During my sixth grade year, two things happened that would change the direction of my life forever: I saw my first anime (Lodoss War) and I played my first RPG (Final Fantasy VI). Both were gateways to expansive realms filled with amazing stories. And in my adolescent mind, a dream coalesced, “What if you combined…
Neon Genesis Evangelion is one of the most famous—and polarizing—anime ever created. And it always seems to fall into one of three categories: Anime fans love it, hate it, or love it but hate the ending. Now we are just under a month away from the release of Evangelion 3.0: You Can (Not) Redo—easily the…
Tokitowa is a new JRPG filled with time travel, multiple personality disorder, talking dragons, ghost towns, assassins, comedy, and cake—lots and lots of cake. Its creators have called it an “Anime RPG” as it uses 2D sprites for all the characters and enemies which are then superimposed on a 3D world. In battle, Tokitowa plays…
Over the past few months I’ve been anxiously awaiting the new PS3 title Tokitowa. While some are looking forward to the love story aspect or to its attempt to make a playable anime, the core of my anticipation is something altogether different: I’ve been dying to play another Japanese time travel story. For me, time…
Last weekend, Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie Part 1: Beginnings, an abridged and enhanced version of the first eight episodes of the Modoka Magica anime was released in theaters across Japan. Now, exactly a week after the release of the first movie comes the second, Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie Part 2: Eternal.…
When the Ace Attorney live-action movie was released back in February in Japan, I called it the best video game movie ever made. When it came out on Blu-ray in August, I watched it a few times, reaffirmed that it was an excellent movie, and gave it a prominent place on my video shelf. Last…
Last generation’s PSP was a bastion of great music games with titles like Lumines and Project Diva—in addition to re-releases of classics like PaRappa the Rapper and Gitaroo Man. However, one music series has been often overlooked, despite having some of the best music games around: DJMax. Why has it been snubbed? Probably because of…
Proving that she is an international sensation, virtual idol Hatsune Miku performed her first live show in Taiwan to sold-out crowds less than a week ago. This was part of a tour celebrating her fifth birthday that also visited Hong Kong for the first time the week before. But the most interesting thing about this…
When I left America seven years ago, I couldn’t even imagine the idea of free streaming video on the internet—much less free streaming anime, subtitled in English, and simulcast with the episode’s Japanese airing. So as I’ve gotten more and more back into anime, I’ve been surprised by hatred of some fans for sites like…
Madoka Magica is an award winning anime series, famous for deconstructing the “magical girl” anime genre and turning it into something more akin to a psychological thriller. More than that though, the series is beautiful, mixing several disparate art styles to make an anime unlike any other. This past weekend, the series’ first movie, Puella…
The Korean-made DJMax games are some of the most popular in the PSP’s library—in addition to being some of the best music games ever made. Now, with DJMax Technika Tune, it’s coming to the Vita as well. While the PSP games use the d-pad and face buttons in the music gameplay, Technika Tune is completely…
Accel World is a popular anime series based on a series of popular light novels centering around a secret MMORPG fighting game that gives you startling powers in the real world. While this seems like the perfect setting for a fighting game tie-in, its first game is instead an odd cross between a dating sim…
My recent forays into Japan-only anime tie-in games have been a little less than fruitful. Regardless of the quality of the source material, they have either been interesting in concept (but failed in the execution) or have just been mediocre at what they were trying to do But despite my recent frustration at finding good…
Music has always been one of the pillars of Macross—along with love triangles and space wars. But only now, 30 years after the airing of the original Macross, is it getting its first stage musical: Macross: the Musiculture. While such performances are somewhat common (like Persona 4‘s own stage adaptation), this musical is actually an…
Without a doubt, Tiger & Bunny was one of the most popular anime of 2011. It took the idea of superheroes and mixed it with reality TV to create what amounts to a buddy-cop anime series. Now a year after the series’ end, the heroes are making their leap to the silver screen with Tiger…
I have made no secret of how much I have been enjoying Sword Art Online—going so far as to call it the smartest anime in years. When fellow Kotaku East writer Toshi Nakamura told me that there was another anime by the same author also about online games called Accel World, I began watching it…
Since the plot of the light novel/anime series Accel World revolves around an MMO fighting game, one would think any games based on the series would fall into the fighting game genre. However, the first game of the franchise, Accel World: Awakening of the Silver Wings, mixes two completely different genres instead: traditional dating sims…
This year at the Tokyo Game Show, Kotaku had the pleasure of sitting down with Mizuno Naoko, the creator of Hyperdimension Neptunia (and both of its sequels), to talk about the past, present, and future of the series. As we sat 47 floors above the game show proper, she told me about the origins of…
Sword Art Online is an anime based on a series of light novels which has just hit the midway point of its TV run. Twelve episodes in, it is the smartest anime I have seen in years—even including the recent Lupin III. But before we get into why this is the case, let’s take a…
We at Kotaku have already reported at some length how long the line was to get into the Tokyo Game Show this year. And with about over 95,000 attendees on the first public day, it’s easy to see why. And since literally thousands of people were standing in line with nothing to do, I decided…
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