#but i really miss the original jpn cast too ;;;;;;;;

[persimmontea]

Death Note the Musical 2020 Dress Rehearsal

[crownconstellation]

#ThankYouA3EN - Extra.

what a surprise, the a3 icon and a3 url and a3 Twitter handle has more to say about a3.

no but for real though I love this game and I wanted to comment on that before I delete my copy of A3EN. i love A3 with all my heart; I downloaded it November 1st 2019 expecting to try it because my friend recommended it and then get bored with it and remove it within a week or two as I tend to do with mobile games, but i never did. despite the lack of gameplay the characters are incredibly engaging and well-fleshed out (to the point where this game managed to take the one character i genuinely couldn’t stand and turned him into one of my favourites somehow) and the localization was top notch (and we’re going to be really losing something special when it comes to mobile game localizations by losing it — where else will there be a game with something like Kazunari’s “welcome homemade pie” to match up with his JPN “okaeringopai”? cybird did a fantastic job of balancing keeping the original text and meaning intact while making things understandable & fun to an English audience. they even provided translation notes for certain things on their social media and those were always fun to see....)

it’s even got the only actually good protagonist I’ve ever seen in any sort of game like this one — Izumi is incredibly active as a MC and has her own very vibrant personality instead of simply being a Y/N stand-in. that’s not common at all for these kinds of games from the ones i’ve seen. most games (or anime based on games) like A3! with a nameable female protagonist — whether they’re otomes (which despite being marketed as one A3! was not is not and will never be one), idol series, raising sims as a genre, et. cetera. Izumi stands out from all of them by having such a solid and well-rounded personality and her own goals, motivations, passions, and quirks, and despite being a backbone for the cast they also let her be just as weird as all of them. she’s a rare breed and I loved how she was localized & it’s a shame we won’t be seeing that. (not that she’s got any less personality in JPN, she’s still incredibly charming, but she was so funny the way Cybird wrote her in a way that can’t be replicated.)

good characters, lots of charm, not to mention better music than a lot of like, actually musically-focused series.... basically, i love this game a lot. it’s been an irreplaceable part of my daily enjoyment for the past 2 and a half years and even without the EN server i’m still going to love it and keep playing, but i’m going to miss the EN server dearly because they did a great job. just wanted to say all that.

(also one more thing: in a personal sense, i also owe A3 a lot because i have it to thank for my girlfriend and i getting closer; she initially downloaded it because she wanted to try it since i liked it and we really hit it off talking about the series and got a lot closer as friends through it. and i adore my girlfriend and i’m lucky to have her. so A3! has an extra special place in my heart for that too. thanks for everything, cybird & A3!EN.)

[inazuma-eleven-translations]

Inazuma Eleven Revival Festival - Review!

WARNING - I will mark SPOILERS for Reloaded and the 2 Ares episodes below!! 

Personal Reflection: I’ve been an Inazuma fan since roughly 2010, but TRULY became obsessive from 2013+ when I saw Kirino and fell in love. Inazuma has a special place in my heart because it’s one of my strongest connections to Japan. I learnt Japanese through watching, reading about, listening to and eventually translating for this anime. To actually get to go to an event which marks the start of a new Inazuma series was a dream come true. Being SURROUNDED by a sea of fans wearing cosplays, badges, scarves, uniforms… To know what we have in common is a love for this dumb sakka series - it felt amazing. It would be an even bigger dream come true to make friends with EVERYONE who also loves this series. I hope IE EXPLODES over the next 3 years and I 100% believe IT WILL. And I will do whatever I can to help the JPN-ENG translators!!

Apologies if I’ve forgotten anything important.

Okay! Let’s go!!

Attendees: There was about 2,000 people at the live event. 

Before the Event: The merch went on sale from 10am, and you didn’t need a ticket to the event to queue to buy it. I arrived at 12ish and the queue looked to be about 2 hours long, so I decided I wasn’t interested in buying anything for once in my life. I’ll post a list of the merch later.

There was an area to trade merch and take photos with the cosplayers.

The doors opened at 2pm and the event began at 3pm.

START

It began with Endou explaining the rules: no filming, photography etc… during the event.

Then a ‘memory reel’ where they showed screens of all previous characters. Endou CHEER Gouenj CHEER Kidou CHEER Kazemaru HUGE CHEER Atsuya and Shirou HUGE CHEER Reize HUGE CHEER Go Raimon HUGE CHEER (and Araceli cries) Kirino and Kariya ENORMOUS CHEER Shindou CHEER Torb SILENCE… then laughter… Alpha, Beta, Gamma CHEER Fei CHEER Galaxy HALF ASS CHEER

Opening Songs 

Preformed by pugcats and King Cream Soda. During the song, the characters came to the audience to dance. There was Endou, Gouenji, Kidou, Fudou, Fubuki, Hiroto, Kabeyama, Asuto and Kazemaru. Unfortunately they never went on the stage so we couldn’t see all of them. Endou high-fived a few people.

Introduction

Hino and Mo appeared. Hino said he’s so happy to see so many people gathered here to celebrate Inazuma Eleven, and the huge crowd is proof Inazuma is Avery loved series. Mo adds it’s been 4 years with nothing yet still so many people are here or watching the live-viewing. They introduce themselves formally - Hino as president of Level 5 and Mo as an employee - and Mo said she will do her best with Japanese today too (Mo, PLEASE your Japanese is AMAZING)…

Hino says this event marks the start of a new Inazuma series.

All-Star Cast Line Up

Guest stars were Nojima Hirofumi (Gouenji Shuuya), Terasaki Yuka (Matsukaze Tenma), Tomatsu Haruka (Nishizono Shinsuke/ Kudou Fuyuka, Hattori Handa) and Kamiya Hiroshi (Haizaki Ryouhei).

Tomatsu’s outfit was really pretty, like a long white dress-shirt and blue jeans. Kamiya wore a black and red jacket that looked really cool. By the way, he seems like a very funny person, so I was surprised he’s playing so many last boss characters.

Before Reloaded, there’s a recap of the story so far. Reize’s opening monologue. Fans went wild.

Hino says this will be the first time the voice actors (minus Nojima) see the completed episode, so they will watch it together on stage with everyone. The sit around their own TV. Tomatsu says it feels like being in a living room. Nojima comments there’s no drinks. Mo and Hino sit with them too. Hino says the reason they made Reloaded is because they had to have a reason to connect the original series to Ares.

WARNING! BELOW HERE CONTAINS SPOILERS! 

Inazuma Reloaded Opening: Remastered Stand Up Tachi Agariyo

Raimon return after the FF. The whole school is so happy to see them. They’re crowded by fans. There’s a scene of Miyasaka hugging Kazemaru and the audience went nuts. Endou is so overwhelmed he runs to the toilet as an excuse. Kidou and Gouenji call him into the clubhouse.

Comment - Their body language is WONDERFUL! It’s so realistic the way Endou can’t sit still, or Kidou leans forward to speak.

Gouenji/ Kidou say next is the world as Endou gets excited over the idea of playing new opponents.

Hibiki arranges an exhibition match against Barcelona Orb - the team came from Spain to Japan for this match. The match starts and Gouenji tries Fire Tornado right away. It fails when the goalkeeper stops it with his finger then throws the ball back to Gouenji. They next try the Inazuma Break, which also fails. Kazemaru, Gouenji and Ichinose perform the Phoenix, but that doesn’t work either. 

It’s shown Hakuren, Zeus, Sun Garden, Teikoku etc are watching the match. This got a huge reaction from the crowd.

Barcelona’s captain the rest f the team start to attack. The captain scores without using special moves. The score becomes over 8 (to zero) and Barcelona’s teammates tell the Captain to give them a taste of their real level. The Captain uses his special move - Diamond (don’t remember the second word, possibly ball) where he carves the ball into a diamond. It’s very beautiful. He scores before Endou can even react. Endou seems reluctant to pick up the ball after that shot, like he’s almost in fear - but that doesn’t last for long.

Raimon lose, exhausted, as Endou lies back and laughs to himself, reflecting on how great soccer is.

Raimon are called into an office to talk. I didn’t catch the guy’s name, but an official looking person tells them that Raimon vs Barcelona proves that Japan’s soccer is not at world level. He wants them to join soccer teams around Japan and strengthen Japan’s soccer as member of the strengthening committee. Endou agrees to it.

Raimon are gathered outside their club house, seemingly worrying. They don’t want to split up. Kurimatsu says it’s okay for the Captain and the others but some f the weaker members don’t feel they have what it takes. Kidou says no matter what happens they will all be connected by their hearts.

Domon and Ichinose are going to America, and the managers see them off at the airport. Aki’s wearing a cute pink hoodie. She’s mad that they’re going to America and tells Ichinose that he should represent Japan. Ichinose says he needs to gather strength in US before returning. He doesn’t know yet if he’ll play for a Japanese team or an American one.

Natsumi, along with the managers, are also given roles as members of the strengthening committee but it’s not revealed what they are. Natsumi has her laptop in any case.

Final scene - Break Trio are on top of the hill talking. Endou still doesn’t fully understand what a strengthening committee member is, and Kidou asks if he was can listening at all. Endou seems to have just heard the word soccer and agreed to it.

They say the next time they meet on the pitch they’ll be rivals. None of the 3 plan on losing. They part ways.

Closing theme: 

Remastered Seishuu Oden showing scenes from the Raimon kids’ school life. E.g., Kazemaru and Makksu in class, the kids eating lunch, Kabeyama doing science, the team playing soccer…

There’s a chat session with the voice actors - their thoughts about the episode. Pretty predictable - it was very interesting and great and the animation and remastered moves were great. It’s commented that the leg movement for Fire Tornado is very different, because Gouenji is longer.

They talk a bit about the Captain of Barcelona Orb and the rest of the team. He’s not good-looking but still kind of cool - that’s the kind of character Hino wanted to make. Mo comments on his ‘bear eyes’.

It’s the new characters’ turn to be introduced. The voice actors Ayumu Murase (Inamori Asuto), Michinari Tatsumi (Kimura Ryouhei) and Hanae Natsuki (Okuiri Hiro) come to the stage.

A picture is shown of Baddap, Haizaki and a character from another anime he plays. They all have grey hair and tanned skin and are Last Boss type roles. Kamiya says Baddap was his first villain role and then his second Inazuma role is Haizaki. He wonders just how does Hino see him since he keeps getting villain roles?

Since the topic of villains comes up, a pic of all previous enemies is shown. Terasaki points to each GO character and says alien (Ozrock), future boy (Saru), ghost (Shuu) and human (Hakuryuu). There’s only one human, compared to the original series.

They go through the new 11 members. Some notable comments were:

Michinari -  Hino says Michinari is a Captain like Shindou from GO with many worries.

Okuiri - He wears glasses like Megane’s but he’s a much more serious character.

Iwate - He and his voice actor look alike to the point it’s scary.

Mo and Hino say they feel like something is missing from this voice actor chat session - oh yes, Endou! Junko has left fans a message that will be played on the screen.

A word from Junko: She really wanted to come but couldn’t. She says she assumes Hino is talking and talking and talking. She gave her own proverb: everyone, please enjoy today’s event!

There’s a break for 30 mins where they showed Outer Code eps Hakuren, Teikoku and Sun Garden. Fans screamed for Shirou, Atsuya, Someoka, Hiroto, Midorikawa, the group of Sun Garden kids, Sakuma, Genda, Fudou and Kazmaru.

Inazuma Ares 1 (note - some scenes may be out of order)

Opening Theme: Teppen Mezasou! It was epic! The start focused on Inakuni Raimon, we see Haizaki’s GORGEOUS school uniform!!! Like a blue blazer ~ Sakuma, Aphrodi, Hiroto etc appear~

It opens with the Inakuni kids playing soccer. Goujin makes a shoot but Norika saves it. She said he’s getting better. Sasuke is watching them. They take a break. Norika says soccer is great: it can let you forget about all your worries. I think it’s Hattori who is surprised that Norika has worries. Asuto and Michinari decide to ask the principal if they can play a practice match against another team. The principal (Fuyukai) says instead the soccer club will be demolished because they have no sponsor)

Workers are demolishing the pitch. Asuto runs to stop them but they forcefully push him away. Eventually Michinari had to hold him back. Later Norika is bandaging him up. She said she understands his worries but he was too reckless. Asuto asks her is she okay with not being able to play soccer? She says, of course not. Kirina runs over saying there’s bad news about Asuto’s Mom.

Asuto runs to hospital. His Mom apologizes and says she can’t stay with him. Asuto is upset to lose not just soccer but his Mom too. His Mom assures him he won’t lose soccer - soccer will be there as long as he needs it.

Kirina wonders if Asuto will be okay as he runs off. They guess he is going to the highest point in the island. Asuto reaches the top of the hill and screams.

The next day the Inakuni kids are called into the office where they ware told if they can win one match they can get a sponsor if they transfer to Raimon. That means leaving the island and moving to Tokyo.

It’s revealed Sasuke is a recent transfer student.

The kids are shown wondering about their decision to go to Tokyo.

Hiura tells his Grandma he’s going and she comments things will get lonely around there. By the way, she calls him Ki-chan.

Hattori rides on top of Iwate’s back as he rides a bike. Hattori wonders if the food will be good in Tokyo. 

Michinari is walking with his father. He feels like his Mom will protest if he goes to Tokyo, but his Dad assures him he’ll talk to her.

Mansaku is at his Dad’s sushi restaurant. His Dad gives him his specialty sushi, and tells him to eat. He says he won’t lose to the food over in Tokyo.

Norika, Hiyori and Okuiri are together that evening. They comment going to Tokyo would be Norika’s first time to ever leave the island.

Raimon vs Seishou. Sasuke makes the First Goal with Fire Tornado. This wakes up the Devil of the Field, Haizaki. He goes wild, scoring again and again. Their are 2 special moves - Overhead Penguin and the Death Zone. Kidou does not appear in this match.

Proverb: Soccer will be there as long as you need it!

Inazuma Ares 2

Haizaki and Seishou are beating Raimon. Agirls are watching the match from a box, making fun of Raimon being from the countryside. Anna tells them to be quiet.

Flashback to 1 week before Raimon vs Seishou.

Inakuni Raimon at outside the clubhouse. Norika tries opening the door but it won’t budge. They comment that Raimon/ Tokyo is very different to their island.

The group of girls come over (perhaps members of the student council? Managers?) with Mikado Anna, who introduces herself as president of the student council. The girls are dismissive of Raimon winning their match against Seishou, but Asuto says they will.

Next the kids meet Ootani Tsukushi (do you remember her? A game only character!) who is very bubbly and friendly. She shows them around the school.

The team get their uniforms and are very excited. Ootani is so excited she’s about to cry. They also get the Inazuma Band - a wristband that measures their exercise levels. It’s also a communication device - the coach can use it to contact them. He does so immediately, summoning them to the field.

They are surprised their Coach is from China. He said he prefers Kung Fu to soccer. He made them a crazy training schedule (think: worse than Kidou from GO). Like 100 laps, 100 push ups etc. He asks them what they have to do? Goujin/ Asuto say train and win their next match. Coach says no - they have to NOT LOSE.

The start with laps through Inazuma Town. 

Back to the match. Haizaki’s still demolishing them.

Flashback to a new scene.

Haizaki is showering. Another boy comes in. You see the infamous goggles and Haizaki calls him by his name, so we know it’s Kidou. We only see the bottom half of his face and legs by the way.

Back to the match. Seishou win. Raimon are disappointed but Asuto says while they’re in Tokyo they should do something fun like go to Sky Tree.

Inakuni Raimon are at Tokyo Sky Tree. Suddenly Asuto starts crying. He wanted to play soccer more. The others start crying too, except for Sasuke who is annoyed they are crying in public.

A man walks over and introduces himself as a member of Island Travel - a famous travel agency. He says he he would like to sponsor Raimon. Asuto is surprised because they lost. The man says that the fact they were able to score even one goal against Seishou and the way they fought their hardest to the very end of the match moved him emotionally. There’s more than just winning and losing. 

Asuto reflects. They may have lost but in the week before the match they trained all over Inazuma Machi, getting to know the local community.

So Raimon get a sponsor. The kids are so happy they start dancing and hugging each other.

Proverb: I can’t fully remember but I THINK it was something like, you’ll make your own future out of the path you choose to walk??

Closing Theme: All of Inakuni Raimon jump out of a scales in different poses. Then we see everyone’s ‘battle’ suits. Asuto - knight Nosaka - mage Hattori - Robin Hood/ Cupid Okuiri - Some kind of wizard Sasuke - Shirtless gladiator (by the way everyone laughed)

2 Questions from fans

Boy: Is it relevant that in the ending theme all of the players are divided into 3 'sets’ to showcase their battle armor? Hino says it might be.

Girl: She was very excited. First she said she loves Mo. Her question is - what’s up with Kudou’s redesign/ why is he coach for Seishou? Hino said, history has changed!

Voice Actor Talk: The VAs were asked to draw their most memorable scene.

Nojima Hirofumi: Gouenji didn’t appear! He is literally like… So… Gouenji didn’t appear??? Why am I here again?? I was looking forward to seeing him! He does add the episodes were very exciting, with no boring parts.

Kamiya Hiroshi: OVERHEAD PENGUIN and Sasuke. He said he wants to know what the balance of Ares is.

Kimura Ryouhei: Sasuke’s Fire Tornado. Mo comments Sasuke shoots Fire Tornado with his right leg but Gouenji used his left.

Hanae Natsuki: The ending theme where Okuiri jumps out of the scales, he makes a cute pose like 'kyaa’ waving his arms and legs. His VA is surprised because it seemed unlike him.

Murase Ayumu: Hattori riding on Iwato’s back

Terasaki Yuuka: Kogarashi Manor is brand new!

Tomatsu Haruka: The scene where everyone cries together! OR ~shower scene~ she drew a questionable picture of Haizaki showering. The way she drew his legs were awkward and looked like something… else lmao.

Mo comments that the pose Haizaki makes while he showers is very strange (head down, hands against the wall)

Terasaki comments that it’s strange Kidou took his goggles off in the shower of all places. She thinks they would be useful to keep shampoo out of his eyes.

Apparently Hino argued with staff over whether or not the shower scene was necessary. Hino felt it was.

Kamiya comments that he was watching the fans react to that scene, he’s like - I heard you! I saw your reaction to that! I know you liked that!

Hino reveals that since Ares is a parallel world he wants to redo the whole series up to FF International. He says he really wants Inazuma to run for a very long time.

Terasaki asks Hino to please make a new GO. Hino said he wants to. But this not an official statement, more like ‘if possible I’d like to do that’. Personal opinion - if IE becomes very popular I would say there’s a 40/60 chance of a new GO.

Future of Anime Preview:

Two picture were shown that showed future plans for the anime. One was young Hiroto and Tatsuya. It’s implied there will be an episode with them as children (personal speculation - possibly all the Sun Garden as kids??). Second was Haizaki getting very worked up over trying to win a stuffed bear from an arcade game (personal speculation - it’s not actually for him, but the girl in the flashback).

Game Info: It will be released on Switch, PS4, IOS and Android.

The showed gameplay: Inakuni Island, Raimon Chuugakkou, Match vs Seishou, Kidou running and tackling, Sasuke’s Fire Tornado. Quality was very high, like Breath of the Wild.

Mo made a comment that the story mode map looked very big and it seemed it would take ages for the character to run far distances. Hino said they are working on that.

Next Walker: March 10th 8PM

Closing Words (that I remember):

Nojima: He said he can’t wait for Gouenji to appear. Why does Gouenji always keep us waiting?

Terasaki said she’s so happy to stand on the stage and play an Inazuma character again.

Mo said it’s an honor to stand on the same stage as Hino as a foreign Inazuma Eleven fan (Mo is from China).

Ending Live: Ryuusei Boy by a two girl idol group (name??). Then pugcats and King Cream Soda joined them to sing Saikyou de Saigo and Maji de Kansha. The voice actors joined in and the character suits too. Confetti exploded. Fans waved their glow sticks and cheered.

[postgamecontent]

The RPGs of the Super NES Classic #2: Super Mario RPG - Legend of the Seven Stars

Original Release Date: March 9, 1996 (JPN)

Original Hardware: Nintendo Super Famicom

Developer/Publisher: Square/Nintendo

There was a time where the idea of Mario being in a role-playing game was absolutely bizarre. Now that Mario's had several turns at the genre it's not nearly as outlandish a concept, but just about everyone I knew who was into games at the time was quite surprised by the mere existence of Super Mario RPG. Looking at it from a Japanese perspective, it's not that strange, I suppose. RPGs were hot, parody RPGs were already a thing, and Mario wasn't any more out of place than Doraemon or Godzilla. In the West, though, things were different. Console RPGs were about to break out on the back of an incredible marketing campaign from Sony for Final Fantasy 7 and the meteoric success of Pokemon, but they weren't there yet. The ones we did get typically fell into the fantasy genre, with the odd science-fiction game to mix things up. The best-known console RPGs were heavy on melodrama and usually played things reasonably straight. So yes, the news of the Final Fantasy folks making an RPG starring Nintendo's mascot kind of came out of nowhere.

Super Mario RPG represented the culmination of what was seen as one of Nintendo's closest relationships with a third party. Square had been peddling their wares almost exclusively on Nintendo's hardware for quite some time to great success. From Nintendo's perspective, having both of the major RPG publishers in Japan on their platforms exclusively was a real boon, and Nintendo had even gone so far as to publish Final Fantasy overseas to try to get it off the ground in the West, just as they had tried to do with Dragon Quest. It was in pursuit of that Western success that Super Mario RPG was born. Square had been trying hard to get the Western console audience to bite on RPGs the way their Japanese counterparts had. They pushed the Final Fantasy brand as widely as was possible for a company of their means, made a spin-off that served as a beginner RPG, and even tried setting up an American development team. Perhaps what they needed, it was surmised, was an established star. For Nintendo's part, Shigeru Miyamoto had apparently been interested in seeing Mario star in an RPG. The deal was made and Super Mario RPG entered development early in 1995.

Sadly, this game would prove to be the last collaboration between Nintendo and Square for quite some time. Scant months before the official release of Super Mario RPG, Square made the announcement that changed the entire video game landscape in Japan and arguably the world. Final Fantasy 7 would be their most ambitious project yet, and it was coming exclusively to Sony's new PlayStation platform rather than Nintendo's Nintendo 64. To say Nintendo's president, Hiroshi Yamauchi, did not take this announcement well would be an understatement of the highest order. It would be several years before Nintendo and Square would mend fences and do business together again. What should have been a celebration of a great on-going business relationship ended up being its eulogy instead.

While Super Mario RPG wasn't exactly the game to break down the JRPG walls in the West, it did do fairly well for itself considering how late it released in the Super NES's life cycle. It turned out that with some careful considerations, Mario was a really great fit for a light-hearted RPG that would appeal more widely than the usual game in the genre. Of course, with the relationship soured with Square, Nintendo went in a very different direction for their next RPG starring Mario. Intelligent Systems drew some ideas from Super Mario RPG for their Paper Mario RPG on the Nintendo 64, but it was very much its own thing on the whole. Meanwhile, several former Square employees, many of whom had worked on Super Mario RPG, set up their own new studio called AlphaDream in 2000. Headed by Square's former president Tetsuo Mizuno, the team self-published just one game before beginning a long-term second-party relationship with Nintendo, the greatest fruits of which being the Mario & Luigi series of RPGs.

For a lot of English gamers, Super Mario RPG was their first experience with Japanese RPGs or even RPGs in general. I've noticed there is a lot of affection for the game and its characters, with many of its fans believing that the Mario RPGs never got better than this. I can appreciate that perspective, but I'm not sure that I'd agree with it. The game was attempting a very unusual hybrid of mechanics and themes, and it doesn't always work out for the best. As we would similarly see in the later Kingdom Hearts series, there's a little bit too much Square in here at times. By that I mean the game occasionally feels decidedly unlike Mario, sliding into odd bouts of melodrama and opting for a slightly darker tone than we would see in later Mario RPGs. The pacing is a little hit-or-miss, too. That all being said, I have tremendous respect for this game simply for being largely successful at navigating the tumultuous waters of mixing a beloved side-scrolling action mascot and his world with turn-based battles and leveling up.

Outside of battles, the game didn't do anything particularly unusual by action-RPG standards. The game takes on an isometric perspective and involves a fair bit of platforming and navigational puzzles. These are all things we've seen before, even among the limited selection of games I've covered on this very site. The angled view of the action can make things somewhat tricky as usual, but Super Mario RPG is wise enough not to ask too much of the player in this regard. Anything truly maddening is relegated to optional content, ensuring that even a moderately-skilled player will be able to see the story through. Battles take place in a separate screen, and basically follow the turn-based rules of games like Dragon Quest or earlier Final Fantasy titles. The big innovation here was in including timing-based commands that, if successfully performed, could increase the amount of damage you deal to enemies or reduce the damage you take.

It was a smart way to bring a little bit of familiarity to a situation foreign to action game fans. Sure, you had to pick what Mario was going to do from a menu, but when he leaps into the air to jump on an enemy's head, carefully-timed button presses will allow him to bounce off of his foe's head and keep on going, just like in the platform games. This semi-action based combat would become the hallmark of Mario RPGs, with increasingly complicated mini-games introduced as time went on. Aside from pulling some of the action elements from the platformers into the game, these commands also kept the players fingers busy during battles. For players turned off by how hands-off many RPGs tended to be, this was a welcome element.

There's something else I have to give Super Mario RPG credit for, too. Namely, this is the game that started to flesh out Mario's world and the characters who inhabit it. This game was Princess Peach's second playable appearance in a non-sports game, and the first playable appearance of Mario's frequent foil, Bowser Koopa. The villainous king of the Koopas had never been presented as anything other than a nefarious bad guy before this game. Here, we saw a somewhat-likable oaf who was more egotistical than evil. This would eventually lead to Koopa starring in his own RPG in the third Mario & Luigi game, and certainly did a lot to endear the character to players. Mario's party is rounded out by new characters Mallow and Geno, who seem to have gone over a lot better with players in general than they did with me.

Beyond the playable cast, we also got a lot of world-building that allowed us to see the Mushroom Kingdom and other locales in ways we hadn't before. A village of Toads, the resident staff of Peach's castle, and even seeing Koopa interact with his henchmen all helped contextualize the platformers we had been playing for years. The game also features numerous nods to other Nintendo properties, to an extent that no other Nintendo title had done before. Do Samus and Link exist in the same universe as Mario? Smash eventually tells us that they sort of do, somehow, but it's first suggested in Super Mario RPG. Sure, it's just a bit of silly fun, but it was neat if you were a fan of Nintendo's wider world of releases.

My own experience with this game is somewhat strange. I bought the game the day it released for just over $100 Canadian, a typical price for Super NES games at the time. I blasted through the game over a three-day weekend, and having little desire to replay it, sold it on to a friend for $95. I was already a big fan of Japanese RPGs by this point, and I found Super Mario RPG to be a little too lightweight for my liking. To be fair, it was following a stretch of RPG releases that included Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger. There was only so much it could do. To be honest, very little of the game stuck with me at all. I first replayed it a few years ago when it got released on the Wii Virtual Console. It's a little clunky, and the art really hasn't aged well at all, but the core gameplay is solid enough. It's simultaneously more in some ways and less in others compared to the later Mario & Luigi games.

The game doesn't quite have its tone properly set, for one thing. It feels torn between trying to reconcile the silly nature of Mario's universe with an actual RPG-length plot. Later games in the series would pull back somewhat on trying to develop characters, instead opting for a greater emphasis on events and comedy to stretch things out. That gives Super Mario RPG a feel quite unlike other Mario RPGs, if nothing else. It also feels less confident in venturing too far outside of RPG norms in some ways. The various party members feel in a mechanical sense like the usual templates, something future games would expend a lot of effort to break away from. Still, there's some comfort in Super Mario RPG's embrace of the familiar. I'm not sure if this makes much sense, but if I'm in the mood for an RPG, this game does the job better than the later Mario RPGs in spite of their generally higher quality.

Given its slightly complicated rights issues (the game contains some Final Fantasy music among other bits), I'm glad that Nintendo has made it somewhat readily available through multiple Virtual Console releases and its inclusion in the Super NES Classic. While I don't think of it as highly as some others, it is one of the better Super NES RPGs to get an English translation. It's still a lot of fun, and trying to play the original game on today's TVs can be tough due to latency issues interfering with the timing of battle commands. I suspect that so long as things remain friendly between Square and Nintendo, Super Mario RPG should continue to see releases wherever Nintendo opts to plumb their back library. I only wish it had seen a Virtual Console release on the New Nintendo 3DS so that we could have the whole Mario (& Luigi) RPG series playable on a single console.

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[haillenarte]

hikari no otousan, pt. i;

Here is a partial translation of an interview with Maidy, the blogger behind Hikari no Otousan.

My source text is is this article from 4Gamer, but I won’t be directly translating the information before the interview. Essentially, it’s commentary from the cast and crew.

One interesting point: Yoshida was asked if they did any special visual effects for the shooting of the drama. Yoshida’s team apparently offered to lend their assistance with the shooting — for example, they could have adjusted weather and time in-game as necessary for certain scenes — but the “game actors” refused, and patiently waited for the appropriate lighting and time on their own. So, in that way, shooting the drama in FFXIV was the same as shooting the drama in real life. Also, the screenplay writer himself plays FFXIV, so he had little trouble writing the script for the drama.

Just as a side note from myself (you can skip it if you’d like):

I keep being asked to weigh in on the use of “Daddy” in the title, and my answer is that, while I understand why they went for it — the use of otousan is playful in a way that the more formal Father of Light is not — I think they really, really shouldn’t have, for really obvious reasons. They could have gone with “Dad of Light” if they felt “Father of Light” was too formal, but “Daddy of Light” is just weird.

Alas, it’s too late to change it now, but I did read one defense of the Daddy of Light title from the English forums:

"...Did it ever cross your mind that the name might be for the JPN audience and is appropriate to the context? Two, why in hell would you conclude something creepy because of the use of the word ‘daddy?’”

This comment perplexes me. Or, to put it more bluntly... look, the person who posted this doesn't know what they're talking about. The English name isn't really for the Japanese audience. The Japanese name is for the Japanese audience. I'm fairly certain that most Japanese people are not aware of the sexual slang use of the word "daddy," and they don’t think much of the “Daddy of Light” title, but still, it's primarily thought of as 光のお父さん by Japanese players, not "Daddy of Light." There have been cases where a thing’s English title is better-known to its Japanese players than the Japanese title — but in general, no one’s referred to 光のお父さん as “Daddy of Light” in Japan outside of promotional material.

Also.

Even Maidy, the original author, translated 光のお父さん as Father of Light.

So.

It’s valid to choose “dad” over “father” when translating otousan, but I’m pretty sure the decision to call the show “Daddy of Light” was mostly an attempt to catch viral interest. I don’t know who was responsible for it and I’m not going to point fingers, either, but it feels to me like they wanted people to be interested in it (haha, daddy of light! people are gonna make so many memes!), and if anything, it just turned people off from the whole idea.

Daddy of Light exists to be the English subtitle, presumably for English speakers, and in my view, the sheer confusion it's caused among English-speaking players has been more to its detriment than its benefit.

Also... you know, I often hear this complaint that "daddy" has been co-opted by modern slang, but I don’t get it. Honestly, "daddy" has been creepy for adults to use since the word "sugar daddy" entered public consciousness in the 1920s and skyrocketed in the 1980s. Of course, I don't speak English with my own father, so I guess I can't relate to people who have fond memories of innocently calling their fathers "daddy," but really, I have found it awkward for people to refer to their mothers and fathers as "mommy and daddy" since I was about five years old. Like, even at that age, I thought it was overly childish. If anything, the modern use of the word "daddy" is the only logical development the word could have gone through.

On to the interview with Maidy!

Q: How did your father react when the TV drama was finalized? Maidy: Oh, he was really happy. I think he was even more excited than I was.

Q: Has he complimented or rewarded you at all? Maidy: I didn’t get anything special, but he stood by me and supported me, and encouraged me to go where I wanted to go.

Q: Once he found out about your blog, did your relationship change? Maidy: Yeah, it’s definitely changed. At least, in my opinion, since I don’t have to keep it a secret anymore, I think we’ve become more like normal friends than parent and child. Recently, he’s been playing with (FC member) Kirin-chan and our other friends even more than me, so we’ll talk about that kind of thing at the dinner table.

Q: What was the most difficult episode to shoot? (FC member) Aru-chan: I don’t normally use emotes and talk at the same time when I’m playing the game, so I had to practice doing that a lot...

Maidy: I was always really worried about the other FC members. It was their first time doing this sort of thing, so I’d always be asking, “Are you okay with this?” “Is this too hard?” “Are you stressed out?” I’d try to go around and listen to everybody.

Q: How long did you spend on filming every day? Maidy: We’d film for about two hours every day. After the filming with my friends ended, I’d go location hunting with the director to find new places we could shoot, and we’d do that until midnight.

Q: Rather than the “original author,” it seems more like you became one of the drama’s directors. How do you feel now that it’s finished? Maidy: Well, it was more like everyone was working so hard on the drama, and meanwhile I was there like, “Is it really okay if I just sit and play the game?” So I felt more like, “I’ll do anything to help!” “I really want to help!” But, I mean, as I think every gamer will tell you, it’s fun to challenge new things, and I really enjoyed the experience of working on it.

Q: As far as acting and directing goes, did you feel that any of the director’s requests were unreasonable or too much to expect? Maidy: Well, the director wasn’t used to directing game characters, so at first the acting was left almost entirely up to us. But as he got more and more used to it, he’d start giving us specific instructions like “Smile for four seconds here!” But, in between that and then, we’d throw in our own ad libs and we had a lot of fun competing with each other to give our best performances.

Q: As you get better and better at performing, the bar gets set higher and higher, huh. Maidy: The more we filmed, the better we got. It was very RPG-like in that way. But it was fun because it’s a game, more than anything else.

Q: Did you ever have a character die while filming battle scenes? Maidy: Yeah, we did. We could have had a “rescue team” set up to raise people off-camera, but we decided not to. And then, if it was a rare monster or something we couldn’t possibly miss, we’d be like, “Hurry up! Res me!” It could get pretty tense.

Q: You’ve been writing about the behind-the-scenes story of the drama production in your Producer of Light series. Could you tell us a bit about how that got started? Maidy: I wanted to share this new adventure with everyone, so that we could all get excited together. “It’s gonna be a drama? Well, why not?” I wanted to express my own excitement like that.

Q: You’re keeping this blog about the drama’s production, but I’m sure there are things you can’t write about that you have to keep secret. Isn’t that hard? Maidy: Yeah, there’s a huge pile of things I can’t write about, but it’s still fun.

Q: Your blog is full of screenshots, and you had to experience them again when filming. In your opinion, what was the most impressive scene? Maidy: Well, it’s not quite what you’re asking for, but I was really surprised when I went to supervise the live-action filming, and there’s a childhood flashback scene where Mr. Osugi has a child actor on his shoulders, and I really felt that. All the flashback scenes have such great atmosphere. They’re like my own memories, and they make me really emotional.

Q: You shot the drama based on the events of your blog, but endgame content then is really different from endgame content now. When you were shooting the battle scenes, did you go and equip what you would have been wearing at the time? Maidy: We tried to wear what we would have been wearing, as much as possible. But that was pretty hard, and it caused a lot of issues, and since the Eorzean part of the drama is all (the protagonist) Akio’s mental scenery anyway, sometimes we’d prioritize appearances. But we were very careful with the equipment. Especially with Dad’s, since we had to change it as his character leveled up.

Q: Right now, do you have any in-game goals? Maidy: I’ve got plenty! But the first thing on my mind is always support for beginners. If people become interested in FFXIV because of this drama, I’ll want to talk to them about all sorts of things and teach them not to get lost, and all that kind of thing. I guess I’ll just tell people on my blog.

Q: This drama had the support of all your FC members and friends, but have your friendships changed at all because of it? Maidy: They helped me keep all of this a secret for a whole year, and I became closer to my family as a result. As a friend and as the FC master, I’m grateful for everybody’s support.