E3 2013 Overview and my personal opinions

For everybody that's a gamer, the Electronic Entertainment Expo or E3 for short is the time of year where we all get to find out what's coming up for the current generation and for the big 3 in the gaming industry to show off their best software and also show off live demos of upcoming games that are currently being developed.

Exactly 2 weeks ago, Microsoft unveiled the Xbox One and even though the console itself is an amazing piece of technology, there's just a whole lot of things that Microsoft is doing wrong with this console like having you to be connected to the internet for a game authorization process every 24 hours, being highly restrictive when it comes to used games and wanting to loan games to any of your friends for example. If you want to let a friend borrow a game for the Xbox One, you have to have them on your friends list on Xbox Live for 30 days, and you can only do this once! That's right, you can say "R.I.P." as far as letting friends borrow your games is concerned!

With all of this now being public knowledge among the gaming public, this absolutely hurt Microsoft's press conference at E3 this year. The new trailer for Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain was debuted to kick off the press conference, then the senior vice president of Xbox, Don Mattrick and Metal Gear series creator, Hideo Kojima came out and said a few words then went straight to the games.

Among these games were Below, Crimson Dragon, Dead Rising 3, D4, Forza Motorsport 5, Halo 5, which is a part of the new Halo trilogy being developed by 343 Industries, a Killer Instinct reboot, Kinect Sports Rivals, Quantum Break, Ryse: Son of Rome, and Sunset Overdrive which are all Xbox One exclusive games.

Electronic Arts and Ubisoft then had their press conferences which I'm not really going to go into since they are both developers and publishers for Microsoft and Sony, except for the fact that Aisha Taylor hosted the Ubisoft press conference for a 2nd year in a row and did a much better job than she did last year! Then the Sony press conference began after a bit of a delay just to make sure that everything was working properly and to correct a few things which is an E3 tradition at this point by now!

Sony then came out and showed off their list of impressive games with absolutely very amazing graphics which can also be applied to the games showed off for the Xbox One. And then, Jack Tretton who is the CEO and president of Sony Computer Entertainment of America came back out and began a series of rapid fire jabs at the Xbox One by putting all of our worst fears for the PS4 to rest by saying that we can still let our friends borrow our games, trade them in at Gamestop, it won't require any sort of online authentication for disc based games, and purchasing a game means that it is owned by the consumer forever!

Nintendo decided not to have a press conference this year for E3 for whatever reason and had an E3 edition of their Nintendo Direct online show instead. Nintendo showed off a great amount of games for the Nintendo 3DS and the Wii U as well as some indie games for the Wii U version of their E-Shop and also showed off a  montage of the 3rd party titles that would be coming to the Wii U. They also showed off actual gameplay footage of Bayonetta 2 which will be a Wii U exclusive which doesn't sit right with the people who payed for buying the original on the Xbox 360 or the Playstation 3. Nintendo also showed off some new games for the Wii U and the 3DS including Super Mario 3D World, a sequel to Super Princess Peach released for the Nintendo DS on February 27 of 2006, Pokemon X and Y for the Nintendo 3DS which will be the Pokemon franchise's official 3D debut, Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, and last but certainly not least....

Yes, there is going to be a new Super Smash Bros. for both the Wii U and the Nintendo 3DS sometime in 2014 which is next year, and that the secret characters will be none other than the villager from the Animal crossing series, the "Blue Bomber" himself, Mega Man! Or as he's known by his original name in Japan, Rock Man (ロックマン). And just recently, the Wii Fit trainer was revealed to be another secret character for the game as well. And it's not the Mega Man from the box art of the original Mega Man game on the NES that was made for Street Fighter x Tekken, it's the actual Mega Man that we all know and love and am happy to see returning for another guest appearance!

There's games that I didn't cover, and that's perfectly fine because this is just an overview of this year's E3 from my own perspective! Microsoft, just what in the world happened to you? It's because of what their practices are for the Xbox One that a lot of loyal Xbox fans are going to be buying a PS4 instead of an Xbox One which is very shocking. It seems to me that Microsoft is doing everything that Sony did with the Playstation 3, but just much worse. And Microsoft has continued to either give people the run around, or flat out ignore the issues that a lot of people are wondering about with the Xbox One, and only more than a few details have been 100% concrete which is ridiculous!

Sony came right out, guns blazing and did the complete opposite of what Microsoft did at E3 despite the fact that they showed off what they had in terms of games and they even showed off what the Playstation 4 console would look like. And not to mention that Sony actually showed that they give a damn about their consumers, which is something that Microsoft is hardly doing at all with their consumers which include the now former Xbox fans that have been with them for 7 and a half years. And it must have took some very serious balls for Jack Tretton to be up there on that stage and deliver the verbal pounding to Microsoft by saying that they wouldn't be doing the exact same things that Microsoft are doing with the Xbox One and bullshit everybody with shit eating grins on their faces.

Microsoft introduced the Xbox One, but didn't focus very much on games and focused more on the multimedia aspect of the Xbox One by touting it as a replacement for your cable box even though you still need an internet connection and a subscription to a cable provider. The only mistake that Sony made when it revealed the Playstation 4 was not show off the actual console which was rectified during their presentation at E3 this year. Xbox One does have some awesome games, but most of them are going to be on the PS4 and the PS3 as well as the PC for all of the PC gamers out there, but that's not enough to justify a $500 console with restrictions on used games as well as what you can and can't do with your console that you just purchased!

Sony is the exact polar opposite of what Microsoft is doing and they are actually listening to their consumer base which is a very good thing. Nintendo had a good showing as well even though they didn't have their own press conference which ended up working for them in the long run and they are on even ground with Sony even though Nintendo has their own set of problems to deal with. If this was going to be how Nintendo did their presentations for E3 from now on, it wouldn't bother me a single bit because this gives them much more time on what they want to focus on and how they are going to be presenting their latest and future lineup of games without having to do anything like they did at E3 last year which would make perfect sense.

With all of that being said, here's my verdict for E3 2013:

#1. Sony

#2. Nintendo

#3 for the 4th year in a row: Microsoft

Anyways, sorry this blog post was a bit long everyone, and hope you enjoyed reading my opinions and thoughts on what happened at E3 this year! Will let you guys know what happens with the podcast on my personal twitter, so stay tuned!

"Go Go Powerful Rangers" What the...? and updates

I don't regularly do these kinds of posts, so I'm going to make this an exception! 

If you haven't been watching season 2 of Hikonin Sentai Akibaranger which is known as Hikonin Sentai Akibaranger: Season 2 (非公認戦隊アキバレンジャー シーズン痛(ツー), then you are really missing out on what is looking to be another very great season! Just like the first season of Akibaranger, season 2 is geared towards more mature audiences for fans of the Super Sentai Series who used to watch it as kids.

I'm not going to give too much away, but season 2 takes place in an alternate world where certain things that happened in the first season didn't happen and the original Akiba Blue, Mitsuki Aoyagi was chosen to go to America to work for the Pentagon instead of Nobuo. In the previous episodes, we have had Kiba Ranger and Ryu Ranger from Gosei Sentai Dairanger make guest appearances as well as Mitsuko Horie, Yuko Yamagata, and even Koichi Sakamoto who is best known for his work as a fight coordinator and director for various shows in both the Kamen Rider and Super Sentai Series as well as various shows in the Power Rangers franchise!

Anyways, on to the reason that I decided to make this latest blog post. There will be some minor spoilers for those of you who haven't watched episode 5 of Hikonin Sentai Akibaranger: Season 2, so if you don't want to be spoiled, you might want to skip ahead. I'm also not going to spoil the entire episode either so please keep that in mind! (SPOILER WARNING!!!!)

Luna Iwashimizu, the new Akiba Blue who replaced Mitsuki Aoyagi saw George Spielburton (A combination of the directors George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Tim Burton) playing with some Zyuranger figurines and Nobuo Akagi finds out that somehow, Super Sentai's history was changed to being from the United States instead of Japan under the name Powerful Rangers. Dragon Ranger and Tyranno Ranger, now known as Green Powerful Ranger and Red Powerful Ranger attacks the Akibarangers and eventually had to retreat.

Back at the Sentai Cafe which is the Akibarangers headquarters, Kozukozu informs everyone else that somehow reality had been written that Powerful Rangers is the source of the Super Sentai Series instead of it being the other way around with Hyakujuu Sentai Gaoranger being the first entry which was made from it's American version without permission! (End of spoilers!)

This episode to me played off of the whole "Power Rangers vs. Super Sentai" situation which has been going on within both fandoms in a very comedic and great way. I can understand why the Power Rangers brand name wasn't used again to an extent even though it was used by Ryuji Sainei who made a brief cameo appearance in episode 2 of season 1 of Akibaranger since he voiced Jack Landors, his Power Rangers counterpart in the Japanese dub of Power Rangers SPD. But for the long time fans of Power Rangers that have next to no knowledge of the Super Sentai Series at all whatsoever, they will get quite a few laughs!

It was very strange and weird seeing those things reversed, but it was also funny that Powerful Green Ranger and Powerful Red Ranger as well as the Akibarangers acted exactly just how Power Rangers fans and Super Sentai purists act whenever they get into one of their many debates over "which one is better" and captured that very well in my opinion. 

For those of you who have absolutely no idea what I'm talking about, the term Super Sentai purist basically means that the person believes Super Sentai to be better than Power Rangers and that Power Rangers is inferior to the Super Sentai Series or vice versa. Power Rangers purists are pretty much the same way except that their love for Power Rangers does tend to make them closed minded which happens among people in the fandom, but not all Power Rangers fans are like that though however.

I like both Power Rangers and the Super Sentai Series and just don't understand why we can't all get along and learn to like both! Anyways, I promise to try and keep this blog updated regularly even though E3 is right around the corner. So if I don't update the blog right away, don't worry about it since I do have a tendency to get sidetracked. I might not be able to post about everything that happened at E3 this year, but I'll certainly do my best! May the power protect you, always! 

New Hikounin Sentai Akibaranger promo streamed

Just recently, the official Akibaranger website posted the second promo for the upcoming Hikounin Sentai Akibaranger: Season Two which starts on April 6th on BS Asahi which tells us the story for this season which takes place in an alternate universe or parallel world 9 months after the Evil Group Stema Otsu Corporation have been defeated by the Akibarangers!

There will also be plenty of guest stars who have worked on previous tokusatsu shows like Yu Kamio who played Dr. Maki from Kamen Rider OOO, Keiichi Wada, who is best known for his role as Ryo, Ryuu Ranger from Gosei Sentai Dairanger who also made a guest appearance on Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger, Sakina Kuwae, best known for her role as Natsume Masaki from Jyuken Sentai Gekiranger, Ichiro Tomita, otherwise known by his stage name MoJo who performed the theme songs for Battle Fever J, Dai Sentai Goggle V, and Kagaku Sentai Dynaman, and Yukio Yamagata who is best known for performing the theme song of the 25th anniversary of the Super Sentai Series, Hyakujuu Sentai Gaoranger will all make guest appearances.

At the near end of the promo, we are shown the imaginary legends that will be appearing for this season!

Dragon Ranger and Tyranno Ranger from Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger

Black Condor and Blue Swallow from Choujin Sentai Jetman

Deka Yellow from Tokusou Sentai Dekaranger

Bouken Pink from Gogo Sentai Boukenger

And Kibaranger from Gosei Sentai Dairanger

For everyone out there who doesn't know about Power Rangers, Dragon Ranger and Tyranno Ranger had their footage from Zyuranger used for season 1 of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers as the Green and Red Rangers, and Kibaranger had his footage used for season 2 of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers as the White Ranger. The 5 main suits from Zyuranger were used for all 3 seasons of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers until the annual suit change began with Power Rangers Zeo which was a loose adaptation of Chouriki Sentai Ohranger!

Anyways, who else is psyched about season 2 of Akibaranger besides yours truly?

Details of Akibaranger season 2 have emerged!

All of you may remember back in early January of this year, there was an official announcement that a season 2 of the comedic parody of the Super Sentai Series, Hikounin Sentai Akibaranger would be happening and that not much else was known about it!

Now we have more information about the upcoming season as well as the premiere date!

The second season officially called, "Hikonin Sentai Akibaranger: Season Two" (非公認戦隊アキバレンジャー シーズン痛(ツー) will be debuting on BS Asahi which is a broadcasting satellite, as well as Tokyo MX starting on April 6th. The good news is that almost all of the original cast members from the first season will be returning. The bad news is that Kyoko Hinami who is now best known for her role as Mitsuki Aoyagi will not be returning!
Unfortunately, the reason that Kyoko has chosen not to return for season 2 is unknown and left to fan speculation at this point! And as you can imagine, the fans of the first season aren't taking the news very well and are just as amazed and shocked about this as yours truly.
Replacing her will be 14 year old Shione Sawada as the new character, Luna Iwashimizu. And joining the cast for the 2nd season as the new villain is Ryo Horikawa who is the Japanese voice actor for Vegeta in the original Japanese dub of Dragonball Z, Dragonball GT, and Dragonball Z Kai as well as Makuramon on the original Japanese dub of Digimon Tamers and as Akumaro Sujigarano on Samurai Sentai Shinkenger as General Tsu.
There's also some new changes to the Akibaranger suits including a garter belt on Akiba Blue's legs, Akibba Blue and Akiba Yellow are sporting new 'hairdo's' for their new outfits, and Akiba Red has an armor upgrade in the form of an Aoi looking girl!

TV Nihon will be subbing Hikonin Sentai Akibaranger: Season Two since they did sub the first season as well as the announcement about season 2 back in January. So be sure to go to TV Nihon to download the fan subs as soon as they are released. Still no word on if Over-Time will be subbing Hikonin Sentai Akibaranger: Season Two at this time.

Playstation 4 has been announced!

This past Wednesday at Sony's super secretive event, Sony finally announced the Playstation 4!

And it looks like that it's going to be more socially focused. Unfortunately, the cell processor that powered the Playstation 3 will not be powerhouse for the new console which has been coming back to biting Sony in the butt as of recent times. And there will also be personalization which is something that everybody likes!

Here are the official specs for the console itself!

There will also be new things that people have been asking Sony about for years, like cross game chat which can be found on the X Box 360, as well as a new controller which was also shown at the Playstation Meeting 2013 event in New York City. The new controller does away with the traditional 'Select and Start' buttons which have been a mainstay for the console ever since the original Playstation console and replaces them with a 'Share' button which will allow gamers to share their victories or favorite moments of what they are playing by scanning the last few moments of gameplay, tagging it and then returning the player to said game of choice. And gamers will also be able to share their images and videos to their friends on social networking services like Facebook and twitter.

The traditional "Select and "Start" buttons have now been replaced by an "Options" button!

The Playstation 4 will also enhance social spectating by enabling gamers to broadcast their gameplay in real-time to friends by using live internet streaming services like Ustream. During live broadcasts, friends can make comments on the streamed gameplay and, if a gamer gets stuck on a challenging level, friends can also join the game in completely new ways. For example, friends can offer health potions or special weapons when a player needs them most during actual gameplay.

Some other differences with the new controller is that it will have a sensor for the Playstation move accessory as well adjusted shoulder buttons, new analog sticks, a new directional pad and a touch screen and it will also support motion detection thanks to a three-axis gyroscope and a three-axis aceelerometer and improved vibration!

The controller also features several output connectors. A stereo jack which will allow the connection of a headset to speak and hear audio simultaneously, a micro USB port and an extension port are also included. It can be charged via microUSB, a dedicated charging station, or the console itself when the console is turned off.

There is of course, some bad news though here! The Playstation 4 will not be backwards compatible with the 3 previous Playstation console games because of the cell architecture of the Playstation 3 and a new cloud based streaming service made possible via Gaikai, a company purchased by Sony, which will render Playstation, Playstation 2, and Playstation 3 games and stream them to the Playstation 4.

You also won't be able to carry over everything which includes you're game saves from the Playstation 3 to the Playstation 4 either!The main reason for this also has to do with the architecture between the 2 consoles. However, Sony is considering transferring some games over if things aren't too demanding in terms of emulation. All of the PSN games as well as the game saves for them won't be carried over either unfortunately!

The thing that really strikes as weird or just plain worng is the fact that the actual console itself wasn't shown because even Sony doesn't even know what the design of the console will be and will possibly be determined and made for Sony's E3 presentation this June at the Los Angeles Convention Center! The PlayStation 4 will be released during the holidays later this year.  

Crunchyroll adds season 1 of AKB0048 to anime catalog

A little bit of an update to the previous story for anybody who is a fan of the AKB0048 anime which is based on the real life very successful idol group AKB48. The anime and J-drama streaming site Crunchyroll has now obtained the licensing rights to legally stream season 1 of AKB0048 and has launched the first season yesterday at 7:30am PST which is also the same time that new episodes of the 2nd season, AKB0048: Next Stage are launched and 2 to 3 'new' episodes will be made available each week for both free and premium users of the legal streaming site!

So if you haven't seen the first season of AKB0048 or have only watched it through illegal fan sub sites and want to watch it again through legal means, then this is you're chance to do so and also watch the legal fan subs of the 2nd season at the same time, so it's a "win win" situation for everybody.

Could Sony be announcing the Playstation 4?

We all know that Sony has been secretly developing the next Playstation without much information leaking out and every bit of information that has managed to get out has been classified as strictly rumor! But as of last March, a plethora of news concerning the successor to the PS3 has been made available including some of the specs, and even anti-used games measures which will combat the used gaming market. However, this information is purely speculation and hasn't been confirmed or denied by Sony!
The successor to the PS3 is code named "Orbis" and the code name for the new console from Microsoft is code named "Durango" and that Sony was going to let Microsoft go first by announcing they're new console, but it seems like this isn't going to be the case! 
Recently, this video was posted on the official Playstation Youtube channel as well as the North American Playstation blog which basically tells us that Sony will be having an event on February 20 of this year. The event will be held in New York City and will be livestreamed on the internet which is only 5 days away from the 'Destination Playstation' event starting in Arizona which showcases the biggest and best games that Sony has on it's plate for the year ahead.
Meanwhile, members of the gaming industry press as well as investors have been handed an invitation to the event which have offered no further information which has added more fuel to the fire when it comes to the rumors of Sony and the Playstation 4! The only thing that we do know so far is what the specs of the development kits will be for the developers who would want to develop games for the new console and not much else.
Development Kit Specs: System Memory: 8GB Video Memory: 2.2 GB CPU: 4x Dual-Core AMD64 "Bulldozer" (so, 8x cores) GPU: AMD R10xx Ports: 4x USB 3.0, 2x Ethernet Drive: Blu-Ray HDD: 160GB Audio Output: HDMI & Optical, 2.0, 5.1 & 7.1 channels
Please keep in mind that these are the specs for just the development kits and not the console itself! We will just have to wait until February 20 to see whether or not the Playstation 4 will in fact be revealed before E3 or something completely different. I will be keeping you guys updated with further news as it becomes available! 

Killer is Dead trailer screams Suda 51

Recently, Killer is Dead which is the next game from the crazy and insane mind from Suda 51 was announced! The same person who gave us other games like Killer 7 and No More Heroes among others.

The game follows 35 year-old Mondo Zappa, a suit-wearing executioner responsible for taking out heinous criminals with a katana. Kind of a long the lines of No More Heroes, except that Mondo's katana isn't a light sword.

There is a gun that can turn into a drill is embedded in Zappa's left hand—an augmentation he has no memory of getting. The weapon becomes increasingly powerful during the game, and it can be used to absorb enemies' blood for a powerful "Adrenalin Burst" slash attack. Also included in the blood is "dark matter", which can apparently be changed into energy.

The American born Zappa works at an "executioner's office", managed by Brian Rozen, who was also augmented, to become a world-class executioner.

Joining Zappa is his boss at Rozen's firm, the cat-suit wearing 25 year-old British born Vivienne Squall. Mika Takekawa, who is 20 years old, is Zappa's assistant. After an earlier incident, she met Zappa and then started living with him because she can make excellent soft boiled eggs, which is his favorite dish.

And then, there's the evil Victor, a criminal who is dressed kind of like Mozart—if Mozart had glowing eyes, skeletal features, and green skin. Victor manipulates human emotion through song and aims to bring evil to the world.

Besides the international characters, the game uses various backdrops, such as old Western houses and Japanese buildings. Previously Goichi Suda said that Killer is Dead isn't a sequel to Killer 7, but that it does take cues from the previous title. If you have seen the pictures from the article in Famitsu magazine, the cel-shaded artwork does have a Killer 7 vibe to it!

A trailer for the game was recently uploaded to the Famitsu magazine's Youtube channel, and it has English subtitles for everyone who doesn't understand Japanese so you can read along to get a better grasp of what's going on.


Killer Is Dead will be out this summer for the PS3 and the X-Box 360 in Japan! There are no plans for an international or North American release at this time, but we will let you know if and when an international release or release for North America is revealed.

Hikounin Sentai Akibaranger season 2 announced!

Last year, Toei decided to do something a little bit different by creating a show that was geared towards the adults who used to watch the Super Sentai Series as a kid by coming up with a parody of the Super Sentai Series itself called Hikounin Sentai Akibaranger (Unofficial Squadron/Task Force Akibaranger).

The basic premise of the show is this:

Three individuals (a Super Sentai otaku, a cosplay otaku, and a closet anime otaku) are chosen by a beautiful scientist to become the "Unofficial Sentai Akibaranger" and "protect Akihabara" from a powerful group of villains that exist in their delusions. However, the fight eventually gets literally real when the villains begin to materialize in the real world.

This is REALLY a show that you have to watch for yourself is the only way to describe it!

Recently, the second season of Akibaranger was announced at the tail end of a "Kamen Rider x Super Sentai Live & Show 2013" event which was held at the Tokyo International Forum in Japan on the evening of July 12th! Sorry, but there's no subtitles so you guys will have to make do with it.

Unfortunately, there was no other information was given but I will keep all of you updated when new info becomes available like the premiere date! If you are an American fan who loved the first season like many of my friends from RVT Entertainment have, then you will want to download the subbed episodes from TV-Nihon!

Update: The fine folks at TV-Nihon have subbed the season 2 announcement of Akibaranger so everybody who has watched the Youtube video that wasn't subtitled can now download the subtitled version of the announcement and watch it for themselves!

Sentai Filmworks licenses "AKB0048"

This has come as a bit of a surprise, but thanks to my former co-host Mike Maverick, I have recently learned that Sentai Filmworks, a successor to ADV Films which was a company responsible for dubbing anime into English for anime fans here in North America has licensed the rights to "AKB0048", the anime based on the hugely successful real life idol group AKB48!

It has also come to my attention that Crunchyroll has started legally streaming the 2nd season called "AKB0048 Next Stage". Why Crunchyroll didn't get the rights to stream the first season is unknown at this time, and it's currently unknown if  the first season will be dubbed into English with an English voice cast. If an English voice cast is announced, I'll let you know! But this is a step in the right direction for those of us who want to watch this anime legally without having to resort to fan-subs.

While I regularly don't condone downloading fan subs with tokusatsu being the only exception to that rule, you should go to http://evetaku.com/ and watch the first half of "AKB0048" there and then sign up for an account at crunchyroll.com and start a free trial for their premium membership service.

Here's the official press release!

HOUSTON, January 16, 2013 — Get ready to rock in the New Year with Sentai Filmworks’ newest acquisition: AKB0048!  This epic 26 episode series is directed by Yoshimasa Hiraike (Kaleido Star, Amagami SS) and features series composition by Mari Okada (Vampire Knight, Canaan), character designs by Risa Ebata (Macross Frontier), sound director by Jin Aketagawa (Samurai Girls, Canaan) and music by Hiroshi Takaki (Tytania).

The year is 0048, and in the wake of the great wars, all forms of entertainment have been banned by the dystopian and iron-gloved rule of the anti-music DES.  To combat this threat to intergalactic harmony, a group of bold young women have resurrected the legendary J-Pop band AKB48 and formed an all new Band of Sisters – AKB0048!  But these rocking rebels aren’t simply singers!  Trained in combat as well as choreography, these striking strike team members are equally at home in concert halls and in the trenches.  Under the leadership of the mysterious Sensei Sensei, they’re ready to lay down their lives in order to make the universe a safe place for getting your groove on!  And as a fresh new team of singer-soldiers join the cause and enter basic training, the batons and battle gear are about to be passed to a new generation of daring divas!  Get ready to polish your dancing boots and dive into danger with the latest hard hitting hits as the new recruits take the staging ground and the veterans provide the musical soundtrack to their own action epic in AKB0048!

AKB0048 will be available soon on select digital outlets and later this year on home video.