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Seto Kaiba

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  1. Seto Kaiba
    I'm not sure if I should be disappointed by that or not, TBH. I'm about halfway into Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable and I'm not enjoying it nearly as much as I enjoyed Stardust Crusaders. If Golden Wind is a return to the Stardust Crusaders form, that's a step in the right direction as far as I'm concerned. (Not to say Diamond is Unbreakable is bad, it's just got all the formulaic enemy-of-the-week but it lacks any real sense of direction apart from the short-lived quest for the Stand Arrow that was creating all the Stand users in Morioh. Stardust Crusaders felt a lot more focused because there was a clear goal that Jotaro and company were working towards. Diamond is Unbreakable is bizarre, but it doesn't feel like much of an adventure... more like Jojo's Bizarre Neighborhood.) But is he the long-awaited Jojo protagonist smart enough to realize that the enemy Stand user is always the most flamboyantly-dressed person in the vicinity? "Where's the enemy stand user?" "Look for anyone nearby dressed like they mugged a carnival float this morning!"
  2. Seto Kaiba
    The way she's addressed in the TV series, Lady M's presented as if she were a single person rather than an inherited title or alias. (Which makes it weirder still that the Ragna branch of Xaos don't seem to know who she is when everyone else seems to... even the Windermereans in Passionate Walkure.) I can't quite see Mylene putting her music career aside to focus on playing politics with the New UN Forces either...
  3. Seto Kaiba
    Oh myyyyyyyy...
  4. Seto Kaiba
    Alto didn't really choose anyone in Macross 30... he came to the future (2060) with Sheryl but, in that scene, is relieved to see Ranka is all right because Ranka had been held prisoner by the New UN Spacy Special Forces 815th Independent Squadron "Hávamál" to ensure Major Brera Sterne's cooperation with their goals. (They similarly held Myung Fang Lone hostage to force Guld Goa Bowman to cooperate with them.)
  5. Seto Kaiba
    No... Mainland is just a very large habitat ship where the majority of the Macross Galaxy fleet's civilian population lives. The NMCV-21 Battle Galaxy is the same type of warship as the NMCV-25 Battle Frontier. It's a Battle-class variable stealth space assault aircraft carrier. Each New Macross fleet's Battle-class flagship is built to the same basic design, but no two ships of the class are truly identical due to changes in technology during construction and customization of the design during construction by the fleet government to meet its specific needs or incorporate technology that the fleet government feels it should have. Battle Galaxy looks so different from her sister ship Battle Frontier because its design incorporates a lot of cutting edge and experimental technology developed by the Macross Galaxy corporation that runs the Macross Galaxy fleet as its government. Battle Galaxy would have spent most of its time docked to the Mainland ship the same way that Battle Frontier spent most of its time docked to Island-1. When Battle Galaxy was sunk by Battle Frontier over the Vajra homeworld, Mainland was elsewhere and was not attacked.
  6. Seto Kaiba
    Oh, almost certainly... Robotech is so obscure and forgotten that you don't really see anything in the way of pop culture references to it. Voltron had way better brand awareness in the US even before Legendary Defender. I'm not sure if it's necessarily laudable, but Macross Frontier was one of the most pirated anime properties of 2008... the US and Europe were following the fansubs of the new show almost as strongly as its Gundam contemporary Gundam 00. You see Macross cosplayers are anime conventions... you don't really see much representation for Robotech apart from the occasional HG booth. Only when his bosses are looking over his shoulder. Well, "younger" covers a lot of ground. Kids in junior high or high school aren't going to be out there torrenting anime on the daily to get the latest shows from Japan, they're going to be watching whatever's being carried on Cartoon Network, Netflix, Hulu, etc. The group you're going to see getting into Macross is going to be the tech-savvy high schoolers and the college age fans, who have the wherewithal to look for fansubs for newer or less well-exposed shows. Most Robotech fans are basically just closeted Macross fans... they don't really give a flip about any part of Robotech besides "the Macross Saga". As far as I've seen, that principle holds true even among fans in Latin America.
  7. Seto Kaiba
    Fair enough. I was just struck by this weird feeling - based on nothing in particular - that we hadn't really seen anything recently teasing the forthcoming movie and that felt kind of odd. EDIT: my memory may just be compressing the spans of time between worthwhile news pieces for previous films. (I know he's a busy guy in his job at Satelight, but that he's working on so much other stuff besides the film is a little worrying.) Can't be, Lady M's supposedly been researching the potential of songs since the First Space War... Mylene was born in 2031.
  8. Seto Kaiba
    Is it just me, or has there been a distinct shortage/absence of news about this film since it was announced?
  9. Seto Kaiba
    ... considering that Tommy's the only one with an education even remotely related to his position? (Though, really, that means nothing... it feels like it's rarer these days for someone to have an education and job that actually line up.) It's not really an education problem, IMO. Kevin's parents just never taught their little boy how to play nice with others... a rather important shortcoming for someone whose main job is handling public relations with Harmony Gold's customer base. Especially when the fans of the original don't just have deeper pockets, they arguably outnumber Robotech fans 5 or 10 to 1 in Harmony Gold's main market (the US). "Biting the hand that feeds" feels like an apt metaphor, especially when Harmony Gold's entire merchandise line is built around trying to appeal to those same fans of the originals. For Banky? It's always been about picking fights with people. I doubt Harmony Gold has deep enough pockets to justify hiring a troll farm to defend Robotech.
  10. Seto Kaiba
    In all fairness, Harmony Gold's management would probably have preferred not to antagonize Macross fans unduly... but this is the kind of stupid stuff you get when you make a notorious Macross-hating Robotech fanboy troll your head of franchise marketing. A lot of unprofessional, counterproductive nonsense.
  11. Seto Kaiba
    It's one of those Obi-Wan Kenobi truths... it's true in spirit, but it's not objectively true. Yeah, if the creators of Macross see Robotech as an illegitimate abuse of their work I'm inclined to agree. Eh... I think it's not even so much that as the fact that GoLion was a dead property in Japan. It's like Southern Cross, nobody cares that Robotech bastardized it because nobody would remember it exists at all if not for being included in Robotech. Beast King GoLion would be just another forgotten squirt in the super robot crowd were it not for WEP using the series to make Voltron. There's nothing for GoLion fans to feel like they're missing out on because Voltron exists. Macross fans, on the other hand, know only too well that there's a MASSIVE amount of much higher-quality material they're missing out on because the Robotech series is a thing. If Macross had been a one-and-done like Beast King GoLion then Robotech wouldn't be catching all that flak for having adapted the original series.
  12. Seto Kaiba
    Yeah, it's kind of a pain since several games are key installments in the Macross continuity... ESPECIALLY VF-X2. So much stuff in later stories comes back to or ties into Macross VF-X2 that it's a little frustrating. Both Ernest Johnson and Grammier Neirich Windermere VI have the Second Unification War figure prominently in their backstories, Kaname's home planet is one where that war never ended, surviving splinter groups from the Latence faction that was defeated at the end of VF-X2's Good Ending are the new anti-government terrorist forces that figure prominently in Macross the Ride and likely Mirage Jenius's backstory, etc.
  13. Seto Kaiba
    There is no English option, sadly, but there is a very fine translation guide for gameplay-related matters posted here on MW.
  14. Seto Kaiba
    We have answers. It's a different design, because Macross Galaxy is a unique 4th Generation closed-system chemical plant ship instead of being modeled on 3rd Generation City-class ships the way the 5th Generation Island Cluster-class closed-system bioplants (e.g. Macross Frontier) were. This is Mainland, the Macross Galaxy's primary habitat ship. The prequel light novel Macross the Ride also indicates the Macross Galaxy fleet has the same type of support ships first seen in Macross 7, including a Riviera-class resort ship with the designation Evna, which was attacked by anti-government forces while hosting the Vanquish Cup final in 2058. They're flesh-and-blood people who've had their bodies remodeled with technological implants. Grace has several spare bodies that she can operate remotely using zero-time fold communications to avoid exposing herself to danger, like the body she used to travel to Gallia IV and detonate the Dimension Eater there in Macross Frontier's 13th episode. (Grace's spare bodies have also demonstrated the ability to change genders on the fly, with one turning into a male form codenamed "G" to clandestinely meet with Leon.) The Macross Frontier short story "Wired Warrior" does feature one truly artificial person codenamed Greenwich Meridian, callsign Meridian 01, who was a bio-android constructed around the reprogrammed brain tissue of a deceased Macross Galaxy Corporate Army pilot. Brera found the entire idea disgusting and cremated Meridian 01's remains after the bio-android was killed in combat. The Zentradi are based on the ancient Protoculture's DNA, modified to make them more robust and aggressive... but they're not technically Protoculture. The Mardook in Macross II: Lovers Again - a parallel world story sequel to Macross: Do You Remember Love? - are strongly implied to be descendants of a group of Protoculture who fled the collapse of their civilization. It isn't outright stated that they're descendants of the Protoculture though. The Protoculture AI in the ruins on Lux in Macross 7 is believed to be modeled on a Protoculture male, though its form is only seen in silhouette. Mina Forte from Macross 30: Voices Across the Galaxy is initially believed to be a Protoculture-based bio-android. Mikumo Guynemer is a Protoculture-based bio-android. So we've never seen an unaltered Protoculture individual... but we've got several instances of people who are in the general vicinity of being one. Mikumo Guynemer is a clone of a Protoculture-designed bio-android, created using cell fragments obtained from the Protoculture ruins on Windermere IV by New UN Spacy Major Wright Immelmann. Mikumo herself was created (illegally) by Xaos under the direction of Lady M specifically to join Walkure as a superweapon to use against Var syndrome. The original Star Singer she is a clone of was created by the ancient Protoculture. The SDFN-04 General Bruno J. Global was one of twelve mass-production Macross-class ships constructed to provide advance reconnaissance ahead of the 1st Generation Megaroad-class emigrant ships. The New Macross emigrant ships - the 3rd Generation City-class, 4th Generation Mainland-class, and 5th Generation Island Cluster-class - didn't exist when the ship was launched. By the time we see it, the General Bruno J. Global had been retired from its original duty and seconded to the 117th Research Fleet as its flagship on its expedition into Vajra space. Other ships of her class ended up as permanent fixtures on the planets where the fleets they escorted settled, such as the SDFN-08 General Vrlitwhai Kridanik landing on Uroboros and being repurposed as the planetary capital Vrlitwhai City (as seen in Macross 30). Another one that isn't identified is seen on the planet Pipure in the Macross Delta prequel Macross Delta Gaiden: Macross E. Macross Olympia has, thus far, only been mentioned/described in Variable Fighter Master File: VF-25 Messiah. The book's contents are not official setting material, according to the disclaimer on the credits page. Master File describes the fleet as trailing about 500 light years behind the Macross Frontier fleet (c. December 2056). Their only official mention, as far as I know, is a brief aside in Macross the Ride that acknowledges that Vanquish League VF air races are conducted there as well.
  15. Seto Kaiba
    Finished Akashic Records of the Bastard Magic Instructor. Ultimately... not bad, but not great. Glenn is actually a reasonably interesting protagonist, as what basically amounts to a former military-run magical hitman who found a conscience, but it feels handicapped by the fanservice-y designs of the female cast. It definitely could've benefited from being longer than twelve episodes too. Leos is built up like he's going to end up being the antagonist of the final story arc [...] Decent story, but the ending's weak. Since I'm on a bit of a fantasy kick, I gave Isekai Cheat Magician another whirl and it's freaking terrible. Worse than I originally thought. The animation quality is awful... it looks like it's about ten to fifteen years old. The story is, if anything, worse. It feels like a madlib for a generic isekai fantasy story or a really awful fan fic for Slayers where Lina is a guy. About the only thing it seems to bring to the table so far is fanservice, since the main duo's magic teacher seems to have nicked her wardrobe from a Slave Leia cosplayer.
  16. Seto Kaiba
    IIRC, they did attempt to claim that one of their projects was meant to be essentially that... and that it would be sold in Japan under a different name. (I don't remember which one, though... it might've been Shadow Chronicles.) Possibly, given that Tatsunoko was willing to put Sukehiro Tomita on a new series codeveloped by HG in the 80's... they could've gotten something resembling a quality product if the budget hadn't been too small. Mind you, that would've been a lot of extra cost for Harmony Gold and they probably wouldn't have gone for it... studio time is expensive, and rewriting and redubbing a show like that is even more expensive than a regular dub. That extra cost is a big part of why Harmony Gold's approach to anime went the way of the dinosaur in the late 80's and early 90's. IMO, it wouldn't have done much to forestall the inevitable if they had had a fourth show made and edited it as a continuation of Robotech. It wouldn't have saved Robotech, and they'd have been taking flak for "ruining" four shows instead of three once the 90's rolled around and accurate dubs started to become the norm. On reflection, the biggest problem with the idea wouldn't have even been that Harmony Gold had insufficient funds to make a professional-looking series by 1987's standards. It would be that Harmony Gold's network partners were only willing to take shows long enough for first-run syndication. They would've needed to bankroll three new shows, or at least two new shows the length of Macross, to reach the necessary episode count of 65+. That's why Robotech II: the Sentinels was plotted as a 65 episode series... it needed to be long enough for the networks. That's years of time spent on development, and a LOT of money HG didn't have.
  17. Seto Kaiba
    My suspicion is it's likely a retelling/do-over, given that the full title was Genesis Breaker MOSPEADA 2083. The whole Inbit conflict was set in 2083, which makes a direct sequel seem unlikely. MOSPEADA: the Origin? Eh... even if it's just an updated toy line, it's nice to see the Ride Armors get some attention. This might've been a viable idea 33 years ago when MOSPEADA was still relatively new and Robotech was a fresh property in an industry that still tolerated rewrites... but not today. MOSPEADA was only ever a middling performer in Japan, it had just enough of a cult following to manage a wrap-up OVA in the golden age of the mecha genre. Tatsunoko would not have considered it for a sequel even at the height of its popularity, never mind the at-most trivial contributions of a third-party series in foreign markets. Now that MOSPEADA's a mostly-forgotten bit of 80's mecha esoterica and Robotech's even worse off, it's not a sound investment on Tatsunoko's part and their finances are shaky enough as it is. The painful irony here is you just described two failed Robotech projects... Robotech II: the Sentinels and Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles. Robotech II: the Sentinels was an original series that Tatsunoko Production codeveloped with Harmony Gold USA that used a few select MOSPEADA designs and had similar themes to the MOSPEADA series. It was a complete fiasco from start to premature finish thanks to its pathetically small budget, professional conflicts between the US and Japanese staff, and its creative direction being a mixture of naive ignorance and arrogance from Harmony Gold's side. It was already on the rocks before the sponsors bailed, the exchange rate fell, and the entire project ended up canned shortly after the start of production. IIRC Tatsunoko attempted to salvage some of its investment by reusing some of its original designs for the failed project in Red Photon Zillion. Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles was an attempt to develop an (unofficial) sequel to MOSPEADA with cooperation from Tatsunoko. The only problem being that Harmony Gold could not afford to hire Tatsunoko to do the animation thanks to the Robotech brand's decades of failures leaving them precisely zero investors, so its pathetic budget would only stretch to the point of hiring a pack of fifth string intern animators at DR Movie. For legal reasons, they had to call any old guy Rick Hunter... because they were afraid of getting sued for even an extensive redesign of the Haruhiko Mikimoto design. The problem with this reasoning being that the "long awaited sequel to Robotech" is only long-awaited by Robotech's fairly small - and shrinking - fanbase. Nobody else has been awaiting a Robotech sequel. To turn a decent profit on their dirt-cheap Shadow Chronicles movie, Harmony Gold had to try to compel fans to buy multiple copies of the movie by packaging the glorified DVD extra dub of Love Live Alive with it instead of as a stand-alone feature. There's no incentive for Tatsunoko to take that kind of risk working with HG, especially since if they DID develop an original mecha anime and/or a sequel to MOSPEADA and it was a hit they'd be able to keep the profits to themselves and market it as its own thing internationally. The idea of partnering with HG only makes financial sense if the show's a failure... and they're not quite to the point of deliberately setting out to fail. These days, if you put out a hardcore rewrite of an anime series you get sentenced to trampling under the industry brontosaurus, not rewarded. It's seen as a bad practice.
  18. Seto Kaiba
    ... beyond Frank Agrama's prior conviction for exactly that in 2012. The Italian prosecutors DID say it started out that way... that Frank Agrama and Paddy Chan Mei-yiu hatched a plan at a trade fair in Cannes in the late 70's to launder money by trading movie rights internationally at inflated prices. Agrama dodged a second conviction for money laundering and tax evasion largely due to the statute of limitations expiring. I posted pretty much exactly that in response to an earlier question asking why the Agramas wouldn't sell the company after Frank retires or snuffs it. Frank or Jehan will never sell, because a thorough inspection of HG's business will reveal it's one big Springtime for Hitler. It's not even that... the "35 more years" thing is Robotech fans misinterpreting a form letter "we look forward to continuing to work with you" statement as an indication of how long the license will last. When asked, HG refuses to give any comment on the duration of their renewal/extension.
  19. Seto Kaiba
    Slowly working my way through Kaguya Wants to be Confessed to: the Genius's War of Love and Brains. It's... adorable.
  20. Seto Kaiba
    Because he's an adrenaline junkie and she gets off on that? Well, Sharon had been dragooned into working with Havamal. They'd used her to mind control some of the more uncooperative time-displaced heroes from previous Macross stories (Max, Milia, Gamlin, SMS Skull Platoon excl. Alto, Klan, the crew of the Macross Quarter), so she had pretty extensive access to networks on Uroboros. Uroboros's government happens to have a factory satellite at their disposal, which was used to manufacture all of the VFs you use in-game... and had carried out the limited production run of YF-29B's for Havamal. It wouldn't take any great feat for her to pull a fast one and build an extra one or misappropriate one and cover it up, especially since she has mind control powers. Well, he kind of woke up in it... but wouldn't you? This version of Isamu was time-displaced during his fold jump to Earth. All he'd seen of Sharon Apple at that point in his life was the concert that Jan took him to and the results of Jan's attempt to hack Sharon's system. He hadn't seen her crazy side yet. (Due to the timeframe in which he was punted forward to 2060, Guld, who was following him, is also alive and present on Uroboros and as cheerful as ever.)
  21. Seto Kaiba
    By Harmony Gold's own account, the Tatsunoko-provided writing staff politely but firmly insisted that the Robotech adaptation was a heap of incoherent gibberish and tried to script a story based more on the originals instead. I wouldn't call it a clash of eastern and western storytelling so much as a clash between top-shelf writers and anime's answer to Ed Wood. Unfortunately for Harmony Gold, the hack prevailed through sheer arrogance and brought in more hacks to bring his hack vision to hack life... and a merciful premature death when the sponsors bailed, the exchange rate fell, and the hack's bosses canceled the project.
  22. Seto Kaiba
    Jeez... is there anyone Vic didn't sexually harass? Holy sh*t. The TL;DR version is that, after launching an internal investigation into the allegations of sexual harassment against him by a fair number of his coworkers and convention-going fans and finding out that "Bad-Touch Broly" has allegedly been behaving badly for over a decade with fans and coworkers alike, HR at FUNimation's parent company Sony Pictures ended Vic's employment with the company. Several other companies, including RWBY creators Rooster Teeth Productions, have similarly terminated their business relationships with Vic in response to the growing mountain of accusations against him. Basically, he got #metoo'd, but all the evidence suggests he f*cking well earned it many times over. Vic is suing FUNimation and the first few voice actors who accused him of sexual harassment (Jamie Marchi1 and Monica Rial2) for defamation, interference in existing contracts and business relations, and civil conspiracy. The TL;DR explanation of that being that Mr. Mignogna is suing them for, in short, conspiring to destroy his career and reputation with false accusations of sexual harassment. (Basically, he's claiming this is all made up to ruin him for... reasons? He's not super clear on that front, really. He's going to have some problems with the "made up" part, given the amount of testimony and video/photographic evidence.) 1. A prolific ADR script writer who is also known for voicing Mitsuko in A Certain Scientific Railgun, Rana Linchen in Freezing, Mikako in Heaven's Lost Property, Rias Gremory in High School DXD, Haruna in Negima, Panty in Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt, and Mexiah in Isekai no Seikishi Monogatari. 2. A VERY prolific voice actress who you would know as the dub voice of Misa Hayase in ADV's Super Dimension Fortress Macross, Tsuyu in My Hero Academia, Doll in Isekai no Seikishi Monogatari, Tsubaki in Soul Eater, Renge in Ouran High School Host Club, Kyoko in the ADV Full Metal Panic! dubs, and Bulma in several Dragon Ball Z features.
  23. Seto Kaiba
    Unfortunately the video doesn't show all the variant paintjobs. The default colors for the VF-0 are actually Shin Kudo's blue from Macross Zero. Most non-character VFs in Macross 30: Voices Across the Galaxy offer a choice of four different paint jobs, with a fifth (Havamal's) that unlocks in New Game+. The default YF-29 Durandal has some really trippy ones... two of which are plaid! (No, really!) EDIT: I guess that'd be how you know the YF-29 Durandal is capable of Ludicrous Speeds...
  24. Seto Kaiba
    I wonder if they would, though... since MOSPEADA was essentially a one-and-done entirely by Tatsunoko, so they wouldn't have had as big a stake in it due to its mediocre performance in Japan and they might've even been told by Tatsunoko what was happening to it overseas since it was a Tatsunoko property. I'd imagine they're probably pretty confused by what happened to it, though... especially Sukehiro Tomita, who was VERY confused by what'd been done to his story when Tatsunoko brought him in to help develop Robotech II: the Sentinels. Even Harmony Gold's heavily sanitized, rose-tinted account of the Sentinels creative process admits that Tomita more or less told Carl Macek that the Robotech storyline made no f*cking sense and tried to impose some sense on it himself before Harmony Gold had the Japanese writing team that Tatsunoko had generously provided removed from the project and replaced by Harmony Gold-supplied writers. Smart money says the Southern Cross development team's only reaction to learning about Robotech is "holy sh*t someone actually watched Southern Cross!".
  25. Seto Kaiba
    Accept no substitutes!
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