayu is not introduced to the story until the 2nd episode when she witnesses Lucy torture, but not kill, Bando, a member of the SAT who is sent after Lucy. She is a 13 year old runaway who was raped and abused by her new stepfather. When Mayu’s mother would not stop him, saying that she preferred her husband over her own daughter, Mayu went over the edge. The next time her stepfather asked her to remove her clothes, Mayu simply said no and ran away. Later in the series, becomes friends with Nana. She is taken in by Kouta and Yuka and decides to live with them. 12 elfenliedfansite.com 13 J-popWhile many of us may see J-pop as just another thing to come out of J-popJapan it actually has a long standing history. Originally J-pop is said to have been inspired by The Beatles and is quite unlike it’s more classic Kayokyoku counter part. J-pop uses a special pronun- ciation on it’s lyrics that is much like the style used in the west as well as it’s use of the second major, not often seen in the east. It was 1920s–1950s: Ryūkōka, Kayōkyoku, or nival ever to be held. It was at this carnival that Kyu when the Great Sounds genre, inspired by Western rock music, be- Japanese jazz Sakamoto, a fan of Elvis, made his début as a member came popular that Japanese Pop music adopted the second major. of the band The Drifters. His 1961 song “Ue wo Muite Although J-pop had changed from music based on the Japanese Arukō” (“Let’s Look Up and Walk”), also known as pentatonic scaling and distortional tetrachord, the basic singing It’s believed that Japanese Jazz was invented in the “Sukiyaki”, it was the first Japanese song to reach the style still remained popular. Meiji period (1868-1912), however many would ar- Number One position in the United States, on both However some believed that J-pop originated from the Eurobeat gue that it’s origin was during the Taishō period (July Cash Box and Billboard in 1963, and received a gold- genre and other such genres and so the term J-pop became a blan- 30, 1912 to December 25, 1926) as this was when it en record for selling one million copies. ket term in which a variety of music styles similar to each other gained popularity nationwide. The genre was named These artists were referred to as WaseiPops meaning were placed under the same name. The majority of these being cre- ryūkōka before being split into enka and poppusu. By “Japan-made pop” (Wasei poppusu?, ). ated in the 1990’s. the Taishō period, Western musical techniques and In 1964, The Drifters were re-formed by Chosuke Ika- The first mention of the word J-pop was after the Japanese radio instruments, which had been introduced to Japan in riya under the same name. Eventually, they became station J-wave was established, used only for Western-style musi- the Meiji period, were widely used. Instruments such popular in Japan, releasing “Zundoko-Bushi” (“Echo- cians in Japan like Pizzicato Five and Flipper’s Guitar. as the violin, harmonica, and guitar but the melodies ic word tune”) in 1969 and, along with enka singer In 1990, Tower Records Japan defined J-pop as all Japanese music were often written according to the traditional Japa- Keiko Fuji, won “the award for mass popularity” at the belonging to the Recording Industry Association of Japan except nese pentatonic scale. 12th Japan Record Awards a year later. Japanese independent music, also known as “J-indie”. They then In the 1930s, musicians like Ichiro Fujiyama began In 1970, Keiko Fuji’s album Shinjuku no Onna/’Enka began additional classifications like J-club, J-punk, J-hip-hop, J- to experiment with their music and the instruments no Hoshi’ Fuji Keiko no Subete (“Woman in reggae, J-anime, and Visual kei after independent musicians start- the had acquired . He released popular songs with Shinjuku/’Star of Enka’ All of Keiko Fuji”) established ed to release works through major labels. his tenor voice, singing them with a lower volume an all-time record on the Japanese Oricon chart when But like with many musicians and being categorised into groups than opera through the microphone (the technique is it staying in the Number One spot for 20 consecutive many of Japans rock musicians disliked the label. Taro Kato, a sometimes called crooning). Other Jazz musician like weeks. The Drifters later came to be television person- member of pop punk band Beat Crusaders, pointed out that the Ryoichi Hattori attempted to produce Japanese native alities and invited idols such as Momoe Yamaguchi encoded pop music, like pop art, was catchier than “J-pop”. music which had a “flavour” of blues. He composed and Candies to their television program. Noriko Awaya’s hit song “Wakare no Blues” (“Farewell Eleki Boom and Group Sounds Blues”). Awaya became a famous singer and was later In 1962 The Ventures visited Japan bringing with known as “The Queen of Blues” in Japan. them the electric guitar and the style that came with According to his fellow band mem- However, during the war, the performance of jazz it, the Japanese called this “Eleki Boom”. music was temporarily halted in Japan by the Imperial Then in 1966 the Beatles toured Japanand with their ber Toru Hidaka, the 1990s music that Forces, and wasn’t until after the war that Hattori, who stayed in Shanghai at the time, produced hit songs influenced him (such as Nirvana, Hi- like Shizuko Kasagi’s “Tokyo Boogie-Woogie” and Ichiro Fujiyama’s “Aoi Sanmyaku” (lit. “Blue Moun- Standard, and Flipper’s Guitar) was tain Range”). Hattori was later announced “Father of not listened to by fans of other music Japanese poppusu”. The US soldiers occupying Japan at the time intro- in Japan at that time. duced a number of new musical styles to the country including Boogie-woogie, Mambo, Blues, and Coun- try. Chiemi Eri’s cover song “Tennessee Waltz” (1952), Surprisingly, as time passed Japanese rock musicians began to Hibari Misora’s “Omatsuri Mambo” (1952), and Izumi assimilate kayokyou into their style of music, something that the Yukimura’s cover song “Till I Waltz Again with You” earlier artist disrespected. (1953) also became popular. Foreign musicians and groups, including JATP and Louis Armstrong, visited Japan to perform, and in the mid-1950s, “Jazz Kissa” (Jazu Kissa, literally “Jazz cafe”?) became a popular venue for live jazz music. help inspired the genre know as Group Sound. Jazz had a large impact on Japanese poppusu, though As a result, it became popular to sing in English and “authentic” jazz did not become the mainstream genre not Japanese leading to debate between bands like of music in Japan. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Happy End and Yuya Uchida about Japanese rock Japanese pop became big through urban kayō and music. Happy End managed to prove that rock music modern enka. could be sung in Japanese too and still be great. One theory is that their music became one of the origins of modern J-pop. Several musicians began experimenting with elec- 1960s: Modern style Rokabirī Boom and tronic music. The most notable was the internation- Wasei pops ally renowned Isao Tomita, whose 1972 album Elec- tric Samurai: Switched on Rock featured electronic synthesizer renditions of contemporary rock and pop During the 1950s and 60s, many Kayōkyoku groups songs. Other early examples of electronic rock records and singers gained experience performing on US mil- are Ice World (1973) and Benzaiten (1974), both hav- itary bases in Japan. Around the same time, Yakuza ing contributions from Haruomi Hosono, founder of manager Kazuo Taoka reorganized the concert tour- music group “Yellow Magic Band” (later known as ing industry by treating the performers as profession- Yellow Magic Orchestra) in 1977. als. Many of these performers later became key par- In 1978, another such artist, Eikichi Yazawa, released ticipants in the J-pop genre. a rock single “Toki yo Tomare” (“Time, Stop”) that be- In 1956, the band Kosaka Kazuya and the Wagon came a smash hit, selling over 639,000 copies. He is Masters performed their rendition of Elvis Presley’s regarded as one of the pioneers of Japanese rock and song “Heartbreak Hotel” which led to the Rock and in 1980 he signed a contract with the Warner Pioneer Roll craze in Japan. The music was called “rockabilly” record company and moved to the West Coast of the (or rokabirī) by the Japanese media and Perform- United States where he became world famous. ers soon learned to play the music and translate the In the same year, Yellow Magic Orchestra (YMO) lyrics of popular American songs, these were called also made their official debut with their self-titled Cover Pops (Kavā poppusu?). The rockabilly move- album. The band consisted of Haruomi Hosono, ment reached its climax in the February of 1958 when Yukihiro Takahashi and Ryuichi Sakamoto, and were 45,000 people visited the first Nichigeki Western Car- responsible for the developed of electropop, (or

Not just an invention of the 21st century 14 them the first male artists to have three number- duced hip hop music to Japanese mainstream music. In May of 1998 Japa- ones within a single year. Subsequent Japanese rock Zeebra was featured by Dragon Ash in their song ti- bands were modelled after Boøwy. tled “Grateful Days”, which topped the Oricon charts nese rock legend Hide In the late 1980s, girl band Princess Princess be- in 1999. came a successful pop-rock band who’s singles “Diamonds” and “Sekai de Ichiban Atsui Natsu” 2000s: Japanese hip hop and urban pop died, his funeral held (“World’s Hottest Summer”) were ranked number- one and number-two on the 1989 Oricon Yearly Sin- In the first decade of the 21st century, hip hop and an attendance of gle Charts. It was also in the late 1980s that the well contemporary R&B influences in Japanese music known Japanese trend, Visual Kei, became a part of started to gain followers from mainstream music. In Japanese rock music. The members of male bands November 2001, R&B duo Chemistry’s released their 50,000 people. would wear makeup, extravagant hair styles, and debut album, The Way We Are, which sold over 1.14 androgynous costumes. The most notable Visual Kei million copies within the first week alone, and debut- bands were X Japan (also known as “X”) and Buck- ed at the number-one position on the Oricon weekly technopop as it is known in Japan), in addition to cre- Tick. X Japan’s album Blue Blood was released on album charts. Hip hop bands quickly became a big ating synthpopand electro music. Their 1979 album, CBS Sony in 1989. It sold 712,000 copies, while their thing in Japan. Solid State Survivor, reached number one on the Ori- 1991 album Jealousysold over 1.11 million copies. X Rock band’s like Orange Range began to feature ele- con charts in July 1980, it went on to sell two million Japan was originally influenced by heavy metal mu- ments of hip hop in their music, their album musiQ records worldwide and held both the top two spots on sic, but guitarist Hide came under the influence of sold over 2.6 million copies, making it the number the Oricon charts for seven consecutive weeks, mak- alternative rock, releasing his first solo album Hide one album of 2005 on the Oricon charts. ing J-Pop history. Bands like Southern All Stars and Your Face in 1994. R&B and hip-hop crept into everything, allowing mu- Yellow Magic Orchestra influenced not only J-pop but sicians like Pop/R&B singer Ken Hirai to top the Ori- electronic music around the world, which symbolized 1990–1997: Growing market con yearly album chart with the release of his greatest the end of New Music and paved the way for the J-pop hits album 10th Anniversary Complete Single Collec- genre in the 1980s. Both bands, SAS and YMO, would The 90’s saw a lot of commercialism with the market tion ‘95-’05 Utabaka, it sold over 2 million copies. later be ranked at the top of HMV Japan’s list of top being dominated by artists from the Being Agency, Veteran rapper Dohzi-T collaborated with popular 100 Japanese musicians of all time. artists like B’z, Tube, B.B.Queens, T-Bolan, Zard, singers such as Shota Shimizu, Hiromi Go, Miliyah Wands, Maki Ohguro, Deen, and Field of View. They Kato, and Thelma Aoyama in his successful 2008 al- 1970s: Fōku and New Music were called the Being System (Bīingu kei?)and many bum 12 Love Stories. And although there were only of them topped the charts with new records, notably 132 new artists in Japan in 2001, by 2008 the num- In the early 1960s, Japanese music became influenced B’z was the band that surpassed Seiko Matsuda’s re- ber increased to 512 in total. That year, 14 new artists by the American folk music revival; it was called fōku cord making them presently the biggest selling artist attended the NHK Kōhaku Uta Gassen for the first (“folk”) and was not too popular but later became that of all time according to Oricon charts. time. In December 2002, the digital-download mar- way in late 1960s when The Folk Crusaders became After TM Network disbanded in 1994, Tetsuya ket for ringtone songs (chaku-uta?) was created by the famous and the underground music became known Komuro became a serious song producer. Who company au. The digital downloads market grew rap- as fōku. dominated the period between 1994 and 1997 with idly, opening up a new media for artists to sell singles In the early 1970s, the simple songs of fōku, with its dance and techno bands from the “Komuro family” from. Hikaru Utada’s song “Flavour of Life” sold over single guitar accompaniment, changed into more (Komuro Famirī?) such as TRF, Ryoko Shinohara, complex musical style known as New Music (nyū Yuki Uchida, Namie Amuro, Hitomi, Globe, Tom- myūjikku?). Instead of social messages, the songs omi Kahala, and Ami Suzuki. At the time, Komuro became more about personal messages, like love. By was responsible for 20 hit songs, each selling more 1972, The highest-grossing single of the year was the than a million copies. His total sales as a song pro- enka song, “Onna no Michi”, by Shiro Miya and the ducer reached 170 million copies before his decline Pinkara Trio which eventually sold over 3.25 million in 1998songs lost popularity. By 2005, Komuro’s debt copies. Another historical album was “Kōri no Sekai” lead him to attempt the sale of his song catalogue— which debuted December 1, 1973, by Yōsui Inoue, which he didn’t actually own. When the investor topping the Oricon charts and remained in Top 10 for found out they sued, Komuro tried then tried to sell 113 weeks. It spent 35 nonconsecutive weeks in the the catalogue to another investor in order to pay the number-one spot. 600,000,000 Japanese yen judgement he owed the Yumi Matsutoya, formerly known by her maiden first investor. name Yumi Arai, also became a notable singer/song- writer around this time; in October 1975, she released 1997–1999: Commercial peak the single “Ano Hi ni Kaeritai” (“I want to return to that day”), marking her first number-one single on The late 1990s saw the popularity of rock bands, such Japanese idols the Oricon charts. At first, only Yumi Matsutoya was as Glay, Luna Sea, and L’Arc-en-Ciel, most of them commonly known as a New Music artist, but then related to the visual kei movement, as well as a boom In the 1970s, the popularity of female other artists like Miyuki Nakajima, Amii Ozaki, and in the Japanese music market. In October 1997, Glay idol singers such as Mari Amachi, Junko Yagami claimed the same title. released their album Review -The Best of Glay, it sold Saori Minami, Momoe Yamagu- 4.87 million copies, only to be surpassed a year later chi, and Candies increased. Momoe 1980s: Fusion with “kayōkyoku” (City by B’z’s album B’z The Best “Pleasure”, which sold Yamaguchi was one of first kayōkyoku Pop and Shibuya-kei.) 5.12 million copies. The market for physical sales singers to use the special pronuncia- peaked in 1998, at ¥607 billion. In May of the same tion characteristic of J-pop. In 1972, In the early 1980s, the term City Pop (Shitī Poppu?) year Japanese rock legend Hide died, his funeral held Hiromi Go made his debut with the was used to describe songs that had a big city theme, an attendance of 50,000 people. song “Otokonoko Onnanoko” (“Boy many being inspired by Tokyo itself. Although City At the time, rock musicians in Japan again decided to and Girl”). Hiromi Go originally came Pop was a spin off of New Music the rock band Happy absorbing the kayōkyoku style into their music even from Johnny & Associates. End was considered one of its originators. At the time, after the genre had all but vanished. Glay became In 1976, female duo Pink Lady made music fans and artists in Japan were influenced by especially successful, with massive exposure in the their debut with the single “Pepper album-oriented rock (especially Adult contemporary) media. In July 1999, an audience of 200,000 people Keibu”. Pink Lady released a record and crossover (especially Jazz fusion) with artists like came to see Glay played at the Makuhari Messe, it nine consecutive number-one singles. Akira Terao releasing the 1981 album Reflections, was even certified by Guinness World Records that In the 1980s, Japanese idols inherited which became the best-selling album of the 1980s in this was the biggest solo concert in Japan up until New Music, though the term fell out Japan, selling about 1.65 million copies. that time. of usage. Seiko Matsuda especially Tatsuro Yamashita and his wife Mariya Takeuchi Johnny & Associates produced many boy bands: adopted song producers of previous also became popular in this period their 1983 song SMAP, Tokio, V6, KinKi Kids and Arashi. SMAP hit generations. In 1980, her third single “Christmas Eve” finally reached number one on the the J-pop scene in a major way in the 1990s through “Kaze wa Aki Iro” (“Wind is autumn Oricon weekly single charts on December 25, 1989. In a combination of TV “Tarento” shows and singles, color”) reached the number-one spot the same year, Ryuichi Sakamoto won the Best Album with one of its singers, Takuya Kimura, becoming a on the Oricon charts. Haruomi Ho- of Original Instrumental Background Score Written popular actor commonly known as “Kimutaku” in sono also joined in the production of for a Motion Picture or Television for his contribu- later years. her music. tion to the movie The Last Emperor. However, the By the late 1990s and early 21st century, girl bands Ayumi Hamasaki won Grand Prix popularity of City Pop fell in 1990, to be assimilated and female singers became huge hits. Groups like awards for three consecutive years— by Shibuya-kei musicians like Pizzicato Five and Flip- Speed and Morning Musume were very popular. the first time in Japan Record Award per’s Guitar. Speed announced their break up in 1999 only to history—between 2001 and 2003. Throughout the 1980s, rock bands such as Southern return to the music scene in 2008, while Morning Although Hamasaki became very All Stars, RC Succession, Anzen Chitai, The Check- Musume released a string of songs that were sales famous, Tom Yoda, then-chairman ers, The Alfee, and The Blue Hearts were popular and hits before they were even released. The group’s of her record company Avex Group, it was possible for rock singers like Yutaka Ozaki to popularity gave origin to the Hello! Project, and be- argued that her tactics were risky, be- debute at the age of 18. In 1986, The Alfee became gan spawning several splinter bands. Female singers cause Avex disregarded the modern the first artists to play in front of 100,000 people in such as Hikaru Utada, Ayumi Hamasaki, Misia, Mai portfolio theory. This concern disap- Japan. Kuraki, and Ringo Shiina became chart-toppers who peared when the company’s other At the time Boøwy had become an especially influ- write their own songs or their own lyrics. Some of singers (such as Ai Otsuka, Kumi ential rock band that consisted of singer Kyosuke them were even pitted against each other in the me- Koda, and Exile) also reached a certain Himuro and guitarist Tomoyasu Hotei. All three of dia but there no real hard feelings. level of popularity in the mid-2000s their albums reached number one in 1988, making At the turn of the century the band Zeebra intro- under Yoda’s management policy. 15 as well. In February 2001, Ulfuls released their cover Child Safety bill to Cripple Anime Industry? J-POP SUMMIT FESTIVAL 2011 version of Kyu Sakamoto’s 1963 song “Ashita Ga Arusa”. Their cover version debuted at the number- five position, behind Utada, Kinki Kids, Hamasaki and Hirai. In 2003, Man Arai released the single “Sen no Kaze ni Natte” (“As A Thousand Winds”), it was based on the Western poem “Do not stand at my grave and weep”. In Japan, the poem is known as the poem Rokusuke Ei’s read at the funeral of Kyu Saka- moto in 1985. In 2006 Japanese tenor singer Masafu- mi Akikawa covered Man Arai’s song, his cover version became the first classical music single to top the Oricon charts, and sold over one million copies. On the 2007 Oricon Yearly Charts, the single became the best-selling physically significant popularity of the 1980s, along with Akina Nakamori, Yukiko Okada, Kyōko Koizumi, Yoko Minamino, Momoko Kikuchi, Yōko Oginome, Miho Nakayama, Minako Honda, While a lot of us have heard of the Bill that was passed a few and Chisato Moritaka. years back created to promote the “healthy development” of chil- Other styles that became popular in the recent years dren through the excising of“illegal” sexual acts in media, what would be Neo Fōku and Neo Shibuya-kei in which many of you may not realise is how the bill was aimed at anime artists use elements of the older music genres to cre- in particular. ate their own sounds. Electronic music bands such as Plus-Tech Squeeze Like the Californian video game law about violent games not Box and Capsule were called “Neo Shibuya-kei”. being sold to under aged children, it’s not hard to imagine that While anime music, image sings and vocaloids have Bill 156 comes from a good place. Bill 156 is born from prior been around for a few years now, it is only over the attempts by the government to stamp out sexualized depictions last couple that this art form has become a world of virtual children in anime, manga and games, i.e. lolicon (short wide phenominon. for “lolita complex”). And while I am a 100% behind this attempt Though anime music was formerly influenced by J- at making our planet a safer place unfortunately, much of the pop and visual kei music, it’s reported that Japanese language used in the bill is so vague that it could gut the an- indie music apparently influenced the genre in more ime and manga industry entirely. For instance, Bill 156 includes ways. In 2007, after sampling voice actress Saki Fu- provisions that classify any work as adult (i.e. pornography) if it jita’s voice to develop it, the Vocaloid Hatsune Miku “features either sexual or pseudo sexual acts that would be illegal was released, and a variety of songs featuring Hat- in real life, or sexual or pseudo sexual acts between close rela- sune Miku were showcased on the Nico Nico Douga. tives whose marriage would be illegal,” if the depictions glorified Some of the musicians featuring Hatsune Miku, such as Livetune and Supercell, went on to join the larger and/or exaggerated the act in question. 7 million downloaded copies in 2007 alone. In Octo- record companies in Japan. An is example would be Yes. This seems reasonable and a lot of people might be say- ber of 2007, EMI Music Japan announced that Utada Livetune, who released Re: Package on Victor En- ing, “Okay, so what? What’s wrong with that?” But the problem, was the world’s first artist to have 10 million digital tertainment on August 27, 2008, and Supercell, who again, lies in the language used - for instance, the bill restricts downloads in a single year. released Supercell on Sony Music on March 4, 2009. any content which is “considered harmful to a minor’s mental The popularity of live performances and veteran mu- The albums Re: Package and Supercell were not put health regarding sexuality,” which is an awfully vague condition. sicians also became a hit in the early 21st century, under the control of the copyright system of the Jap- Essentially, it gives a Tokyo government committee the power to causing the sales of physical CDs and albums to de- anese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and classify any potentially-sexual material as adult, relegating it to cline, rasing the number of audience members to see Publishers (JASRAC), breaking with the tradition the proverbial back room of stores. live performances to a new height. However Rock that most musicians under any major labels follow. Again you may wonder what I am on about and that this is a musicians such as Mr. Children, B’z, Southern All In June 2009, voice actress Nana Mizuki’s album good thing for the youth of today, but this bill specifically ex- Stars, and Glay were still topping the charts despite Ultimate Diamond became the first seiyū album to empts things like pornography, live-action film and TV, and this sudden dip. When Mr. Children released their reach number one on the Oricon weekly charts. A novels!! album “Home” in 2007, they passed the 50 million month later the fictional all female band Ho-kago In other words, while a live-action production of Nabokov’s Loli- albums and singles sold record. This made them the Tea Time, from the anime series K-On!, released the ta would theoretically be fine under the law, an animated adapta- second-highest selling artist of all time since the ori- mini-album Ho-kago Tea Time on the. The mini- tion would be able to be classified as pornography and therefore gin of Oricon—just behind B’z, who sold more than album debuted at number one on the Oricon weekly taken of the shelves. 75 million records. album charts, becoming the first anime album to What makes it even stranger is that in Japan the government This new demand for live performances lead to art- reach number one. In May of last year, Exit Tunes already regulates hard core pornography to keep it out of the ists like Eikichi Yazawa to take part in rock festivals; Presented “Vocalogenesis” featuring Hatsune Miku hands of youths. in 2007, he became the first artist to have performed who became the first album featuring Vocaloids In fact, this bill has absolutely nothing to do with porn or adult 100 concerts at the Nippon Budokan. to reach number one on the Oricon weekly charts, content of any sort and only has an effect on the Anime, Manga Namie Amuro to was famous for her concerts, her replacing Hideaki Tokunaga’s Vocalist 4, which had and gaming industries. In other words, this bill doesn’t cover the Namie Amuro Best Fiction tour in 2008-2009, not topped the charts for four consecutive weeks. infamous RapeLay, but can cover things like “magical girl” shows only became the biggest live tour by a Japanese solo J-pop is an important part of the Japanese culture, that imply nudity on underage characters during transformation female artist—attended by 450,000 fans in Japan— you can find it in almost everything from anime, sequences. And in Japan as in the west most stores will refuse to but was also attended by 50,000 fans in Taiwan and commercials, movies and TV shows, to video games stock anime or manga that are classified as porn. It could also de- Shanghai. and even the news. It isn’t uncommon for anime stroy entire genres that deal with same-sex romance (and given Meanwhile Johnny & Associates’s boy bands re- and television shows, particularly dramas, to change statements by Tokyo governor Ishihara calling gays and lesbians mained popular through out the 2000s. In 2001, there opening and closing songs at least four times “deficient,” this may be intended). SMAP released their greatest-hits album SMAP an year. Because most programs have a combination This sudden restriction has led to many job loses in the anime Vest, selling over a million copies in the first week, of both opening and closing songs, it is possible for industry leaving artists fighting for positions where they are paid and their 2003 single “Sekai ni hitotsu dake no hana” one show to use up to eight tracks for a single season. very little to work many hours a day. sold more than two million copies. SMAP was said Over the past decade, J-pop has continually gained However despite this news I believe that there may be hope in to fight a difficult battle though at the Kōhaku Uta fandom worldwide through video games and anime. the situation. Firstly paedophiles will not be getting off on some- Gassen in 2007 when they lost a large part of their Many video gamers and anime otaku will import thing that “is not real” which is a win as far as I am concerned, audience to KinKi Kids. In 2008, male musicians games and anime from Japan well before they are and while Japan may suffer, there is still a huge market world established a record of four consecutive wins at the due for release in their country. These theme songs wide and many countries who could fill the demand. There are Kōhaku Uta Gassen. and sound tracks are a gateway to further interest many great artists out there for the choosing all some one would As before, in the late 90’s and early 21st century, in J-pop and other genres of Japanese music. Some need was the money to fund it. when things changed there was a new fashion that shows aired on television in the United States, for came with that. Back then it was girl bands and example, have seen their themes go so far as to be- girls singers, now it was the boys who were in de- come commercially available as ring tones through mand. The 2008 yearly singles charts saw only one mainstream vendors in that country. song ranked in the top 30 that was sung by a female Especially with the creation of Animax, J-pop and (Namie Amuro’s single “60s 70s 80s”). The only ex- anime music have been able to grow in places like ception was in the case of mixed-gender groups, the US, the UK and most of Asia partly because the boy bands enjoyed an advantage Pop duo Puffy, one of the Japanese acts that in physical single sales. have their material released on the United States Johnny & Associates also produced new boy bands market, had their own animated series on Cartoon such as Tackey & Tsubasa, NEWS, Kanjani Eight, Network—Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi, which premiered KAT-TUN, and Hey! Say! JUMP. In 2006, KAT- in 2004 and ran for three seasons. Prior to that, the TUN’s debut single “Real Face”, composed by Tak duo recorded the theme song to another cartoon Matsumoto, sold over one million copies and topped on the same channel, Teen Titans. Because of the the Oricon Yearly Charts. In 2009, Johnny’s Jr. artist success of their show, video clips of Puffy, who are Yuma Nakayama w/B.I.Shadow became the young- known as Puffy AmiYumi in the United States, are est artist to have their first single to debut at the shown several times during the channel’s program- number-one spot. ming. Cover versions and classical pop seem to be a big thing through out the first decade of the 21st century Read more at : wikipedia.org 16 Side News Tara McPherson Releases Bunny In The Moon

Last month Dark Horse Comics an- Genre: Action-Adventure, Science fiction nounced the next instalment of Tara Format: CGI Animated series McPherson’s art-book series: Bunny Running time: 23 minutes Production company(s): Mainframe Entertainment in the Moon, the third instalment (1997-2001), Alliance Communications, BLT Productions of her surreal style art books. In (1994-1995), Reboot Productions, Zondag Entertainment addition features a foreword by ac- Claster Television, Inc., Limelight Productions. claimed artist Gary Baseman “Where a lot of cartoons McPherson has created prints for from the 90’s now seem The CG series that paved the way for fu- The first season was very self-contained music stars like Kings of Leon, Beck, simply outdated, ReBoot ture generations is back!! with each episode running it’s own story High on Fire, Depeche Mode, Green has a style and humour Ya I know what you may be thinking. This line but as the series began to gain more of Day, and many more. Her work has that people will enjoy for is an old series that wasn’t all that popular an adult audience the creators began to de- been featured in Vanity Fair, the New York Times, and Juxtapoz. years to come.” and that you never watched or that you velop a more complex story line. In season may have never even have heard of. BUT two the creators introduced a In 2006 Mainframe Entertain- I have decided that with the remake of “Tara McPherson is blazing a trail be- ment became Rainmaker anima- the series this year and the green lighting tween illustration and fine art that is both tion and in 2007 announced of the third movie for next year I had to personal and universal, and changing the plans to create a trilogy of face of the art world in her wake.”—Hi- educate every one I could on what it was ReBoot films with illustrator/ Fructose animator Daniel Allen as the that made this an epic step in animation leading character designer. Paul history. Gertz, executive vice president of Since Tara’s last book ‘Lost Constella- The series was started by Mainframe En- Rainmaker stated that ReBoot’s tions’, which was published by Dark fans have been incredibly loyal tertainment (a Canadian company) in Horse she has gone on a 30 city book and continue to keep the property 1994 and was the first fully CG animated alive on dozens of fan sites. And tour through the US, Europe and so they would like to give some- series to be aired on television. The ani- Brazil opening her eyes to the diver- thing in return. mation although a little rough now was In conjunction with the website years ahead of it’s time and although it was Zeros 2 Heroes, Rainmaker “aimed” at kids originally it hosted a wick- announced that they intended on allowing select fans to help ed sense of humour that involved cheesy the development of the movie one liners based on computer terminol- plans and also in development of ogy. The story relates a fictional world a ReBoot webcomic. Fans were given the chance to submit their inside a computer called Mainframe, in own art and designs, with the which characters like Sprites (humanoid potential to end up as an artist on characters) and binomes (characters rep- creature from the Web that entered Main- the project, their feedback helped resenting ones and zeros) exist. In each sity of social perspectives. It was on decide which one of five ReBoot frame from Hexadecimal’s looking glass bond- pitches won. episode the characters are faced with the ing with her. This eventually lead to the creation her travels that the title for her latest The winning pitch was ReBoot: task of playing and defeating game cubs, on Gigabyte and ultimately a tear on Mainframe book came to light when she was in Arrival. Both a movie and a loaded by the User, that seal of a part of through which the Web creature escaped to the Japan having a dinner with some new web comic will be created, with Web. The protectors of Mainframe had to team friends. They had began discussing Rainmaker monitoring feedback the city and turn it into a gamescape. They up with Megabyte and Hexadecimal to close the the moon when she mentioned the for the comic but may not use it are forced to fight the User and win in or- man in the moon. Her friend looked as the basis for their movie plans. der to survive, if they lost not only do all portal. But before they can close that gate Mega- byte betrays Bob, crushing his keytool, Glitch, and said “A man in the moon? You Four ReBoot fans have been sprites and binomes trapped in the cube chosen to work as artists on the and throwing him into the portal. mean the bunny in the moon don’t Arrival comic. turn into energy sucking worms called The third season saw much improvement in you?” This lead her to the legend According to the pitch at the Ze- Nulls, but that sector would be destroyed animation quality, subtle details became vis- about the rabbit that sacrificed his roes2Heroes website, Megabyte’s to. ible and movement flowed better. The season life to feed a starving man that was Hunt has developed into a Net- However our heroes never had a dull mo- started with Enzo, now a guardian, defending actually a deity in disguise. In honour wide war so pervasive even other of the selflessness the rabbit showed, ment as game cubs were not their only Mainframe from Megabyte and Hexadecimal Viruses are united against it. The he made his ashes fly up to the moon Users have gone, spending their with Dot and AndrAIa at his side. After the two enemy, the two viruses Hexadecimal and so all could remember his sacrifice. time in an unending MMOG. A Megabyte frequently cause trouble with kids enter a game they cannot win he, AndrAIa, sentient System named Gnosis is and Frisket ride the game cube out of Main- This was the inspiration for her latest created as a way to stop Megabyte, their evil plans to take over the city and frame and in doing so they age exponentially. achievement showcasing elements of but goes rogue and begins enslav- bring chaos to the Mainframe. It is later As adults they meet up with Bob and returned mythology and folklore with her ide- ing Systems in its attempt to gain discovered that they are siblings and that to Mainframe, which is almost completely deals of love, despair, strength, vulner- User-like powers. Two teams ability, and female empowerment. of heroes are assembled to stop they come from the Web. As I mentioned stroyed by Megabyte who is defeated then by Gnosis and bring back the Users, before the series uses computing terms in Matrix, Enzo’s older self, but not before Mega- which will include new characters everything so it is not surprising that the byte causes the system to crash. As the User For more information on Tara’s new as well as old. Elements of this heroes have names like Dot Matrix, the Reboots the system all is reset and mainframe project visit: /www.thecottoncandyma- would be dropped in the comic. chine.com heroine and owner of Dot’s Diner, and is safe again. However the reboot ends up recre- The official ReBoot website was ating the younger Enzo causing the two to now updated in may of 2008 with Enzo Matrix, Dot’s kid bother. However exist simultaneously. information about the first web- some of the characters are not named as comic to be created by the Arrival After the end of the third season, two TV mov- team allowing fans to track the suck, like the hero and main character Bob ies were released in 2001 which were then split progress of their favourite series. or the computer Administrator Fong. up into eight episodes in its U.S. run on Car- toon Network’s Toonami which revealed much To see more on Reboot visit of Mainframe’s history their official site at: Initial plans for the fourth season included reboot.com three films broken into 12 episodes, followed by a 13th musical-special episode, although the final five were never produced, prompting the series to end with a cliff-hanger. However this early this year remakes of season 1 and 2 of Reboot were released with plans to release season 3 and 4 at a later date and 3 movies next year. No-one knows whether or not the movies will be a continuation of the series or just a recap and if the movies will keep the same humour as that of the series we have come to love. 17 19 For our Halloween edition we thought you might like to see what our top ten scariest anime were for this year. So here they are. All Otaku Top 10 Scariest Anime Enjoy :)

No.10 -Paranoia Agent No.8 -Hellsing No.6 -Hell Girl No.4 -Deadman Wonderland No.2 -Gantz

Not since gantz have I said WTF so many times in one anime. After a spate of attacks in Tokyo two police detectives, Keiichi Ikari and While Hellsing may not be the scariest or goriest of all anime movies, we can Somewhere among the droning Ten years after a massive earthquake hits Japans mainland, Ganta Igarashi A pair of high school students, Kei Mitsuhiro Maniwa, are assigned to the case. While no-one is killed the at- all agree that it deserves a spot on this count down just for being awesome. hum of the Internet, there’s a web- and his classmates are attacked by a red caped creature that bursts in through Kurono and Masaru Kato, are hit tacks are violent and none of the victims can remember their attackers face. Hellsing is named after the Holy Order of Protestant Knights, originally led site that can only be accessed at the class window. The Red Man massacres Ganta’s entire class but instead of by a subway train in an attempt to save the life of a All they can recall is that he is young and wears golden roller-blades and by Abraham Van Helsing. Hellsing’s mission is to protect Queen and Coun- the stroke of midnight. The site is killing him, embeds a red crystal shard in Ganta’s chest. Within days of the a cap, and uses a golden baseball bat to attack them with. The criminal is try from the undead and other supernatural forces of evil. The organization known as the Jigoku Tsushin, ru- homeless drunk. Following their deaths, Kurono and Kato find soon dubbed Lil’ Slugger. is currently led by Sir Integra Wingates Hellsing, who inherited the leader- mor has it that if you post a grudge themselves transported to an unfurnished Tokyo apartment. At one end of The detectives set out to track down the perpetrator, but their search is un- ship of Hellsing as a child after the death of her father. She is protected by there, the Jigoku Shoujo will ap- the room there is a featureless black sphere known as “Gantz”. successful and both men eventually lose their positions as police detectives. the faithful Hellsing family butler and former Hellsing “trashman,” Walter pear and drag whoever torments When the Gantz sphere opens, he informing those present that their “lives As the attacks continue, it is discovered that they are not random, instead C. Dornez, and Alucard, the original and most powerful vampire that swore you into the inferno. have ended and now belong” to him. A picture and brief information is they theorise that Lil’ Slugger is targeting people in crisis, and that the at- loyalty to the Hellsing family after being defeated by Van Helsing one hun- Originally clients would write the shown of some of their targets, all but one of which are aliens living on tacks lead to some improvement in the life of the victim. Maniwa becomes dred years before. These names of those they hated on a Earth, which take on a wide variety of forms. convinced that Lil’ Slugger is a supernatural force and vows to catch and formidable guardians are piece of paper. Later they send a Those sent cannot return from the mission until all enemies have been kill him. joined by former police letter to the address appearing in killed, or the time limit has run out. If they survive a successful mission, With all the public anticipation and fear for the launch of the Maromi tel- officer Seras Victoria, a three-column newspaper advert, as technology evolved clients could con- each individual is awarded points for the aliens they have killed. They evision series reaches a fanatical high, so do the amount of attacks that oc- whom Alucard turns into tact the Hell Girl over the internet and eventually over the phone. All are only are then allowed to leave, and live their lives as they see fit until Gantz summons them back again for the next mission. The only way to stop cur in Tokyo. Things come to an end the night that the Maromi show is set a vampire t save her life. activated at midnight. massacre, Ganta is declared the sole suspect and, following a quick trial, is having to participate in the missions is to earn one hundred points, and to air when Ikari and Maniwa uncover that Tsukiko, the creator of Maromi The story is a breath of The medium through which a client contacts the Jigoku has changed over sentenced to life imprisonment in Deadman Wonderland, a massive theme choose the option to be freed. However, as the series continues, Kurono and first victim had some how manifested Lil’ Slugger through her fear and fresh air from generic the centuries. park prison in Tokyo City. participates with the objective to revive his deceased friends with the 100 guilt to escape her responsibilities. The creature was then fed and nurtured vampire stores that pol- It turns out that the Jigoku Shoujo is actually a young girl who lives with her That’s when I started spitting WTF while weaving tapestries of obscenities in points he can obtain throughout the missions. by the fear of the populace. In a way, Tsukiko does fulfil her job by creating lute Hollywood and equally enigmatic grandmother, and has three magical straw dolls accom- shock factor and continued to watch the series. Deadman Wonderland isn’t After several missions, Nishi unveils a countdown on Gantz that the other a character (Lil’ Slugger) that becomes just as big a sensation as Maromi. cheap horror novels, and pany and serve her. When ever a post is made on the site she is turned and for sissies or the feint of heart, but you better watch it anyway. You won’t regret players were unaware of. This is thought to indicate the end of the human When Tsukiko finally the strong connections to required to fulfil her duties. Most episodes are self-contained short stories in it. Grinning madly, the like prison. Arriving at the prison, Ganta is fitted with race but it also frees all the participants from the game. A week later, a confesses the truth, religious symbolism and which the series narrates the suffering of a different individual caused by one a special collar which monitors his location and life signs. Due to the heinous massive alien force invades the Earth and begins exterminating the human and in doing so ac- Bram Stoker’s Dracula or more antagonists. In general during each arc, the protagonists’ dramas are nature of Ganta’s ‘crime’, he has to live out his imprisonment under Deadman race, Kurono and his companions try their best to make use of Gantz’s cepts the guilt for the were a real treat for me. explained in detail from the start of their grudges, through the escalation Wonderland’s ‘Death Sentence’. Fortunately for Ganta, he is aided by a myste- advanced technology and weaponry in order to take a stand against the death of Maromi, Lil’ Sadly, the main plot gets of their torment until it becomes unbearable and they resort to accessing rious girl named Shiro, who apparently knows Ganta. alien invasion. Slugger is defeated. tossed after episode seven the Hell Correspondence website. Although in general, the client gives the While trying to survive as an inmate on death row, Ganta becomes increas- The violence in this show is not only brutal, but it’s merciless at times. While this story can be in favour of a quick ex- antagonist a chance, he or she usually ends up pulling the string on his or ingly obsessed with the ‘Red Man’ and tries to find him. In a bizarre twist, While most of us can handle the odd person being killed most of us can’t a little vague it is also planation of Integra and her doll and sending the antagonist to hell. Once they have pulled the string, Ganta begins to develop the ability to manipulate his own blood, and use it as handle the idea of torturing an elderly person or child. Gantz presents a highly original and Alucard’s pasts. Overall, before taking the antagonist to hell, Ai Enma punishes the person for his or a weapon. Unbeknownst to him, Ganta has become one of the prison’s ‘Dead- lot of this unnecessary violence. As puts you in perspec- the memorable cast, great her sins with the help of her companions. men’, a segregated group of prisoners possessing the Branches of Sin. After his bad as the aliens may be, it was very tive of what some ones music and the mindless While this may be an anime horror the gore factor is not high, but instead the ability is discovered, Ganta is forced to participate in brutal gladiatorial death uncomfortable watching them plead mind can do to get out action made for a F***ing story line concentrates on actual ploy progression and art style. It is a very matches, known as Carnival Corpse, whose anonymous spectators pay large for their lives while crying, only to be of a situation. awesome series that has beautiful creation and if you didn’t watch it yet, then you have to. amounts of money to watch. In his struggle he manages to befriend some of mutilated or killed. won us all over, becom- those he fights in the arena, and with their help Ganta continues his quest to ing a classic. uncover the identity of the Red Man. No.9 -MONSTER No.7-BLOOD+ No.5 -PERFECT BLUE No.3 -HIGURASHI NO NAKU KORO No.1 -Elfen Lied

Under the care of her adoptive family, Saya Otonashi has been living the life of an anaemic but otherwise ordinary schoolgirl. Saya’s Mima Kirigoe, a pop-idol from the J-pop This has to be one of the freakiest anime I have watched to date. What makes As most of us know Elfen Lied takes Dr. Kenzō Tenma is a young Japanese doc- group “CHAM!”, decides to leave the group happy life is shattered when she is attacked by a chiropteran ( the Higurashi no Naku Koro ni so disturbing is that it contrasts a light-hearted place in Kamakura, Japan, focusing on tor working at the Eisler Memorial Hospi- to become an actress. Her first project is in eastern equivalent of a vampire), later learning that she is the only childhood comedy with visually gruesome and deep psychological horror. The a new strain of the human race called tal in Düsseldorf during the 1980s. He’s a a direct-to-video drama series called “Dou- one who can defeat them. result is similar to taking a comedic slice-of-life anime like the Melancholy of Diclonius. They are similar to human highly accomplished brain surgeon, with ble Bind”. Some of her fans are upset by her Armed with her killer katana, Saya embarks on a journey with the Harsh Suzuki and crossing it with Silent Hill. Higurashi no Naku Koro ni takes beings but different on a genetic level a bright future a head of him, but his fu- change in career, particularly the stalker place in June 1983, in a rural village called Hinamizawa when main character, and notable due to a pair of short ture is quickly destroyed when he decides help of her family, allies, and her chevalier, Hagi, to rid the world of known as “Me-Mania.” Shortly after leav- chiropteran and rediscover her identity. The course of the journey Keiichi Maebara, moves in and befriends his new classmates Rena Ryugu, Mion horn-like protrusions. The main to save the life of a boy named Johan. He ing CHAM!, Mima finds a website called Sonozaki, Rika Furude, and Satoko Houjou. Keiichi joins their after-school character Lucy is initially held in the looses a lot of respect as a consequence. reveals the background history of the chiropterans and Saya’s very “Mima’s Room” that has public diary deep past, which extends into the mid-19th century. club activities, which consist mostly of card and board games Hinamizawa Kanagawa Prefecture facility built for When Johan and his sister suddenly disap- entries which seem to be written by her appears to be a normal, peaceful, rural village to Keiichi. However, the tran- experimentation, located off the coast of Kamakura. She manages to escape Right from the beginning the series caught my attention with fast pear the police suspect Tenma for a series discussing her life in great detail. She quillity abruptly ends after the annual Watanagashi Festival, a celebration to and wreak havoc, but is injured in the process, an event which causes her to paced action, disturbing fight scenes and the almost “scary” cut scenes of unexplained murders but they have no confides in her manager Rumi Hidaka , commemorate and give thanks to the local god, Oyashiro. Keiichi learns that develop a secondary, child-like personality known as Nyu. and audio. The first thing I love about this series is the intense and al- proof. Nine years later and Tenma meets but is advised to ignore it. Meanwhile, on the every year for the past four years, one person has been murdered and another Lucy is found on the beach by two locals , Kohta, who studies at the local most believable plot. Not a single episode is wasted but were used en- up with Johan, who kills a criminal, but set of Double Bind, the producers agree to give her a leading role. has gone missing on the day of the Watanagashi Festival. Keiichi himself soon university, and his cousin Yuka. They take her in, and become involved with spares him. After this incident, Tenma is tirely to explain nearly every detail about a plot that is full of intrigue, However, it is as a rape victim in a strip club, which Rumi warns Mima becomes drawn into the strange events surrounding the Watanagashi Festival the numerous, often brutal, attempts to recapture her by a Special Assault again suspected by the police, particularly Inspector Runge, and he tries to tension and plenty of subplots and surprises... especially nearing the against as it will ruin her reputation, but Mima accepts the part voluntar- and Oyashiro. In each story arc, he or one of his friends become paranoid, and a Team and a number of other Diclonius, who shift from oblivious to murder- find more information about this “Johan”. He soon discovers that the boy’s end. It’s what made this series deeply engaging and had me glued to ily. The atmosphere of the scene traumatizes Mima, stopping her from dif- crime is committed. Usually, the crime involves the murder of one of their own ous frequently. Other characters include Bando, an SAT trooper mauled by sister, now named Nina, is happily living the life of an adopted daughter to each episode nonstop. ferentiating reality from fantasy. As her mind breaks down several people friends. While it seems impossible to tell their delusions apart from the mystery Lucy and infected with a virus, and Kurama, a carrier of the virus. two caring parents, the only traces of her terrible past being a few dreams By the end of the series, you realize it’s a bittersweet tale that still ends involved in the tarnishing of Mima’s reputation are murdered. She finds evi- While the animated series ends with Lucy confronting a large team of SAT trouble her. Tenma discovers her on her birthday and manages to prevent with a gratifying conclusion. dence which makes her appear to be the prime suspect, and her increasing members, after which she disappears, the manga continues by showing the her from meeting her brother, but comes too late to stop Johan from mur- mental instability makes her doubt her own innocence. It turns out that the mad plans of Kakuzawa, leader of Diclonii research, and his ultimate failure. dering her foster parents. As the story progresses, Tenma learns of the ori- diarist of “Mima’s Room” is delusional and very manipulative, and that an The world itself is endangered. For Kouta and Yuka, finding the bloody na- gins of this monster, from the former East Germany’s attempt to use a secret intense folie à deux has been in play. The faux diarist and serial killer, who ked young girl on the beach would change their lives forever, for better or for orphanage called 511 Kinderheim in order to create the “perfect soldiers” believes herself to be a Mima who is forever young and graceful, has made a worse. Unable to speak or function as a normal human being, she is named through “psychological reprogramming”, through the author of a children’s scapegoat of stalker Me-Mania. Mima knocks Me-Mania unconscious with Nyuu by the duo, and taken into their home in an effort to save her. But what book which was used in a eugenics experiment in Czech Republic. He also a hammer in self-defence when he attempts to rape her, and runs to her only neither teenager knows is that this innocent young girl is actually a killing learns about the scope of the atrocities this “monster” has committed, and support she has left alive, her manager Rumi. machine -- an experiment gone terribly wrong -- and it is only a matter of vows to fix the mistake he made when he saved Johan’s life. Perfect Blue is an intensely brutal mental beat up, courtesy of a director with time before the murderer in her awakens again... While the story is chilling and can often gore fulled the only flaw it has is in zero interest in separating dreams from reality, or in giving the audience This Anime is very short lived but the story is intense. And while the most fact Tenma himself. Don’t get me wrong. I like the character but whenever any point of reference. Satoshi Kon’s gives us none of the usual story cues, impressive scene is the very first one few after that achieve the same level he’s pointing his gun to someone, he just couldn’t fire it. Imagine, he travelled no transitions or assurances, just one fluid and ever-changing ‘reality’ with after it. But this is one of those Anime that make you think about it more all over Germany and Czech Republic in search of Johan who he’s out to kill no way to ease in. after you finish it, making you want to watch it again and again to better but whenever his target is right in front of him, all he needed to do is pull It’s this type of uneasy mental trauma that earns this anime our number understand it’s progression. the trigger. five spot. We give it this years number one spot! Jeanclaude Pratt “Well, at least the monster seems to always make sure the girl’s satisfied” | ”Ph34r my l33t n3kkid skillz!!!” | ”Sometimes you just gotta go with whatya got! Pathetic people need love too!”

Set in a fictional version of Tokyo, Megatokyo tells the story of two geek friends, Largo and Piro who leave the country for Japan after an One of the first Western manga’s to incident at E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo). But when they get to Japan Largo is expected to beat the ninja Junpei at a video game to gain world wide acclaim. Megatokyo enter the country. Once in the country the pair go nuts and spend all is stall going strong after 11 years on their money on a “cool thing” leaving them stranded in Japan. They are then forced to take up residence with Tsubasa, Piro’s friend, who the web. then leaves the country to find his first true love leaving them with out a place to stay. He also leaves them Ping, the playstation accessory who looks like a girl. Adding to the group are Dom and Ed, two shadow operatives for Sony and SEGA who travel to Japan to try and steal Ping for their companies. At this point Piro goes to a book store to do research on girl problems for Ping, while among a mountain of Released on August 14, 2000, Megatokyo was created by Fred shoujo manga books a group of girls run into him. Embarrassed he Gallagher and Rodney Caston, who began releasing the free runs away leaving his book bag with his sketch pad in it. After being web comic in weekly instalments with out so much as a story evicted Piro begins to work for Megagamers where his boss allows line. The comics name was taken from a domain owned by him and Piro to live up stairs above the store. Largo to manages to Caston which he used for a short time as a gaming review get a job when he is mistaken for the new English teacher at a local site. Originally they announced that they would be releasing school, here he forces his students to call him “Great Teacher Largo” the comic three times a week (Mondays, Wednesdays and and introduces them to L33T speak and computing. Later on he is hired by the Tokyo Police Cataclysm Division (TPCD) after saving Fridays) but ended up only releasing once or twice a week on the city from a giant drunken turtle. Meanwhile Piro meets Yuki at nonspecific days. Recently, this schedule Megagamers, who returns his book bag and has slipped further, due to the real life asks him to teach her how to draw. He soon health issues of Sarah Gallagher (Sera- forgets about her request and goes on to meet phim), Fred’s wife. Nanasawa Kimiko at a train station where she As of May 2002 Caston had sold his own- is scolding herself for forgetting her rail card. ership to Gallagher due to artistic dif- Piro gives her his and walks about before she can refuse. She then becomes a famous voice ferences, making Gallagher the owner artist who Piro believes he has to protect. At of one of the most popular web comics the same time Largo starts to develop a rela- published out of the west. Shortly after tionship with Piro’s co-worker Hayasaka Erika, Fred was laid off at his day job as an ar- who shares a place with Kimiko. It terns out chitect and decided to make the comic a that Erika is a former idol who decided to go full time thing, publishing the comic on off grid after her fiancé left her, Largo then of- paper. There are currently 6 books in cir- fers to help her but it leads to him being fired from the TPCD. The story also frequently fea- culation, the first three being published tures Tohya Miho who knows Piro and Largo by one of my favourite publishing houses from the Endgames MMORPG. Her soul Dark Horse and the last three being pub- purpose is to bring ruin to the characters lives lished through CMX. using the Harajuku club (or “Cave of Evil” as As of February 2005, sales of the third Largo calls it) as her base of operations. comic book were ranked third on the Megatokyo was original all about the humour, BookScan’s list of graphic novels sold in parodying the stereotypes and clichés of anime, manga, dating sims, arcade and video bookstores. games, and occasionally making direct refer- Initially the comic was funded by Gallagher and Caston but ences to real-world works. But with Gallagher’s take over the comic in October of the same year it was started they opened a store became increasingly about the characters and their lives. Not all hu- in connection with ThinkGeek selling megatokyo merchan- mour is lost though and the story is still going steady. dise. On the 1st of August 2004 the store was replaced by If you would like to read it visit http://megatokyo.com/strip/1. “Megagear”, An online store created by Gallagher and his wife from which they sell Megatokyo, Applegeeks and An- gerdog merchandise. Gallagher insists that the comic will remain a free online “The situation comic and that the paper backs are just another way to get with Caston the comic out into the public. was not fully As of comic strip number 1193 the comic is drawn digitally explained until by Gallagher, he also began “Fredarting”, where he showcases 2005 when videos of himself drawing the comic strips, in 2009. He will Gallagher an- occasionally feature guest artists like Mohammad F. Haque nounced: of Applegeeks. “While things However when the Megatokyo first started out all of the were good at strips where drawn in pencil and were intended for inking first, over time but Gallagher believed it unfeasible. The original frames we found that we were created by rough sketching each frame on a piece of were not working paper and then tracing, scanning and cleaning the frames up well together on Photoshop and Illustrator. The tracing was necessary as creatively. There the original art work was not neat enough to publish. is no fault in this, But as he grew accustom to the style Gallagher was able to do it happens. I’ve away with the tracing process and allowing him more time never blamed to focus on the smaller details ad creating a more in depth Rodney for this story. Megatokyo’s early strips were laid out in four square creative ‘falling panels per strip, in a two-by-two, a formatting choice made out’ nor do I as a compromise between the horizontal layout of American blame myself. comic strips and the vertical layout of Japanese comic strips. Not all creative But Gallagher soon realized that this was counter produc- relationships tive to the story line and after their first year of comicing he click, ours didn’t changed the format to a free form comic layout. in the long run.”” 20 21 22

Artist of the month. tion. When I’ve achieved that, I’d like to stay working in the industry with other creatives to This month we talk to the Durban born artist Kim bring stories from South Africa alive through Bussiahn. Growing up she went to 4 different schools starting with St. Mary’s, then she went to Thomas More, the medium. Forest View and finally finished at Kloof High School. Kim discovered her passion for art at the age of 12, and quickly decided that animation would be the direction 4. Where do you believe the South African she would take. The dream of working with production market is going in terms of art and the anime companies and creating her own animation was essentially what has kept her drawing. In 2010 she caught industry in general? the chance to work on an international animated series At the moment we have a very slow starting which has taught her everything she needed to know point. The art industry isn’t doing too badly, about the industry. Kim now teaches 2D concept art we do after all have quite a few amazing artists and animation at Learn3D in Johannesburg. She taught working on international projects in games at the Learn3D this at rAge 2011. and comics. However the 2D animation industry is leaving much to be desired. At this moment it’s about training our creative people to do it at a level that is international, and then finding the resources to help the industry grow here so those creatives don’t have to go overseas to do what they love at a level they Artist of the Month can appreciate. Where the market goes in the next few years is up to the people who want to finance and grow it.

1. Ok so being South African and not having 5. I see that you went to rAge this year. How too much exposure to Anime or Japanese cul- was it for you? ture, what made you get into the anime style rAge is always an awesome experience for me, you work with now? I believe mostly because I have never attended Kim BussiahnI’ll admit. It was Pokemon. Before Pokemon I as a customer, but rather an exhibitor. This had glimpsed some anime, but I didn’t realise year I had 2 stalls where I had responsibilities, exactly what it was. I guess Pokemon really so there’s constantly stuff to do and it’s always started the anime boom in the country. Al- high energy for me. I also really enjoy dressing though I must say that currently my style has up on the Saturday for cosplay, whether I win sort of drifted into a mixture of Western and or not it’s just a lot of fun. Also, being there all anime, influenced by anime that I watched af- the time gives you great opportunities to get ter seeing Pokemon, and the Western cartoons free stuff! and comics that I love so much.

6. Last question, Where do you see yourself in 2. Who would you say influenced you most in 20 years from now? terms of your art? I’ve learnt not to look too far into the future. My influences come from all sorts of places. We can all say we see ourselves somewhere, Disney, Marvel/DC, Brian Froud’s faeries, but life always takes such unpredictable turns anime, important people in my life... all sorts. that your prediction for yourself is almost I’ve always enjoyed portraying very real feel- constantly changing. I’d like to say that I see ings with very unreal styles and ideas. I think myself working at a top notch animation stu- people can sympathise with a different world a dio somewhere, but who knows. Life will go lot easier when there are realistic similarities. where it wants to go and I just want to enjoy 3. What is your goal in life? the ride. I’d really love to help the industry grow in this country in terms of art and 2D anima- Anime news Anime

More Live-Action Rurouni Kenshin Cast members Announced The News box

Alteil - Japan’s #1 On- Anime figurines for sale line Card Duelling Game – is proud to this month. announce a team-up with the world’s most popular virtual pop- idol, Hatsune Miku! At the 2011 Anime Expo in LA, fifteen new incarnations of Hatsune Miku were released as cards that will be added to the This past month three new actors for the 2012 game. live-action film, Rurouni Kenshin Samurai, Miku Avatars, including a Pet, Background were announced. The new cast members are: and Accessory, will be available. This year one of the best car chases in Kouji Kikkawa (Let’s Dance With Papa; Check out our preview page here: anime will be honoured by a figurine pictured right) as Jine Udō, Yosuke Eguchi model. This set is from Studio Ghibli’s Miku Cards (Shonan Bakusozoku, Tokyo Love Story; The Castle of Cagliostro, a 1979 animat- pictured left) as Hajime Saitō, and Teruyuki ed feature based on the manga series Kagawa (From Up on Poppy Hill, 20th Cen- Lupin III and directed by none other tury Boys) as Kanryū Takeda. than Hayao Miyazaki himself. Keishi Ōtomo will be directing the samurai This piece will be out in December, and Montauk Monster Scares Beach Goers film starring 22-year-old actor Takeru Sa- will sell for around USD$45. toh (Kamen Rider Den-O, Rookies, Beck, Ryōmaden) as the Titular character. I know, this isn’t exactly anime news but we The 17-year-old actress Emi Takei will definitely believed that it belonged in our news Good Smile Company announced their play Kaoru Kamiya while Shueisha’s Jump section, especially since it is Halloween. In late Square magazine announced Yuu Aoi (Hana release of the newest product in their 2008 there were reports of a “Demon” that had popular Nendoroid series, Sena Kashi- washed up on shore on Long Island’s Montauk and Alice, Honey and Clover) as Megumi wazaki from Boku wa Tomodachi ga Point. What was dubbed as the “Montauk Mon- Takani, Munetaka Aoki (The Last Message Sukunai, aka Haganai. Haganai is a light ster,” made very little airtime despite its obvious Umizaru, live-action The Girl Who Leapt novel series written by Yomi Hirasaka difference to anything normally seen. CBS did Through Time) as Sanosuke Sagara, and and illustrated by Buriki. The TV anime air it but the announcement was short and only Taketo Tanaka as Yahiko Myōjin. The film’s adaptation has already started broad- declared that they were not sure what the crea- staff held an open casting call for volunteer ture was and that they suspected it was a fake. casting since October 7 in Japan. extras in the film last July. Nothing was mentioned as to what happened This is the first of two Haganai hero- The Sankei Sports newspaper reported to the body but simply that it was taken away. that the film is intended for international ines Nendoroid, and will be released in Right offshore of Montauk is an island called January 2012. The release date of the Plum Island. It’s a restricted area known as a release and will eventually see the creation second Sena Kashiwazaki Nendoroid is government poison and animal testing facility. of a series. This will be the first live-action two months later in March of 2012. The Rumour is that it may have come from there. adaptation of the manga and will be producd retail price in Japan is 3,500 yen (about by Warner Brothers Pictures Japan. Shooting US$45.52). began in July. Hisashi Sasaki, deputy director of Shueisha’s Shonen Manga group, posted four photo- graphs from the set of the film in August. Watsuki’s original 1994-1999 manga ran in Shueisha’s Weekly Shonen Jump magazine and the resulting 28 compiled books volumes have 50 million copies in print. The manga inspired a television anime series that is celebrating its 15th anniversary this year. ADV Films released two later original video anime projects and a film on DVD which were released on Blu-ray Disc this year. 23 Japanese Government to Fund J-Pop band go on their first tour Anime. of America The Agency for Cultural Affairs for Japan announced on that they will help fund five Formed in 2003, members of one of Japans first all projects for this year’s Support Program for female Visual Kei band ,exist†trace, announced on International Co-Production. This will in- the 18th that they will be touring America in March cluding two anime: The Legend of Budori of 2012. Gusuko (Gusukobudori no Denki) and Jyou (vocals), Miko (guitar), Mally (drums), Naoto the Blood-C film. Tezuka Productions and (bass), and Omi (guitar) will be performing live con- Production I.G will each receive 50 million certs in: Boston/ MA, New York/ NY, and Philadelphia/ PA. yen (about US$650,000) for the two anime As well as touring Japan multiple times, exist†trace has performed twice in Europe, making projects. appearances in Berlin, Helsinki, Moscow, Paris, London, and Barcelona. In 2009, the band per- Tezuka Productions took over Group TAC’s The Legend of Budori Gusuko anime film formed at the 2-day V-ROCK FESTIVAL in Chiba, Japan. In November 2010, they released project after TAC’s bankruptcy. In 2008, the their album “TWIN GATE”, followed by an American release from JapanFiles. In June, 2011, Group TAC studio announced plans to redo they made their major-label debut with the “TRUE” EP on Tokuma Japan, and released a sec- Kenji Miyazawa’s The Legend of Budori Gu- ond 5-song EP “THE LAST DAYBREAK” in this October. suko (Night on the Galactic Railroad). The Last month, exist†trace announced a special appearance as a special guest at Japanese culture tale was previously adapted into an 1994 and anime event Tekkoshocon 2012. The band will perform a live concert and attend special anime film by director Ryutaro Nakamura. autograph and Q&A sessions for fans during Tekkoshocon’s four-day event in Pittsburgh, PA At the time, Gisaburô Sugii (Galactic Rail- from March 22 - 25, 2012. road, Touch) was set to direct the new ad- Dates, venues, and ticket information for their American tour will be released in the near future. aptation for release in 2009. However, after the unexpected death of Group TAC head If you want to know more about the band head to their official site at: Atsumi Tashiro, production of the new film http://www.exist-trace.com/ was halted. The anime and computer graph- ics company owed about 650 million yen (US$7.7 million) to about 167 creditors at Capcom announce the Ulti- Android Release Free Mami the time of its demise. mate fight off. no Dokidoki Tiro Game Yoshihiro Shimizu, general manager of Te- zuka Productions, stated in his interview with Total Licensing magazine that the ini- Blogomatic 3000 had this to say about the up tial production cost estimate for the anime and coming CAPCOM events at this years an- film was 300 to 600 million yen (US$4-8 nual MCM London Comic con: Created to cel- million) when Group TAC was set to pro- ebrate the March duce the film. According to Shimizu the “CAPCOM comes out fighting with the an- Tezuka Productions film has found some 15 2012 release nouncement that STREET FIGHTER X TEK- investors, but still needed about 50 million KEN, ULTIMATE MARVEL VS CAPCOM 3 of the PSP game yen to ensure the film’s completion. and actioner ASURA’S WRATH will all be play- Puella Magi able at MCM Expo London Comic Con. The Blood-C anime was originally created Not only is the legendary publisher bringing 20 consoles Madoka Magica by team CLAMP who developed both the for show visitors to check out the new titles on, but CAP- Portable , the free iOS/Android Game, Mami story and original character designs for it. COM is installing two full-size boxing rings at the MCM no Dokidoki Tiro Finale (Mami’s Heart- It was based on Production I.G’s Blood: The Expo to let gamers battle it out (with controllers, that is!) Pounding Tiro Finale) was launched in Last Vampire film. in style. Japan by Bandai Namco Gameson the 14th This past April, just weeks after the first an- STREET FIGHTER X TEKKEN sees two beat-em-up nouncement of the Blood-C anime project, behemoths go head-to-head for the first time. Dozens of of October. playable characters lets you pit the likes of Ryu, Ken and the staff revealed that the project will be both a television series and a film next year. Chun-Li against Tekken heroes such as Kazuya, Nina and “Puella Magi Madoka Magica Portable’s offi- King. The final episode of the television series Telling its epic tale of feuding gods through TV-style epi- cial website displays a counter for how many ended with the announcement that the film sodes, ASURA’S WRATH seemliness blends relentless ac- people received a perfect score of 100,000 on will open on June 2, 2012. tion with dramatic narrative, eliminating the traditional the Mami no Dokidoki Tiro Finale smart- Eight live-action films and three animated distinction between gameplay and cut scenes. phone game. After 500 people earned that projects had applied for this year’s fund- ULTIMATE MARVEL VS CAPCOM 3 adds 12 new leg- ing, but only five projects will receive it. The ends to the already bulging Marvel vs. CAPCOM 3 ros- score earlier today, Namco Bandai Games re- ter – including Ghost Rider, Hawkeye and Strider – not to vealed a box illustration for Puella Magi Ma- three live-action films receiving funds are mention eight new stages and a refined fighting system. doka Magica Portable.” CMC’s Tenjō no Kaze, Shimensoka’s Legend Other top publishers attending MCM Expo London Comic of the T-Dog, and Eurospace’s The End. Con on 28-30 October include 2K Games; Namco Bandai; Nintendo; Pqube; Rising Star; Square Enix; Tecmo KOEI; It was announced that a group of the origi- THQ; Ubisoft and WB Games. ” nal anime’s staff, including head writer Gen Urobuchi, are planning and developing the For any of you wanting to find out more please visit their new PSP game. Puella Magi Madoka Magica site at: www.mcmexpogroup.com/store Portable will be on sale at 6,480 yen (about or follow them on: US$84) for the regular version, and a limited- www.twitter.com/mcmexpo pressing pre-order edition will cost roughly www.facebook.com/mcmexpo 11,990 yen (about US$155). www.londonexpo.com

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A.I. Fest (December) FL: Hernani Ribeiro, Paula Ferreira, Kendyll Anime Infection was started by Dain the winner is announced based on Anime Infection (Pty) Ltd was regis- Cloete, Dain Cloete” Date: Saturday 10 December 2011 Cloete and the siblings Roberto and his score for that year. Their first offi- tered this year with Paula as director Time: 09:00AM – 09:00PM Paula Ferreira who thought that there cial winner, the 2010 winner, was Jade and site release will be taking place in Address: Lala Palm Hall Klipriviersberg Recreation Centre just wasn’t enough in the south of JHB Cloete. the near future. A.I. Tech has a large Cnr Peggy Vera Road and Sunningdale Road in terms of gaming (casual LANs and variety of tech available for order on * There will be lunch, Kibler Park console gaming with tournaments) This year they have a Razer Lycosa their site, and will be continuing to ex- beverages and snacks Entry: LAN: R50 (Online booking available) and anime. If you felt like participating Mirror gaming keyboard up for grabs. pand their catalogue over time. for sale at the event. Walk in: Free in an event, you would have to drive The growth around this competition Cosplay: R30( Theme-Christmas, Registration- out to all the other parts of JHB (north, alone has made gamers more competi- Anime Infection on the other hand, * Anime, manga and 09:00AM till 02:30PM and Judging@03:00PM) east or west) just to take part in these tive and interested in each tournament is already live, this site will sell anime, MTG will also be for Gaming Tournaments: R15 a tournament events, of which some only occurred that takes place. The log table for this manga and eventually other anime sale. Magic the Gathering: R40 for Legacy format start- a few times a year (rAge, ICON, etc.). year’s Gamer of the Year title can be merchandise, it will also have MTG ing at 02:00PM, R270 for Sealed format starting at * Players will be able found on the A.I. Fest website. stock and possibly other hobby games 05:30PM. On 28 November 2009 they had their in the near future. to register with us for first LAN in a small hall on a farm an official Magic: The in Kibler Park. At the time they only Their most successful event to date The site will also feature Plushie toys managed to attract five participants was they first birthday event (calcu- made by Tarryn Wood. She has named Gathering member- but that was enough for them as they lating from when it was named A.I. her little business “Plushie Heaven” ship card to partici- were new to organising these events. Fest) which was on 06 August 2011. and her creations will be brought to pate in official tourna- They held their first MTG (Magic the A.I. Fest events for sale. Plushie Heav- There will also be an Anime Screening at this They also held anime screening at Gathering) game here, and asked their en will soon have an e-store too that ments. event; the screening schedule will be posted on our their first set of events, but they had guests to dress up as a Rockstar as a will be affiliated with A.I. website and on our Facebook page. very few who come to the screenings part of their Guitar Hero and Rock and so idea was put on hold for the Band tournaments. But the team have been itching to bring time being. back the anime element of the A.I. With the help of Grant from Outer Fest, and so have decided on a Cosplay Event and tournament The team of three began to introduc- Limits Paula and the team registered competition at A.I. Fest December this rules, online booking PC tournaments and eventually their venue and held their first sanc- year. The competition will be held on PS3 casual gaming, tournament win- tioned tournament in September the 10th of December at Lala Palm Hall, ings, map and direc- ners won prizes but only to the first 2011. The next game will be held over Klipriviersberg Recreation Centre, Cnr tions, and further Peggy Vera Road and Sunningdale Road, place winner. the weekend of the 10th. information can be Kibler Park Johannesburg. Registration will be from 9am to 2:30pm, R30 entrance and It was only at their 14 August 2010 found here: www.ai- the judging will take place at 3pm. LAN that they were big enough that But as we all know sponsorship is a fest.co.za alternatively very tricky thing to gain, so they de- they could give out prizes for first, sec- The December Festival will also consist of cided to do it on their own. The idea you may email info@ ond and third place, they also started an A.I. LAN, gaming tournament, an An- the “Gamer of the year” title in which was to sponsor themselves, and to do ime screening and two sanctioned MTG ai-fest.co.za gamers will receive points depending so they would start up A.I Tech. Dain tournaments, all sponsored by Anime In- on what place they come in monthly and Paula began putting together a fection Tech. Hope to see you all tournaments (1st place – 3 points, 2nd web site (see links above) that would place – 2 points, 3rd place – 1 point). deal with the sale of PC hardware, soft- there for yet another At the end of the year at their annual ware, peripherals, games, consoles, ac- awesome A.I. Fest! A.I Fest (Anime Infection Festival) cessories, etc. SA Anime Directory 26 Genshiken is a university based society that aims to promote anime and its culture to as many people as possible. Quite like this here magazine. They do not only promote anime, but manga, cosplay and all other dimensions that make up being an otaku. Every two weeks the society hold an anime screening based on the theme they run for that week for example as you would expect their last screening was for Halloween and featured Hell Girl. Their audience are mostly students from the university, but they do get a lot of others from all over coming to our screenings, some watch, some lan and most leech off other’s hard drives. Their real goal is to be able to gather enough interest to get together an annual event or a screening Founded in 2010, and launched in or two outside of the university, a chance for the South African anime lovers to come together and 2011, Digital Sushi has evolved into get to know each other, strengthen our ties, to strengthen the industry itself in South Africa. the store catering towards the geeky The society was founded in 2006 by the passion and dedication of UCT students, it was opened its and hobby products available on the doors to members at O-Week 2007 and is still going strong. market. Their main focuses includes Although the society is a university society they welcome non-UCT students to their events. Wheth- model kits, board games, living card er you’re new to anime or just looking to meet others who share your life-long passion, Genshiken. games, gaming supplies and roleplay- UCT is the place to be. ing games and books. If you are in the Cape Town area feel free to look them up or pop onto their web site http://www. Digital Sushi is the original brain-child genshiken.uct.ac.za/ of Graham Peter, a lover of all things gaming and geeky. Graham saw something lacking in the South African Anime in South Africa- ecchi.co.za Welcome to Animated Me- market: a central destination for board and card games. He decided to launch Although anime has grown in popularity in anderings. Digital Sushi with that in mind, and South Africa over the past few years, it’s still very now has clients across South Africa. much a niche market and not as dominant as it is “Animated Meanderings started out very simply in countries like the USA and Japan. Store own- back in November 2007 as a personal blog on The newest member to Digital Sushi’s ers selling manga, figurines and other merchan- Quantumworx as a way for me to express my website is the Electronics department. dise and the launch of the Animax DStv channel opinions and share news about a couple of the With several of Digital Sushi’s staff hav- (which has since been cancelled) has gone a long things I’m passionate about, but quickly evolved ing a background in IT, an Electronics way to making anime more mainstream in South to something that demanded more and more of department was a natural extension to Africa. my time, as I attempted to share news, views and Digital Sushi. We will admit there are reviews about more things anime and manga. many online IT retailers already in the What is ecchi? and What is the purpose of this South African market; but Digital Su- website? It became apparent to me that Animated Mean- shi claims to offer the best service pos- The aim of this site is to try and provide greater derings has outgrown its original home, and I sible. “They do not compromise!” exposure of anime to South Africans, Build a decided to move it over to where it is now, and community of anime fans, Support local busi- I’m hoping that I’ll be able to grow the blog and In the words of our founder: “At Digital nesses that sell anime-related merchandise. The turn it into something more people will want to Sushi we are avid gamers and refuse to site is always full of exciting new anime reviews visit and read. We can all dream – and of course, sell any products that we wouldn’t play, and pictures for anime lovers to browse. So don’t I’m trying to make that dream come true.” use or enjoy ourselves!” hesitate to go and visit them. If you run a local anime group/society or your own anime store The above serves as the about page contents http://www.digitalsushi.co.za/ and would like to post blog articles or alerts for the Animated Meanderings web when you get new stock, please contact ecchi site. Based in SA this site and it’s at: creator Jaydon aim to connect people to the world of anime. His weekly up http://www.ecchi.co.za/home dates will keep you apprised of the latest happenings inside and out side of the country. To see more go to the site:

*http://www.animated- meanderings.com/

*http://www.facebook. com/AnimatedMeander- ings

*https://twitter.com/#!/ shadowfoxza Hair, make up and cosplay

This year with all of our Cosplay madness happening in Decem- ber we managed to find some one who supplies cosplay trinkets. Unfortunately it is very hard to find stores who sell good quality cosplay items in this country and we thought we would just notify you of a local who may be able to help you. December 2011 Her inventory includes things like:

*Jet Black medium length wig Cosplay Cape Town made of kanekalon fibres - R150 (postage R30) A group of anime, manga, cosplay and gaming fans will be getting together to pa- *Custom made Dark Purple rade around in costumes of their favourite anime characters – and they’ll be joined and black wig with blunt bangs by various photographers, videographers and bloggers eager to take part, promote (fringe) can be used for goth loli cosplay/punk/scene etc - R350 and share the happenings. (postage - R40) It’s an open event, so if you’re in Cape Town on the 3rd of December and have some *Ginger haired medium length free time this is an opportunity to have some fun. wavy wig with blunt bangs worn The event is being organised by Sasha Perdigao, a fellow SA Otaku with a passion once for a photo shoot. -R200 for cosplay. As well as doing cosplay as a hobby she sells cosplay items (postage -R40 ) *Black wig without fringe/bangs like wigs and accessories. To the right is a list of some of her wavy medium length,brand new stuff along with her contact details. - R150 (postage -R30) This all SA event will take place at Kirstenbosch Botani- *Turquoise Vocaloid wig - R450 cal Gardens, Cape Town from 10:30AM – 1:30PM. (45 postage anywhere in the While Cosplay Cape Town is free you will have to country unless it is collected)Set comes with a short haired wig pay R40 to get into the gardens, beyond that join- with two long clip on ponies. ing the cosplayers will cost you nothing more Short haired wig can be worn on than a little bit of energy and a sense of fun. it’s own as well.(Postage- R40) Attendees will be required to bring themselves, their outfit, a camera, sun block and food for the Please not that most wigs can be restyled for a small fee. pic-nic. After the picnic there will be some studio Styling depends on the wig and shoots as well, and all the cosplayers are invited to costs depends if extra materials take part. are needed to do the restyling. Feel free to visit the official event page on Facebook, Just contact me for more details :) and join in the discussion on the Cape Town Cosplay [email protected] group on Facebook.

28 29

Cosplay of theOk so while the ONLY thing we could find on the lovely cosplayer k_miyuko was that she was Month born April 16 1991, we did manage to fine a stack of pictures for your viewing pleasure. As you can see below her latest Cosplay was Saya Kisaragi from the soon to be released Blood-C.

Check out K_Miyuko out at: *http://asiacutegirl.com/korean/k-miyuko/

*http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/k+miyuko Developer: Grasshopper Manufacture Publisher: JP Kadokawa Games, NA and EU The Gamers CornerWarner Bros. Interactive Entertainment Platform: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 Dead Island Release date: Some time 2012 Genre: Action, Zombie

Just from watching the trailers the All Otaku spouting rainbows, coming up with quips team have dubbed this their most anticipat- and being generally girly about the whole ed game of 2012. That is until we find some- situation. Sounds like something out of an thing even more awesome, but at this rate anime right? we doubt it. Definitely so, but as mentioned before the game has a high gore factor and is not for Lollipop Chainsaw is obviously anime in- the faint of heart, so if you do go out and So what makes Dead Island so different from other zombie ti- spired, with a cute cheerleader as the main see it don’t be fooled by the cute pink cover. tles, like Left 4 Dead or Rise of Nightmares and why is it so character and panty shots galore it was cre- This one bites. popular? Well, to put it bluntly it is not a shoot everything in ated by the famous game developer and As for the actual gameplay Juliet has a series site and survive the zombie apocalypse on twinkies kind of director Goichi Suda in conjunction with of light and heavy attacks which allow her game. No, it’s actually about carefully choosing when to fight a Grasshopper Manufacture. Working closely to set-‘em-up-and-knock-‘em-down with horde of killer zombies and when to get the f**k out of there. with Akira Yamaoka, the creator of Silent killer combo moves for better points. You The game takes you to an island holiday resort in which a zom- Hill, and James Gunn, director of Dawn of can use her ninja cheer leading acrobatics bie attack occurs while you and your family stay there. You the Dead, he plans to release the game not to stun zombies creating more combos and are given no weapons and are forced to scavenge for anything that will help you survive, to make it worse any items you may only in Japan but to the rest of the world use have a limit to how often you use them meaning that they through Warner Bros. Interactive Entertain- could break during a fight leaving you defenceless and at the ment. mercy of the undead. The release announcement came shortly af- This is just an example of how Dead Island makes you believe ter his success with Shadows of the Damned you are in a real survival situation. As well as weapon limita- in June of this year, it announced that while tions, Dead Island hosts an RPG element to it in which you they did not have a specific genre for the can choose from four main characters - each filling archetypi- game, it would showcase “really extreme cal roles of “tank”, “rogue”, “damage dealer”, “healer”. Once you have established your character, there are three skill trees to up- twists” and be rather funny. Suda also de- grade as you level up by completing quests and killing zombies. clared that he believed it would be “a big title This RPG element makes you feel like you really are the char- in the worldwide market”. acter. Your not just choosing a character and running through The game was previewed along with two of a level. Instead, you’re choosing a character and moulding that Suda’s games, Black Knight Sword and Sina extension moves that earn you stars, which person to fit your game strategy. The game is also programmed Mora, for release next year. It looks like Mr you can use to unlock special abilities. so that you cannot just swing and hit a zombie to kill it. Instead Suda has been a busy boy this year making Through out the game she will come across you are required to find weak spots on the zombies body and gamer dreams come true. hit these, as with most zombie related movies and games the students and teachers who are turned, often advice is given to “aim for the head” The Lollipop Chainsaw game will be re- the teachers will act as mini-bosses who To make the game even more realistic as you traverse the island leased on PS3 and Xbox360 and will focus control the students. You will have to fight you will often run into spots where there are no zombies at all on Juliet Starling, a cheerleader gone zombie these off and rescue human students that and others that are swarming with them. The reason is obvious, hunter at San Romero High. She is sprightly you find along the way. Should those stu- it is to heighten the gamers senses and create the sense that young girl with a killer chainsaw, a dark dents be turned they will become more dif- this is really happening to you. Along your journey you will past and the head of a man names Nick on a ficult to deal with than normal zombies. meet survivors who will often give you quests to complete or chain around her waist. The trick however to recognising the real ask for your help. In return you can pick up essentials needed Juliet is also the product of genetic manipu- to survive. boss characters is that they will have a name. But the fun doesn’t stop there, the game has many tricks and lation who has been programmed to be a Zed for example is the first boss faced by Ju- surprises that will have you going “Holy S**t!!”, like zombies zombie killing machine with crazy acrobat- liet in the demo. She calls him a “Hot Topic that may appear dead can jump out at you unexpectedly or ics and nifty tricks like breaking necks and Sales Reject.” after which he attacks her with the fact that not all zombies react in the same way either. And sawing zombies clean in half. But among a microphone. while you will have your garden variety knuckle dragging zom- her murderous endeavours she finds out The bosses are allowed to do things like bies you will also be faced with zombies that are happy to lunge that this sudden zombie outbreak “is only use words to kill you, as Zed does when he at you and even the occasional 7 foot tall bastards who thinks the opening act to a festival of zombie rock screams things like C*CKSUCKER at her it smart to scare the little guy. lords determined to kill the chainsaw-wield- and the enormous word appears on screen ing cheerleader.” rushing towards her. At this point she can In the long run I definitely believe that this game either smash through the word or dodge it. achieved it’s intended goal. To create a realistic scenario But the game is not all zombie massacring The games dialogue is full of unsafe little in which the player was able to believe they were trapped and gore, there are a few lighter scenes in words not meant for the ears of children but on an island surrounded by zombies. It has everything which Juliet will find health power ups in it is hilarious an would advise that you do a good zombie game should, violence, blood, gore, and the form of lollipops, her favourite. Or the not miss out on what looks to be one of next a sense of urgency I haven’t felt since the my first zom- odd scene in which she bounces around years best sellers! bie movie. The game is there to scare you s**tless and it does, which is why I can say that it truly has balls. Developer: Techland Publisher: Deep Silver Platform: PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 Release date: NASeptember 6, 2011, PAL September 9, 2011 JP October 20, 2011 Genre: First person horror action- adventure, role-playing, open world

November Game Review 30 All Zombies Must Die!

Publisher: Doublesix Genre: Zombie game Developer: Doublesix Release Date: Dec 31, 2011 Platform: PC, xbox 360, PS3 Fatal Frame wii

Publisher: Nintendo From the creators of Burn Zombie Genre: Survival Horror Burn! comes the latest in epic zombie- Developer: Tecmo ness. All Zombies Must Die is aimed to Release date: To Be Announced please zombie lovers and haters alike, Platform: Wii, and 3Ds pitting one of four characters of your This year Nintendo and Tecmo Koei announced their inten- choosing against hordes of zombies in a tions for a new Fatal Frame spin-off, titled Spirit Photogra- battle of epic proportions. phy: The Possessed Notebook, to be released on Nintendo As the only living things left on the planet a 3DS. Gamer, a Girl, a Mad Scientist and an Alien are But this is not the only Fatal Frame game Nintendo have an- all that stands between 6 billion zombies and the nounced. For those of you who have been following the game world’s supply of stored brains. This arcade RPG The Darkness II last year Nintendo came out with a statement announcing starts you off in the town of Deadhill, where you Publisher: 2K Games that they would be developing the new Fatal Frame for Wii Genre(s): First-person shooter, first-person in September of last year. Since then there has been no word must blast, hack or smash your way through action, survival horror on the games future, up until recently that is, when Famitsu ranks of brain hungry zombies with a choice of Developer: Digital Extremes magazine commented on it in their release calendar a few makeshift weapons while completing quests as- Platform(s): PC, PS 3, Xbox 360, Wii U weeks back, indicating that the game is still alive. However signed by the game’s insane creators. Release date(s): NA Feb 7, UK Feb 10, 2012 there has been no mention of a title or release date for it Navigating this cliché town gamers can use a yet. The story line to is a mystery, will Nintendo continue the original story line based around the twin sisters Mio and combination of their surroundings as well as 2K Games recently announced a sequel to the 2007 game improvised weaponry to destroy the unrelent- Mayu Amakura or will they take it in another direction en- The Darkness, the sequel like the first game will be based tirely? ing army of humorous zombies. As the story on the world inside Scott Campbell’s horror comic book The previous game’s normal gameplay worked like this, Mio’s progresses, gamers will need to collect powerups series The Darkness. The game takes players down a health is shown as a bar in the lower right corner, although allowing them to unlock new weapons, new brutal and personal path as Jackie Estacado, wielder of only during combat and in Finder mode. If her or Mayu’s characters and new arenas as well as gaining the The Darkness - an ancient and ruthless force of chaos and health runs out, the game will end. Life can be replenished ability to customize both their characters and using different healing items scattered throughout the game. destruction. The gameplay breaks the norm of an FPS Mio also has a flashlight, which can be aimed in different di- weapons. in allowing players to use quad weapons to slash, grab, Few games of this genre allow for such variety rections, although the flashlight will not work in all areas. and throw objects and enemies with Demon Arms while Mio’s only weapon is the Camera Obscura, an antique cam- and depth, with creative combos on the same simultaneously firing two weapons. The Darkness II is era with the ability to take pictures of ghosts and exorcise level as Dead Rising and hilarious kill scenes the littered with references to the fight between good and evil them. As “ammunition” the camera uses films of different game not only presents a new way to bash out and the inner struggle that your character goes through, quality. Type-07 film, the weakest type of film, is unlim- zombie brains but is also a great form of enter- it also highlights a very stylistic violence that showcases ited, but the other types have to be collected throughout the tainment in the form of funnies. Jam packed game; the strongest ones being the rarest. The camera can be hand-painted graphic noir imagery that stays true to its equipped with special functions and with special lenses, all with references to the zombie cult, the game can comic book origins. take some surprising turns in the form of mutant of which grant some special ability useful in combat. During The game follows Jackie, now the Don of the Franchetti the game, Mio must explore the entire village area and its zombies created by them stumbling into radio- crime family, and wielder of the Darkness which he central buildings, and needs to find various objects and solve active goo, or fire zombies that saunter through used to kill the man who murdered his girlfriend in the puzzles in order to advance. Throughout the game, Mio will fire catching flames and wearing them like flam- last game. But now after him being able to suppress the encounter different kinds of ghosts, some of which appear ing body suits. And these are only a few exam- darkness within him the demon wants out and after an unexpectedly while some appear during cut scenes. The van- ples of what this creative game has in store for ishing ghosts often talk, giving some information related to unexpected attack on his life Jackie is flung into a full on the story, or a hint on how to progress. The game is divided it’s players. mob war. Now he must slash his way through enemies Gameplay will also allow up to four players to into nine chapters, mostly related to certain areas which Mio while trying to find out who is behind the attack and why. visits as she chases after her sister. cooperatively navigate through the town; to con- According to the developers more time had been spent The game can be saved at red lanterns scattered throughout trol the fight, one joystick moves your character on the refinement of the Darkness powers in this game, the village. Unlike in the first Fatal Frame, there is no way through the town and the other aims. Twin-stick unlike in the first game where players could only access to restore film ammunition; should you run out and use up shooters rarely go deeper than this, but All Zom- the Darkness at certain times and had limited control all the film found in the game, all you will have left is the weakest type. bies Must Die! adds layers of gaming and RPG over what actions could be taken, players can now use upgrades to the mix. each arm for different actions. You are now allowed to use All Zombies Must Die will be available in De- the right tentacle to kill enemies while the left will be used cember on PC, PS3 and xbox 360. For a look at to pick up things to use as weapons or remove them from the game trailer visit the address below. your path. The Darkness II also features some new moves performed by your character, such as allowing players to impale their enemies with the Darkness and the introduc- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hU55j3nOqA tion of quad wielding which will allow for some wicked combos while playing. The Darkness II will be available on February 7, 2012 in

North America and February 10, 2012 internationally, for PC, Xbox 360 and PS3.

31 November Game Review November Game Review Zombie Panic: Source

As the foundation of Kinetic zombie bashors I would say that this gameRise definitely ofhit the bullsNightmares eye, but as an actual game on it’s own it leaves a little to be desired. Although I am a big fan of what SEGA have done here. Not only have they taken one of the worlds most popular cults and attempted to make it even more realistic but they have started a new generation of zombie games. As we dive, head first, into the this very 2D story line you must remember that it has mountains of potential, and with a little refining Rise of Nightmares could be an amazing game. Underneath all of the overly done plots and heavily repetitive game play there is the chance to literally wade through hordes of zombies, smashing their faces in and chopping them to pieces with various tools you find along the way. The basic idea of the Zombie Panic is to create a scenario in which The game starts with a normal guy like any other, players accompany Josh and his wife Kate as they travel players are able to play both humans and zombies. Allowing for the European by train. As the story unfolds, the couple is found fighting over Josh’s boozing. Kate storms off, situation you are faced with to seem more realistic. The game calls leaving Josh (and the player) to pursue her. Kate is kidnapped by a mad scientist and Josh then sets off to for players to join each other on a server where one person will volunteer themselves as the first zombie. If no-one volunteers some rescue her from a castle of creepy only to be met by brain starved zombies who are let loose on him. The one will be chosen and the game will begin. The idea is that one game allows you to use what ever tools you can find to defeat the zombie masses and reach new levels in zombie then infects the other humans playing and they turn into an attempt to free Kate. zombies themselves. At this point your objective to fight off the un- One thing I’ll admit though is even though fighting the undead may be easy (in the beginning) getting dead and survive the outbreak changes to hunting down and infect- control of the game and your character is not. To begin it will be difficult as you try to steer your character ing the remaining survivors. The humans not only have to survive but complete tasks and even attempt to wipe out all of the zombies, through corridors and train cars, often running into walls of falling off to one side, but once you have the catch here is that they cannot tell just by looking at their players mastered your movement it can be rewarding. I am impressed that all control of the character is given to list who is and isn’t zombiefied. the player, it’s a BIG leap in Kinetic games that may be the first step toward true virtual reality gaming. However the zombies have their weaknesses to, they only have a Another great feature in this game is the interactively of your surroundings. Whether you are required to certain number of lives before they are destroyed. When a zom- climb ladders, pull levers or kick in doors you can do this all with the real world movements you would bie is killed they lose 1 life from the coun- normally use. One such situation sees Josh exploring a derailed train on the verge of tumbling over a water. However, when a terfall. Here you are forced to keep balance until it was time to just run. human is killed they As you get farther in the game fighting becomes more difficult, now you are required to aim at certain weak gain 1 life. If the zom- points in your enemies defences rather than just swinging and hoping to hit. Your weapons become more bies only have 1 res- complex although you have become accustom to the games movements you a expected to be able to pull pawn left the humans can win the round by off better combos and tasks. Properly applied, the games ideas could make for a grand adventure game, killing off the remain- opening us up to an entirely new breed of gaming. As it stands, I believe that for a first try this game exceeds ing undead. any expectation, Zombie Panic may and any flaws it seem simple, kill all may have are just zombies and survive, but it can get a lit- technicalities. tle complex at times. Many other games For example the game have made it to the allows for weight/speed control, while zombies cannot run faster top of the list with than a human can by carrying lots of weaponry and ammo you will more faults than slow your character down and allow them to be caught. Weapons are also a big thing in this game, you will have a wide range of weap- this one on charm ons to choose from if you can find and collect them. You will start alone. And while out with a random melee weapon and handgun but with a little bit Rise of Nightmares of skill and team work you can locate a treasury of zombie destruc- is a novel experi- tion. The down side is that at the beginning of the round, everyone ment, it has a good else is a Survivor. This means that they can easily watch each others backs but once their ammo starts to run dry they begin to squab- chance at being one ble amongst themselves. Another great feature in this game is in- of our best games of stead of typing messages to each other (occupying busy hands), the the year. humans will have the ability to communicate by voice commands. There is a menu with several commands that can help the humans to organize a defence, trade ammunition and request help. However the humans are not the only ones who have fun in this game, zombies also have their perks. One such perk being regenera- tion, over time a zombie will regenerate hit points making it more Twisted Metal 2 difficult to make the undead dead. They are persistent little f***ers who will keep on coming back until their last life, and as the game commences and the survivors are turned by the bucket load the One of this years biggest and longest running PS franchises releases, Twisted Metal 2, seems to have stayed zombies will also have numbers on their side. Another cool feature true to its predecessor’s cruel and twisted form. While the game sees no change ion format of playability is Z-vision, allowing the zombies to see in dark corners and moni- (which is a good thing) it does sport a few additions including more vehicles, more weapons and eight tor who is most active on the field by seeing your prey surrounded new worlds in which to run riot. Instead of the fictional worlds of the first Twisted Metal this game hosts a by a red glow. Those who camp or play hide and seek will also ap- variety of real world playgrounds for you to rev your hard core engine in. TM2 features maps based on Los pear with this glow. To add to this the original zombie looks and sounds different to the rest of his droning cronies and sports talents Angeles, New York, Hong Kong, Moscow, and Paris. It even showcases the frozen Iceland of Antarctica; they wish they had. He is the Carrier! With the power to infect peo- the moulten lava ruins of Amazonia; and the serene farmlands of Holland. While I am sure there are those ple (10% infection chance per hit by default) and he causes panic who will disagree with me I think I prefer the make up battle tracks. They seemed a bit more inventive, but and paranoia amongst the living. because of the shear size of these tracks it is easy to get lost in exploration, but we all know that is not why The mod on this game is well creepy but it is not the kind of game most of us pick up this type of game. that takes itself too seriously. Like any good zombie game Zom- bie Panic has a sense of exciting desperation in which the player This latest addition to the Twisted Metal legacy will have you jumping about in excitement as you play can make choices for themselves, one of ten characters, a few of which we are all familiar with (Mr. Grimm;Warthog; Sweet Tooth and even getting the blood pumping in Minion) and a few new recruits who will give you a real run for your money. anticipation. As I said it has a lot The game features a tournament mode which requires you to destroy all opponents on that level before you of freedom, which not too many are allowed to advance, while a challenge match lets you select levels and opponents to tackle. zombie games are open to, allowing you to kick zombie ass your Your characters ultimate goal is to compete in one of the most grandly destructive vehicle combat races own way. And while this makes it and survive. Should you manage to avoid being smashed to little bits, chomped by metal jaws or blown to one of the hardest zombie games smithereens in a fiery ball of scrap metal and win you will be awarded “anything your heart desires” by an out there it brings a certain au- insanely evil man named Calypso. thenticity to the experience. Like in the original game the characters have a very human aspect making you hate or fear them, this Whether you are a survivor or a zombie you will be able to enjoy brings a realistic sense of competition that leaves you screaming at your screen or insulting your oppo- the thrill of killing your team nents. The playability like the rest of the game is smooth but with such a variety of weaponry you will be mates in a friendly fit of glee as wishing you had a third hand with which to bash your console. you shoot, slash, hack, gnore, And now with the ability to play online disciples of this wicked car killer can strategically dismantle op- bite, tear and obliterate your way ponents through the Playstation Network. Players will unleash destruction with up to 16 players and battle through the game. I believe in all honesty that this through a variety of favourite and new game modes. game is one of the greatest in zombie bashing history, and is one for the record books for To find out more go to their web site www.twistedmetal.com/ many years to come. Mon-Thurs:: 9am-5:30pm Friday: 9am-6pm Saturday: 9am-5pm Sunday: 9:30am-3pm Public Holidays: 9am-3pm

Randburg: Telephone: (011) 789-8215 Fax: (011) 781-2551 e-mail: info@awx. co.za Address: Shop G16A Bright- water Commons Randburg

Centurion: Telephone: (012) 654-4735 Fax: (012) 654- 4735 e-mail: centurion@ awx.co.za Address: Shop 45 Eldoraigne Shopping Centre Centurion, Pretoria

Fouways: Telephone: (011) 465-6641 e-mail: fourways@ awx.co.za Address: Shop G12A1 Four- ways Crossing Fourways

Be sure to visit them online at: www.awx.co.za that require multiple characters to pull. The Little LittleBigPlanet is a manifested embodi- Big Planet’s mascot is the icon of creativity, Sackboy ment of your perfect dream world. It’s all is the raggedy little doll who’s creative potential is infinite. This incredibly cute rag doll acts as a blank about your imagination, and your creativity slate for your creativity, and as traverse the games and to date you’ve filled it with over 5 Mil- story mode you can collect new materials and cloth- lion levels. ing with which to dress him. Or her, Little Big Planet LittleBigPlanet 2 is two has brought out a new character Sackgirl for those of you who like to play with little girl dolls. You part of that very same can dress them up and add a multitude of accessories dream world, it’s all to make your character what you want it to be. You one big ever-expand- can even change their appearance to any colour you ing cheese-stuffed- like. Your little sack person can be very expressive, using your controllers you can make them happy, crust community, Yes. I know this is not a big smash out game with big explosions and sad, angry, or scared, you can even make then smack which means each mutant creatures who’s soul purpose is to rip you limb for limb. But other players by using the analog stick. You can also and every one of those this game deserves to be in the magazine, if not for the sake of it’s use the motion sensor to move Sackboy’s head and five million creations hips. With so much variety you will often be spend- creativity alone. will be yours to play, Little Big Planet has been described as a platforming game, but its ing a lot of time just changing clothes, pulling faces, dedication to creativity in every area takes it far beyond the restric- and adding to your sack persons personality. right out of the box, tions of platforming. Now with the release of Little Big Planet 2 things along with everything are even bigger, better, and more interactive than before. Everything “What makes Little Big Planet unique you’ve already collect- from your character to the environment is geared towards user crea- ed or built in Little- tion and adaptation, whether you are adding costumes and stickers to is that it frequently goes way beyond your little sack guy or acting like god in level and game world creation, platforming into something else en- BigPlanet. We’ve given you are able to adapt things to your hearts content. Each level is a wild tirely, seemingly for no other reason the searching system trip through one of many different worlds, all a collective of the hu- than to satisfy the designer’s rampant a total overhaul, and man imagination. The overall effect is a game that has the potential to we’ve added Activ- be taken further by its community, growing in size while the number imagination. With scenarios such as ity Streams so you can follow your friends of it’s followers grow. Being fed by the thoughts of thousands until it hot-air balloon riding, animal prison becomes a living idea in which hundreds of people can play. and hearted creators to see what they’re Unfortunately the actual story mode of the game is over very quickly breaks, and ninja henchmen battles, getting up to, helping you unearth all the and while it may seem like a brilliant idea to give the general public every level of Little Big Planet demon- top notch playable nuggets that are pop- the power to try and develop comlex games that will entertain any one, some people just can’t. The ability to create new character, games strates incredible imagination.” ping into existence all around you. A new and levels also takes a lot of time, so if you are like me that is ok but if web portal called LBP.me gives every single Sadly, the game is very generic when it comes to ac- you work a 9 to 5 it maybe a little difficult for you to get into this game. tual gaming structure, there is no such thing as pro- LittleBigPlanet creation its own home on gressive level difficulty and rather few truly testing the web, with a page for every creator and “ The titular Little Big Planet is the place where challenges. But for those of you who don’t need logi- every level. all human imagination collects--the planet above cal story progression to have fun with a game then this is just for you. And with over 5 million levels the cosmos where our untapped creativity escapes you will be sitting in front of your screen for hours. To see more go to their site: when we’re asleep or daydreaming. ” http://www.littlebigplanet.com/en/news/archive/ Each level of the game incorporates games like centipede, skipping http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oy_a3oCDzRA contests, ping pong and drag racing competitions. There is an oasis of gaming options waiting to be compiled into the ultimate game. To make things even more exciting you can now compose your own music, direct cinematic masterpieces, wire controllers directly in to your contraptions, and even use switches, microchips and circuit boards to build epic bosses, vehicles, machines, and puzzles. For those of you who would rather play than create you have over 5 000 000 levels to choose from. Item collection is a must as it affords you more creative freedom in the shape of stickers and costumes, it also means that you can place loot drops by putting stickers down in certain places. The game becomes a little more difficult when they throw puzzles at you that can only be solve by playing multi-player mode. These include gates that can only be opened remotely, objects This years December Christmas Issue 2011 We bring you all of this years Favourite anime and more.

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Next months hot-off-the-press issue will feature all your favourites for the Christmas season. We put together a Best Otaku Presents list in which we tell you who has the best stuff and where to get it, then we cover the best anime of this year, see what is coming next in the new year, Find out why Sunrise Studios is one of the best, discover what LARPing is about and see what you can do to save money on the anime you buy. Also we will be releasing our first Gadgets 1o1 page as well as anime personality for the month and All Otaku Team Event of the month.

So get ready for an issue of immense proportions

This is our Christmas issue!!!

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