Radd

Umm, have you played Battleycry and any Macross games? I'm not going to say the PSX Macross games are great, but they're better than Battlecry....though Battlecry may be better than M3. Besides, getting an american made game, by an american company, does not somehow justify not getting a plethora of Japanese games that are related in visuals alone. The fact remains there are still Japanese games that we'd like to play, that are not getting US releases. Pointing at Megaman of all things does not prove otherwise.

I have to agree with Keith 100% on this one. Flashback 2012 came out years before Macross II, but went completely ignored. The Marduk have absolutely no relation to anything put forth in both SDF Macross or DYRL?, while the Protodevlin and Varuta forces follow up with and expand upon the already introduced Supervision Army. Macross II blatantly rehashes DYRL?, which is one of my personal gripes with the worst aspects of Gundam, and I sincerely have to disagree with the statement that "Thematically Macross, Plus, 7, and Zero have about 0% in common", and cannot comprehend how anyone who has seen these shows can even come to this conclusion. I'm not going to tell you these sequels were better than II or that you should like them, but they do follow the themes and expand on the plots of each other, SDF, and DYRL? far more than II does, even if you feel it is in ways you do not like.

Galaxy Defenders also apparently bootlegged some Gao Gai Gar toys. It's always the same, they take the basic ideas from an existing toy, modify them (always in ways that one could not possibly call an improvement) amd release them. I'm surprised no one has cried foul on them yet. Still, I don't mind so much. They're no worse looking than most of today's Energon and Armada Transformers.

Well, I did finally pick up the Art Asylum Enterprise A, decided to order it off of Amazon after a relatively successful Otakon. To be sure, it does not stack up against either the Polar Lights or the Bandai model kits, but for those of us that just aren't into building models it's a godsend. Very pretty toy, very detailed....for a toy. Model fans might look at the seams and gaps, and the tacky "Lights and Sound Action!" and moan, but as a toy it ranks highly. I'm already contemplating taking mine apart and figuring out if I can rewire the electronics so I could just turn the lights on and off, without the blinking or the craptacular sound effects. I'd love to have it sitting on my desk with the lights on, and staying on until I turned them off or the batteries ran out. As per all reviews, the stand does suck...a lot. I can get it on the ball joint easily enough, and it holds really well...but the stand itself wobbles endlessly, as if just looking at the ship is enough to send it swaying back and forth.

Wow, DOOM3 looks gorgeous on my GeForce3 set at next to minimum settings. Umm..I'm gonna go play s'more. Bye.

Ah, the dual-layer/single-layer thing puts it in perspective. Blu-Ray does seem to be the superior format, then.

Macross II did completely ignore the entire Protoculture/Supervision Army subplot of SDF and DYRL?, creating a major plot hole with the introduction of the Marduk and Lord Ingus. To address another comment, M7 did not ignore any parts of DYRL? or SDF, and did not introduce any major plot holes. The problems people do have with M7 are entirely cosmetic in nature, and those that have these problems are very vocal about them. By comparison, those that do not like Macross II are very passive.

With very little loss to the US market, since who wants to spend that much for a single DVD with only a single episode on it? Only the most die hard fans, and they're most likely to pick up all versions regardless.

I would think the question would be the other way around. Japanese DVDs cost far more than US DVDs, so it makes sense that they don't want their public importing DVDs from other countries.

So, any comparisons of HD DVD and Blu-Ray? What little I've read points to HD DVD being the better format, able to hold 36gigs per disc as opposed to Blu-Ray's 27, and it definitely will be compatable with older DVD formats.. I'm certain there's other factors, though.

I'm with JBO on this one, at least in that DVDs were already well into their own when the PS2 came about, and they helped the PS2 more than PS2s helped DVDs. However, this is the first I've heard of this 'Blue-Ray' stuff, and with Sony's fanbase already to pick up their PS3's regardless of how good or crappy the system winds up being, it can only help this new standard take root.

No it wouldn't. You are still buying the product, and the maker of the product in question is still recieving support by way of the purchase being made. If you were buying a cheap knock-off of Yamato's toys, where Yamato gets no support from your purchase, then that would be akin to buying a bootleg DVD, which is pretty much on the same level as piracy. As for me, I see no problem with someone downloading a game, fansub of an anime, or anything like that, so much as they do purchase it should the product be worth the person deciding to keep it. As for the whole "toys are for kids" argument coming from a bunch of people drooling over a videogame, on a board dedicated to a cartoon show...well, I certainly hope they are being made with tongue firmly applied to cheek.

I wish I'd been able to make it to the Macross panel on Friday, unfortunately I was so exhausted, having been up since 2pm on Thursday, that I went back to my hotel to conk out around 9 o'clock or so. I didn't have the energy to move from my table in Artist's Alley to really do much else. But I had a blast at the convention. Otazine seemed to do pretty well, so hopefully there will be another issue, and a lot of people dropped by my table to say hi. I wonder if anyone from these boards did? No one mentioned Macrossworld.

I'm gonna have to say I prefere Jazz without the Martinii Porsche racing stripes all over him. Looks tacky on this particular car. Also the "conehead" thing doesn't bother me at all. I rather like it. I certainly don't think it makes him look like a conehead, considering that is not at all attached to his head. However, this is the first time I've noticed that they changed Jazz's face, and that makes the baby Jesus weep. Jazz has a visor, it's a part of the character, why did they have ti change it? He does not look right without the visor. It's still a great looking toy, but I'll always think it could have looked so much better.

Um, I gotta agree with Panon on this one. Sure, the message isn't as deep as that in 7, and there isn't as much character development, for a short OVA Macross Plus deliveres story and character developement very well. The story between Guld, Isamu, and Myung is not the simple love triangle and rivalry relationship we've come to expect from anime, it tells a far deeper tale than that. I love Macross 7, but one could easily play down the amount of character development and story in that saying simply aliens attack and a hippy in a glamrock Valk ends the war with music, simple as that. There's no need to take sides at one extreme or the other. Sure, 7 outdoes most anime in the character developement department, but it doesn't do nearly so well on other levels. Sure Plus doesn't have the level of character developement that a 49 episode TV series could pull off, but what developement it has it pulls off very well, and stacks up admirably against other OVAs and movies of similar length.

That blinged out brush guard looks like crizap. ...but overall he looks excellent! Both Decepticon remolds that we've seen have looked pretty nice (though I'm still very much peeved that Sunstreaker's head is being used on a Decepticon, with no Sunstreaker being planned).

While I'm all for Bandai going after people who are pirating licensed anime DVDs I can see some negative implications here for anime fans. If they're cracking down on people selling bootleg merchandise, which is well within their rights to do so, but they still don't release similar products, the fans get cut off from the merchandise they want to buy and have nowhere else to get it from. That's a minor concern, a much bigger concern is customs officials actively searching for bootlegs. They're probably not going to discern between licensed anime and unlicensed anime. They might not even discern between bootlegs and legitimate region 2 DVDs. While it's unlikely that small, personal shipments will be hassled with, this is more of a concern for places like Valkyrie-Exchange and getting copies of stuff like unlicensed Macross titles. Just a little Devil's Advocate for ya.

Just watch The Night the Earth Stood Still Giant Robo.

But where does opinion end and fact begin? You could be of the opinion that Matt Groening is a better at drawing than Leonardo DaVinci. You could be of the opinion that SDF Macross is better animation than DYRL?. I would argue that the facts of the matter are quite the opposite. Except that, aside from you, Sundown, and Max, no one has strongly argued that the mouse and keyboard is definatively better than a gamepad. And I haven't even been arguing that the gamepad is better... just that PC gamers seem unwilling to accpet that their choice is an opinion based on a matter of personal preference, and continue to work with the assumption that they are in fact working with the best equipment. When does opinion become fact? It can never actually become fact... anyone who says that he thinks Groening is a better artist than DaVinci is actually entitled to that belief. The closest thing an opinion can become to fact is when it is excepted by an overwhelming majority... which goes back to the point that I was trying to make earlier that Sundown seemed to miss when I said that the Xbox version of Doom 3 will outsell the PC version. It is true that my point said nothing about controller effectivness... I'm not trying to claim one is better than the other, nor was I claiming that sales figures decide that one is better than the other. My point about sales figures is that PC gamers have become the vast minority. Most gamers out there will buy Doom for the Xbox, because that's what they use for their games. Most gamers out there will use the gamepad, because that's what they're used to (and no, there is NOT a mouse for the Xbox- at least, not one sold outside of internet stores like Lik Sang). The majority of gamers, given a mouse and keyboard setup, wouldn't even know what to do with it. Sundown is right to say that says nothing about which is truly the better setup, but what I'm saying is that mouse and keyboard PC gamers are the minority, and yet they're convinced that the majority is wrong, and that their mouse and keyboard preference should be taken as factual evidence of the gamepad's inferiority. Hence, the stereotype (I'll admit that it's a stereotype, since most of the PC gamers I know don't fit the bill) that PC gamers are elitists. And hence, why people like Druna are leaving the thread. Any argument against the mouse and keyboard as factually superior is taken as a personal insult, and automatic siding with the gamepad, and a comment of profound stupidity by a few people who are normally very rational, intelligent people in other threads that just can't get over the fact that their opinion is nothing more than their personal preference, and the preferences of the minority. (Truthfully, gamers who prefer the gamepad are a minority as well... the majority actually wouldn't have a preference, having possibly recognized that there are people who play games on PCs, but have never actually considered playing with one themselves.) I'm hoping you misunderstood my argument. Art takes skill to produce. Someone does not become 'good' simply because a certain number of people arbitrarily settle into the opinion that they are good. Sure, someone can like one artist over another, even if the artist they like is less skilled, that is opinion. Also, I did not mean "when do opinions magically turn into facts" I mean there is a division between fact and opinion. There are tools better suited to certain tasks than others. You try using a hammer to take a watch apart and put it back together in perfect working order. Sure, you'll probably be able to take it apart rather quickly, but good luck putting it back together. Is it simply my opinion that a hammer is not a very good tool for watch repair? Try drawing on a computer with a mouse, then try with Wacom tablet. There will be a noticible difference in the quality of the work simply because a tablet is better suited to the task. I've seen few people argue this one, and those that did didn't have very convincing portfolios. There are some that perhaps believe a Model T is a better racecar than a 2005 Mustang. Guess who is going to win the race, though, despite what opinions those people might hold? I agree with you that numbers prove nothing in this argument, no more than the box office numbers prove that Titanic was a good movie. I don't see anyone in this thread, no one at all, saying that a keyboard and mouse are better than a gamepad in all regards, simply a few people pointing out that a keyboard and mouse are simply better suited towards a specific type of game. I'm not a huge fan of FPS games, but for those few FPS games that I do play, I prefere the keyboard and mouse combo because of the fact that it works better. I used to abhor the idea, it took a roommate of mine, sitting me down, setting up my controls and forcing me to give it a try. Does it mean that this combo is the best for all games? Hell no, just try playing a fighting game with a keyboard and mouse.

I seem to have gotten my girlfriend's cousin hooked on Macross 7 now, too. He loves it. I was even more surprised to hear that he wanted to keep the DVDs longer because his sister has started watching it now.

Grimlock is growing on me quite a bit. I'm not more excited about picking him up than just about any Alternator besides Jazz (and Sunstreaker if they ever make him).

But where does opinion end and fact begin? You could be of the opinion that Matt Groening is a better at drawing than Leonardo DaVinci. You could be of the opinion that SDF Macross is better animation than DYRL?. I would argue that the facts of the matter are quite the opposite.

*sniff* Dreams do come true...

Next up, ladies and gentlemen, mouse versus Wacom tablet, are artists just being elitist when they say that Wacom's are better for drawing on computers?

Grimlock as a Ford Mustang? Wacky! I'm dissapointed, variety made the original Transformers so great, and Grimlock was always a Dinobot. Still, he looks awesome and I look forward to adding him to my collection. Can't wait to hear more about this Mini Coop, I'm hoping for Bumblebee!