mikeszekely

I'd for one would miss the magazine updates. The forums are great, but the scanned magazine pictures have given me tons of inspiration to go out and build models in ways I hadn't tried before. I totally understand that this site is a labor of love, and it pays nothing. Even if there isn't another update for a year, I have to thank Shawn for all the work he has put into this site so far. I don't know if they quit, but a lot of people that got the magazines posted the best stuff in the forums.

Best death ever? Hardly. I don't know about most of you guys, but for me, the first time I saw this was as Robotech, and as a young boy. Now, this was back when most of the cartoons on TV were American, with just a sprinkle of Japanese shows (the complete opposite of today, I've noticed). In American cartoons, people didn't die (Well, in the movies, maybe... Optimus' death... I cried in the theater...). So, to see a main character go, that was really something. As an adult, I've see countless more death scenes (and probably half of them from Gundam... ). And while Roy's death was tragic, it lacks the power of some other death scenese I've seen. In the movie, it was even worse. At least in the TV series, it was one of those "war is pointless and tragic" deaths. In the movie, it became the cliche "die so the main character can live" deaths. My call for best death? *SPOILERS* Uso's mom, in V Gundam. Kinda similar to Z Gundam, to Camille's mom's death, sure, but being that Uso was younger, and his mom got crushed by a freaking battleship... that's probably a bit more traumatic.

If it's easier on Shawn, why not simply get rid of everything but the forums? News, toys, models, games... it's all covered in the boards anyway.

Seems there's two, the first Gundam Evolve and Gundam Evolve Plus. Well, out of curiousity, I ordered myself a copy of Evolve Plus. But what I want to know is, what exactly are they? Is there some story to be found? Did I waste my money? Should I try to find the first one?

Mobile Suit Gundam may suffer from poor animation due largely to its age, but it still remains a groundbreaking series with memorable characters and an excellent story. Zeta Gundam is, by far, the best of all the Gundam series/movies/OVAs I've seen. ZZ Gundam had a ridiculously corny start, but once you get around it, ZZ Gundam really picks up and ends up being one of the better Gundam series. And I thought Moon Moon was actually kinda cool. Victory Gundam had the worst beginning ever, and that includes being worse than ZZ's. ZZ may have had a corny beginning, but V was just borning until they went into space. By episode 32, I can say that the story picks up, but the characters are still pretty bland. Also, it's like the polar opposite of Gundam X... Gundam X was a AU Gundam that felt like a UC Gundam, and V Gundam is a UC Gundam that feels like an AU Gundam. AU Gundam is definately more kiddie than UC Gundam. This isn't really a UC elitist opinion, but a marketing fact. The whole point of AU Gundam is to attract new fans without having to explain the backstory of Gundam, Z, ZZ, Char's Counterattack, F-91, and V (here's hoping they forget about G-Saviour). That's not to say that AU Gundam sucks... I like Wing, even if it's my least favorite (that I've seen), and I loved X.

Look at the picture carefully. The blue screen is clearly at an angle. And whoever made this image cropped the tops of the two photos to follow the angle of the text. But look at the photos themselves... they are clearly not at an angle, however their tops are cropped. Somebody made this picture. And a blue screen with text about a new Robotech series with a picture of some Japanese men in white lab coats and a second picture of the Tatsunoko building added on later really doesn't mean too much.

Y'know, Mechamaniac, I was willing to cut you some slack, what with your far superior knowledge of 12" Gundams, etc... But then you had to go and cast disparaging remarks toward Pabst! I'll take Pabst over Bass any day! But if you were to mention Samuel Smith vs. Milwaukee's Best (the Beast)... then I might follow your logic. S'okay, though... as I've said before and I'll say again - Diff'rent Strokes rule the world. Personally I dig the old animation better, it just has a classic quality (like Disney's Bambi or Dumbo) that new anime just doesn't seem to measure up to. I like both, but I can see where you're coming from with your preference. Just don't dis the PBR again! Except First Gundam and Zeta aren't really beers at all... they're fine aged wines. And while I'm on the topic, Wing and SEED aren't really beers either... they're more like Mountain Berry Blast Kool-Aid with extra sugar. The beers would be the one-year war OVAs, which were well animated, but lacking sorely on story. Y'know, empty carbs.

Unfortunately the older fans are even worse. The bulk of the Gundam fanbase sadly are just completely obnoxious, especially the UC elitists. nothing wrong with being a UC elitist I'm gonna go with Skippy, here. I mean, sure, I'll admit that it was Wing that got me into Gundam. And I'll admit that Wing isn't bad, per se. But by now, I've seen every Gundam except for V, Turn A, G, and Seed, and Wing was by far my least favorite. It (kinda) has the Gundam themes... but they take away the seriousness of UC Gundam and replace it with a boy band (minus the music). Not to mention that it's pretty irritating when the younger fans refer to Char as a lame ripoff of Zechs, no matter how many times you explain to them that Char came first.

Do you know of the Orguss Shrine>>>>>>>? Nay, until today, I had not heard of that site. Mostly, I get my mecha info from mahq.net, as they have a ton of nice pics for both Macross and Gundam, but was kinda suprised to see that they have nothing on Orguss.

Where can I find more info on the mecha from Orguss?

That's a bad thing? I loved Federation vs. Zeon, even though I had the DC version without many extras or 2-player mode... I played the bajeezus out of it. If AEUG vs. Titans is the same, sign me up. I second that. Fed. Vs. Zeon is still, to this day, my favorite Gundam game, flaws and all. And from the moment I first watched Zeta, I knew I wanted a Z Gundam game in the same genre. Hope both sides still have mega-long campaign modes.

Hahaha, I remember that one, but this auction is definitely a classic. That kid is getting 10,000,000 for his virginity?!?! And I went and gave mine away for free...

On the package your DVDs came in... actually, on the surface of the disc itself, it should say either "DVD-R" or "DVD+R." Now, it sounds like your burner is a DVD+ burner. If the DVDs you bought say "DVD-R," then you actually bought the wrong kind. Remember also, just because you have an mpg file on your computer, doesn't mean that it's an MPEG-2 (tricky, because both MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 files share the same .mpg extention). Your burner probably came with some kind of software, right? I know mine came with DVGate Plus, and Click to DVD. DVGate Plus can turn avi and MPEG-1 files into MPEG-2. If you're starting with some other video file, you might need some other software. It's a pain sometimes to have to re-encode the video twice, but TGMPEGEnc is free and useful, despite it's funny name. TGMPEGEnc can turn most video files into MPEG-1, and then I use DVGate to turn the MPEG-1 into an MPEG-2. Your help file was right about you needing an authoring tool, but to be perfectly honest, while Nero kicks ass for CD burning, it's not as useful for DVD burning. My burner came with Click to DVD. It can be a little confusing at times, because everytime you use it it thinks it should be capturing video from an i.Link device, and you have to manual tell it that you're just using files on your computer. It's also slow as anything... but it does make good DVDs.

Okay, don't be offended, but I was trying to teach my best friend to do something similar, and the more I assumed he knew, the more dissapointed I was. So I'm going to explain it like you know nothing, okay (but I am going to assume that you have a DVD burner and not trying to burn DVDs with a CD burned like my brother did). First thing first... DVDs basically used MPEG-2 format. This is actually different than the MPEG-1 format that VCDs use, or the *.mpg files you find sometimes on the internet. If the video on your hard drive isn't an MPEG-2, you need to convert it. Okay, second, you have to know if your DVD burner does DVD+ or DVD-, and make sure that you have the right kind of blank DVDs. Thirdly, Nero is great for burning DVDs that have been backed up using a program like DVD Shrink, but I don't actually reccomend using Nero to burn a DVD from video files. I read somewhere that Nero burns DVD in a kind of UDF format that's not compatible with a lot of DVD players. When I want to burn a DVD from an MPEG-2 video file, I tend to use Click to DVD. Finally, even if you got everything else perfect, your player still might not like it. For example, a lot of the relatively inexpensive DVD writers on the market just burn DVD+. Your DVD player, however, may only like DVD-, or no burned DVDs at all. (Both DVD+ and DVD- burned DVDs do play on the Xbox or the PS2, if burned properly.) If you need more help, try DVDRHelp.com.

Oh, I'm not saying that I can't do it without tricks. But I know I couldn't when I was seven and playing Megaman for the first time. Back then, those tricks did come in handy, and they're part of my fond Megaman memories. Well... same here.... kind of. For 2 years, I had no other game other then Megaman 1, 2 and 3. Trust me... I have those game memorized. But before you had the games memorized... didn't the Yellow Devil in the first Megaman game give you a hard time? And when you first learned about the pause trick, didn't you whip the Yellow Devil's ass, then do a little happy dance? Again, I'm not saying I need tricks to beat them (I beat them without tricks on the Megadrive collection later), but those tricks are part of my fond memories for those games. That's why I want them in the collection.

You put a big enough rocket on it, and you can get just about anything to fly.

Yes, get them! Your soul with thank you later... especially when it realizes that those classic Megaman games are waaaaaaaaaaaaaay better than a lot of the crap companies are shoveling at you to make a quick buck.

Oh, I'm not saying that I can't do it without tricks. But I know I couldn't when I was seven and playing Megaman for the first time. Back then, those tricks did come in handy, and they're part of my fond Megaman memories.

Probably not since those were just released on the PS1, and as such are still playable on the PS2. And because we hate Legends.

Did you know that in the original Japanese version of Battle Assault (Gundam the Battle Master), there was no Wing suit? They carbon-copied Zeta's moves, whipped up a sprite, and gave it the spot that should have been Hamma Hamma. Hero's role was originally some unnamed girl, as I recall... Were the AU suits in the original Japanese version of EiS? Anyway, it's not that I have anything against AU Gundam. (I'm actually pretty fond of Gundam X). They just don't belong in a UC Gundam game. If they try to cram Wing Zero or Aile Strike into AEUG vs. Titans, I'll crap a brick and toss it through Bandai's office window.

Yes, the Megaman cartoon did suck, and so does the box art... but that's part of Megaman's history... As far as I know, the Navi modes are supposed to be easier in general. The regular modes should be same as we remember, except they'll have saves instead of passwords. I'm actually hoping that they're the same right down to the little things... like rapidly pausing to get multiple hits off the elec beam, constantly re-opening the weapon select screen to get infinite metal blades in Megaman 2, the high jump trick in Megaman 3...

No word yet... but remember, we vote with our dollars. With the announcement of the GBA compilation, we know that Capcom is definately interested in making Megaman compilations. If the Megaman Anniversary Collection (especially) and the Megaman Mania games sell well enough, Capcom might give us another compilations. Personally, I'd like to see Megaman X1-X6, plus Megaman Soccer and Megaman Battle and Chase. Then maybe another GBA compilation with Xtreme and Xtreme 2, plus the Wily Tower levels from the Megadrive collection and Rockboard. That would leave us with just the Wonderswan version of Rockman and Forte plus Super Adventure Rockman unaccounted for. I wouldn't hold my breath on SAR, and trust me, you don't want the Wonderswan Rockman and Forte. Oh, and Abombz... I'm with you on Megaman II. I think it and V were the best on the Gameboy. Dr. Wily's Revenge was too cheap, and III was kind of boring. I assume IV wasn't too exciting either, because I don't even remember it. But Megaman Mania is definately worth it for V, and I'll take I-IV as bonus.

Okay, since we got started talking about it again OT, I decided to start a new topic with fresh updates. First, the Megaman Anniversary Collection will be released on February 24th, 2004. Capcom is taking pre-orders for it online. Here's the link for the PS2 version. Basically, what we've heard so far is that it will contain Megaman 1-8, plus the two arcade games, and lots of bonus material. It has been reported that the Navi modes from the Japanese PSone releases of Megaman 1-6 with new life bars, weapon select screens, hints from Megaman characters, and remixed music will be included in the collection. We have not heard if the version of Megaman 8 will be the PSone version, or the Saturn version. (The Saturn version featured a few extra, classic bosses.) A Gamecube version of this excellent collection is also supposed to be available. A new suprise is that Capcom will be releasing a second collection, called Megaman Mania. This collection, for the GBA, looks like it will be a compilation of the five original Megaman Gameboy games. From the screenshots, it looks like they still look like 8-bit graphics, but they've been re-colored to look more like the NES. This collection is worth it for Megaman V, in my opinion. While the first four Megaman games on Gameboy had re-hashed bosses, Megaman V was one of the rarest and most original classic Megaman games to come down the pipe in awhile. Capcom is also taking pre-orders for Megaman Mania here. It will be out in late March.

Yeah, Nintendo hit it right on the head with the GBA. But even while recognizing that carts killed the N64, they still refused to go to the DVD format. If they finally go to DVD now, I don't think it would be impossible for Nintendo's new system to be backwards compatible, but it would definately be more of a challenge. Simple fact, though, is that Nintendo hasn't said anything about backwards compatibility, while Sony has already confirmed that the PS3 will play both PS2 and PSone games, which for me personally makes the PS2 version a safer choice. If you're anti-PS2, get the GC version. If you're anti-GC, get the PS2 version. If you're like me and have both, get whichever version suits you better. Then everyone (except those few who only have an Xbox) can be happy. In any case, I'd bet that the GC version and the PS2 version are identical. The space missions could definately use some more work, from the Fed vs. Zeon engine. They really need to make it easier to move around in space, ala EiS, but not so fast-paced. But there's lots of room for ground levels, too. Colonies, inside Axis, and that whole part of the series where Camille was on Earth with Amuro and Karaba. But, even if the space missions aren't fixed, it could still be the best Gundam game on PS2. I mean, flaws aside, I loved Fed. vs. Zeon.

As exciting as Megaman is, I'd hate to get off topic here. So, about that announcement... AEUG Vs. Titans in the U.S... *Does dance ala Ren and Stimpy* "Happy happy joy joy happy happy joy..."