Gaming of 2022

 Sigh, another year down and here I go with a summary of my gaming exploits for the year.  Oddly enough, it was a pretty cheap year.  

New games-wise, I think I bought only two, and even Saturn game wise, I didn't get that many probably because the ones I'm eyeing nowadays are the expensive ones.  So.... with that in mind, my good and only "local" friend challenged me to include games I've been playing on my 3DS.

Hrm, tricky, and... Just a tad... dubious because of.... reasons.  But I will add them, and while I'm at it, I will also include any games that may be old that I tried out through emulation.  Overall there aren't that many, so I'm gonna go one by one.  

Let's do it

Androgyne's 2022 Games and Toys in Review

Feel pretty good about this year. Played more of less purchases overall I think.

I'm going to include links to pics so people know what I'm talking about too. Some might be links to stores, but there's no commission here just first google result kinda thing so cut me some slack!

Toys of 2022 Summary of the year.

Ya know, my local friend asked me what my toy of the year was and I was unprepared for that question.  I hadn't really thought about it that much to be honest and so I started thinking.  Then I had a look over my blog to see what I had accomplished and had a little read back over my previous years' summary posts.  

2015   2016    2017   2018    2019    2020    2021   

It was interesting to have a read over and also contrast it with my thoughts on this year.  Last year, I reflected on how pleased I was with my blog efforts.  This year, I don't really think I have grown that much, nor been all that productive about it.  Most of my posts have been banging on about my gacha videos, and translation wise there were only two.  

And I feel that summs up the way I feel about my year.  It's been a bit shitty and unproductive.  Both work & life-wise and blog-wise.  Work wise I have been busy, but in a Japanese office-worker way.  High amounts of pointless busy-ness with low amounts of output, which frustrates me greatly.  Blog wise I haven't really felt all that inspired, which probably stems from my lack of interest at work.  A horrid circle that feeds upon itself.  

Welcome to my personal diary it would seem.  Anyway, enough of the mild depression symptoms, let's talk about the good stuff.

Toys

Velocitron Part 2 Manga Translation.

 So coming hot off the heels or wheels of the first one, here is another couple of pages of 

HAWT RACING ACTION!!  

My beautiful little boy Cosmos badly narrating a race with his gun flag thing.  I tried really hard to fit some Daytona USA phrases in there, but they just didn't work.  Also, it's no real surprise who wins... so...   Although, thiking about it, does that mean Override has a higher speed stat than Blurr?  Hrm...

(Part one here)

And for posterities sake, the Japanese Versions:

Velocitron Manga Translation part 1

 Takaratomy whipped out a little manga to ingratiate the characters of the Velocitron 500 "series" to a Japanese audience(Purely my own speculation), and being the kind hearted fellow I am (also speculation)  and it not being as bat shit crazy as the usual Manga (ahem, I'm looking at you Selects and Legends....) I promptly set about translating it.

And because the Japanese ones usually disappear after a while, here they are too.

Road Rocket's a chick now hey?  Cute to see Devy peering over the top, wonder how they feel about Roadhauler?
I'd be more inclined to buy the Legacy DiaBurnout if it came with a little person figure, like the Masterpiece version does.

Mega Construx Cliff Climber with Fisto

 

Ahh Mega construx, how you tempt my ways.  I was first introduced to this brand through X-Men, where I got Cyclops and Havok, then Later I found me a Thor, Loki and Captain America.  Old Cap was good enough to be my desk toy for a good number of years.

I later discovered Ninja Turtle versions, and set some friends to the task of hunting them down AND then found out about the He-Man versions too.  My first He-man set was a desperate play for a 5 pack, because it had Scareglow in it. (review on the way sometime).

One day while bored and cruising the net, a dangerous occupation I know, I saw these Masters of the Universe sets on sale on Amazon and with a bit of careful planning, decided to take the plunge. Sigh.

This Cliff Climber set wasn't on special as such, BUT it was only 10 bucks and the Skeletor face glows in the dark.  Perfect!  Having no idea what the hell a Cliff Climber was, would the novelty of a Glow Skeletor face be enough to justify bored frivolity? 

Read on....

End of G1 Universe Manga translation part 2

 Aaand here I am with the second part.  What a cute little story of excitement and redemption and friendship.

Part 1 Here

Random notes and what not at the end. 

End of G1 Universe Manga translation!

 Hellloooo ladies and gentlethings, Mr. Sakamoto has been hard at work drawing a new Manga with a bunch of pals and I have been hard at work trying to make it look like an English version of the same comic books.

Well, I have finished and thus I will share it here.  Initially uploaded on Twitter, I messed it up a bit because I despise social networking on the internet.  I have a bunch of accounts I barely touch.  So naturally I made a complete and utter balls up of trying to upload the comic as a "thread" on the twatters.

Random Notes and Ramblings at the end.

Cool mystical glowing foxes!

Ah foxes, aren't they just the cutest little creatures, with the creepiest little eyeballs?  I love them.  And I found these crazy, but awesome foxes with a hint of Japanese magic and mystical-i-ness.  Check out the video to find out all about them!

Revisiting Tenchu Part 2-A Thoughts on Wrath of Heaven

 Good time of day ladies and gentlethings, now that my fun with Shadow Assassins on the PSP has been had, I've ventured back to the Tenchu game I am second-most-familiar with (the first being PS1's Stealth Assassins); Tenchu Wrath of Heaven (WOH).

This is another Tenchu game I played a lot of. Quite a lot of in fact.  When I was younger I managed to Grandmaster each level with each character.  I can't remember if I bothered with all three map set ups, unlikely methinks though.

I started this one a while ago and got distracted by the PSP Shadow Assassins, so now I'm back and thought I'd put in and update thoughts, especially since I'm not that close to finishing it.

Revisiting Tenchu Part 1- Thoughts on Shadow Assassins

 

A while ago I decided my new laptop must be able t handle a PS2 emulator and so I got one. Then I hunted down my favourite games and thought I'd replay some of them.  The first one I looks for was Tenchu Wrath of Heaven and I've been going through that enjoying it quite a bit.

Then with the usual casual research I do looking into things, I decided that I should have another crack at Shadow Assassins, the Tenchu that came out on the Wii and PSP.  Now I have this on the Wii, but at the moment, no Wii.  However, being a fan of the PSP and still having some unfinished games  on that, I decided to grab the PSP version so then I can avoid the waggle controls of the Wii.  Let's see how this goes shall we?

More pull back Batmobiles！

 Glad to say I managed get get my grubby mitts on all the pullback batmobiles from Takaratomy Arts and their capsule toys. Yay. 

SO here is a video of the FINAL THREE.  Watch it and enjoy yerselves.

Previous Batmobiles here;

Tets' Toys and Shenanigans: Mini Batmobiles!! Takara Tomy ARTS Capsule toys. 

Crazy little Gacha Jukebox!

Greetos wonderful denizens of the internet!  Today I have a short n sweet video of a nifty little item I bought while I was touring GachaGachaNoMori.

Made by Toys Spirits http://toysp.co.jp/ , a company that seems to focus a lot on miniature items and I have found myself slowly grabbing more and more from them.  Generally both sculpt and function are pretty high.

This one is a Jukebox, of which there are 5 flavours, for full details, I suggest checking the video, as that is why I made it.

 

Gacha Gacha no Mori Store Walkthough

 In the delightful city of Yokohama is/was a delightful shop full of Gacha toys, called Gacha Gacha no Mori 「ガチャガチャの森」 (the Forest of Capsule toys).  

I thought it was cool as there are just heaps of  gashapon machines all over the place and it just feels a bit classy.  If you have a chance, I highly recommend checking them out.

https://www.gachagachanomori.com/   Their website for store locations.

https://twitter.com/gachanomori　　　Their Twitters as well.

I was allowed the opportunity to stroll through it with my camera and be a nuisance for a while.  So thanks for the opportunity, and if you're around one one day somewhere, check it out!

Also, check out my video that I made.

February 17th is Gacha day!

 So today I found out it is Gacha day!  

The anniversary of gacha being launched in Japan in 1965.  Well there ya go.

It was started by a company called Penny, who stole the idea from America.  Penny is still around to this very day, which is nice.  

Here's a link in Japanese.  Google translate works with this if you need it.

https://www.penny.co.jp/gacha.html

And another link giving us the same information in a slightly different format.

https://zatsuneta.com/archives/102175.html

And the home page of Penny.

https://www.penny.co.jp/

There we go, I just thought I'd share that.  Happy birthday Gacha in Japan.

Legends Sunfire Age of Apocalypse

 

Well, this is a story and a half.  I imported this guy, along with AOA Weapon X and Sabretooth as at the time, they were the only toy representations of the Age of Apocalypse X-Men figures.  If you haven't checked out those pots yet, please do so.  Oddly I was fairly positive that he was made by Toybiz (now gone), but he was ACTUALLY made by Hasbro.  So, there ya go. In case you were wondering.

To summarise my feels, Age of Apocalypse was the series that got me into the X-Men and comics that weren't Transformers (eventually I was a rabid Sonic comic guy too).

If I remember correctly, there was some limitation to this guy, as in shop or something.  He definitely wasn't a regular release.  ** Sometime later.**  After a bit of searching, Sunfire here was part of a vote through ye olde toilet reading Toyfare magazine.  The toilet reading is a compliment of the highest regard.  I loved that goddam magazine when it was alive.

Ok let's go!

Kirby Magnet Capsule review

 Wa hey, over the Christmas break I made a quick trip to a place that has mucho gashapon toys and bagged myself a Kirby magnet.  Then I made a fascinating video on it, becase not many people make videos about fridge magnets and surely, surely someone on the internet wants to watch a video about a capsule toy magnet.

So here it is.  Enjoy

2021 Toy Recap and Toy of the Year

Stock Image so that the final toy of the year isn't prematurely revealed.

Well, its the end of another year and so time to do a little wrap up post. I know for a fact I intended to do one of these for 2020, but managed to forget about it until April or so and had therefore felt like it lost any relevance.  

So, here's a link to the last one I did in 2019

And a link to the gaming post I did for that very same year

Final link is a pretty comprehensive summary and short description of all my gaming gets throughout the year of 2021.

Blog wise, I am kinda happy with what I have accomplished.  I managed to finish up the Generations Selects Manga translations and effect editing, which I enjoyed immensely and also learnt a HEAP about how to do use photoshop and other editing tools, so on personal growth things it was great.  Not to mention the bonus warm feels I get when I hear/read about people enjoying them as well.  (Despite the struggles of the initial story in the first place ).

Secondly I had a rather exciting spurt of video editing  fun and capsule toys, which I would like to keep up with.  It was all going smoothly with a nice flow of video creation, until my little laptop started grinding to a halt.  So I had to get a new one, this time though I focused a bit more on raw power, as when I bought the last, I think I was still editing on *ahem* windows live movie maker, and after that proved inadequate graduated to something better, but the computer had trouble handling it.  Now I put the video requirement at the head of my goals for the computer.  So I have a nice sexy new computer, but have been EXTREMELY lax reinstalling and carrying various files across.  

I am slowly getting my act together though, so if you like those capsule videos please stand by.  

I guess I will summarise the yearly blog wrap with, while blog posts were a slow slog, personal growth and skills increased quite a bit.

NOW FOR THA TOYZ

(After the jump)