TheLoneWolf

Here's my take on Macross II: The Good Character designs Mecha designs Music Fleet battles The Bad Character personalities (excluding Sylvie, Feff and Dennis) English Dubbing The Mediocre Plot Script Mecha battles. Ichiro Itano's absense is glaring. Where did that information come from?

The only things missing are the landing gears. To save money, plug-in landing gears could do. Other than that, the sculpt looks great! If the toy is going to come with a flight stand, I think smoke trails that plug into the feet would look cool. I don't think any VF toy has ever done that before. My final suggestion would be optional stickers. All canon markings should already be painted on the toy, but give the buyer some purely optional stickers if he/she wants. For example: a HUD sticker that shows a chibi Regult or Glaug, a UN Spacy logo with a kite line attached to make it a true "flying kite," or a chibi Misa sticker for Hikaru, or a chibi Milia sticker for Max, or a chibi steak sticker for Kakizaki. It's supposed to be a fun toy, so have fun with it.

Congrats on getting a 60gb PS3! And yes, I have a US 60gb version and PS2 games play fine on it, but PS1 and PS2 Macross games don't because they're Japanese. The only way I got Macross DYRL for the PS2 to run on mine was through a USB trick.

Not in the real world. All Harmony Gold's general counsel has to do is a send out a form letter for trademark infringemet. It's a no-brainer really. If JManga is truly a legitimate site for downloading manga in the USA, then they must not know about Harmony Gold's "Macross" trademark. Which is is pretty surprising since it's common knowledge in the US anime/manga industry that anything Macross related has to go through Harmony Gold first. After reading through JManga's legal section, they employ some pretty bizarre practices and disclosures. Not exactly what I'd expect to see from professional website that sells subscriptions.

Keith's right, the only way to play any Japanese games would be to get a JP PS3. And if you're set on getting a slim Japanese PS3, then you'll be limited to JP PS1 games, not PS2 games. Another alternative would be getting a local PS3 and buying a Cobra USB jailbreak dongle. With the Cobra dongle, you can rip any region PS1 game to your PS3's hard drive and then play it off the hard drive. The only caveat is that your PS3 has to be running firmware 3.55 or 3.41. The Cobra dongle also works with any region PS2 game, but only if you have one of the original 60gb or 20gb PS3's. And since you're in the UK, also check to make sure it works with UK PS3. As far as compatibility goes, I've checked gotten Macross DYRL for the PS2 to run on my 60gb USA model via an old USB hack. But since I don't have Macross DYRL for the PS1, I can't test that one out. Though the PS3 has near-perfect PS1 compatibility, so I'd be truly shocked if it doesn't play.

That article contains a typo, the Takatoku 1/3000 SDF-1 went for $1,100, not $2,100. And it wasn't just any SDF-1 toy, it was Noburo Ishiguro's own personal SDF-1.

What an embarassment for Nintendo. After just 5 months on the market, the 3DS' price is being slashed by 32%. Most likely due to poor hardware sales, several 3rd party games being cancelled, and competition from smartphone games. History is going to be made if Nintendo manages to lose a war of handheld systems. You really want to see Poison's piece, huh.

The cardboard pages in the Aliens box set are extremely durable, the only way you'd be able to bend or break them is if your forcibly tried to. When you think about it, they're far more durable than the small plastic hubs/spindles that BD and DVD discs clip on to. If the Star Wars box set uses the same cardboard stock as the Aliens box set (and it looks like it does), then you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Nice job, I always thought the stock HCM VF-1J looked a little bland. It's incredible how just a little bit of TLC can really make it shine. You've also got more guts than me. I don't know if I would've been able to repaint portions of such an expensive and uncommon toy.

Yeah, reissuing the 1/55 Jetfire toy in the USA won't happen because there'd be too many hands in the proverbial cookie jar. Takara - As Hasbro's business partner, Takara would need to be on board for this to happen. Bandai - As the owner of the 1/55's manufacturing molds, Hasbro would have to pay them to manufacture more 1/55's. Hasbro's original 1984 contract with Bandai has most likely expired by now. Tatsunoko Production/Harmony Gold - As the rights holders of all SDF Macross toys outside of Japan, Hasbro would need to obtain a license from them before Bandai could manufacture anything. Since the 1/55 Jetfire is merely a repainted SDF Macross toy released in the USA, Tatsunoko Production/Harmony Gold have jurisdiction. Toynami - Since Tatsunoko Production/Harmony Gold designated Toynami as their exclusive distributor of Macross toys in the USA, Toynami might need to be the company to distribute any reissued 1/55 Jetfire's in the USA. At the very least, I'd imagine that Toynami would need to be compensated in some fashion. Big West - While they have no legal jurisdiction over SDF Macross toys outside of Japan, they do hold some sort of sway over Bandai when it comes to SDF Macross toys outside of Japan. So Big West would need to be on board too. Bandai attempted to release 1/55 SDF Macross toys in the USA in 2008 and Big West somehow stopped that from happening. That's a lot of egos that Hasbro would need to bring to the bargaining table. The logistics alone would be a nightmare. Not to mention all the money that Hasbro would need to front. It's never going to happen, IMO.

That's an interesting bit of trivia. I think Uchiyama's loli designs would've been in stark contrast with Southern Cross' serious atmosphere. Ultimately, Southern Cross would've still been hamstrung with bland writing and equally bland mecha designs; I doubt Uchiyama's character designs would've been able to save it. Though the show might've earned an honorable mention in the history of anime as "that show that had lolis piloting transformable tanks." Also, if Uchiyama had done Souther Cross' character designs, then the show might not have had it's futuristic sengoku-style armor. That's assuming that the show's actual character designer, Kogawa Tomonori, also designed the armor and not Ammonite. BSU exiled himself from MW (can't really blame him!) and I think 1st Border is on permanent suspension or something.

I'm pretty sure that most developers don't allow players to create their own emblems because they're afraid everyone will draw a bunch of d*cks and other offensive imagery.

I've also forgotten why MW banned fanfics, but from a liability standpoint, it makes sense. Fanfics are considered copyright infringements, so there's a small chance that Shawn could be held liable if MW were to host them. I doubt Big West would cares about fanfics, but however small the risk, I don't see any reason to put Shawn's neck on the line. But if Shawn ever moved MW's server to China, then it'd be party time!

Whoah, I gotta give Nintendo credit for taking another big risk. That's a pretty interesting controller they've got there. At first glace, this controller is going to be great for football games, so that you can hide your plays from human opponents. And I guess this means that Nintendo is doubling-down on their action-party games, such as Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles and Zelda: The Four Swords. The only problem I see with that is, unless these controllers are sold cheap, I don't know how many people will be able to afford more than two. That, and most people can simply go online for their multiplayer fix. I can also see Nintendo focusing on portable mini-games, ala Sony's PocketStation and Sega's VMU minigames. But unlike Sony's and Sega's offerings, these games won't be constrained by piss poor display screens and controls, so they might actually be fun. I can also see Nintendo selling more pick-up-and-play games through their online store and allowing customers to save them directly to the controller, ala smartphones and tablets. I think this is what Nintendo's really banking on. But we'll see if gamers will be looking to play these types of games on something other than their phone/tablet. My biggest concern is ergonomics. I don't know my hands will handle a marathon gaming session with that controller.

I find it ironic that MGS2 is getting an HD rerelease. The graphics in that game were fine, it's the story that needed fixing.

Sunwards was just a straw company for Yamato. Their existense only went as far as those advertisements. Here's the original Yamato ad. I never understood why Yamato/Sunwards published those ads. The Tokyo District Court cases involved copyright ownership, not merchandising rights (ie: toy sales). In fact, both Big West and Tatsunoko Production agreed that Tatsunoko has always held SDF Macross' international merchandising rights. Since 1982, the rule has always been: if you want to market SDF Macross toys outside of Japan, you have to get permission from Tatsunoko/Harmony Gold. My guess is that either Yamato/Sunwards failed to do any basic research, or these ads were meant to be part of a childish mud-slinging campaign against Toynami. I remember Toynami produced similarly childish ads against Yamato, so these might've been published as retaliation. But really now?

All jokes aside, I think a brief (not a two hour) documentary about the making of Streamline's 10th Anniversary Soundtrack would actually be interesting. From what Dennis Bateman (Tom's brother) told me, it was a long and arduos process. Various audio masters of varying quality were scattered all over the place because, let's be honest, no one ever thought there'd be any interest in preserving the soundtrack of a 1985 cartoon. Some audio masters were in such poor condition that they were purposely omitted and others were discovered too late into production to be included in the final cut. I used to joke with Dennis that he should "lend" me a copy of the latter tracks, but he was always professional about it and said that he legally couldn't. I think these latter tracks were the ones that were eventually added into Harmony Gold's 20th Anniversary release.

Referring to the Gakken Legioss' as the "best" isn't really saying a whole lot when you consider its' competition. Toynami's Alpha/Legioss is, hands down, the most accurate toy compared to the line art. Unfortunately, it breaks way too easily due to obvious design flaws. CMs' Legioss is pretty robust, but CMs made too many needless revisions to the Legioss' classic design, which turned off a lot of fans. While Gakken's Legioss will never win any line art or posability contests, it's very large and solid as brick, which is enough to beat the meager competition. Gakken's nostalgia with older fans doesn't hurt it either. Personally, I think an all-plastic version of Toynami's Alpha/Legioss with reinforced hands would solve it's design problems, but I don't believe a re-release is ever going to happen. Experience has shown that premium grade New Generation/Mospeada toys just don't sell.

Just an FYI, if your fan dub is derived from or resembles the original Japanese script, then it's an infringement of Big West's copyright and you cannot legally claim that it belongs to you. If legal action were taken against that podcaster, he would be forced to take down the infringing podcasts and you would be forced to stop producing dubs from copyrighted scripts. You can always politely ask him to stop distributing your dub, but if he chooses to ignore you, the best thing to do would be to walk away. The same thing goes for boinger's edits.

It would be nice to know the details of the AllClear ID Plus insurance plan that Sony is offering. If the policy/certificate works exactly as described, then it's a step in the right direction for Sony. And just a caveat for anyone who's planning on taking advantage of the promotional Playstation Plus period: don't use cloud game save service. Cloud game saves are only accessible to PSN+ subscribers, so once your promotional period ends, you should lose access to any cloud game saves that you've created. I believe that this also applies to any PSOne Classics and Playstation Minis that are downloaded too. Like others have said, just about the only things that you'll probably be able to permanently keep are themes and avatar items.

Macross Blu-ray will come. I know that we've been waiting for this for a while, but I'd prefer that Bandai Visual take their time and get it right on their first try. Bandai's first-generation Macross DVD's were rushed out the door and it shows. Macross DYRL in 3D? Why stop there? Let's have it in Smell-O-Vision too. Mutant-fish roasting scene FTW!

I'm surprised to hear that Anonymous has been implicated. First, because Sony cleared Anonymous of any wrongdoing just a few days ago. Second, even if this "We are Legion" calling card was discovered afterwards, Anonymous' hacking skills are weak, their only effective weapon is a DDOS attack. They got through to HBGary because HBGary had awful internal security, ironic for a commercial cyber-security company. Third, this calling card doesn't jive with Anonymous' MO. They're attention whores and if they successfully broke into the PSN, I would've expected them to shout about it from every mountaintop. Did Anonymous suddenly mature overnight and exercise some self-restraint?

I noticed that the PS3's vents easily become clogged with dust, so I bought a cheap anti-static dust cover for mine for when it's not in use. And about once a year, I use a hand vacuum (set to medium power) to suck out any dust that may have snuck in. Mine's a 60gb unit and I haven't had any problems with it yet. All PS3's can play PS1 games. It's PS2 games that only the 20gb, 60gb, and 80gb units can play. edit: According to the latest news, Sony has begun playing the blame game, and Anonymous is the scapegoat! Sony's excuse is that while they were busy defending themselves from Anonymous' DOS attack, someone broke into the PSN. But the Anonymous DOS attack ended on April 4, 2011, and according to Sony's own blog, the actual intrusion occurred between April 17 and April 19, 2011. Got any other lame excuses Sony? What Sony doesn't want customers to know is that the PSN was hacked because it was running outdated Apache and Linux server software with publically known vulnerabilities. Hackers noticed these vulnerabilties back in February 2011 and wondered why Sony hadn't applied any of the available security patches. The rest is history.

Just to clarify, Sony has settled with George Hotz ("Geohot"). As part of that settlement, Hotz has agreed to avoid accessing all Sony products and software. The only other publically known PS3 hacker that Sony's taken legal action against is a German named Alexander Egonrenkov ("graf_chokolo"). Egonrenkov is working to restore the Other OS functionality to the PS3 and argues that he isn't doing anything malicious. Neither Hotz nor Egonrenkov have any reason to hack PSN and actually stand to lose everything by doing so.

That is true. But the Ghostbusters audio clip that's sampled in Gunbuster isn't limited to foley, it also included voicework from Ivan Reitman, who provided Slimer's groans and gasps.