Gamer--freakz

Opening Songs
OP 1 - Dramatic Market Ride (Aya Suzuki)

Ending Songs
ED 1 - Naguse (Aya Suzuki)

Genre: Comedy, Slice of life

Episodes: 12



"K-on" anime lookalikes always get me, first "Hyouka", now "Tamako market". "Hyouka" was pretty good, but "Tamako Market" not so much. I mean, I do enjoy various genres of anime, "Slice of life" included, but sometimes its the sheer silliness of these slice of life animes that get me going. "Tamako Market" doesn't have much of those, other than having an incredibly ridiculous talking bird. Everything else just seems a little too normal and uninteresting to get my attention. Still, the tale of a mochi making girl belonging to a mochi making family and running into unexpected events can be entertaining. Most of the characters are pretty streamline normal, which makes it rather difficult to gather some gut busting funny moments. If you're just overall bored however and want something super casual, "Tamako Market" isn't bad to the point that it won't at least put a smile on your face.

Yo man, that's not how you do it.

A happy, easy-going anime like this means that its going to get a happy, easy-going song for its opening, and "Dramatic Market Ride" does just that. Its sung by Aya Suzuki (seiyuu of Tamako), and while it fits the anime, I'm not too much into the actual song. Same with the ending though, its also sung by Aya Suzuki, and the song is called "Naguse". It takes on a slower pace to fit the ending, but still feels too easy going for my tastes to be honest.


Rating: 7.0/10


I don't find "Tamako Market" too amusing or funny, but I don't find it bad either. Its entertaining at times, and its just one of those where you sit down, watch it, and just keep clicking the next episode when you're done with one. There's nothing too exciting about it, but if you don't hate the slice of life genre, "Tamako Market" is easy to watch. It does its best during the times where it tries to exploit its funny, fat talking bird, but other than that, most of the other characters....aren't too interesting or funny. There are probably only 4 worthwhile characters in this entire anime, the rest are just paper cut stereotypes. Also, it had the romance genre tagged on, but honestly I didn't catch anything of the sort....(You know me, I won't put the label "romance" unless there's REAL love going on). The animation and art style is cute, just because it reminds me of "K-on" and "Hyouka".

Dera is one funny ass bird.

Tamako is a regular girl that lives in a busy shopping district where all its residents are bonded like good friends. Her family runs a long time mochi making shop, and her family has been in the mochi making business for as long as they can remember. As the daughter in a mochi making family, she joins in on the hard work in making mochis as well. While going about her day as per normal, she suddenly runs into a fabulous looking bird in the local flower shop. She sneezes on to the bird, and the bird suddenly talks, saying that he is honored to Tamako confessing her love to him. Apparently this bird comes from a faraway land, seeking a bride for his prince, and that a custom to his kind is that whenever someone sneezes at him, they confess their love to him. Dera decides to stay in the district to seek his perfect bride, but was actually forced to stay after eating too much mochis and growing too fat, he is unable to fly away.....


All in all that's about it. "Tamako Market" probably won't impress too much of the people who would watch it, but I'm sure that was not what it was trying to accomplish anyway. You won't need a huge attention span to watch "Tamako Market" (just like "K-on") and actually that is beauty of it. Feeling lazy, want to watch something but don't know what? This might be just your thing if you're feeling lazy as f**k.


Peace.

Gamespot Score: 9.5 (Editor's Choice)

My Score: 9.0

(+)Pros: - New areas are interesting and absolutely mesmerizing, - A LOT more difficult than the rest of the original game, - Great new bosses, weapons, spells and enemies, - New PvP arena allows for PvP specific fights, - Come on, its more "Dark Souls", we all love "Dark Souls".

(-)Cons: - Needs a little bit of balancing in my opinion.

Gameplay time: 10 hours or so

I'm not the kind of guy that gets too much of a kick out of DLCs for games. If I buy DLC for a game, its probably going to be characters for a fighting game (Makoto, Valkenhyne and Platinum for "Blazblue:Continuum Shift" cost me $20), and nothing else. Unless of course, the game for the DLC is badass, in this case, "Dark Souls". Easily on my top 5 favorites list and easily one of the best PS3 games ever released....I'll be damned if I don't get it. So, you don't need my influence to buy this if you own "Dark Souls", hell you probably already played this if you have the game. If you don't what are you waiting for, this is one of the best DLCs for a game to date!


In the DLC, your character finds himself sucked into the realm of Oolacile, the entire area of the Darkroot Garden in the past. It was a sanctuary used for its residents, and people there lived in harmony, until they dug up the pilgritive pigmy. The abyss spread, and the denizens of Oolacile fell into a terrible state. Infected by the abyss, they lost all sense, and became nothing but a horde of mindless savages. Dusk of Oolacile was kidnapped in the distorted time, and your character is tasked by a giant mushroom to rescue her from the clutches of Manus, the father of the Abyss. Looks like shit is getting real for our hero after all.... 

Have a taste of dark magic!

As you step into this DLC, you will immediately feel a chill running down your spine. You haven't played "Dark Souls" for 2 years, and you're suddenly back in this new environment that you've never been to before. Everything looks surprisingly different, and the very moment you step into the fog of your new playground, you are greeted by a massive manticore that lunges at you with all its might. You look around, you see trees, you see a great grove, and many other things. Oolacile looks amazing, and it absorbs you in, just like every other new area in "Dark Souls". You'll feel immersed again right from the get go, and you'll love the feeling of being in "Dark Souls" again.


Fans will be glad to know that the DLC is no walk in the park. In fact, I think its actually EVEN HARDER than most parts of the original game can offer. The denizens of Oolacile hit harder than you'd like, and they don't really give a lot of souls for the effort you need to put in to kill them. Like in most areas in the original game, the enemies in Oolacile gang up on you. Exercising caution is a must, and it doesn't help that in NG+, you'd probably get one shotted by those pesky black phantom mage enemies. Every single boss in the new DLC is rage inducingly difficult (I'll cover them in my boss profiles when the time comes), making most of the bosses in the original game look like pansies.

SHHHHHIIIIIIEEEEETTTTTTTTTTT-

Of course, when you walk into a new area, you expect many new things. The crazy enemies and insane bosses are just part of the overall package. You'll be meeting new NPCs, some that you'll find intruiging if you are into the "Dark Souls" lore. You'll find your bout of exclusive new loot, weapons and armor included. This in the end, opens up more builds for players in the long run. A staff that scales of strength? Yes please! Dark magic for my mage? Why not? More than anything, this just opened a bigger set of possibilities for player builds.....Also, who wouldn't want Chester's armor? You'd look like Hazama with V for Vandetta's mask, its awesome!


The new PvP arena is also a sweet addition to the game. Tired of getting invaded when you don't want a fight? Or tired of trying to invade someone when you want to test your new PvP set? Never fear for now you can pair up against other battle hungry fighters thirsting for a good fight. The battle arena pits you and another opponent in a single arena where you can duke it out. Stats are recorded, your wins, loses, so on and so forth. This is a small addition to me, as I'm not a huge fan of PvP, but it might be bigger to others.

Yo, why the hate?

There's not much to bash about a DLC, especially if there are flaws with the DLC, they would probably be the same flaws as the ones in the original game. However if I were to iron out something, it would be the un-balanced difficulty of the DLC. It seems like Oolacile enemies and bosses have some mighty high resistances to anything that isn't raw physical damage, which is beyond. Its like they are trying to punish INT/FAITH builds, because I don't deal nearly HALF the damage that I can deal to other bosses, which is bull. If only they'd balance out the resistances of the bosses, or make their raw physical defense higher, it'll be more fair.


I don't really review DLCs often, so forgive me if its a tad shorter than normal game reviews. End of story, ITS MORE "DARK SOULS", there's nothing more you can ask for here to be honest. At the end of the day, you get to play more new content for one of the greatest games ever made for the PS3, which is in my opinion, something that's already all too amazing. It provides more of that hair-pulling sensation that we all know and love, what more can you ask for?





Happy gaming!

Opening Songs
OP 1 - Dream Riser (Choucho)

Ending Songs
ED 1 - Enter enter MISSION! (Ai Kayano, Ikumi Nakagami, Mai Fuchigami, Mami Ozaki, Yuka Iguchi)

Genre: Action, Comedy, Slice of life

Episodes: 12



Anime will always be anime, and many a time it will do something ridiculous to catch us all off guard. I would never have watched "Girls Und Panzer", but then again, its just a bunch of girls with tanks. Its like the tank version of "Upotte"....but then again "Upotte" is the gun version of "K-on!"....which is the music version of "Lucky Star"! God....what will they come up with next. Having watched all of the anime that I've listed in the previous sentence, I told myself "Why not? I've survived stuff like Upotte!", and sure enough here I am today with this review. I can safely say that "Girls Und Panzer" is really REALLY similar to how "Upotte" goes. If you like tanks, you'd probably get a better kick out of the anime than the rest of us. If you don't like tanks, this is probably just an anime you'd watch for cliche girl bonding and minor silly laughs.

Even tank warriors can look cute in swimsuits.

Not a huge fan of most of Choucho's songs (Kawaru Mirai was great though), so I can't say much about the opening song. "Dream Riser" is a really cheesy, cliche song about girls trying hard...and well, its not really something that I would listen to. Too cheesy, if it was something catchy, it would be perfect. The ending is among the same area. "Enter enter MISSION!" is sang by all the seiyuus of the 5 main girls of the show, its another easy going song, not something I would listen to.



Rating: 7.0/10



It would be a 7.5 if you like tanks. Since "Girls Und Panzer" takes a huge amount of consideration into its specific tank theme, most of the time the anime goes on and on and on and on and on about tanks, explaining the different types of it. They go really in depth into the name of the tank model, how it served its purpose in wars, battlefields, the type of cannon ammunition, so on and so forth. If you're into tanks, like my friend, you would have your eyes wide open, a huge smile spread across your face as you nod to the facts about tanks when the anime explains it. For someone like me, who knows NOTHING about tanks, I would just stare at the screen, and what I would see and/or hear would just be a bunch of cute girls talking about unnecessary banter....

F**k everything, lets paint our tank and give it flags!

The Nishizumi household has always been known for their highly regarded tradition for tanks. In the world of "Girls Und Panzer", girls undertake tankery, a sport which involves driving tanks as a team and demolishing other teams in friendly competition. Miho, our heroine of the anime, wanted to step out of the tankery business and take something else, to change her life, so she transferred to a new school to take up something new. Unfortunately, in that new school, tankery was also enforced as a popular fad, and many girls wanted to join it, including her friends. Bent on not taking tankery, she insisted on taking something else, but the higher ups of the school asked her to take tankery, as she is of the well kown Nishizumi household. The school needs to win the upcoming tankery tournament to stay alive, and because of that Nishizumi joins as a member for the team.


"Girls Und Panzer" is what you'd expect. Its tanks, and its girls. There's nothing super interesting about it if you don't dig the initial premise of girls riding tanks, and the way they go in depth about tanks and their specs might not interest everyone. There's a decent anime here for everyone, and probably more if you're into the whole tank thing, but honestly, how many tank nuts do you know watch anime? Most of them would be into model building and army stuff won' they?!


Peace.

Not doing one for "Mai Otome", because my favorite for that is still Nao.


I reviewed "C3" not long ago, its about a crazed loli that likes killing shit...lets just leave it at that! It has psychological themes, as well as action, while also retaining a little bit of school life/slice of life in there. "Campione" is just a sexy harem with action mixed in. Its about killing gods and making love with sexy girls to "absorb"/"take in" information from them. Despite all the sexiness and fan service, it is legitimately cool and awesome to watch. "Jojo" is just "Jojo", I reviewed it recently and its just what it is! A crazy experience with a really awkward visual style that not everyone can appreciate...although I really liked it.


C3:Cube x Cursed x Curious 

Animes like "C3" don't come often. The typical high school action anime feel is there, but rarely do they introduce their main characters to be so incredibly screwed in the head. "C3" is like that, and to me, there was one character that totally made me go gaga. 

DAWWWWW

Kuroe is f**king adorable. She is the mascot of the hometown that Haruaki belongs in, as it should be. Being voiced by Yui Ogura is one thing (she has one of THE most loli-fied voices in the seiyuu industry), but she has the most adorable design out of the entire cast. Yes, she's cuter than Fear. Bring out the lolis because  I have a sudden craving for them! Oh, did I mention that she's also funny and a troller at that, a really really cute troller?


Kuroe doesn't appear until quite a bit later, and when she does, you'd already fall in love with her ridiculous antics. She opens up by tentacle raping Fear with her hair powers. She was also a cursed doll that had her curse removed, as she stayed in Haruaki's home. Without her curse, she is but a cute little girl with powers to help others, how can anyone hate this? Of course, to be somewhat useful, she opened a barber shop in the town district and gained a lot of love from everyone, before long she was the mascot of the district.


She became good friends with Sovereignty almost immediately (dolls unite!), and is not to be laughed at in combat. I mean, she generally uses her hair to attack her enemies, and as a small loli doll, she mostly just uses her hair to do stuff. No one should underestimate this little gem of a doll. I did want her to have for fight time tough, because for the most part during the end, she was just a target for being paralyzed and didn't do much....



Campione

"Campione"....its great. I mean, its boobs, its intense kissing, its fan service, its fighting, and its about slaying gods. The term "Campione" is used to refer to god slayers in the anime and that is really freaking cool. Also, its a harem/action type anime, how do you refuse that?

This is hella cute, but I'm damn sure she isn't THIS flat in the anime.

Hehe, many of you would be expecting Erica. Erica is the hottest, sexiest and most seductive out of all the girls in "Campione", that's for sure. But for me, I like Mariya the most. In some matters, sexiness matters, but for other times, other traits do shine. Mariya is the best character in "Campione" for me, because of how she is from time to time. Also, its worth noting that I have a soft spot for shy characters, so Mariya fits right in for me :).


Mariya starts off as a shy, humble young woman who treats Godou with care and strictness. She tells of Erica for her constant acts of indecency, and tries to stray Godou down the right path. Of course, she showed so much care for Godou that even Erica says that Mariya should be the second lover after Erica herself, and even mentions that Godou can only have feelings for her and Mariya. At least that proves that she backs her up!


Mariya is an important addition to the team, but not in the ways of combat. She doesn't fight, but she has magical charms and seals that help during battles when the need arises. Of course, she's there for Godou to kiss when he needs the information, but other than that, she's mostly just a main support character of the anime. A really attractive one.



Jojo's Bizarre Adventure (2012-2013)

Do I really have to? I reviewed "Jojo" not long ago, and well, I won't go too in depth. What can I say about "Jojo"? Crazy, just like my favorite character of the anime.

Thinker pose. Still fabulous.

What can I say about Joseph? Well, he's the complete opposite of Jonathan, his grandfather. Okay, not literally, but he's so different that you wouldn't think that they were related....in a good way. Jonathan was too justice driven, too "by the book". Joseph just does whatever the hell he wants, and because of his boisterous personality, he is easily one of the most liked characters in the anime.


Joseph is like Dante in many ways (old DMC Dante, not DmC Dante). He likes to rile up his opponents, make fun of them, make a silly joke about how they look or fight, then go out all, beat him in a fair fight (or in some cases, not so fair) and respect his opponent. His smart ass attitude makes his opponents hate him, and whenever he goes "YOU'RE GOING TO SAY THIS NEXT", his opponents usually say it and they'd go "WTF?!! How did he know?!". That's how he reads his opponents and eventually drive them into a corner.


Joseph fights with the Hamon within him, which is normal for he IS Jonathan's grandson. Since he has a really nonchalant attitude, he really doesn't give a f**k or realize that it is a power that he can harvest. He likes to chase after pretty women, and doesn't really work hard until he has to (see how he trains his Hamon under Lisa Lisa). He cares for his friends and family, above all however, he is one respectful mother f**ker. I literally saluted along with him when he defeated Wamu.


Peace.

Gamespot Score: 7.5 (Good)

My Score: 8.0


(+)Pros: - Amazing visuals for the DS, - Great music, - Battle system is easy to learn and fun to exploit, - Djinns are as awesome as always, - Huge world for movement and exploration, - Great field mechanics and different skills that can be used to solve some pretty diverse puzzles in dungeons, - Post game content (yes, I know almost every RPG has them), - More party members than previous installments, - Cameos and references to old games.

(-)Cons: - Way too f**king easy, - Sequel bait ending....yeah.....

Gameplay time: 30 hours +

It's been a long time since my last DS game review, hasn't it ("Dengeki Gakuen" was way back in March)? I've never been too big of a "Golden Sun" fan. I've played the original on the GBA, but I just didn't quite get the feel for it and never finished it as a kid. Many years later, "Golden Sun:Dark Dawn" came out, and I just let it fly under my radar. Only years after its release then I picked it up and said "why not?", thus I gave it a spin, and for the first time in my life, I finished a "Golden Sun" game. I'm glad to say that I was genuinely surprised, and really happy to find a RPG with such old school roots. In this day and age, old school is good.



Its been many many years since the previous game, and our old battle worn hero Issac, has already settled down. He has a son, Matthew, and he lives with him on the top of a mountain, watching over the world of Weyard. One day, the son of Garred screwed up with a flying mechanism and went crashing down into the forest below. This is the first time something like this has happened, so ours heroes start to panic. Issac, being the cool mother f**ker that he is, suggests that they all go down to look for him. So now Matthew, Issac, Garred and Karis, the daughter of Ivan who happened to be there, all set out to look for the poor chap. After all is said and done, the three children of our old heroes are sent on an adventure which starts out with a minor purpose, and propels to something big that threatens the fate of the world.

Towns, everyone likes them

"Golden Sun:Dark Dawn" looks beautiful, there's no doubt about that. Among all the games on the DS with 3D visuals, "Golden Sun:Dark Dawn" is one of the best out there, that's for sure. Great attention to detail in the environments will definitely spark "ooo"s, "ahh"s and "woah"s in most players, because I know I was impressed. Its also safe to say that the game looks EVEN BETTER during battles. Chibi-fied characters become normal, full sized characters, and they look amazing at what they do. Skill effects can look overpowering at times, and some of the more powerful Djinn summons look REALLY badass, like old school "Final Fantasy" summons. Plus, you combine all this with the AMAZING battle music (I love Sakuraba, but his "Golden Sun" work has really been the best so far), and you've got yourself a hype pumping battle.


Battle is the standard affair you get out of old school RPGs, and is mostly the same as it's predecessors. You take turns to hit enemies and they take turns to hit you, its a simple process that most gamers must have encountered before at least once. Basic mechanics such as normal attacking for physical damage and using spells for magical damage apply here, but exclusive to "Golden Sun" games, we have the Djinn system, which is COOL as f**k. Like in old games, you spend time traversing the world, and occasionally, you run into Djinns. These sly f**kers are hard to get, as most are usually hiding in some high edge corner which require some puzzle solving or power from a later level to get. Some even encounter you during random battles. Djinns are like the summons and Materia of "Golden Sun", and come in handy in MANY different ways. Depending on the affinity type of your characters, Djinns will boost or weaken them accordingly when you equip them.

I CALL FORTH DA POWER OF DA DRAGONZZZZ

A Djinn  of different affinity is going to weaken the user, but will grant him/her new spells usually not accessible. Its a really cool system, but while equipping all Djinns of similar affinity to a character is best, swapping around is also an option you might find worthy of exploration. Using them in combat will grant some flashy attacks, and when using multiples Djinns will sometimes summon another Djinn of extreme power to pull off something ridiculous looking. The world is HUGE, and exploration is done via a world map like old "Final Fantasy" games, while going into a location will switch to the normal map navigation. With a HUGE world map, there is a shit ton of locations to explore, and most dungeons, have puzzles. Using the different field skills that you have, you interact with objects to clear path ways or create new ones to proceed.


This includes using wind to blow up petals for you to step on, shooting water to douse flames, using energy to push blocks and logs, or using a pull type magic to lunge you across pillars. There are tons of these little interactive objects and different complimenting spells, so it can get rather difficult at the higher level dungeons, hell some puzzles are harder than the bosses that come later. And you know, since THIS IS a JRPG (one with an old school feel at that), you can expect, post game optional content. Optional bosses and dungeons galore, you can probably still net a good 10 hours or so after you finish the main game (f**king Dullahan). Its also worth noting that this installment has more party members than previous ones (8 as compared to the previous games' 4), which gives more variety. Plus, if you're a fan of the old games, cameos and references to old characters will make you smile.

Meh, just a bear and 2 birds

As I said this was the very first "Golden Sun" game that I cleared, and I'm not sure if this was the case to old games, but this game is way to f**king easy. THIS, was my major concern with the game. Not the touch screen menus or anything like that, its the difficulty of the game. If there was a hard mode, I would have picked it. I died ONCE throughout the entire game (and it was because I didn't know how to fully utilize my Djinns during that part of the game), and the last boss....didn't seem like a last boss, he was so easy! Hell the Roc was harder than he was (f**k I'm sorry if I spoiled you, the only worthwhile challenging boss in the game is Dullahan, but he's post game). The sequel bait ending, I guess its also a bad thing. Most people hate to see sequel bait endings, but honestly, I want the sequel already :D.


"Golden Sun:Dark Dawn", is a great JRPG for the DS that can really get you going. The old school feel and gameplay made me stick around, because nowadays, most JRPGs play themselves, and are void of that exploration feel that games like "Golden Sun:Dark Dawn" can provide. If you missed the old days of "Final Fantasy 1-9", this game can bring you back. Fans of old series will definitely enjoy this I suppose, but as for newcomers, you'll like it if you love old school RPGs, otherwise, maybe not that much. It is however, too easy to be of much challenge (hell the hardest parts were the puzzles). Nintendo if you're watching this, make the sequel harder please, or power down the Djinns if you really can't balance it out.





Happy gaming!