AnimeNation Anime News Blog

Japanese anime studio Office AO now hosts a small resolution video sample of its artistic, experimental animation Ukihune.

Source: Moon Phase

The official site for Square Enix’s sword & sorcerery MMORPG Fantasy Earth: The Ring of Dominion hosts three streaming Flash trailers. Japanese gaming news site 4Gamer hosts large, downloadable, high resolution MPG versions of the game’s opening movie (151 MB zip file) and a gameplay trailer (165 MB zip file). The game will go on sale February 23rd.

Source: Rakuga Kidou

Question:
Is lolicon still legal in the U.S.? It seems that recently the topic has become heated on various forums that there was a change in 2005 to the law.

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Bandai Visual USA has announced that its first DVD release, Patlabor the Movie, will be released on April 25th. Reportedly the movie will be released as a $29.98 standard edition, and an $89.99 limited edition double disc set that includes a 300 page storyboard book and a 184 page archive book.

Source: Anime on DVD

Central Park Media has revealed that the Animation Runner Kuromi 2 OVA will be released on American DVD on May 9th. CPM will also be releasing a domestic Kuromi soundtrack CD later this year.

Source: Toon Zone

Harmony Gold now hosts a QuickTime teaser trailer for its Korean/American co-produced animated series Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles.

Source: Anime on DVD

Seven Seas Entertainment has announced plans to publish a 5 issue mini-series of original Speed Racer comics beginning this July. The Speed Racer mini-series will mark Seven Seas’ first foray into traditional 32-page color comics. For this latest incarnation of Speed Racer, Seven Seas promises an engaging cinematic storyline written by a prominent Hollywood screenwriter, along with dynamic artwork by a top-notch manga artist – both to be announced shortly.

e frontier has announced the release of Manga Studio 3.0, a manga and comic book creation software program designed for aspiring and professional artists. Manga Studio contains everything needed to create high-quality, manga-style comics. e frontier is partnering with TOKYOPOP to release Manga Studio 3.0 in the United States. Manga Studio was originally created in Japan as ComicStudio and has become the best selling manga software in Japan and worldwide.

Bandai Games has opened its official website for the Japanese IGPX game. The game will be released for the Japanese PS2 on March 30th.

Source: Moon Phase

Japan’s D3 Publisher has announced plans to release Xbox 360 versions of its budget line PS2 games Oneechanbara and Chikyuu Boueigun.

Oneechanbara X (the name is a pun on “oneechan” meaning “sister” or “girl” and “chambara” which refers to “swordplay”) will be a new version of the popular, cheesy Oneechanbara action game franchise that features scantily clad girls with swords slaughtering hordes of zombies.

Chikyuu Boueigun X (”Earth Defense Force X”) will be a new version of the action game parody franchise that has girls with giant guns protecting the earth from attacking UFOs, giant monsters, and giant insects.

Source: The Magic Box

Question:
It seemed like in the early part of the decade there was a huge rush to license everything under the sun, but it seems of late that has slowed to a crawl and a lot of great shows are being left out. I’m not sure if this was due to sales or expense of the show to license. Is this at all indicative of the current state of things with R1 companies? Is it now to the point where they are just unable to take risks on potentially unprofitable shows or was the first few years just their way of testing the waters? My concern is that we may be on the downslide when it comes to quality licenses and may soon be depending once more on fansubbers more and more to get those shows with no chance of hitting stateside.

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Ain’t It Cool News has published a lengthy interview and editorial with Dark Horse Comics’ manga editors Philip Simon and Carl Gustav Horn.

WOWOW has opened an official website for the upcoming anime TV series adaptation of Fujisawa (GTO) Tohru’s action/horror manga serial Tokko. The series will premier in April.

Source: Moon Phase

Japanese television network NTV has opened its official website for the Ouran High School Host Club anime television series, based on the manga by Bisco Hatori. The series is scheduled to premier in April.

Source: Moon Phase

Galaxy Anime now hosts an exclusive interview with Ken Berry, Marketing Manager for XSEED Games. XSEED’s first console game releases are Wild Arms 4 and Shadow Hearts: The New World.