Their website is here: http://www.ani-jam.com

I didn’t really know what to expect since it was also around the weekend of Otakon, EVO, and several other conventions.

It was definately a smaller, “homelier,” convention.  Both days at the convention was only 25$ entree, which I found to be a great price.  The Radisson Hotel lobby was amazing (so was the room rate, which was around 99$’s a night for two nights), with a two story indoor waterfall.

All of the standard fanfare that you would expect at a convention was there from panels and AMV contests, to concerts and cosplay.  The dealers room had very solid variety of merchendise. 

The staff at this convention was very laid back.  All of them were friendly and a lot of fun to hang out with.  The guests were also equally awesome.  I got to meet DJ Jinnai, Kristine Sa http://www.kristinesa.com/, and Stephine Yanez.  Ms. Sa was definately the most personable person I’ve ever met, she has the outgoing personality that’ll let her get along with pretty much anyone. Other than that, I saw the LYV and Stephine Yanez concert.  Here’s a youtube video of a song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96aJLNZX_Uw and that’s Ms Yanez below.

They had about six video game tournaments during the two day event.  They were very well run and the turn out to each game was about 12-14 people (Super Smash Brothers: Brawl had over 25 people).  I must admit, out of all the conventions I’ve gone to, they had the best prizes.  All of them were 25-50$ gift certificates to Best Buy.  How very awesome (more awesome since I took the win from the GGXX tournie)!

The Cosplay Masquerade was pretty good.  Honestly there were a few skits I could have been without, but the crowd was very supportive of all the acts, unlike in many major con’s where something less friendly would happened.  This is one of the benefitsof a smaller con, since people can’t hide in the crowds of anonymousity and being rude.

The Dance hall was a decent size, but in comparison to how few people there was in the dance room, it felt really big.  There just wasn’t too many people dancing (or even in the room, the count was probably around 40 people).  The music was was very upbeat and familiar thanks to DJ Jinnia. Like other conventions, this dance had no real ventelation and it was really hot in there after awhile.  None the less, I’m rather easy to please and had fun too!

Lots of people were cosplaying (like any convention).  The dominant  theme was Misa from Death Note this trip, which was kinda weird to me, I was expecting more Code Geass, Bleach, and Naruto (not that there wasn’t a lot of that, because there was!).  At one point, I counted about seven Misa’s.

By the end of the convention, I was almost reluctant to leave Fresno, but we had places to be and things to see.  (Ironically, I ended up at a natural park and a place called “Japan Garden” shortly afterwords, a story for another day.)  Ani-Jam was a lot of fun, if I have the funds to visit again next year, I’m going to make sure I do so.  A quick shoutout to Ray for hanging out with us in San Fransico after the convention!  I want to thank everyone at the Ani-Jam for contributing to such an awesome experience.

The Guy From NJ.

~Fei

Overview

Hilde is at best a mid-tier character.  She is only mid-tier because of TWO moves.  Her Charge A moves and her Charge 3 B.  (We’ll be referring to them as C1 A, C2 A, C3 B, etc.)  The reason is that on most characters, a single hit on either will do over 30% damage (70-100 damage) or automatically ring out from ridiculous ranges. The rest of her move list are rather low damage defensive stuff that many would consider as “good” moves, but in reality, they hardly win games on their own.

Pros

• +Ridiculous ring out game
• +A large vocabulary of safe moves

Cons

• -Somewhat steep execution learning curve (at some points you may be holding up to three buttons down while trying to block mid, low, or breaking throws.)
• -Pretty awful damage potential outside of landing C3 B
• -Combos are character specific

I like what I see, so what do I do now?

A few random technical things first.  If you’re using a pad (ie controller), either bind buttons to your shoulder, or play with your index and middle fingers on the face of the pad.  I play with two fingers on the face of the pad for Soul Calibur IV, the left shoulder buttons are for B+G and A+G (they act as throws or throw breaks).  In reality, this is more of a personal preference than a requirement, but playing purely with face buttons when you obviously have better options just doesn’t make sense.

First thing to do is go into practice mode and familiarize yourself with all of her moves.  While it’s true that you won’t be intentionally using most of them, it’s typically counter productive to  try playing the game without knowing the existence of more than three moves (except if you’re Mitsu I guess, in which case it’s probably ok.)

After you’re comfortable with the move list, we can get started with either Arcade Mode (waits to get stoned to death) or begin practice of her charge move combos.

Basic Charge Information:

Hold A or B or both for a set time and release for a special move.  The “A” versions auto guard impact (gets that honor pretty fast if you haven’t gotten it).  The B versions are linear mids. 

• C1 – About 1 full second. 
• C2 – About 2.5 seconds.
• C3 – About 4 full seconds.

And so the two main comboes to practice are:

• C3 B, 44K, C3A, C2 BB, C2 AA
• C3 B, B+K, C2 BB, C2 AA

Pick Nightmare as your practice dummy (he’s the easiest to land the first juggle on) and give it a swing.  I want to point out at this point that if you can not do either of these in practice / arcade mode, you should not play vs real people.  This is her bread and butter, without it, you will not win consistently.

Additional Combos that you will commonly use from charge:

• C2 BB, C3 A, C2 BB, C2 AA
• C3 AA, C2 BB, C2 AA

Common Combos:

• 33K, 1KK, 2B+K – You’ll find many chances to use this, 33K connects more often than you’d think.
• 6B+K, 4A+B – Super long range combat.  Linear.

Advice for practicing the charge combos:

• Make sure that your last move fully finishes before releasing your next charge.  After each charge release, instantly “re-charge” that button as early as possible, the slower you re-tap after release, the more likely you haven’t charged a move sufficiently to the level you need it at.
• Smaller characters have smaller windows for landing C3 A in a juggle (they are near Just Frame timing).
• Rock, Astroth, Vader, and Yoda can not be hit with the first juggle, so you must do the second one instead.
• Watch combo videos on youtube.com for a visual cue on the timing.

Hilde’s Game Plan

Look for places and ways to land C3 B or any variation that goes into charge based juggles and win.

Starting the round: 

During this phase of the game, you typically have three really good options.  Most other options are character specific.

• Charge both A and B and 8 way run up or down with the intention of stepping a linear opening move and connecting with 33K, 1KK. 
• BB (or 6BBB if you’re counterhit fishing) is fast enough to interrupt most moves people begin rounds with. 
• Back up and see what the opponent wants to do.  Typically you’re just going to block something on reaction.  You have the option of beginning the round with both A and B charged with this approach.

Close Up:

When you and your opponent are face to face, pretty much the rule of thumb is to release charge A if you have it.  Your "A" button is extremely important and you should not be gimping yourself with it being held down for charge when close.  Charging B is ok at close range.

• 6A+K – One of fastest moves in game.  Has minimal range.  You get this free after counterhit 3A.
• 4B+K – One of the best “Get out of my face moves.” Used after 2A on hit for better results.
• AA – Natural combo and buys space.
• 3A – Counterhit fish with this.  Block something and throw 3A out if you want.  Use after A+B on block.  After 2A on hit.
• 2A or 2K – Both serve the same function, 2A gives advantage 2K is low
• 1A – Low poke, doesn’t give advantage, but most people stop moving after getting hit with this.
• 4AK – Decent string.  Good damage (considering it’s Hilde) on counterhit.
• 3BA – Good damage. 
• 3K – Gives space.  Mid hit, ok range.
• 1KK – Another tool to fish for counterhits with.

Mid Range:

Your options are either to look for an opportunity to charge or pressure with lots of linear mid range moves.  Typically at this range you want to be charging A and B.  Much of your move set will be limited to K’s until you commit to releasing a charge.  Use mid range moves as an excuse to charge.

• 3B,A – Unsafe.  Damage.
• B,B – Natural combo poke.
• 33B – Low Poke
• 9K – Tech jump.
• 33K – Unsafe but good wiff punisher and decent damage return on hit.
• 11B – Ranged wiff punisher
• 66K – When you’re charging, you’re pretty limited, this is one of the few moves that you can rush with.
• 11K - Tech highs and it’s low.
• 4B+K – A great overall kick. 
• 22K,A – You get decent damage from this.
• 66A – It looks REALLY high, but it’s not any higher than any other high move.  With that said, it’s decent step killer.
• 6A+B – First part and chase step, decent range and speed.
• 2A+B, K – Natural combos are always good.  2A+B is safe, the K followup isn’t, hitconfirm before K input.
• 2B+K – Low poke.
• A+B – Great move that should be used whenever you can.  (Isn’t that often because of the need to charge.)

Long Range:

At long range you should do nothing but charge whore (charge both A and B, wiffan "A" if you have to).  All of your best moves *which incidentally are the longest range moves in the game* can all be evaded by anyone simply holding up or down and 8way walking.   Again, disclaimer: All this stuff is rather linear.

• 4A+B – Tag this at the end of long range moves that knock down.  It’s pretty fast and probably the best ranged move in my opinion.
• 66B – Rings out mid at range.
• 66A+B – Better damage than 66B but no RO option.
• 44B – These three moves all pretty much look the same…
• 11B – Your ranged step punisher.  Sets up wakeup, good chance you won’t hit 6A+K for the juggle.
• 33B – Your ranged low poke.
• 6B+K – Super long distance, tech jumps, knocks down, and linear as hell.

While Under Pressure:

When under pressure, you want all of your available escape tools ready to use.  Release charge A (with intention of it connecting) and DO NOT charge A or B until you get advantage again.  Otherwise you’ll eat throws until you die.  Remember your B throw will ring out behind you!

• C1 A, C2 AA, C3 A – Your panic button.
• 2A – Stops most forms of agro.  Returns advantage to you on hit.
• 2K – Same as above but no advantage.
• 4B+K – Fast mid that instantly returns advantage to you on hit.  Sets up wakeup.
• 11K – Low move that avoids highs.
• 1KK – Use on advantage to fish for a counterhit.  Unsafe on block.
• 6A+K – Fast, stops aggro.
• 1B – A fantastic escape tool.
• 7K – Another fantastic escape tool.
• 3K – A fodder mid to discourage aggro, it’s not too exciting.  I’m listing it as an option, but that’s all it is.

While Pressuring:

• A+B – +2 frames on hit and block.  It’s low damage, but it’s used in place of other characters "BB’s"  On block you can very safely do 2A or 6A+K.  You can counter hit fish with 3A as well.  Make sure to abuse this until they realize you’re netting free damage.  When they turtle up, you have free wield on how to milk out damage.
• 3BA – You want this to connect for damage.  On block the second hit can be ducked and the 3BB variation just isn’t worth it.  Very unsafe, but necessary part of her game. 
• 6A+K – One of fastest moves in game.
• 2A+B,K or 2B+K – The first is slower, but sets up a wakeup game.  The second one is a moderately faster low.  Both are important because she stays standing which hides lows better than moves that blatantly are slow and ducking low (ex. Mitsu 1A or Astaroth 1A).
• Throw – Breaks turtles good.  Her best damage.

While Opponent HP under 20%:

This is where you’re shooting to win either from pressure and frame traps or mid range low pokes.  You have to make the call whether to charge A or not.  You don’t want to charge B in this situation since you don’t need the damage, a simple 3BA will be fine.

• C1 A, C2 AA, C3 A – Typically will make the opponent block again after blocking this.  Lets you keep pressure.
• 2K, 1A, 2A+B A, 2B+K - These all serve the same purpose, just the low poke you need for a game win.  2 A+K is left out of this list because it’s blatantly slow and 11K does the same thing better.
• A+B – Again, +2 frames on block, keep advantage, makes 2A and 6A+K connect most of the time.
• Throw – If you’re expecting them to freeze after blocking A+B or any of the C A’s, run up and throw.
• 3BA – Wins games, run up and do this instead of throw if you expect them to twitch duck.

Opponent Grounded (Wake up game):

In these situations, you always want ot nab free damage and force mixup before charging.  The worst thing you could possibly do is to knock down JUST to gain charge.  Get your damage first and charge from that move.

• 2A+B, K – A person who’ll not get up can just eat 2A+B until they die. 
• 3B,A – The mixup to 2A+B incase they want to wake standing.
• 1B – Run up alittle so that this connects, start charging A and B with this move.
• 4A+B – Tech catch people who naturally roll back on wakeup.  Gives you wake up again.
• 11K – Catches people who tend to roll up and down.

You Gaurd Impacted something (Post GI):

Simple enough.

• 3BA
• Throw
• 2A+BK

While Trying to Win with a Ring Out:

Hilde auto pilots this.  Just land a C3 B or A.  Keep decent space and let them rush in.  Don’t let them bait you into swinging on their block.  If your press them at rings edge, you can try to spam 4B+K and bank on the random hit, otherwise, back up enough so you can land any charge you have for free wins.  B+G RO’s behind you if you’re cornered.  One of the biggest mistakes I see players make, is intentionally setting themselves back to rings edge, this is rarely a good strategy since you only have ONE move that Rings out, while the opponent no matter what character, should have many more than that.

• C2/3 B and C3 A – Connect and win pretty much any distance forward.
• 4B+K – Super fast mid ring out in front.
• 2A+B, K – Great low option for ringouts.
• 3BA – Rings out in front, better distance but slower than 4B+K
• B+G – Rings out behind you.  Don’t just toss it out, 2A first so you have advantage.  Just spamming B+G will ring yourself out pretty fast since anyone spamming will destroy you.

Final Thoughts and Reminders:

I want to point out that there are a lot of scenario specific moves that are not covered.  This is more of a general guide to get everyone going.  Some notable examples would be the uses for the full crouch charge moves and what they punish. 

Remember, sometimes the very best round finisher might not be the quick low, but instead the quick mid!  A+B will either win, or set you up to win many close games.  3BA might not be the safest move in the world, but it’s a natural combo mid and pretty much her best damage without charge, you absolutely want this as part of your game.

So there you go~ Thanks for reading this to the end! I hope this helps improve your Hilde game.

Did I say something that didn’t make sense?  Anywhere I was blatantly wrong?  Have other suggestions? 

Comments, questions, and suggestions are always welcome!

~Fei

PSN: xFei

I didn’t really know what to expect when ordering Anime PVC figures online, nothing at all…  Not how long it’d take, what condition everything would be in, if all the parts were there,…  When the parcel finally arrived, I was pretty excited to see that everything was in place!  So, without further ado, my first shot at an Anime Figure Rewiew.

We have here Kanako Ohno, a girl who loves cosplay, anime, and most other otaku’ish hobbies.  This particular figure has her cosplaying as a Kasumi Kisaragi from Kujibiki Unbalance (An anime within an anime)!  Ohno comes with her figure, sword, sheath, and stand.  (On a side note, there is no place to put the sword in the sheath.)

Ohno stands about 7″ tall.  She’s made rather heavy.  The figure is definitely detailed, from the creases in her outfit down to the buckles on her boots.  Her skin is smooth, no signs of mold lines on closer inspections.  Something really cool to note is the detail they put onto the bottom of her boots, even though no one see’s them while she’s on the stand, you can tell that a lot of time was spent putting this figure together.  (Even the box art was nice.)

 Something that worried me was how hard it was to put her sword onto her hand.  I swear, the botton of the sword was wider than the top.  I was pretty afraid I’d break her hand or sword with how much pressure I had to put on it inorder to push it through.

A few notes about the photoshoot:  I was still learning about my camera while doing this and took quite a lot of pictures.  The backdrop is the Genshiken DVD Art Box.  I also want to add some close up shots of some of the more detailed parts of this figure, but apparently the shots looked better on my camera than when I pulled it up on my PC for editing,… I’ll try again later and upload them.  Also a slightly larger version of all these pictures can be found on my photobucket page.

Until Next Time!

~Fei

When it comes to flat out reviews to new or popular games, typically the most credible sources are the famous publishers and many web sources.  Having said that, I’m not going to go into a comprehensive “review” of the game.  It’s been done,… probably at this point 142,831 times … or more.  Rather, I’ll be going through and pointing out interesting notes and other things to think about while playing.  I’ll be avoiding any and all comparisons to other current FPS’s, there will be no Halo bashing, or how this game is better/worse than Gears of War etc.

Single Player

The core of the game is a first person shooter.  The single player campaign is beautiful.  The graphics if you’re fortunate enough to see them in 1080p is phenomenal.  When you play this, you definitely want surround sound, go all out if you have the resources.  The AI monsters in this game (the Chimera) interact and battle with reasonable amounts of intelligence.  They run when low on numbers, they hide in cover, they’re rush you, they have a decent amount of tatics.  Details in this game are really special.  Shooting pool balls on a pool table moves the balls about, killing Chimera have a multitude of death poses, shooting dead Chimera in different spots yields different effects, yes, many cool details.  The game itself can be easy or hard, depending on how patient you are and how good you are at aiming a 2D cross-hair in a 3D environment.

An interesting game mechanic is how you will regain life up to the nearest quarter life bar marker.  This healing system allows you to more or less play tatics throughout the game, also giving you a sense at the kind of “supersoldier” that you play in this game.  Also cool to note is the game does use the controllers motion sensoring capablities.  If you’re on fire, shake it off!  Homing tag on you?  Shake it off!  Etc etc.

 Lots of cool weapons which have a special secondary fire, nothing too amazing there.  Also to note, in single player, there are select guns that are clearly the most useful in the game, and guns that you will use only when out of ammo of the “good” guns.

Online Multiplayer

This is definitely what I log on and look forward to whenever I play Resistance: FoM.  There is a very good deal of content to be offered here.  Most importantly, recorded stats that can be viewed by others.  40 player death matches offer frantic running about, typically giving you no more than a minute before bumping into your next adversary. Through play, you earn more customisation for your character online, be it a new color helmet, new outfit, or what not.  This encourages more play.  It offers anonymous online ranked match making, pairing similar skilled players together.  There is also a way to group with your friends from game to game as well.  This allows everyone to have more fun while playing. 

Two modes unique to Resistance: FoM woudl be meltdown and conversion.  Meltdown is sort of like a tug of war for territory, controlling points on a map, and seeing who can control the most for the longest duration of time before the round ends.  Conversion is a deathmatch where you get two chances to die.  Starting as a human, if you die you become a Chimera.  This plays out as a free for all until only one stands.  Most online matches make you play two rounds, one as each race so neither has any advantage or disadvantage given from race.

Voice chat is open to anyone with a USB headset.  You can hear others through the ear piece.  Typically you’ll find out who has a mic during the lobby area of the game before a match.  During a game you can speak with your team with a press of a button, or move to select channels for open mic communication.

Human Race

The humans in this game have unlimited sprinting at the cost of their aiming crosshairs.  They have working radar that see’s everything (which can be avoided by crouching).  They begin with a single grenade (something the Chimera’s DO NOT begin matches with). 

Humans begin with a riffle more suited for ranged combat (overall it’s a pretty bad PvP gun).  When I play, typically I only pull this gun out only when I’m completely out of ammo for all other guns and absolutely have to fight or when I pick up a rocket for it’s secondary fire (forgiving 1 shot kills are nice).

Chimeran Race

Available only on online play, the Chimera have an activatable rage bar.  The rage bar acts similairly to the humans sprint, but with a timelimit before the Chimera start overheating and losing HP up to one half of their life.  During rage, Chimera deal more damage, can see living figures through walls (think heat sensor), and move rather quickly; this gives Chimera a pretty solid close combat advantage in battles.  Chimera do not lose their crosshairs during rage, giving more advantage to Chimera’s “Sprint.”

The Chimera start out with the higher speed machine gun which is suited for close range sharing affinity with the benefits of the traits as a Chimera.

Chimera do not have any radar.  Infact, you don’t even see your own teammates on your map.  This forces players to act much more independently than the humans because if you lose sight of your partner as a Chimera, you’re alone unless you have voice chat.

Weapons

In PvP, the best guns are the Bullseye (close-range machine gun, you use this to do pretty much all of your killing close up), the Auger (a gun that can produce shields and shoot through walls), and sniper riffle (standard high damage, generally keeps you out of danger).

The rocket launcher, your grenades, the shotgun all give you the opportunity to pulls some free one shot kills.  This alone makes them decent.

The flamethrower and the electric gun have almost no use.  Their effects can be shaken off and typically, you can get kills faster if you were just gunning them with something else.

Tactics and Strategies for Online Play

Standard rule of thumb applies to all team games: Whenever at all possible, play WITH YOUR TEAM.  Always have at least buddy near you.  Traveling in numbers is how you win. 

Voice chat is a phenomenal way to keep organized.  It keeps a clear line on who wins more often as opposed to just random run and gun style of most players online.

In free-for-all matches, you’re going for high amounts of kills, turtling and hiding will not win games as often as aggressive players eating deaths spread over many other players.

Remember, if you’re bullseye tagged shake your sixaxis to shake off the tag.  Doing this while running around a corner maybe the difference between living long enough to shoot back, or dying straight up.

When you approach doors, remember to strafe around to them and not walk up to a door, then turn.

Crouch to avoid radar detection.

Don’t use a sniper riffle at close range…  (Duh…)

Random Random Notes and Opinions

I really didn’t like that you only had two rounds in most ranked matches.  Mainly because often times you win one and lose one.  You never have the sense of a clear victory with this system.

The servers as of this writing just had an update and apparently they’re having trouble updating stats in a timely manner.

I remember when I first tried to log on and couldn’t figure out why, I was online and busy looking for the reason.  It ends up that the server was down, but because I had never logged on before, it didn’t occur to me as a possibility (stupid network connection error).  So incase anyone is reading this for just that reason, here you go.  Just try again later.

Controls are good, but there are certain maps I don’t like the hit detection on movement.

I can’t figure out how well everything is balanced at the moment, with no clear weapon or race being completely unbalanced.  I’ll add my opinion over a bit more testing.

At the moment I’m considering just editing this into a full fledged FAQ.  It doesn’t read too well in my opinion, so I’ll continue to edit and add content (I was also pretty lazy with the name usage of weapons…).  Feel free to add anything you want to say.

~Fei

IGN: xFei

A new HDTV, HDMI cables, wireless router, wireless receiver, and some other odd and ends equipment later, I got going and got to mess around on my new setup.

The wireless Sixaxis controller is very cool.  The motion sensoring controller is fun,  it’s a very light and wireless controller (that doesn’t run you on batteries).  It’s already been beaten to the ground that it WILL NEVER support rumble feedback.  Ok, that’s ok,… rumble is great fun but I can live without it just fine.  Something that disappointed me was that the pressure sensitive buttons from the Ps2 controllers were also removed (as far as I can tell).  Now that bothered me since I felt it was one of the coolest things a controller would feature.  Something I’ll point out is that only the first USB to Ps3 controller is free (ie the Ps3 Controller Charger).  You have to buy future ones separately.  Though giving out a freebie first one is good.

Blu-Ray Disc has a lot going for it, it holds a lot of stuff, and it’s fast (exactly what we want in our information containers!).  Apparently, my system was one of the first 50,000 released systems, so I got a freebie copy of the BluRay version of Talledega Nights (a great movie, it’s so funny!).  What else is there to say about this format… right now there is a lot of hype going on what “new format” will win the wars.  What’s probably going to happen is that someone will just invent a new format that would be compatible with both HD DVD and Blu-Ray technology.

My first games on this system were Resistance: Fall of Man, Blast Factor, and Tekken DR HD.
Resistance: FoM – Full review later, but some footnotes here.  It has some amazing visuals.  40 person PvP is great.  A few twist scenarios for multiplayer online play.  Single player campaign is really fun.  Online recorded stats.  Random Match making.  Voice chat supported.

Blast Factor – Simple shooter that takes advantage of the motion-sensoring controller.  Lots of fun.  Lots of pretty colors.  Only cost like 7$’s.

Tekken DR HD – Tekken in 1080p is gorgeous!  This makes it look like a next gen game, while still only being a standard release of something that’s been around for over a year.  Everything from the menus to the actual game is amazing.  Although long strings of matches you gradually notice the Ps3 Controller sometimes missing signals for advance precision based moves.

Random notes:

Each Ps3 sold technically loses Sony money.  Each 20 gig system they lose like 300$’s and each 60 gig they lose like 250$’s.  (Give or take some, this is the internet afterall … )

At the time of  this writing, to get Tekken DR HD, you’ll need to make a new usernam to make a HK account.  Keep everything about the billing data the same, just change the billing address.  Buy 80$’s in HK credits, buy Tekken and choose to add the remainder to finish the purchase.

Other things you can do with your HK account is DL new Japanese demos and see what is coming shoreside before it happens (In some cases, never happen). 

At the moment, both 20 and 60 gig units are pretty readily available.  Go get one if you can afford it!  (Technically Ps3 is easier to get than Wii…  Granted I want a Wii too…)

You can actually update your Ps3 Operating System to run on Linux.  Just burn Linux OS onto a DVD and choose to update from the system menu.

The Ps3 can rip Music CD’s and auto sort stuff pretty decently too.

Differences between 20 and 60 gig?

Either will play stuff fine.  Just the 60 gig has the chrome finish, some extra drives, and more space.  Overall, the quirky “Remote Play” feautre (exclusive to the 60 gig at the moment) used to connect your PsP to your Ps3 really isn’t all it’s hyped up to be.  It just makes your PsP into a Ps3 controller, with a monitor.

Ending Notes:

There’s a lot of hate on Sony and the Ps3.  There’s always mudslinging in any console war though,… we’re use to it right? (*Eyes for any advid gamers.)  I don’t really fanboy for any side, I don’t claim Resistance to be a “Halo” killer, not battling it out over if “Xbox Live” is a better online service than Sony, or even “Rawr!!! BluRay is going to win the format wars over HD DVD!  Buy a Ps3 or BluRay player!”nothing like that at all.  We’re gamers, just buy the system that has the games you like, right?

Sorry that this sounded more like a blog entree rather than a review or something more straightforward.  Hopefully this will provide anyone who had some basic questions about the Ps3 to have them answered here.  I miss anything?

Until Next Time!

~Fei

 Starting this series was pretty much on a whim.  Like a lot of decent series, this one got me hooked pretty early on and kept me until the end.  I looked forward to episodes any free moment I had.  If I were to compare the style of this anime (not the genre), I’d most likely compare it to Gantz and Elfien Lied sheerly for the amount of violence and taboo subjects covered.  For fans of those two series, this is a welcome watch, since anime of this “style” comes out once every other blue moon.  Others who haven’t seen the series will likely have the initial shock value of what’s to come and may be hooked or turned off of it pretty quickly. (Notes: This series is definately not for younger audiences.)

The series has fantastic animation, everything is fluid, from action to drama, most of it is done very well.  Music is pretty upbeat, alittle catchy, and fits the mood overall.  If I were to guess, I’d bank that Speed Grapher had a pretty solid budget during production.

There’s actually a lot I want to say about this series, but since this is a generic overlook of the series, I’m not shooting to throw out spoilers this time.  I’ll note that the story picks up pretty well, and well,… a lot of the characters are cooler than they originally start out as.  (My opinion ofcourse.)

~Fei

So what about Once Piece?  I got to see the most recent movie subbed by ADC-Elites (link right below).

http://www.adc-heaven.com/test/index.php?page=cutenews/show_news.php

And so, here’s my two cents or what not about this movie. 

One Piece the Movie: Karakuri Castle’s Mecha Giant Soldier is the seventh movie released with the “One Piece” name.  At a solid run time of 1 hour and 30 some odd minutes, I’d have to say I was very entertained throughout the entire movie.

The animation quality was consistantly great all around.  The music is cheerful and very “adventure” like.

This movie takes place just before they reach Water 7, with Luffy in-company still traveling across the Grand Line looking for a means to repair Going Merry.  The main plot this time, is more or less, “Ohh there’s treasure,… let’s get some.”  So it’s still predictably generic.  What makes OP stand out is the cast that you’ve been following so long, and how the story is told. 

There was a lot of goodies for everyone who follows the series too.  Like how Luffy would eventually figure out how to “shift gears” (avoids spoilers kinda) appears in this movie.  For fans of Nami, she gets a lot of screen time in this movie.  Random note, I don’t think that Ussop, Chopper, Sanji, and Zorro seem to get nearly as much screen time as Luffy, Nami, and Robin.

After watching One Piece Movie 6 awhile back, (which I couldn’t get myself to like because of the style of art) this was definitely what I was looking for to remind me why OP is so awesome.  Yup, there was a lot of stuff to like about the series for any OP fan.  At the time of this writing, unfortunately, there won’t be another OP episode until September 10th, this movie being the only thing to tide fans over for a good few weeks.  Until next time!

 ~Fei

Soul Calibur 3 has been out for awhile, at this point everyone who plays more or less knows their characters.  The arcade version is out now and Tira plays quite differently from this.  None the less, I’ll just cover basic Tira for console.

Tira is pretty much the worst character in this game (lowest tier), on the ground floor with Raph and to some extent Rock.  Playing her at a tournament level requires a good deal of patience and absolute knowledge of the basics.  Her damage is bare minimal having very very few good natural comboes.

A few things about her stances and infinites, they’re unsafe, and won’t typically work more than the first time you throw it out.   So more or less just avoid using them.

Top 10 List

A,A – Natural combo and fairly safe to throw out anytime you have frame advantage.  Know how to do basic lock downs with A’s.

2A – Shuts down anything agressive that is close range, deals with anything that A,A may not deal with.

4A – A decieving low, on lock down, this is mind games and fair damage.  On counter hit you get 6B free.

B,B – This is most of her damage.  Spam it often on frame advantage.  It beats out people who try to duck A,A spamming if you can read it.

WsB – Huge damange off of tech crouch.  Tira doesn’t have much of that, making this amazing if you can catch wiffs, highs, or punish extremely slow moves.

WsA – Amazing range, a good overall fodder move.  Safe as long as you don’t wiff.

WsK – Tech crouch fodder move, it’s just a good move throw out at close range.

6,6A – Knocks down, decent range, this is the move to catch steppers for the most part.  Punishable by A,A on block by most characters, but for what it does, it’s a solid move.  You can mix it with throws, or buffer 4A and fake people out with it as well.

6,6B – Safe launcher.  Just juggled with A+B.  Pretty spammible, pretty steppible, use when you want to punish from a distance, overall safe if you can force them to block it.

3,3B, A : A – The _best_ move Tira has.  This can be 60 to 90% of your real damage.  It’s a step punish, it’s NATURAL COMBO.  It’s HUGE damage.  Make sure you can just frame the last input most of the time if you plan to make Tira your main character.  Without good placement of this move, Tira really will have pretty much nothing…

So that’s the top 10, stuff I left out are throws (good damage, make sure to memorize which way they ring out), and her B+K jump moves which are fairly decent.

So there you have it, a quick guide to the worst character in Soul Calibur 3.

Bonus: Tira Cosplay.

~Fei

The first thing that stood out is that I don’t like the main characters eyes.  I just don’t…  Which made the first two episodes go by probably slower than it should have.

Other than that, it was a pretty normal start.  You have your young guy who wants to protect stuff and unwillingly ends up with uber something or other.  Throw in some rivals, some drama, some comedy, and there you go, you have Fate-Stay.  To me, it feels like it’s been done; so it looks rather predictable. Not exactly a bad thing, just exactly like I said though.

Anyways, only first two or three episodes are slow.  The series picks up pace rather quickly, and pretty soon you have lots of battles, you meet the cast, and you get your character development.

Characters are pretty colorful, the outfits are pretty nice for the most part.  Although seeing spandex wearing male characters within the first few episodes was something that would take time to accept.

Grouping the music and action together for this series, there are some very good points to both, but some rather cheap and weak scene and scores as well.  Most notable in half of the fights where action is barely even par to other series.

I’d say the humor is decent.  There are the cute moments to the series.  Fate-Stay reminds me a little of Jojo’s Adventure, Pokemon, and Gash Bell at the moment.  A lot of things came to mind on how to compare this with other series.  But in the end, I think I’m settling with something like “The RPG version of Mai Hime” minus the fanservice.  Or something…

Saber fights with an invisible sword, which is rather badass.

With what I’ve seen, I’m going to stick with saying this is an above average series, having some good high moments, some “cool” scenes, and other goodies.  Ultimately though, this is a forgettable series that will kind of just fade away over time like any other spur of the moment type of series.

~Fei

However, I’m going to try something alittle different with this.  Instead of starting with the new stuff, and what’s happened so far.  I’m going to go over what we don’t have, and what hasn’t changed first.  without further ado:

Even though it’s Season 2 now, we have no Arin yet.  We know that Arin will be the only new character coming up until season 3, where we’ll see Kaz.  So twelve more months starting now, give or take.

No matter what you do to this game, it is still the same game.  For better or worse.  Though season 2 does a good job of sugar coating it and giving it a new dress.

New Course, Silvia Cannon.  The course itself is based on playing golf on top of battleships.  Cannons, helicopters, giant fans,… all sorts of rage inducing stuff.  There is new music to this stage, which I thought was cool, until about 30 mins in, where I turned it off… Unlike the other songs that play, this one doesn’t have the same “timelessness” to it, and thus, made it rather annoying to listen to.  Overall, this course is very cool, there is a lot to see and experiment with.  But if you’re shooting to keep a low OB%, this stage can be rather frustrating if you’re trying to keep a good score at the same time.  At this point, I would consider this to be the hardest A18 course, clearing WizWiz and Windhill by leaps and bounds.

New Interface was rather confusing at first.  But it is rather nice to look at.  After a year of A18′s season 1 backdrop, this was a good change of pace.  Something I’d like?  To have the option to change interfaces.  No reason other than wanting the option.  Minor note is that there is a new splash screen, but it’s almost implied with the new interface motif.

Some new music.  The stuff in the intro is good, but like I said earlier, the new Silvia Cannon music is pretty annoying.

You can Dye Hair now, in my opinion this is pretty big.  There are only a few dyes released, but it will give a lot of variety to what we see when we play now.  Instead of stoic models that looked the same in every way shape and form.  Now they’ll be the same shape, but different color!

Lots of smaller changes, for example, in your profile, it shows you the number of days total you’ve played, converting all the hours in your play.  It takes up a little less text space for some people,…

Website updated.  I like it more now than before, overall, it’s what Pangya’s website looked like during their season 2.  A note is that they have now locked down their old forums and made a new one.  People who like to whore out posts and post counts have lost everything and have to start over again.

They have a new rewards system now.  Everyday you play you get a “stamp.”  Some days have bonuses.  No clue what the prizes are yet, but it’s an interesting gimmick to get people to play regularly.  It’s definitely obvious that all they’re trying to do is to get you to play each day.  Hopefully baiting you into spending money in the game (I still don’t think it’s a bad deal if you plan to invest more than 40 hours in something).

Season 2 stuff to look forward to:  More outfits, swimsuits, a few more courses, a few more club sets, a few new items.  Season 3?

Overall, a decent update.  The more I look at this game, the more I wish I didn’t start playing it until now.  I enjoyed the game fine when it first game out in betas until a few months after release.  But had I started now instead, I’d think I’d have gotten a lot more out of my time.  With that said… old players that arn’t heavily addicted get nothing really great.  New players are in for a treat: A free game that looks nice, and has a LOT of options for customization.

For those who don’t know what Albatross 18 or Pangya are, try the links below.

http://www.albatross18.com/

http://www.pangya.com/

~Fei