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RPG Watch

If you're a fan of RPGs, I urge you not to lose hope during these dark times, because there are three note- worthy RPGs hitting the stores this summer. And as most RPG fans will tell you, summer is the best time to play Because all the time you'd nor- mally spend on homework can be poured into a RPG.

Granted, you don’t want to be spending the whole summer indoors—but at least you can knock off a few of those deathly hot days fighting evil.

Fist up, releasing anytime between right now and May is La Pucelle Tactics, which, as the name gives away, is a tactical RPG. Although it’s not just any Tactical RPG, its a Nippon Ichi RPG. That's right it’s the same people who made Disgaea: Hour of Darkness, the game that most of us have been playing straight since late last August.

As a friendly forewarning, this

visn’t a sequel, it’s not even really a

prequel; it’s just sort of the game that came before Disgaea. It’s kind of old and has dated graphics, but the game play is the main reason anyone is going to pick this up. I suggest anyone who liked Disgaea, or anyone who missed Disgaea and now really, really wants to play a good tactical RPG, should check this out.

For midsummer we have Front Mission 4. The Front Mission series is a great one because it combines a tactical RPG with robots and polit- ical intrigue stories that would put Tom Clancy to shame.

Oddly enough, not a_ huge

amount of details have come flood- ing out for this title, despite the fact that the Japanese version is almost entirely in English. Not that it will play on a North American PS2, mind you.

The battle system works in a turn-based manner, with each side using a team of fully customizable robots. How in depth is the cus- tomization you ask? Basically you can choose the legs, main body and arms as parts and mix as match as you wish—provided they are not over the specified weight. You can also equip a variety of hand-held and shoulder-mounted weapons. This isn't going to be the hit RPG of the year, but those who are into this type of game would be well advised to pick it up when it hits stores.

And finally appearing on the PS2 is the North American version of Star Ocean: Till the End of Time Directors Cut. If you're a regular reader then you know I've pretty much given this game 10/5 before it has even come out. | believe that Star Ocean will achieve a large measure of success for its innova- tion,

It has a fully 3D real-time combat system with two party allies being Al controlled, and it allows you to take control of any of your three party members during the battle. All magic charges and casts are in real time as well—same as with the use of items in battle. There is also an extremely in-depth item-creation system that lets you make and improve weapons, make food and healing items, and even compose music for instruments.

Now, since we didn’t get the reg- ular edition, the Directors Cut, for

those who want to know, adds new story sequences, expands the bonus dungeon, adds an additional bonus dungeon, and adds two new charac- ters (bringing the total list of playable characters up to 12). This is the kind of RPG that sets the bar for future games, and will probably be on most people's best-of lists for 2004.

So yes, we will have something to

Disgaea look forward to this summer, and to keep us entertained. Provided of course that none of this is pushed back to a later release date. But then, if you even slightly follow games, you already know the pain of having to wait another six months for the game you have wait- ed almost two years for. Such is life when youre a gamer.

Trigun

The $60,000,000,000 Man

Well, Trigun isn't new by any means, but it does come in a slightly new package from Pioneer, I mean

Geneon, with its new signa- ture series. Basically it’s the DVDs of old but popular series you passed up because of the huge price tag that was attached.

Now you can get the same great anime for less, actually a lot less. It's enough to make the people who paid the Pioneer price a while back bitter, very bitter.

At first, I swear I couldn't figure out what was wrong because the DVD auto plays, that’s right—no menu. Meaning you can watch the entire DVD without having to use the

menu. I find it odd because

the menu design was origi- nally stylish, and functional. Now for extras, they’re a lit- tle on the thin side here. There are no clean opening- or-closing animations, although I should state for the record that this DVD was first made before the clean open-and-close laws came into effect.

The disc does have a character sketch gallery that is quite nice, and there are no trailers for anything on the DVD. And despite the fact that this is just a reprint of an earlier DVD, the pic- ture quality is still good. The colours are vibrant and don't bleed together. In fact sthe only problem with the picture is that some still- shots tend to jitter around a

bit. ’'m not sure if that’s a defect of the DVD, or the original animation process, but it’s not very noticeable. Lastly, both 2.0-channel sounds tracks, English and Japanese, are done rather well for being regular stereo tracks. I was also impressed with the quality of the voice acting and of the dub tim- ing; Trigun is an early exam- ple of an English version done right.

So what’s an anime like Trigun about anyway? Well, it’s what you could call a post-apocalyptic western, although that’s not a real genre, but it aptly describes Trigun.

We follow the exploits of two insurance agents, Millie and Meryl, who are search- ing for Vash the Stampede—a man so dan- gerous the government put a $60,000,000,000 bounty

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on his head. Their job is to try and prevent him from causing too much damage and havoc, and that’s only after they find him.

Obviously, you know the guy on the cover is going to be Vash. The entertaining part is that Vash doesn’t quite have the personality of a wanted gunman. Who has ever watched a series with a gunman that doesn’t fire his gun, eats lots of donuts, cries a lot, and doesn’t like to see people get hurt or killed?

The story does have depth to it, but in the first four episodes you don’t get to any of it. This DVD is pretty much a setting and character introduction, nicely setting the stage with some comedy and a bit of foreshadowing.

Is this series worth the investment even though it’s

gong to be eight DVDs long and is fairly old? I can say without a doubt, yes.

First off, at the new pric- ing point under the signa- ture series its only $20, which you cannot really complain about, unless you bought the DVD a couple of years ago and paid twice as much.

Secondly, this is a classic of anime. It’s on a lot of fans all time top-ten lists, mine included. It’s got great char- acter design, a stand out story that blends comedy with drama, an excellent English voice-acting cast, and a flawless English dub. There isn’t much more you can ask for in a series. If you've neglected Trigun in the past, nows your time to add this gem to your collection.

April 7, 2004

Anime Laser

This week’s look at what's going on in the anime world.

What's Hot Right Now:

Inu. Yasha should barely qualify as being entertainment, but with 15 DVDs out so far, the story that puts most people to sleep just keeps on going.

You've got to admire the brains behind Jnu Yasha. | mean the writer is committed enough to run a story into the ground until people will lit- erally stop watching. After 15 vol- umes they've got about 25 of the possible 25,000 jewel shards they must collect, now that’s entertain- ment. Hell, they might as well be counting grains of sand, at least that wouldn't put me to sleep as quickly.

What's Going to be Hot:

On the top of the “it took damn well long enough” list is Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex, which you may of may not remember had a movie with a North American the- atrical release in 1995.

The series takes place sometime after the film, and has excellent looking computer animation and loads of action. Now, as for the story—well, complex would be an understatement. It seems that whenever you go to the trouble of blinking you've already missed large portions of the plot. And really, who doesn't enjoy a series that you have to pay more attention to than a cal- culus lecture?

What’s Hot in Japan:

There’s only one thing better than a popular anime—a popular anime that has more merchandise than you can shake a stick at.

That’s where One Piece comes in—it follows the adventures of the wannabe pirate Luffy and his small crew of misfits. And as polls show, pirates rate an acceptable second behind ninjas in cool professions. They. may not have ninja stars but they “Arrrr”, pirates, so you have to give them that.