Lynx7725

Breaking the rules a bit:

I (3130 000 000 results) versus You (1740 000 000 results)

I win!

-------------------------

And On Topic:

"Robin Sena" ( 29 700 results) versus Amon ( 878 000 results)

Amon wins!

-------------------------

And the age-old question:

Love (255 000 000 results) versus Money (235 000 000 results)

Love wins!

-------------------------

Back to the point:

Zentran (1 800 results) versus Meltran (2 150 results)

Meltran wins! (Anyone particularly surprised?)

0083 had Kou, the worst Gundam character ever.

I take it that you have never seen Quess Paraya? (Wonder if I got her last name correct...)

Kou Uraki is a wishy-washy character, but if you have not see Quess... You have no idea what a "worst Gundam character" is like.

Well, that's part of it, as my favorite thing about Gundam "is" Newtypes. 0080 just seemed to be a throw away story. Nothing that happens there is really of any consequence, especially since the the actual threat to the colony is taken away, despite the main characters not knowing.

It's a difference in perspective I guess... nothing particularly wrong or right with that.

Maybe the whole story hangs better precisely because it's inconsequential -- the futility of it all, and yet in the midst of it real courage from a boy-man to do something for the greater good.. even something that would label him as a warmonger.

The layers of irony in the whole story is just entertaining to me I guess.

I honestly don't see what the big deal with 0080 is. I always thought it was the weakest Gundam OVA (by U.C. standards).

It is if you approach Gundam with the expectation of Newtypes in cool Gundam suits laying waste to whole fleets of enemy ships and mecha. <-- sounds like an advert for Gundam Wing.

The beauty about 0080 is its message that nobody wins in a war.. the buildup, character development and conclusion is consistent in that message, and it is presented in a way where most audience can easily relate to it.

C'mon, pretty girl next door in a nice neighbourhood, a nice big brother figure, children running around underfoot most of the time -- life doesn't get much more perfect than this. And the war between Federation and Zeon sucks an innocent in with promises of glory and corrupts him.. it doesn't get more poignant than that.

Personally, I've watched the following.. watched being "Watched from top to bottom":

• Gundam 0080
  
• Gundam 0083
  
• Gundam 08 MS Team
  
• Char's Counterattack
  

Plus various bits and pieces from F91, manga, etc etc. Not a true-blue fanatic.

Of the whole lot, I find 0080 the best in terms of story and character development, 08 MS Team in terms of balance between action and story (though not as good as 0080), and 0083 best in terms of BiG BanGs. CCA is last of the lot as it requires quite a bit of background knowledge to appreciate.

0083, which is a fan favourite, has less ground with me because it mainly showcases mecha and action.. good as an intro to the UC universe, but to me 0080 is what the UC universe is about, really.

Not to mention, if you are not building your system to multitask and whatnots (like a normal PC), and it's a dedicated system, you can actually squeeze quite a bit of performance from older chips.. and add on top the additional cooling factor, etc.

We have mutli-processor servers running off 500mHz chips at work here, individually the CPU isn't impressive, but collectively small chips can do a lot.

I, too, would be interested in a recast.. Destroids are a personal favourite of mine, especially now that Yamato 1/60 Destroids look more and more like vapourware.

Shrug. Please keep us updated.

I didn't watch it, but my friend did, and his review (edited to be more internationally readable) is as follows:

Special Effects: Quite high quality graphics, especially like the part with the 2 assassins killing the 2 masters. Lots of very Matrix like sequences.

Storyline: Huh? There's a story?

Casting: Stephen Chow's the good guy, as always. The rest are normal.

Funny? Not really.

Enjoyable? Definitely.

Nice, but a Zaku won't have the reactor juice to power a Beam rifle.

Is the landscape in scale?

Thanks for da bad ass pics eriku and samuraisouthpaw. 

Personally, I think Black goes with Meister, Red with Streak, and Silver with err.. what'shisname? Smokescreen, aye.

My BT Grimlock just came in two days ago......he is ONE TOUGH mo-fo to transform. Maybe even harder than ol' Smokescreen. 

Aye, Grimlock is a bit hard to transform, and he came rather stiff for me. I particularly dislike his "spine".. I think it's a weak design and should have been better executed. As it is, I don't dare to transform him too much.

Other than that, Grimlock's arms are cute but I feel it may get into the way in Car mode.. as it is, the front wheels would lock up if you turn them at max; and occassionally the fat forearms will push the front wheel off the surface.

Overall, Grimlock's very nice as a display car and as a display bot, but as a transformable toy, he's just one step above part-swaps.. I'm really worried the main spine may snap after some transformations.

Actually I do know what that is... and c'mon, anyone with half a brain and who has been following this topic would know what to expect.

Back to the topic guys. Engrish, Engrish, not the apparent horniness of young nubile Japanese girls.

Hmm, just had the opportunity to look (not handle) at a Rook-type at a local store. Leastway, I think it's an MPC I was looking at.

Suffice to say I had the misfortune (or fortune) to have just purchased a Binalteck Grimlock from said store.. and the comparison between the two, as inappropriate as it may seem, really send the Alpha into the gutter.

In terms of details, the Alpha really doesn't stack up well with recent Japan offerings - or even offerings as far as a few years back. I note that the missiles appear to be nothing more than coloured disks on a white background.. I would typically expect raised details a la models by now, the technology is certainly available.

Also, there were visible joint lines and such; even if you disguise them under panel lining, there is a rickety look to the Alpha, like it's about to fall apart at a moment's notice.

The good thing that I can say is that it's relatively large -- about a 1/60 Yamato, give or take, certainly large enough to play with, yet at the same time it's small in terms of desk footprint. If the quality is sufficiently high (and the price is right), it's worth getting as a display piece as it doesn't take up that much room.

The J-type head sculpt is also throwing me off.. I guess I can rectify many of the shortcoming manually, but it's time I don't have in my (non-existant) social life at the moment.

This visual inspection plus the various horror stories floating around here is seriously giving me second thoughts about getting an Alpha of any type.

Uh-huh.. Okiee...

Truth to be told I'm not sure what the appeal of this game is.. can anyone enlighten?

Aye.. but which year?

Sorry, what's Shenmue? Any linky linky?

For the seller, if he gets the 25 Grand.. aye, I think it does.

I'm fairly sure that some of the bidders are doing it for fun, but you never know. 25 Grand for a piece of paper.. I wonder if the winner's ever going to actually use it in a deck.

EDIT: Godzilla and I were thinking along the same lines. Great minds think alike.. and so do little ones, I guess.

Here's the Bids Listing.

I recognize one or two as online retailers, and you can tell (when it's sub 100) that some collectors are keen on it. But 25 Grand -- USD! -- for a piece of cardboard that is only slightly bigger than a name card?

Better be gold-plated, inlaid with precious gems, etc. etc.

Man.

Haha.. can you imagine it? A USN Carrier Wing comprising of:

• Interceptor Squadrons with ST-14s
  
• Attack Squadrons with Quickstrike F-14s
  
• Electronic Warfare with EF-14s
  
• etc. with F-14 variants
  

I start to drool.

EDIT: changed ASF-14s to Quickstrike F-14s.

But as far as I know, even when a company has international branches, the products created by one still have to be licsenced for distrubition in other territories by the other branches. I mean, take Gundam Seed Destiny, for example. Seed's been reletively successful both in Japan and in America, do it's innevitable that Bandai America will release it here. But, until Bandai America has to liscense it from Bandai Japan. Until they do, it's considered unlicsensed.

It doesn't really matter in this case.. Yes, the license still need to be purchased/ issued, but in this case Bandai US and Bandai JP will just have a nominal transaction to satisfy the legal requirements. For all practical purposes, it's Bandai all the way, so they have a vested interest from the start to go for the fan subbers -- every fan sub copy out there will cut into their profit margin.

The point is, American (any independent really) companies wishing to sub and distribute anime are not likely to take any serious actions against fan subbers, because the fan subbers are providing a FOC service. So long the Japanese animation houses have no interest in distributing their works in the US markets, there is no vested interest for them to take action against the fan subbers, and the current status will remain.

But when the Japanese animation houses have intention to distribute in the US, they will start protecting their IP rights from day 1. That is expected and is really the worrisome thing for the "free" anime community. If the trend is for Japanese firms to start producing direct-to-America content, then fan subbing is likely to be hit. How badly depends on how aggressive the Japanese firms push.

Hmm. Fan subbing, as I understand it, has always been a grey area.

Technically, it is undeniably a violation of the copyright owner's intellectual property rights, but traditionally it has been accepted as "free" advertisement by the owners.

The reason why licensed anime are often pulled from fan sub lists is probably related to the sue-happy nature of the American society, but that's a different discussion.

Fan subbing does hurt the owners.. because there will always be a propotion of downloaders who see no point in buying official licensed versions (especially in my censor-happy country.. hey, we like T&A too.).

Yes, we all say "Support Anime! Buy Licensed DVDs!", but remember, people are cheapskates by nature.

The other side of the coin is the principle behind it. If you do not enforce your copyrights for every infringements, you run the risk of letting one (harmless) offender go by that will allow someone else to use as a precendent to do something you really don't want to happen. Legally speaking, it's safer -- and cheaper! -- to send a C&D than to potentially fight a big court case later.

Coming back to my opening, up till now, the industry (as I understand it) works something like this:

• Japanese Company create anime for Japanese Audience
  
• Fan subbers pick up series and subs it
  
• American companies watch for downloads to determine popularity
  
• American company license from Japanese Company, and sell licensed copies.
  

So, it is to the American company's interests to let fan subbers go on -- because, as some of you points out, it tests the market for you, FOC.

But if the Japanese company wishes to get into the US market, does it make sense to let fan subbers do it? No, because it cuts into the US distribution margin for them. What we should be looking out for is whether MFI is getting into the US Distribution market on its own.

The bigger question is whether Japanese anime companies are in general trying to create animes aimed at the US audience.

Now, the above is my opinions and logical exploration, it can be wrong.. so you're not obliged to agree, though that will be nice for my ego.

errr, M.A.T.S has a page devoted to it.......

here it is

Man, seeing that page brings back memories.. I hope somebody will pick up the Super Tomcat programs, that bird is too mean to let go into the sunset like this..

Man, what is a "Car Rectal" supposed to do? :D

Sorry for the ignorance, but what's "The O"????

The O is The Thing to The Right of The Picture Jolly Rogers put up, next to The Marasai.

Double Post, pls delete, thanks.

Solve by algebra.

Let B be the number of boys before recruitment, and G be the number of girls before recruitment.

Thus:

(1) G = B+3

(2) G = 0.6(B+G)

Substituting (1) into (2),

B+3 = 0.6(B+B+3) <-- (3)

Resolving (3)

B+3 = 0.6(B+B+3)

10B+30 = 6(2B+3)

10B+30 = 12B + 18

2B = 12

B=6 <-- (3)

Substituting (3) back into (1)

G=9