mikeszekely

Just finished both stories, but I haven't unlocked everything yet. In the end, I feel that Macross for PS2 was REALLY overrated. I know a lot of the board members LOVE SDF and DYRL and tolerate everything that came after, and maybe those fans want to relive all those moments... but I'm not one of them. I'm tired of Gundam games that can't get out of the One Year War, and I'm not for Macross running Space War One to death, either. To that end, games like M3, that tell about some of the 30 year gap between the end of Space War One and the events of Macross plus, or games like VF-X2 that have great stories and continue to expand the Macross universe, make for better games. A side-effect of the above problem is, Space War One really only has several flavors of VF-1. It was kind of a blessing when I finished the ARMD story and got the VF-4. Set a Macross game in 2050, and you could potentially have every variable weapon Kawamori's come up with so far, plus any new ones he feels like whipping up for the game. And while a lot of people like the VF-1 the best, I prefer the VF-22, so... Well, okay, I'll stop griping about what I'd rather have in a Macross game, and take the game as it is... oh, wait, I still have complaints. Gerwalk mode was crap in this game! I want to flip over and whip around corners like Millia did in Macross 7, not akwardly try to turn my nose toward a door. Graphically, I felt that Sega could have done a lot more. Sure, it's better than VF-X2, but VF-X2 was on the first PlayStation. The PS2 Macross game is still very blocky, and a few lighting effects wouldn't hurt. Maybe AM-2 should ask Namco how they're getting Ace Combat 5 to look so good... Finally, the game was WAY too short. I started playing yesterday, and I'm done today. Yeah, yeah, I know, I got more stuff to unlock. Well, I'd probably care a whole lot more except I already have a VF-1J, a VF-1A, and a VF-1S... what's another paint job to me? All the missions were pretty much the same anyway... intense dogfight after intense dogfight, with a few ground levels thrown in here and there. It wouldn't have hurt them to try to come up with some more variety in the missions. Well, those complaints aside, Sega AM-2 did do a nice job with the Fighter mode. 'Bout time I got some yaw controls in Macross! I guess their experience with the Aero Wings/Aero Dancing series helps. Battroid wasn't bad, either, and it was nice to see someone finally make use of the head lasers in a game. In the end, Macross isn't a bad game... it's just not the greatest Macross game in the world, and there's a lot of room for improvement. Now if we can talk AM-2 into making those improvements, we'll have a truly great game on our hands.

SDF Macross is, by far, the superior. DYRL is all flash and no substance. Yeah, the animation is great, the new flight suits rock, yadda yadda yadda... but the Protoculture island was dumb, finding and translating a Protoculture pop song was even dumber, and the Zentraedi/Meltrandi conflict was an interesting idea that was never fully realized and detracted from the overall Protoculture-is-the-origin-of-everyone theme that the other Macross series run with. I'd actually go so far as to say that, for all the hype it gets on these boards, DYRL is actually my LEAST favorite Macross production. Better animation doesn't equal better finished product. The original Gundam and Z Gundam are still better than Wing or Seed, and SDF Macross is better than DYRL.

Cybertron is the next series? I thought Universe was next.

Who cares? For $30, I'm getting the best version of SF3, plus a new version of SFII that's basically all the other versions smashed into one. Good deal. In Japan, they have to spend three times that to get what? The same game, plus the SF2 movie, and I sure as hell hope something else to make it worth that obscene price tag. Which is probably a bad deal anyway, because: A.) The SF2 movie sucked. B.) The live movie sucked more. C.) The Street Fighter Alpha movie sucked. D.) The American Street Fighter cartoon sucked. So, there's no way I'd pay a fortune for any of those extras. Only way I'd pay $100 for a Street Fighter collection is if it's the game + the Street Fighter II V series.

Which is why it basically boils down to the PS2 version being the better version, whether it's a Sony conspiracy, lazy programing, or the Gamecube's media. I'd say it's probably some combination...

His voice changed in X6. He was girlie in X4. He had no voice in X5 (save the in game SFX?), and he had a slightly manlier voice in X6. Megaman, the classic one, is supposed to be the equivalent of a 10 year old boy. I'm pretty sure that in Rockman 8 he a girly voice, and then they gave him a girly voice for the American Megaman 8. For the American version of Megaman X4, they used the same VA for X that they used for Megaman in Megaman 8. In X6, there was no English audio, so you heard the Japanese actor. In X7, you could pick whether you wanted English audio or Japanese audio. If you use Japanese audio, you'll notice that it's the same VA that was in X6, and I think the same VA they used for X in the Japanese Rockman X4. Officially, Megaman and X are NOT the same robot, and X is supposed to be the equivalent of mid to late teens. Hence, the more manly voice. For whatever reason though, the localization team for X4 just figured that it's another Megaman game, so X must still sound girly.

I beat them all back in the day, and I've finished all of the games but 7 and the second arcade game. I'm not really sure what exactly you're asking, but to beat the first 8 games, you start the game, kill the robots, go through the castles, and catch Dr. Wily.

Utter rubbish. If they couldn't fit the whole package into 1.5 gigabytes, they are not worthy of their dev kit. Just beause you port an NES game to a GameCube doesn't mean it suddenly takes massive amounts of space. Your sprites are still 8*16*2bpp, if I recall. Your screen resolution, and thus background resolution, is still only 256*240. The NES ROM iamges are an accurate representation of how much space things should take. Again, Atomic Planet didn't emulate. So, the original NES ROM dumps are NOT an accurate measure. A closer approximation is if you look at the Japanese PlayStation "Rockman: The Complete Works" series. Here's the size of those games: PS1 –Rockman Original Image size: 273mb PS1 – Rockman 2 Original Image Size: 384mb PS1 – Rockman 3 Original Image Size: 466mb PS1 – Rockman 4 Original Image Size: 591mb PS1 – Rockman 5 Original Image Size: 584mb PS1 – Rockman 6 Original Image Size: 488mb PS1 – Megaman 8 Original Image Size: 318mb Total for MM1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 8 = 3.03gb Now throw in Megaman 7, the two arcade games, and all the bonus stuff, and you're WAY over the Gamecube's 1.5 GB limit. IT DOESN'T MATTER. The data used is still the same size. Just because you're on a new system doesn't mean an 8*16*2bit sprite suddenly takes MORE space. It's the same 256 bits of data, just being fed to a new executable. The music is where the space change occurs, as the 'Cube lacks the PSG of an NES. Without knowing the hardware better, I can't guess if it can be programmed to simulate one like the SNES hardware can(as was done for exactly ONE game), but I WILL bet that no one bothered even if it could. BTW, you aren't shoring your argument up well with the PS revisions, as even assuming that the entire disk is music, so that stripping remix tunes out halves the game size, you're STILL over the 1.5 gig limit with no extras. Or even any games... I don't know what they were doing on the NES remixes to make them larger than Megaman 8. I've never had the pleasure of owning any of them. But I can assure you it had little to do with the process of porting the game. In fact, I've heard that the PS1 Megaman remixes load the entire game into RAM when you start playing, thereby completely eliminating load times during play. And as the PS1 only HAS 2 meg of system RAM, that places an upper limit on how large the games can be. They likely stream music from the disk. But the only way music is going to fill the whole disk like that is if they're using something high-quality and uncompressed, like raw redbook audio. And music compression is no big deal for a modern system. The GameCube has quite enough horsepower to stream compressed audio from disk and decode it in real-time while running a smooth game. Far more so when running a straight port of an NES game. And I can take a full 650 megs of redbook audio down to 88 megs at grotesquely high quality settings. Though personally, I'd use the nice sample playback hardware they have in all 3 systems, at least for the remixed versions(though I think the original PSG music can be done with samples too, I'm not as sure). Load your instrument set, load your "score" and set the sound chip to work playing it back. BTW, check out the Genesis title "Rockman Megaworld" or "Megaman: The Wily Wars". It features full remakes, as opposed to just remixes, of the first 3 games. Full resprite, more frames of animation, new music, the whole 9 yards. In 2 megabytes of space. I repeat: If Capcom can't fit the whole package into 1.5 gig, they don't deserve their dev kits. Hey, I'm just passing along the info as I got it. I'm sure as hell not a programmer. You want to discuss the technicalities with Atomic Planet, be my guest. I'm sure they'll take the time to explain exactly what they did to make the games so big. But bottom line is don't blame Capcom/Atomic Planet because Nintendo insists on using propriatary media every time they make a new system.

Say what you want about the gameplay, the graphics in this game are unreal! Hard to believe it's for PS2...

Anyone know of any good FAQs for Macross? I mean, you get a Japanese Gundam game that's really self-explanitory, and there's info galore. You want info on a Macross game, you're up a certain creek without a paddle...

Utter rubbish. If they couldn't fit the whole package into 1.5 gigabytes, they are not worthy of their dev kit. Just beause you port an NES game to a GameCube doesn't mean it suddenly takes massive amounts of space. Your sprites are still 8*16*2bpp, if I recall. Your screen resolution, and thus background resolution, is still only 256*240. The NES ROM iamges are an accurate representation of how much space things should take. Again, Atomic Planet didn't emulate. So, the original NES ROM dumps are NOT an accurate measure. A closer approximation is if you look at the Japanese PlayStation "Rockman: The Complete Works" series. Here's the size of those games: PS1 –Rockman Original Image size: 273mb PS1 – Rockman 2 Original Image Size: 384mb PS1 – Rockman 3 Original Image Size: 466mb PS1 – Rockman 4 Original Image Size: 591mb PS1 – Rockman 5 Original Image Size: 584mb PS1 – Rockman 6 Original Image Size: 488mb PS1 – Megaman 8 Original Image Size: 318mb Total for MM1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 8 = 3.03gb Now throw in Megaman 7, the two arcade games, and all the bonus stuff, and you're WAY over the Gamecube's 1.5 GB limit.

Under options, set the difficulty to Easy, then go and start a new game in Megaman 2. Oh, and play it straight through, because if you save and quit, you'll lose your E-Tanks.

By now, most game retailers should have the Mega Man Anniversary Collection for PS2 and Gamecube. At a measly $29.99, it'd be worth it if it just emulated the games in their original form, but developer Atomic Planet actually went and re-wrote the games, so each one plays beautifully, not to mention they crammed the game with extras. The PS2 version is simply amazing. The controls were a perfect fit on the Dual Shock 2, the remixed music is cool, and little tweaks like adding an auto fire button and allowing the L1 and R1 buttons to switch weapons are nice touches. Not to mention that you can play the NES versions in the original format you remember, or in the cool "Navi Mode" from the Rockman: The Complete Works series that came out for PSone in Japan. Another nice touch for those who remember getting their rear ends handed to them is that you can set the number of starting lives from 3-5, and you can select either "Normal" or "Easy" difficulty for Mega Man 1-7. Since the old pause trick is gone, I think a lot of people are going to be playing Mega Man 1 on easy to keep from breaking controllers on the Yellow Devil (aka Rock Monster), but I don't reccomend playing all the games in easy, because it makes the rest of the games almost comically easy. Oh, another thing is that the game autosaves. Everytime you beat a level, it automatically saves it. That's handy if you don't feel like writing down passwords (and REALLY handy for Mega Man 1, since you originally had to play it straight through). But, if you're like me and have a notebook somewhere that you wrote down all the passwords from when you played it back in the day, good news! Those passwords still work! Nintendo fans are kinda mad right now, because the PS2 version is clearly the better version. Since the games aren't emulated, some of the cooler stuff like the remixed music coulding fit on the smaller Gamecube media. Also, for reasons that boggle the mind, Atomic Planet decided to use the A button for fire, and the B button for jump on the Cube version. If you have a choice, go for the PS2 version, but if you only have a Cube (or a Cube and an Xbox), the Cube version is still worth it. Okay, I'm outta here! I got Robot Masters to take care of...

I'd like to see Tarantino stop making movies all together, since he clearly has no talent.

Yup, and again there's a readymade technological solution that's been largely ignored by the studios. It's called "seamless branching". Eh, Seemless Branching has caused a problem in more than few DVD players out there. Ironically one of the first T2 discs used it. The Lord of the Rings discs have been anything but "milked" franchise thus far. They've released 2 versions of each movie. One is a 2-disc theatrical cut. The second is a lavish 4 disc set with a longer cut of the movie, and tons of bonus features. It usually costs a cheap $30 to boot. The big difference here is that they've announced, from the beginning, that they would be releasing 2 versions of each movie. They've announced both release dates each time. Who's getting fooled? What's tricky about this? But that's just a more clever way of milking it. Take Robocop. First the Criterion version, then the cheaper ordinary version, now the boxed set. I bought the Criterion version, then had no interest in any of the other versions. Now with LotR, they make it really clear that there's going to be the theatrical release with the usual extras, then later a special extended edition. Now fans know from the get-go that if they want the theatrical version, they will buy one version, then to get all the extras, they'll have to buy the extended version. Well, fortunately for the fanboys and girls, they spaced them out, so they have time to save up for both versions. Besides, how many people here really doubt that sometime in 2005, you'll be seeing a boxed set with all three films, plus some other extra exclusive bonus material?

You, my friend, are the target audience for this movie. However, one or two of us actually prefer a film to have a bit of substance now and then. Hey, I'm not claiming that I never like a movie with substance. I'm just saying that only movies with substance are worth watching, and that sometimes a cheesy action flick can be fun.

I know JSA and Mechamaniac already made up, but I still wanted to toss my two cents in... Anyway, every man and woman who joins any of the US military, I feel, deserves respect from those of us who do not serve. Every one of them, even the box pitchers, are providing a needed service, functioning as part of a whole... and that whole is looking out for us so guys like me can think about picking up the Megaman Anniversary Collection instead of wondering if an foreign militants are going to crash a busload of explosives into my Mitsubishi on the way to Gamestop. Now, every man and woman in the military does get to wear something very special, to let us civillians know that they're military and deserve our respect. And that something is their uniform. Within that groups of respected men and women, there are the cream of the crop. Everyone works hard, but they worked harder, and did the tougher and often more dangerous jobs. They've earned the right to stand out from their peers, hence the berets. Now, does giving everyone a beret make everyone elite? Nope. Instead of raising morale and making everyone feel like an elite, all it does is make the elite look the standard look. The box pitchers, vital though they are, are still pitching boxes. And the elites are still doing the elite stuff, only without the symbol of recognition.

When I first saw this set, I was was like "Holy S#^T!" But then I remembered that Robocop 2 was kinda mediocre, and Robocop 3 outright sucked. And I already have the Criterion version of Robocop. So, I think I kinda have all the Robocop I want. Unless they put the TV show on DVD... although I don't remember if the TV show was any good or not...

Yeah guys, okay, whatever. First, to address the Will Smith issue... yeah, he does usually play the wise-ass urban yadda yadda yadda... but he's still a fairly good actor. Even if most of his roles are similar, he's never struck me as anything less than convincing, which puts him a step ahead of a lot of the other flavor-of-the-month actors out there (Colin Farrel, Vin Diesl, Orlando Bloom, the entire cast of the Matrix save Hugo Weaving, etc). Also, for all the bad-mouthing he's getting, I don't think I've seen him in a movie I haven't liked. Granted, I don't consider any of his movies to be masterpieces of literature... but 99.99% of movies aren't, and aren't supposed to be. Which brings me to my second point. While movies sometimes have thoughtful points are clever writing, most movies are intended to be simply an hour and half of fun. I enjoy a good car chase or explosions that make me glad for my 5.1 surround setup when the DVD comes out. If every movie was a "Memento" or a "Fight Club" I'd probably stop going to the theater, even though I loved Fight Club. And just because a movie is loosely based on the book, I don't expect it to be the book. Books are longer and allow for more detail. Besides, if a movie and the book are identical, and I've consumed one, what's the point of checking out the other? That said, taking the movie for what it is, I, Robot looks like a vapid action movie. And vapid action movies are usually good times, so I'm planning to check it out.

I don't know about older air superiority fighters, like the F-14 and earlier incarnations of the F-15, but it seems to me that newer fighters are designed for (or at least intended for) multirole from the get go. F/A-18, F-16, F-35, F/A-22... I mean, I don't wanna knock the A-10 or anything, because it does it's job and it has it's fans... I'm just not one of them. I got no interest in Hummers - I drive a sports car. And I guess I like my planes the same way... I don't want the hulking brute, I want the one with super cruise.

I you disliked Pitch Black (as I did) do not go and see this film. My friend convinced me to go see Chronicles of Riddick because he had four free passes. Chronicles is actually worse than PB. The horrible lines will kill you and if they don't, the heavy-handed grandstanding of the main character will. Avoid it if you want some advice. Thanks for the advice! So instead, I went and saw Harry Potter today. It was the best of the three. Good times.

It's amazing how many people are telling me they liked this movie. Then again, it's amazing how many people told me they liked "Pitch Black," which is on my list of top ten dumbest movies of all time. I think I'm going to see either Shrek or Harry Potter today, then I'm probably done until Spider-Man.

In my store personally (I work at Gamestop), we sold a few. Mostly to the anime/Gundam crowd. I hope the DX version is what we get here. I'd guess we probably will get it here, although when is anyone's guess. I think Bandai will push the Seed crap this year, and probably release AEUG vs. Titans when they release Zeta on DVD. Anyone know what the new Mobile Suits will be in the DX version? Seems they got most of the good ones already, and I was under the impression that they left them out because the Titans already had a ton more Mobile Suits than the AEUG. Vinny... I think the fact that it's basically the same as FvsZ with Z Gundam suits is exactly why some of us will enjoy AvsT. I mean, I loved the gameplay in FvsZ, but I thought there weren't enough MS in it, especially on the Feddie side, and that a lot of the MS in FvsZ were just... old and stupid, like the Gogg or the Ball. I loved the original Gundam series, but I loved Zeta a lot more, and Zeta had a ton more MS that I liked better, especially the Gundam Mk II. Motley... like Vinny said, space-combat is nearly identical, as it's basically the same engine. The only thing I can say about it is that for a show that really took place mostly in space, there are plenty of land battles, and I really do think that targeting is a little more smooth, especially for stuff like the head vulcans. I mean, in FvsZ, they were useless, in AvsT, I can't do without them.

Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see where you got the pre-modded PS2 anywhere in your posts. Could you let me know where you got it? I wanna play Macross! PM me please if you don't wanna leave it here. Thanks! H Oops, my bad! I got it from Modchipman.com. Also, I finally got a real Japanese PS2 game to play on it. I got Z Gundam: AEUG vs. Titans. Macross was backordered, but as far as I know, they're going to send it when the get it back in stock. You can check out my thoughts on AvsT here.

Got my first Japanese PS2 game today. They were out of Macross, but I got a used copy Z-Gundam: AEUG vs. Titans. Not a whole lot to say to review it. If you played Federation vs. Zeon DX, you're already intimately familiar with AEUG vs. Titans. For the most part, it's the same controls on the same game engine. Like FvsZ, AvsT basically has three modes... a port of the Arcade, a two player vs. mode, and a mission/campaign mode. There are both ground and space missions in Arcade and Mission, and the ground missions are still roped off with red lines. The screen looks basically the same as FvsZ, too, with the forces meter on the top left, armor and weapons info on the bottom right, etc. You can still issue commands to your teammate and the like. Gameplay improvements are minor. The only real addition is the useless transformation mode, which is essentially a kind of jumping dash, and a "Hyper Mode." Hyper Mode allows you to do team attacks with your teammate when the Combo bar fills up. Where AvsT really shines, I think, is the fact that it's Z Gundam. Sure, it's a plus because Z Gundam was my favorite series, sure, but I think it's also a plus because you have more mobile suits and usually cooler mobile suits. This means you don't have to play mission after mission as a GM in the Mission mode, like you did in FvsZ. As far as I'm concerned, Z Gundam also means slightly better music. For those of you who prefer the classic One Year War suits, take heart. Beating arcade as the AEUG unlocks all the Feddie suits, and beating it with the Titans unlocks all the Zeon suits. Also, although literally just started the Mission mode, I have a RX-79[G] in my aresenal, so it looks like the FvsZ suits are in Mission mode, too. Anyway, at the end of the day, if you liked FvsZ, you'll probably enjoy AvsT. If you hated FvsZ, you'll hate AvsT. I just happen to fall into that first group.