True, true. However, Millenium Actress was up for Oscar consideration. Haven't seen it (and the reviews I read were pretty mixed), but it was probably the most noteworthy anime entry this year.
Otherwise, I agree with you. It's been a lackluster year for anime. All the best animation I've seen this year has been from places other than Japan (like the French/Canadian/Belgian The Triplets of Belleville). Not necessarily a bad thing, mind you;)
I agree. The Triplets of Belleville definately trumps the other nominees in this category. I was delighted to see that this film got a "Best Song" nomination too (which it also totally deserves).
Provided that Sony promotes Triplets in the trade mags the way Disney promoted Spirited Away last year, an Oscar's definately in the bag.
I wonder if this news will affect the production on Fear Effect 3 (aka Fear Effect: Inferno)? For awhile, I heard it had been cancelled... though now that I look it up, it was just put "on hold" (link).
Just a friendly little FYI... the Spyro games were not made my Naughty Dog, but by Insomniac. However, as far as I know, there were some people involved with both companies in the creation of Crash Bandicoot (Naughty Dog) and Spyro.
Otherwise, great post:) I too have gotten a lot of milelage out of used/rented games, and have bought games I wouldn't have touched otherwise.
I must admit, the Wall Market scene in Final Fantasy VII is one of my favorite parts of that game. Especially if I get the Honeybee Inn members card. And most especially if I'm using the Sephiroth patch.
Yep, there's no guiltier pleasure than seeing Sephiroth in a hot tub with the muscular Mukki, or asking the Honeybee Inn honeys to put some pretty makeup on his face ^_^
The X-Ecutioners (formerly known as the X-Men) are a world-famous group of NYC DJs. They remix tracks as well as creating original works, so I'm guessing that the Korn, et al. tracks on NFL Street will be remixes, along with whatever original tracks the X-Ecutioners come up with.
Though I've heavily disliked the rock/rap collaborations the X-Ecutioners have been doing these past few years ('specially the Linkin Park one-- ugh!), I'd love to hear what they did for NFL Street.
Re:Forgotten studio? Not quite.
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Despairing of Pixar
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· Score: 2, Informative
An American Tail, for one. Not to mention The Land Before Time, The Secret of NIMH, and the Dragon's Lair game.
Just dig back 15-20 years or so and you'll come upon the good stuff.
Well, if I was the original poster, my point would've been that it doesn't need to be done in CG to be entertaining! I loved Kill Bill Vol. 1, partially because it was so unreal; it was, in its purest essence, a live action cartoon-- just like the kung-fu flicks and spagetti westerns that Tarantino references. I mean, how realistic is a stump of a neck, with blood squirting out of it? The most important thing about Kill Bill is that it's pure entertainment, which is more that can be said about the CG rabble that is the two Matrix sequels.
The Triplets of Belleville was amazing-- one of the most imaginative animated features I've seen in years. If anyone here has the chance to see it, please do-- you won't be disappointed. I kind of wish this one was put in wider release...
Although I appreciate the great selection of the EBs and GameStops of the world, I can't stand their markup, especially for console games. In many cases, a new console game at GameStop, costs an average of $5 more than at Toys R Us, Best Buy, or a number of other places. Even the mom and pop game stores here in Manhattan have better prices than either of these two national chains. Sure, game stores are still great for used games, but even then, there's Blockbuster; though there's less selection, if you find what you're looking for, the prices are pretty reasonable. And of course, ther'e always Amazon and eBay...
For PC games, I pretty much stick with CompUSA, for the reasons others listed: prices and selection.
From what I understand, the "Technics 1200" hasn't changed in twenty or thirty years. In the hip-hop community, it's long been considered THE turntable to have. I don't think I've ever known a DJ who didn't have a pair of these in their main setup...
And having known a few DJs myself, I would have to say that yes, they are very much geeks-- music geeks, of course.
The music has already been out and available for a while by the time it reaches the U.S., and usually it has to be re-done and re-negotiated for use. (I think this is why a lot of Japanese games wind up having the vocals removed from their tracks, like the old Wild ARMs games-- but, per my sig, I could be wrong.)
I can see Square having to renegotiate the rights for the vocals (as they use genuine Asian pop stars), but the songs themselves are usually written by the developer's in-house musicians, and Square even publishes the soundtracks and singles themselves under their Digicube label (though there have been exceptions recently-- the FFX-2 soundtrack was published by Avex).
Sometimes I wish that these songs didn't have to be rerecorded-- "Suteki Da Ne" was left in Japanese, so why not the others? Guess the lyrics have to be in English to sell games stateside...
Slightly off-topic there, as none of the FF game soundtracks use liscenced music. I do agree with you that FF7 (and numerous other Square games) have great soundtracks. What's especially cool is that in recent years they've been taking to creating their OWN pop songs ("Eyes on Me" from FFVIII, "Hikari"/"Simple and Clean" from Kingdom Hearts, a whole bunch of songs from FFX-2, etc.), which is probably the way to go if you want pop music in your game without having to go the liscencing route.
They also get certain games earlier than North Americans do. For instance, rhythm games seem to be more popular there (both Rez and Space Channel 5 Part 2 were released in the UK before the US). Also, wasn't the Dreamcast version of Shenmue 2 released over there?
Maybe it's more of a case of different types of players rather than genders; my boyfriend's the Myst geek, while I prefer Unreal Tournament (not to say he doesn't play FPS games at all, of course...). There's some games (and game types) we both like-- any Final Fantasy game, Mario games, certain puzzle games (ChuChu Rocket for the Dreamcast is a personal fave)-- that have elements that both of us are looking for in a game, such as intellectual stimulation, likeable characters, and a certain type of pacing. I guess finding the right game to play together would including striking the right balance between all these elements.
With that, my recommendations are (besides ChuChu Rocket): Final Fantasy Tactics, Gran Turismo 3, Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, Super Smash Bros. Melee, and any of the Doom games.
The anime show Great Teacher Onizuka (better known as GTO has been picked up to air on SHO Next. If you've never seen GTO, it's a hilarious show about a former street punk who takes on a job teaching high school.
U.S. anime distributor ADV launched an Anime Network awhile back, which is available in select digital/satellite TV markets (mainly those monopolized by Comcast, AFAIK). I suppose it's a matter of time to see how well that channel does before Adult Swim branches off into it's own thing.
(Not that CN doesn't already have its own spinoff: there's Boomerang, which is pretty much all old Hanna Barbera stuff. Don't know how well that network's doing...)
As for the editing issue... blame the anime companies themselves, not Cartoon Network, as the former (Bandai, Pioneer, et al) are usually the ones to do it. As a counter-example, this summer FLCL (one of the most lascivious anime in recent years) aired on Cartoon Network... with only two edits throughout six episodes. Kudos to Synch-Point for leaving the show pretty much untouched...
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Otherwise, I agree with you. It's been a lackluster year for anime. All the best animation I've seen this year has been from places other than Japan (like the French/Canadian/Belgian The Triplets of Belleville). Not necessarily a bad thing, mind you ;)
Provided that Sony promotes Triplets in the trade mags the way Disney promoted Spirited Away last year, an Oscar's definately in the bag.
I wonder if this news will affect the production on Fear Effect 3 (aka Fear Effect: Inferno)? For awhile, I heard it had been cancelled... though now that I look it up, it was just put "on hold" (link).
Otherwise, great post :) I too have gotten a lot of milelage out of used/rented games, and have bought games I wouldn't have touched otherwise.
Oh wait, no... those are the keystrokes themselves...
Yep, there's no guiltier pleasure than seeing Sephiroth in a hot tub with the muscular Mukki, or asking the Honeybee Inn honeys to put some pretty makeup on his face ^_^
Also, Harvest Crack has been around far longer than Animal Crack... even the original SNES game is still addictive (as I discovered not too long ago).
Though I've heavily disliked the rock/rap collaborations the X-Ecutioners have been doing these past few years ('specially the Linkin Park one-- ugh!), I'd love to hear what they did for NFL Street.
Just dig back 15-20 years or so and you'll come upon the good stuff.
Well, if I was the original poster, my point would've been that it doesn't need to be done in CG to be entertaining! I loved Kill Bill Vol. 1, partially because it was so unreal; it was, in its purest essence, a live action cartoon-- just like the kung-fu flicks and spagetti westerns that Tarantino references. I mean, how realistic is a stump of a neck, with blood squirting out of it? The most important thing about Kill Bill is that it's pure entertainment, which is more that can be said about the CG rabble that is the two Matrix sequels.
The Triplets of Belleville was amazing-- one of the most imaginative animated features I've seen in years. If anyone here has the chance to see it, please do-- you won't be disappointed. I kind of wish this one was put in wider release...
The one I frequent is on 57th and Broadway (entrance on 8th Ave.). There's also one on 5th Ave. and 37th St., but I've never been inside that one.
For PC games, I pretty much stick with CompUSA, for the reasons others listed: prices and selection.
And having known a few DJs myself, I would have to say that yes, they are very much geeks-- music geeks, of course.
I can see Square having to renegotiate the rights for the vocals (as they use genuine Asian pop stars), but the songs themselves are usually written by the developer's in-house musicians, and Square even publishes the soundtracks and singles themselves under their Digicube label (though there have been exceptions recently-- the FFX-2 soundtrack was published by Avex).
Sometimes I wish that these songs didn't have to be rerecorded-- "Suteki Da Ne" was left in Japanese, so why not the others? Guess the lyrics have to be in English to sell games stateside...
Slightly off-topic there, as none of the FF game soundtracks use liscenced music. I do agree with you that FF7 (and numerous other Square games) have great soundtracks. What's especially cool is that in recent years they've been taking to creating their OWN pop songs ("Eyes on Me" from FFVIII, "Hikari"/"Simple and Clean" from Kingdom Hearts, a whole bunch of songs from FFX-2, etc.), which is probably the way to go if you want pop music in your game without having to go the liscencing route.
That's a shame, really. Maybe editing options could be given to those with paid subscriptions and/or excellent karma.
I think GamingFM has the best commentary on the VGA, in this respect at least :)
I second this suggestion. My first photography classes had us use these cameras, and they're great-- easy to use and quite sturdy.
They also get certain games earlier than North Americans do. For instance, rhythm games seem to be more popular there (both Rez and Space Channel 5 Part 2 were released in the UK before the US). Also, wasn't the Dreamcast version of Shenmue 2 released over there?
What about Final Fantasy Anthology, which included FF6? Wasn't that released around 1999?
With that, my recommendations are (besides ChuChu Rocket): Final Fantasy Tactics, Gran Turismo 3, Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, Super Smash Bros. Melee, and any of the Doom games.
The anime show Great Teacher Onizuka (better known as GTO has been picked up to air on SHO Next. If you've never seen GTO, it's a hilarious show about a former street punk who takes on a job teaching high school.
U.S. anime distributor ADV launched an Anime Network awhile back, which is available in select digital/satellite TV markets (mainly those monopolized by Comcast, AFAIK). I suppose it's a matter of time to see how well that channel does before Adult Swim branches off into it's own thing.
(Not that CN doesn't already have its own spinoff: there's Boomerang, which is pretty much all old Hanna Barbera stuff. Don't know how well that network's doing...)
As for the editing issue... blame the anime companies themselves, not Cartoon Network, as the former (Bandai, Pioneer, et al) are usually the ones to do it. As a counter-example, this summer FLCL (one of the most lascivious anime in recent years) aired on Cartoon Network... with only two edits throughout six episodes. Kudos to Synch-Point for leaving the show pretty much untouched...
Looks like it's since been corrected. SMB3 is now listed with 456 voted.