Acid for Blood

Winter Holiday in Japan: Game, Toy, Anime Edition

I was in Japan for two weeks and I just returned last night. I didn't do much gaming there because I placed more importance on other activities. I did take a lot of pictures and bought a bunch of stuff, though.

This is one of many used goods shops (recycle shops) I visited. The majority of items in these shops are in good condition, even the games. Most of the games, especially for the past two generations, come with boxes and manuals in good condition. This particular shop sells used toys, ...:

Used/vintage games, ...:

As well as many other second-hand items, such as CDs, records, clothing, and random assorted sundries.

I spent some time wandering Akihabara in Tokyo, looking at/for toys and games. Akihabara is one of the major places to go in Tokyo if you are looking for anime, toys, and games (new and vintage). Here are a couple of pictures:

I also went to Shibuya, also in Tokyo. If you've played The World Ends With You, this sight may be familiar:

A Final Fantasy: Dissidia advert at the Shibuya train/metro station:

Konami, known for the Metal Gear Solid, Castlevania, and Silent Hill series of games, also runs a chain of gyms in Japan:

The following was taken in Den Den Town in Osaka. Den Den Town is a section of Osaka where many game, anime, and toy shops are located, kind of like what Akihabara is to Tokyo.

If you've played Mirror's Edge, the next few pictures may be of interest. The Mirror's Edge developers have stated that the nameless city in the game is not modeled after any one particular city, however during my travels in Japan, many urban spaces reminded me so much of the architecture within the game

One of the interesting things about the Japanese games market is how varied the player base is, and consequently the types of games released. This is particularly true for the DS, but the PSP is also marketed as a portable console for all gamers, including women. For example, I found marketing advertising targeted specifically to women, in which the PSP was presented as a friendly and stylish product. On the subway, there were many types of people playing portable consoles. I saw more women playing PSPs in Japan than I think would be the case in the West. Judging by what is played on the subway, the PSP is performing well in Japan. For the DS, you can find games for (left to right) training/exercising your face (it comes with a camera so you can see your face on the DS screen), selecting wines for all types of meals (there is also a bartending/mixed drinks DS game in the same series, both published by EA), and practicing your kanji brush strokes (complete with a 'brush' stylus!):

I'm a huge Studio Ghibli film fan, and one of the highlights of the trip was a visit to the Ghibli Museum:

This is a sampling of the goodies I came home with after the trip (there are other purchases I haven't shown such as my modest haul of J-music CDs and yet more Animal Crossing plushies). Click through to the Flickr page for notes about the picture:

The most expensive piece was a boxed, Limited Edition Mother 3 GameBoy Advance Micro:

I haven't played Mother or Earthbound, but my partner is a huge fan, and I have always wanted a GBA Micro, so it all works out. I just have to be extra super careful when I use the Micro.

So there you have it, a pictorial review of the gamer/anime/toy aspects of my holiday. All my pictures from my holiday in Japan are located here.

The Dragonlance Animated Movie… Sucked!

I am not entirely surprised that it was terrible, but I decided a while ago that I was going to watch it anyway. You see, I really liked the original Dragonlance novels.

The art style and cel animation in Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight were both awful. They must have been channeling the old Dungeons & Dragons cartoon, because this full-length, direct-to-DVD animated film was hardly better than bad 1980s Saturday morning cartoon fare. Furthermore, they thought that mixing choppy cel animation with poorly-rendered CGI would be a great idea, possibly to distract people from just how bad the art design is. Guess what? It didn't work! The dragons and Draconians (reptilian humanoid creatures) were all animated with computer graphics, but they looked very awkward next to the cel animation. The character designs were fairly true to the novels and artwork inspired by the novels over the years. The art team had no skills, however, so all of the characters looked bad. There was also some really cringe-worthy fan service.

The voice acting and music were mediocre on the whole. Kiefer Sutherland did a passable job as mage Raistlin Majere (my favourite character in the series), but his voice wasn't at all raspy or whispery as the books described. I was disappointed. The other voice actors were good enough, though there was some over-the-top acting, particularly on the part of Dragon Highlord Verminaard's voice actor. The music was uninspiring -- standard 'epic' fantasy type music.

The plot of the film covered all of the main plot points of the first novel of the same name, with irritating inaccuracies, especially at the end. Obviously, any film adaptation would be unable to detail every event of the novel, but the Dragonlance film was an especially shallow adaptation. The plot felt very rushed. I've long had the opinion that Dragonlance should be an episodic animated series rather than a series of films. The events in the film lacked impact and did not inspire any sort of excitement. It was unable to elicit one bit of concern for any of the tragic and world-changing events in the story.

Dragonlance is known for sticking very closely to standard Dungeons & Dragons conventions: epic quests, good versus evil, dungeons, dragons, magic, etc. In other words, the early Dragonlance novels are not the most non-stereotypical pictures of a fantasy world, however the complex and memorable characters shine through the familiar fantasy conventions. The characters in the film, however, were portrayed very shallowly, by bludgeoning the viewer in the face with their most obvious and visible personality traits. It was painful to see the characters treated so badly.

If I watched this film and had never read the novels, I would avoid reading the Dragonlance books. I don't know what Wizards of the Coast were thinking when they approved this project. Dragonlance is one of the most loved Dungeons & Dragons related fantasy series, and this film was an insult to the fans, an insult to the authors of the novels, and an insult to the Dragonlance fantasy world. Only watch if you're a true fan and are prepared to either mock it at every poorly-paced turn or wallow amongst your dice and miniatures (to comfort you), shedding geeky tears of sorrow and rage.

Onimusha Film Will Star Kaneshiro

Oh. My. Goodness. I've never played the Onimusha games, but I really like Takeshi Kaneshiro. The main character, Samanosuke Akechi, was modeled after Kaneshiro, because Takeshi Kaneshiro is really hot. Okay, I made that second part up, but it's true.

I first became aware of Takeshi Kaneshiro from his role in the 1994 Hong King film, Chungking Express. He played Cop 223. Kaneshiro also played Miyamoto in the derivative-but-still-fun science fiction film, Returner. More recently, and probably famously, he starred in House of Flying Daggers.

Christopher Gans, director of Silent Hill (which I really liked) and Brotherhood of the Wolf (which I thought was terrible), has stated that Takeshi Kaneshiro will be reprising his role from the videogame in the feature film adaptation of Onimusha.

[Ain't It Cool News via N'Gai Croal's Level Up]

Production Blog for Dracula’s Curse Animated Movie

The blog aims to provide readers with details of behind-the-scenes progress on the upcoming animated movie based on the Konami videogame Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse. Scripting will be handled by Warren Ellis, and James Jean is on board as art director. Members of the production team will contribute in the upcoming months.

[Link]

X-Strikes the Spot

Last week's The Escapist highlighted the link between videogames and cinema. One of the articles spotlighted a group of videogame film makers, X-Strike Studios.

I first discovered X-Strike Studio's films at the 2004 Mid-Atlantic Gaming Festival (MAGFest), where they premiered their (then) latest film, Silent Horror. Silent Horror is a comedy film based upon survival horror videogames. Anyone familiar with the conventions of the genre would get a good laugh from the film.

The X-Strike Studios creative team, including its actors, regularly visit anime and gaming conventions on the East Coast (not sure about the West). These folks are real videogame fans and it shows.

Their latest film is Low Budget Espionage - Project: Snake, based upon Metal Gear Solid.

If you want to see videogame films "done right" (the opposite of Uwe Boll), I highly encourage you to check out X-Strike Studio's projects.

[Read]

Dragonlance Movie in Autumn 2007

The Dragonlance novels were my favourite series of books when I was in high school. The Dragonlance books made me want to play Dungeons & Dragons in the first place, but I never found a group to play D&D with until near the end of my university career.

Naturally, like so many every other Dragonlance fans, my favourite character is the highly intelligent, cynical/sarcastic, physically-weak, and extremely ambitious Wizard, Raistlin Majere. He is by far the least-liked of the party of adventurers. Everyone can relate to feeling left out in some way, at some point in their lives, which is why Raistlin was so popular.

Apparently, Raistlin Majere is being voiced by Kiefer Sutherland. Sutherland has a really sexy voice, and he's a great actor. I don't watch 24, but I remember him being really good in Dark City. Keifer Sutherland's role in Phone Booth really made me take notice of his voice. He plays the terrorist who is talking on the phone to Colin Farrell's character. He doesn't make a visual appearance in the film until the end. Sutherland has a deep, gravelly voice. Raistlin Majere has a physical ailment which makes it hard for him to breathe, so he's got this whispering, wheezing sort of voice. I think Sutherland should be able to pull that off.

Another famous actor who announced her participation in the film is Lucy Lawless, who will be playing the plainswoman Cleric, Goldmoon. Goldmoon is the catalyst for the adventures that begin in Dragons of Autumn Twilight, which is the first book in the first trilogy of the novels. Goldmoon has been entrusted with proof of the gods' presence on Krynn (the world/planet in Dragonlance). At the point in the timeline when the story begins, it is widely believed that the gods had abandoned the people a few hundred years before, right after a great Cataclysm. I think Lucy Lawless should be all right as Goldmoon. I am not too fond of her voice, but she's a decent actor anyway. I hope her American accent has improved since her Xena: Warrior Princess days, though. Apparently, the actors will all be using American accents, except the Elves who will sound "European" -- whatever that means.

The Dragonlance movie is going to be an animated movie, based upon Dragons of Autumn Twilight. They plan on a continuing series of films, but it depends on how well the first one does. They're aiming to make it a PG-13 film, which more or less matches the books' content. I've always thought that it would be awesome for a movie to be made, and I think animation is ideal for the adaptation because they can show everything they need to show.

The books themselves are not literary masterpieces, but they're great entertainment. In gaming terms, the use of the D&D character classes and party composition is traditional and balanced. It's almost like the writers basically took the D&D Player's Handbook and made a standard D&D party. The characters really make the books come alive, though. The characters are the strength of the Dragonlance novels, so I hope they write them as true to the books as possible.

I'm really looking forward to this movie, and I hope they don't screw it up.

Trivia: My Animal Crossing: Wild World town, "Wayreth", is named after the Tower of High Sorcery of Wayreth, one of the five bastions of magical teaching on the world of Krynn.

WARNING: Spoilers in the comments section!

[Dragonlance Movie Site]
[Dragonlance Movie Site - About Dragonlance]
[Wikipedia - Dragonlance]

What is Wrong With Comic Book Movies?

gatmog briefly reviews a bunch of comic book movies, and ends with a critique:

What continues to astound me is how the medium has been treated in its transfer to film. While it's nice to see them being taken seriously as money making ventures, there comes a point where the film's ties to the original format are permanently broken by inserting too many characters, plot contrivances or intellectually stunted lessons in morality. They're comic books. They thrive on exposing us to fantastic things that could never be realized without multi-billion dollar budgets. The stories are already there, archived for use in any screenplay. And yet somehow the visual medium of film, including the enormous leaps and bounds the world of special effects has made, cannot seem to capture the feel of these things.

Is anyone else dreading Nicholas Cage as the Ghost Rider? The trailer before X-Men: The Last Stand was visually cool, but at the end of the day, Johnny Blaze is still being played by Nicholas Cage.

[Read]

Civ IV: Warlords Bush and Blair Teleconferences

US President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair discuss the imminent threat of long-dead dictators in a series of hilarious videos (adverts?):

Teleconference 1: Ghengis Khan

Teleconference 2: The Who

Teleconference 3: Wang Kon

Teleconference 4: Hannibal

[Via GameSetWatch]

X3

I saw X-Men: The Last Stand this past weekend. I enjoyed it. There were some details I didn't like, but the details didn't mar my enjoyment of the movie. Ever since more and more films based upon comic books have come out, I have slowly resigned myself to the fact that they will never be true to the original source material. I still liked it, though.

Warning: Spoilers below! Spoilers in the comments, too!

GW vs. WOW Music Video

Stop. Hammer time:

I am biased because I like Guild Wars, so with that in mind, my opinion is: the dance animations are better in Guild Wars. For example, if you compare the male Blood Elf Napoleon Dynamite dance with the male Ritualist Napoleon Dynamite dance, the male Ritualist comes out on top.

As yet, a flamewar between GW players and WOW players has not erupted in the comments to this video.

EDIT: Nice to see that Kotaku (and everyone else now, it seems) are on the pulse of the zeitgeist. They posted the Guild Wars vs. WOW dance video I blogged about here 10 days prior to their entry.

P.S. -- Apologies for the lack of activity this week. I have been a little stressed out lately.