Foxy white

I got this yesterday, but wanted to try to scan some of the images before making a post. My scanner sucks balls, though, so no high-res Yuzuruha assets for you. We all loose :(

In all seriousness, this is much more than a simple art collectible. After playing through the game, and having "examined" this foldout in "detail," it feels more like a design document. Muramasa is a very simple game, comprised of pretty much only the art pieces found on this scroll. I'm very glad I could get my hands on it, and am surprised that it was originally given away as a free gift. I don't mind having paid money for this.

ELMM

A company called PMOA (Pro Mold Office A?) just put out a bunch of figures and models, which they call PLUM's (Petty Lovely Unique Mechanism). One of those is the SA-77 Silpheed from the Mega CD game of the same name. Silpheed is awesome. By extension, PMOA is now awesome too. They also have plans to put out the Silver Hawk from Darius. I hope this means they'll commit to modeling shooting game ships, with the detail and scale they deserve. To date, other than one-off models, the only shooting line has been a series of gachapon toys. This needs to change. Bookmarked.

Three's a crowd

The original Reviera ~The Promised Land~ on Wonderswan was notable primarily for looking damn fine on the anemic hardware. Unfortunately, the game was technically similarly underdeveloped, a sort of RPG-lite. The follow-up, Yggdra Union ~We'll Never Fight Alone~ on GameBoy Advance was a much more interesting affair. The game was still pretty much just a battle engine, and not much else. Thankfully, it was an awesome battle engine. The third in the "series," the DS' Knights In the Nightmare was even less of a game, and sadly not very entertaining in the end, but by far the most aesthetically impressive. Here's to hoping for a second dose of that Yggdra magic on PSP. The PSP ports of past Dept. Heaven games have been a little dodgy, though. Hopefully Blaze Union ~Story To Reach the Future~, being a PSP game from the start, will shine technically in a similar way to its predecessors.

Upgrades?

I've named this blog and myself after one of their songs, for crying out loud, so I regret to admit that I didn't find out about Fear Factory's latest album until last week. In my defense, they've been sort of coasting for the last five years. And the last few times they were in the news it was over some bullshit drama. Thankfully, their latest was only released in early February, so I almost got it right. When I learned the album was out, I was in fact checking up on whether there was any progress on plans to release it. The drama the band was previously involved in centered around kicking two founding members out, and letting previously ousted member back into the fold. Thankfully, the tinkering behind the scenes paid off. Mechanize is a return to form for the band, and that form is both familiar yet new.

Some of the best (and worst, frankly) songs Fear Factory ever put out were composed by the team of vocalist Burton C. Bell, and guitarist Dino Cezares (the two original founding members). Cezares was unceremoniously dismissed from his duties around 2003, and the band hit the skids. They put out a few albums since then, but they never could match the brilliance of their 90's efforts. Mechanize marks the return of Cezares to the FF fold, and we're all better off for it. He could never be accused of being the most creative guitar player, but his unique and simple riffing style is one of the hallmarks of FF. He actually joked that he should sue his "replacement" (long-time FF bassist, Christian Olde Wolbers, who moved over to guitar duty following Cezares' departure) after their 2004 album, Archetype, regurgitated his old riffs he'd written for FF's previous albums. It's nice to see this old dog hasn't learned any new tricks. The guitars on Mechanize are simple, fast, and brutal. Fear Factory's schtick had always been incorporating mechanical themes, and designs, into their music and lyrics, and Dino's technical guitar sound is an important part of that formula. Another pillar of Fear Factory is vocalist Burton Bell's voice and range. He was a pioneer of the growl/choir voice dual vocal style that seems to be the staple of every band since then. The biggest letdown of the past few FF albums has been his tendency to move towards a more uniform singing style. There were still screams, but they weren't guttural anymore. Mechanize is a return to form for Bell as well.

Stand out tracks include the nihilistic 'Powershift,' and 'Oxidizer.' Fear Factory's magnum opus, 1999's Obsolete, was a post-techno-apocalyptic concept album, focusing around the rebel, Edgecrusher, and it's nice to hear those themes return. (But I may be biased.) With lines like "always question authority," Bell is channeling the part of ourselves that is always sixteen. Another fun part of this album, specifically the Limited Edition, is the inclusion of demo versions of some FF classics. 'Crash Test,' 'Big God,' and 'Self Immolation' are actually better than the sterile versions found on the band's debut, Soul Of A New Machine. But 'Soul Wound' is a discordant mess compared the the final version, 'Soulwounds,' that itself was eventually included as an extra track on Obsolete.

The album is an intricate blend of old and new Fear Factory sounds. Thanks to the return of the fifth, unofficial member, long-time producer Rhys Fulber. Mechanize feels not like a lost album that was meant to have been released instead of 2001's disastrous Digimortal, but a natural evolution of the Fear Factory organism, an allegory the band themselves often make. In the end, however, it would seem that Fear Factory is just the sum of it's parts, and those parts were clearly defined at the outset. Any deviation, produces anomalies.

Tried and true

This was something else I did over the weekend. Paid $68 for this. Worth every penny. I had actually forgotten that I picked this up in spite of the fact that it was produced by the same jokers who did Samurai Princess. Thankfully, this one is a much more competent and entertaining experience. Probably 'cause it's based on someone else's work. And that someone has talent.

Vampire Girl VS Frankenstein Girl is a stupidly entertaining move, almost from the instant it begins. Fountains of blood, faces getting ripped off, chicks with... erm, swords. It sort of begins like a standard high school drama, but gets to the point rather quickly, and doesn't really beat around the bush. The plot centers around the titular Vampire Girl (Monami, played by Yukie Kawamura) , who attends a local high school. She gives a guy she likes a chocolate that's intended to turn him into a vampire too, that way they can be together forever (high school girl logic). She states this pretty plainly to the guy in their second scene together. And we're off. The conflict arises, in typical high school drama fashion, from the fact that the guy already has a girlfriend (Reika, played by Eri Otoguro). When said girlfriend winds up dead after falling off of a roof, her mad scientist father turns her into the titular Frankenstein Girl. Hilarity, quite literally ensues, between Monami dancing under a shower of blood, Reika using her legs as a helicopter rotor to fly to the top of Tokyo Tower, or the creepy old grounds keeper named Igor, this movie doesn't even pretend to take itself seriously.

If the main feature wasn't bad enough, the two disc set includes a short that sort of vaguely retells the story. Except in the end Vampire Girl and Frankenstein Girl fuse into some sort of macabre defender of peace and love. Take that Osama bin Laden. Vempire Girl will get yo' ass.*

*May, or may not have happened. I was pretty drunk.

I sort of vaguely recall that the reason I picked this up was because Eri Otoguro was in it. While she certainly is, the show is completely stolen by Yukie Kawamura. She has a lot of fun being Vampire Girl the highschooler, and Vampire Girl the monster. And is mesmerizingly beautiful in either role, an important characteristic of any vampire. I was bummed I didn't have any prior works to base my newfound fandom on, or so I though. Turns out Yukie is a pioneer in another area of entertainment I can appreciate. I love it when a plan comes together.

Click, click, boom

This fell of the back of a donkey cart over the weekend. It's a remix album for WayForward's necrophiliac Contra 4. I never played that game, so I can't judge how faithful, or appropriate the metal reinterpretations found here are, but I do like me some fuckin' rock, and I feel qualified to make a comment. This stuff fuckin' rocks!

The closest video game comparison one can make is Daisuke Ishiwatari's Guilty Gear XX soundtrack. Something I was never a fan of. The difference between the works presented here, and the GGXX tracks, is that Contra 4 Rocked 'n' Loaded is concise, unlike the all-over-the-place nature of the GGXX OST. Every track is made up of everything it needs, blazing fast guitar riffs, groovy base lines, keyboard flourishes, and a drum machine. This is a testament not only the skill of the producers and players, but also to the ability of the original composer, who was involved with this project since day one. This can therefore be considered an official remix album, even though it's not, you know, official.

Rocked 'n' Loaded is definitely video game music for people who don't like video game music. By that I mean this is real rock music. It commands attention just for being itself, and isn't there to be in the background. The closest real world musical comparison I have is Children Of Bodom. The keyboards on the first two tracks do sound almost identical, but change their tone for the latter half. In 10 minutes R'n'L already managed to evolve further than COB managed in 10 years. Just in case anyone had any doubts, track 10 comes full circle and throws in chiptune melody along side the riffing. This combined with a certain voice clip, from a tangentally related medium, combine into exactly what the producers set out to achieve, a celebration of Contra, video games, and rock-and-roll. I give Contra 4 Rocked 'n' Loaded 29 spent shell casings out of a 30 round clip. Let's hope they won't get sued.

There goes that idea

The plan for 2010 was to get my rampant game buying under control. Fuck that. This week the US sees Final Fantasy XIII, Resident Evil 5 Gold Edition, and Yakuza 3. Hong Kong gets Red Seeds Profile, and so am I. Japan gets a bunch of budget re-releases, one of which is Dream Club. Next week is a lot harder thanks to Fragile, Infinite Space, and Resonance Of Fate all on the same day, and in the same region. Japan gets Darksiders Shinpan no Toki, just for kicks. If all that wasn't enough, NCSX just got a bunch of those Oboro Muramasa fold-out thingies that were used as pre-order bonuses. The artwork for Oboro Muramasa is worth money, no questions asked.