Fate/stay night was released in Japan on January 30, 2004 for Windows PCs. In honor of this Type-Moon, Kadokawa, and Banpresto are presenting a special flower themed Ichiban Kubji prize lottery, the A prize for which is B2 size art by CLAMP, pako and Shizuki Morri. Kadokawa's Young Ace has posted a special preview of the CLAMP contribution.
the S prize is a first edition Language of Flowers art book.
From that, they've previewed works by Shinjirou
and Medori
B prize is a school calendar
C is a Fate/zero cafe tumbler set
D is a set of 5 bookmarks
E is buttons
F is Chibi charms
Last chance prize is a Takashi Takeuchi poster
Double change prize is a special edition of the art book with textured cover
Thanks to an ESRB rating that listed Persona 4 for PlayStation 3, pretty much everyone was prepared for Atlus to confirm the 2008 RPG as an upcoming PlayStation 2 Classic release. Atlus followed through with an email header announcing "A Beary Important Date," with Persona 4 set to hit PlayStation Network on April 8.
As Atlus points out, the release date is three days prior to the main character's transfer to Yasogami High School. Thus, those who fancy themselves dedicated Persona 4 players—or newcomers who want an authentic playthrough—can play the original version of the game exactly to the calendar date.
While Persona 4 lacks the enhancements of PS Vita's Persona 4: Golden release, it does feature the original voices behind Chie and Teddie, and can be yours for $9.99.
Actually, last night's episode of Community — which was not only animated like the classic cartoon, but also contained several shockingly accurate '80s GI Joe toy commercials — was pretty much perfect all the way around. But if you missed the show, you at least need to watch the wonderful opening. At least.
This post-apocalyptic adventure/visual novel game is looking to combine the character interaction in games like Ace Attorney with the you-can’t-win of Zero Escape-style games.
Updraft, a Tokyo-based character goods company will release two iPhone 5/5s cases featuring Saber and Gilgamesh, the characters from Type-Moon's popular visual novel Fate/stay night. The cases made of duralumin are collaboration models with famous smartphone case maker GILD design. The company will start accepting pre-orders for the make-to-order items on its official online store UD PREMIUM on 00:00 am, April 4 (JST). The price for both cases is 12,312 yen (about US$118) and the scheduled deliver day is in early June. Check the details with the product photos and CMs below.
Popular media generally has a problem with representation. Fictional worlds are often designed by and for straight white males, and this can subtly affect ho...
NOT A JOKE! NOT AN IMAGINARY STORY! Crunchyroll will soon begin streaming the amazing anime colossus known as JoJo's Bizarre Adventure!
Both Stardust Crusaders and Season One will be available starting on Friday, April 4, at 9:30am Pacific Time, 1 hour after Japanese broadcast for premium members, with free members able to watch one week later. More information can be found on www.crunchyroll.com/jojo.
Story and background
Finally, the long-awaited and hotly anticipated anime title makes its way outside of Japan! Based off of the long-running and hugely popular JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure manga series by Hirohiko Araki, JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure features a different protagonist for each of its story arcs, with the fact that each one is a descendent of the powerful Joestar family. Because of inheriting the Joestar family genes, each member in Stardust Crusaders has special fighting abilities known as “Stand,” which manifests itself differently in each person.
Part 3 of the series, Stardust Crusaders, focuses on Jotaro Kujo, the grandson of Joseph Joestar, protagonist from the second series. David Productions, who also worked on the previous JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure anime series returns for animation production, and famed voice actor Daisuke Ono, Sebastian in the Black Butler series, stars as Jotaro. Daisuke Hirawaka, Momotaro from Hozuki no Reitetsu, voices Noriaki Kakyoin, Fuminori Komatsu, Yasui Shinji from Inazuma Eleven, plays Jean-Pierre Polnareff, Kenta Miyake, Genma Shizume in Darker Than Black, is Mohammed Avdol, Unshou Ishizuka, Kizaru from One Piece, plays the old Joseph Joestar, and Takehito Koyasu, Oberon from Sword Art Online, stars as the antagonist DIO.
JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure will be available to Crunchyroll’s audience worldwide except Japan.
Look Kate! You can have a Shinra Kishitani twitter Icon!
In anticipation of the new anime, durarara.com is staying active. This week, it's celebrating the April 2nd birthday of maverick doctor Shinra Kishitani with a special illustration, featured on a wallpaper and Twitter icon.
This year's eighth issue of the semi-monthly josei manga magazine Be Love, on sale in Japan today, features a special crossover illustration between the magazine's award-winning karuta series Chihayafuru and Detective Conan by authors Yuki Suetsugu and Gosho Aoyama.
The picture will be given away as a prize to voters in a Chihayafuru favorite cover election leading up to the release of volume 25. Buyers of last month's issue 6 can vote by postcard or online through May 7th. Other prizes include special bookmarks and Mizusawa Karuta Club gear.
Volumes24 of Chihayafuru and 83 of Detective Conan are both being released in Japan this week.
Moyoco Anno’s autobiographical manga “Insufficient Direction” will come to life April 3 when it makes its debut as a short anime series broadcast on TV Tokyo Corp.’s late night anime support program “Animusu!”
Brad sez, "Trusty Sword, an Olympia, WA-based RPG developer, has posted hundreds of scanned D&D cover art from dndclassics.com [a site where you can buy all the classic D&D modules and books as ebooks, though some are larded with DRM] to Pinterest. It's awesome."
I shared it more for Chika Umino than Kill La Kill but I think it has something for everyone.
This week, Chika Umino (Honey and Clover, Eden of the East's original character design) won the prestigious Manga Grand Prix at the 18th Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize for her work on shōgi rom-com March Comes In Like a Lion. Despite the big news, she found time to share pictures of yawning pets and doing a bit of Kill La Kill sketching.
The Kuroko's Basketball anime official site decided to get in on the April Fool's Day jokes by switching the main image of the top page from ballplayers to cute chicks, but not in the way you're thinking! There's a Kuroko chick, Kagami chick, and Generation Of Miracle chicks just for one day of enjoyment.
You can see they crossed out the word Kuroko and replaced it with the hand-written Hiyoko, which means "chick" in Japanese. These deformed chicks are often used by the anime staff on SNS during the broadcast, but little did we know that they took the center stage for April Fool's Day.
On other news, Weekly Shonen Jump announced that it will be renewed as a fashion manga magazine, Jumpteen, which is a parody of Seventeen, a teen's fashion magazine also published by Shueisha. April fools!
The long anticipated visual novel spin-off of key's Angel Beats! multi-media franchise was supposed to finally be on its way, with the "-1st beat-" slated for PC in 2014. Looks like a broad 2014 time frame is being scratched in favor of an even less specific future listing.
The highschool afterlife story that Jun Maeda introduced in the 2010 anime will be told across 19 character routes in six volumes, starting with Yui, Iwasawa and Matsushita. Last month, a series of CG for original scenes not featured in the anime were previewed.
The daughter of Osamu Tezuka, legendary creator of Astro Boy, Black Jack, and Buddha, recently discovered some of her father's locked away sketches, including a handful of drawings of a rather voluptuous mouse.
We've seen numerous western superheroes drawn in the styles of Japanese manga artists, but what if famous Japanese characters had been designed by American artists? Jack Kirby's take on Akira might have been an American version worth looking at.
1: Taiga Kagami from Kuroko's Basketball 2: Portgas D. Ace from One Piece
Another popular Japanese hashtag crowding Twitter timelines is "#reply a character, will put a costume of the second character on the first character replied". This hashtag is producing many genius, interesting and totally random images for Twitter users' entertainment. The way it works, a twitter user tweets the hashtag to let followers know the intention and wait for the replies. The first replied character determines the wearer and the second replied character determines whose costume the first character wears. Check out the gallery below!
We've mentioned that the next episode of Communitywill be animated in the style of the original G.I. Joe cartoon
, but now you can see Britta and Abed — er, Buzzkill and Fourth Wall — in action as they teach kids about the importance of... something or other. The episode airs on April 3rd. Can't wait!
Discotek Media has announced plans to release Hayao Miyazaki's Lupin III anime movie Castle of Cagliostro on DVD and Blu Ray. They say that DVD will come out first, likely in August. The Blu-ray is slated for the end of year or early 2015. Both the Streamline Pictures and Manga Entertainment English dubs will be included, it will have the original intro along with the Japanese language and English subs.
Also...
Our own @ReedNelson has already recorded an audio commentary for CAGLIOSTRO. Other extras are TBD, but we have a LOT in mind.
This Sunday, two talents who've spent their lives among the stars will join forces as Stewart star in an animated Cosmos segment. He'll be the voice of 19th century astronomer William Herschel, who explains to his young son about how time and gravity affect light — or, in layman's terms, SPACE GHOSTS.
“I think I’m allowed to tell you that Joseph Gordon-Levitt signed on as a producer for the ‘Sandman’ film, and I had a fantastic day spent with Joe talking ‘Sandman,’ and his knowledge and commitment to it impressed the hell out of me.”
Saber gets all the attention these days, but Good Smile Company hasn't forgotten about tsundere master Rin Tohsaka of Fate/stay night! She got a gorgeous scale figure way back in the day, but now returns as a diminutive Nendoroid.
Kahotan has put up a preview to herald the pre-order period, which starts now. You can see the variety of poses and effects pieces, but my favorite part is the embarrassed expression.
You can pre-order Rin for ¥3,900. She's set for a July release.
Ufotable, the animation studio behind the Tales of Xillia and Tales of Xillia 2 movies, will create a new opening video for Fate/hollow ataraxia when it comes to PlayStation Vita.
The Nitro+Chiral official site has announced that their popular BL game title, DRAMAtical Murder will have an anime adaptation in the Summer of this year and both the anime's official site and Twitter account have been launched at the same time. NAZ, the animation house created with the staff who worked on the DEVIL SURVIVOR 2 THE ANIMATION anime and are currently producing Hamatora will be the studio handling production along with Yukiko Ban for the anime's character designs.
The anime's first trailer has also been posted on the official site. If it didn't work, try here (link via AniMeni).
Aoba is voiced by Atsushi Sakiichi
Koujaku is voiced by Hiroki Takahashi
Noiz is voiced by Satoshi Hino
Mink is voiced by Kenichiro Matsuda
Clear is voiced by Masatomo Nakazawa
Ren is voiced by Ryota Takeuchi
Original Concept: Nitro+CHiRAL Director: Kazuya Miura Story Editor: Touko Machida × Kabura Fuchii (Nitro+) Original Character Design: Honyarara (Nitro+) Anime Character Design: Yukiko Ban Music: Yuuki Hayashi Animation Production: NAZ Opening Theme: GOATBED「SLIP ON THE PUMPS」
Togainu No Chi may come to mind when it comes to anime adaptations from Nitro+Chiral titles and many fan reactions on the internet are hoping that NAZ will do justice and not produce legendary screen cap comparison images to the game, which the previous anime was known for, as the not-so-pleasing artwork was frequently spotted in the show and made for additional entertainment during its broadcast.
Previously listed by Right Stuf, Kodansha confirmed at Anime Boston that they will be releasing Fullmetal Alchemist and Silver Spoon author Hiromu Arakawa's adaptation of Yoshiki Tanaka's (Legend of Galactic Heroes) Persian inspired fantasy epic Heroic Legend of Arslan, serialized in Japan's Bessatsu Shonen Magazine, in print and digital this August.
Also announced at Anime Boston, they will be releasing a digital-only reissue of the acclaimed Mushishi manga, later this year.
Meanwhile, Attack on Titan Colossal Edition will be the first book in the world to include 15 color pages from the original magazine run.
As they describe it:
The Colossal Edition collects the first five volumes of Attack on Titan, bigger than you’ve ever seen them before. Clocking in at 7”x10.5” and around 1,000 pages, this enormous book will be printed on premium-quality paper for the best Titan reading experience.
The color pages in the Colossal Edition are not even in the Japanese tankobon releases. This will be the DEFINITIVE Titan manga release.
After a year's break, the David Production adaptation of Hirohiko Araki's long running, ever shifting JoJo's Bizarre Adventure manga returns this April with a new anime based on Part III: Stardust Crusaders. The character promos are now up to the third in the line of titular JoJo's, Daisuke Ono vocied Jotaro Kujo.
Also recently announced, opening theme will be Jin Hashimoto's "Stand Proud."
Stardust Crusaders, the only of the series' eight parts to be released in English, was previously adapted into two OVA series in 1993 and 2000. The horror/travelogue introduces super powered alter egos called stands, which became a pillar of the franchise going forward as it follows brilliant delinquent Jotaro Kujo's search for the vampire Dio Brando.
The anime production staff
Director: Naokatsu Tsuda
Series Director: Kenichi Suzuki
Series Composition: Yasuko Kobayashi
Character design: Masahiko Komino
Music: Yuugo Kanno
Animation Production: David Production
Cast
Jotaro Kujo : Daisuke Ono (Juurouta Kosugi in earlier OVA)
Joseph Joestar: Unsho Ishizuka (Chikao Ohtsuka in OVA, Tomokazu Sugita in All Star Battle and earlier seasons of anime)
Avdol: Kenta Miyake (Kiyoshi Kobayashi in OVA, Masashi Ebara in All Star Battle )
Kakyoin: Daisuke Hirakawa (Hirotaka Suzuoki in OVA, Kōji Yusa in All Star Battle)
Polnareff: Fuminori Komatsu (Katsuji Mori in OVA, Hiroaki Hirata in All Star Battle)
DIO: Takehito Koyasu (Nobuo Tanaka in OVA)
------ Scott Green is editor and reporter for anime and manga at geek entertainment site Ain't It Cool News. Follow him on Twitter at @aicnanime.
