Genesis Climber Mospeada

After finishing watching Super Dimensional Cavalry Southern Cross  I wanted to make another comparison series to Japanese original version.  Robotech’s Third Season is often thought of as being as good or close to the most beloved season being the Macross Saga.

Robotech’s third series the New Generation of which the Mospeada series gave birth to, is known for it’s characters all being featured in individual episodes, and all their inner demons being dealt with in a very real and psychological perspective.

I am excited to enjoy my childhood love affair with Robotech’s rich character drama and mecha action. and music in a whole new perspective. Despite what die-hard Macross purists will tell you about how the Robotech versions being ‘butchered’ or ‘dumbed down’ versions is an outright lie. So far I have sen about six episodes of Mospeada and the all of Southern Cross, all of which actually had less compelling emotions and dialogue. Then the Robotech rewritten scripts and edits. Very few things are left out in each.

Moving forward, the first episode of Genesis Climber Mospeada is almost identical two things that stuck out for me that Robotech actually improved on greatly, at least in this first episode.

First, the scene where Scott Bernard is riding through the desert he has a bit of a soliloquy that is left out. His thoughts on being the lone survivor and the ghosts that haunt one who is left alive being more frightening than any horror one’s  mind can dream up, is only materialized visually by the image of Marlene floating about his cyclone/mospeada motorcycle in the desert.
To me these words really struck me, it has a universal quality in the real life to real human tragedy. It’s poignance is worth any dramatic tale of war, survival and remembrance.

Finally the music of Mospeada while the Intro “Lonely Soldier Boy” is a raucous rock n roll number with a male vocal part that is unforgettable that deserves being heard loud,  the credits music ,which is a main theme since it replaces the Yellow Dancer song Lonely Soldier Boy in Robotech, is a bit of a sleepy bluesey jazz number with not too much of a stunning efect as the intro or the Michael Bradley/Yellow Dancer “Lonely Soldier Boy”.

abscense, tardiness and fan art

I have been absent from posting for awhile but I am going to keep more regularly posts going. I have recently finished watching Superdimensional Cavalry Southern Cross and will finish reviews where I left off as I go back and watch these again. Also, you may want to re-read some f my posts as I am redoing some of my posts, editing adding and trying to improve them where needed.

As of late I have been re-learning an old past time and passion for drawing characters. combined with my Robotech obsession this has become a quite addictive outlet for me.

Retro Game Review: Castlevania Symphony of the Night.

Back in the 1980’s when two dimensional side-scrollers were the norm for action/adventure games. Castlevania or Akumajo Dracula as it was first known in Japan , was at the top of the most difficult, maniacally frustrating and showcasing unforgettable background music. Castlevania was the game that made you want to burn your NES and hit the glass screen of your tube television. Yet you kept coming back for more beatings from hunchbacks, skeleton armies and flying Medusa heads. It was one of the few games that was maybe even better to play at night with all the lights out in your room.

After several sequels on multiple generations of console gaming systems, some better than others, yet all seemed to be a solid reworking of the Castlevania concept finally a culmination of all the past success had been achieved as a crowning jewel to the story of the Belmont clan and Dracula. This episode follows Alucard the half-vampire son of Dracula.

In 1997 Konami released Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. This classic penultimate example of the side scrolling genre was a bit of a throwback since at that time game the market was flooded with sub-standard First Person Shooters. U.S gaming fans  didn’t appreciate 2-D side scrollers as much as Japan.Therefore that era will always remind me of some classic RPG’s but very awful First Person 3-D games for the most of the latter half of the nineties.  Symphony of the Night re-visited Castle Dracula and all the tradition of Castlevania’s legacy in what was one of the best games of that era on any system. One of the traditions of Castlevania has showcased superb music. Konami composer Kinuyo Yamashita a female composer who wrote a lot of the first music for Castlevania using traditional period music such as the genre of Baroque music in the style of J.S Bach and C.P.E Bach. As well as Romantic, Rococo and classical periods. But Symphony of the Night did review some of the old Castlevania’s classics like Bloody Tears and Wickedest Child though a few had a more Rock instrumentation.

Symphony of the Night added RPG elements to the franchise and solidified itself with the likes of Metroid for a very deep immersion in the game map. I mean in that the player truly feels they can get lost in the world constructed by the game. Dracula’s Castle is vast and has depth and a very highly detailed baroque or gothic atmosphere. there are multitudes of layers and expansive quality that can rival many of the best 3D environments even in today’s generation’s games. There are subterranean environments below the Castle as well as exteriors, brick sky-walks and even ethereal or seemingly dimension shifting areas.

The bosses of Symphony of the Night have so much detail some are quite repulsive. There is a giant rotting Corpse which is Beelzebub and a frightening room containing hundreds of corpses and souls that cluster in one sphere of tortured souls and attack.

Symphony of the Night is the ultimate Castlevania experiences it is thought of by many as being the culmination of all the series and is the peak of Castlevania’s legacy thus far.

Half Moon and Trouble City

Today was another stressful day, trying to catch up with all the money I owe and trying to see if I can possibly get some kind of student loan, even though I have had to forgo finishing college to work full time and being out of a job at the time is starting to really take it’s toll on me. I was however able to escape and enjoy a few episodes of Southern Cross.

Today I watched Half Moon and Trouble City.

I am really beginning to enjoy the intro music: “Deja Vu” is becoming a really decent rival to Genesis Climber Mospeada’s awesome intro. The other counterpart to Robotech’s Japanese original series, Mospeada being the third and Southern Cross the second.

Since I have never seen the Southern Cross original it has been a totally new experience to see the characters I grew to love as a kid from the Robotech : the Masters series in a whole new light with new music and slightly different take on their story.

One difference that really stands out is the music for  Southern Cross being very different from Robotech’s mostly orchestral and a few synthesized ethereal backdrops by Ulpio Minucci, Robotech’s theme music composer. Southern cross has a funk/jazz rock fusion and an occasional pop ballad thrown in as well as some more lighthearted whimsical tunes that really seem a bit odd yet enjoyable. The credits or outro music  again, I am really getting to like the more I hear it, as am I enjoying the intro and outro animation. On to the episode Half Moon really has some serious pressure on Jeanne as in Robotech she has  a sense of guilt after having to leave Bowie to be captured by the Aliens. In the Southern Cross edition however she has I would think even more pressure seeing that her Chief of Staff Emerson is the actual father of Bowie not just his Guardian. The dialogue is a bit formal and rigid in this episode compared to Robotech, it lends itself more to the formal and polite culture of Japan, also the weight of decisions by officers and leaders seems to carry more shame with failure or mistakes and responsibility.  Jeanne has to make some serious decisions however she has a lighthearted and confident outlook in this episode as compared to the space mission of episode 3 which I didn’t review yet. The battle scene is played out decently very minor edits were made for the Robotech Half-Moon episode. It was not too slow of an episode and showcased some decent battle scenes. However in the Robotech version of this episode the scene where Dana finally rescues Bowie and thinks for a second of how much trouble she may be in always seemed a little awkward. However in Southern Cross, it is a bit more explained as when the animation goes to a still frame with some speed lines and a close up of Jeanne/Dana’s face and I can’t imagine why she would assume she would be in trouble or thrown in the brig for, yes ,breaking the rules and engaging the enemy under the guise of a training mission, but rescuing her commander’s son, would be an obvious save of face. However, in the Southern Cross her look of disbelief and the dramatic pause was done to emphasize her shock on how Zor/the red Bioroid’s pilot is still alive after taking damage to the head of the Bioroid. It made a little more sense.

Trouble City had a few more lighthearted moments however it’s Robotech counterpart had a few more edits that were minor there is a little bit more to the scene of examining the captured Bioroid. Still, the scientists are able to find somewhat the same insight into the Zor. They are able to understand that the aliens are using bio-engineered technology and that the aliens are essentially the same as humans on earth. They have the same misconceptions as in Robotech they throw around the same phrases of androids etc. However Chief of Staff Emerson in Southern Cross does have a more logical assumption instead of saying ‘no humans are capable of creating Robotech ships’ as in Robotechs version here when the possibility of space pirates is brought up, he assumes no humans have this kind of technology. That dialogue is a little more logical since human’s were reverse engineering and integrating robotechnology for years up to that point.

This episode is a bit lackluster in both versions with the trench run scene being a bit predictable. We get to see a few Bioroids blasted by HMT-1 Hoveretanks/Spartas. The energy weapons or particle rifles seem to have some serious damage on the bioroids, I think Robotech edited maybe a few quick bits here and there from this battle, not sure I would have to go back and see. But we do get too see some of the Bioroids taking heavy and fatal damage to their armor and fuel spilling out as cables are torn of the armor by the Spartas auto fire There are some more brief moments where we get to see the Tactical Airforce piloting phantom fighters against the the Zor’s Battleship.

however there is a funny scene at the end that puts a lighthearted girlish moment that is somewhat endearing to the female characters of Lana/Nova Marie Angel/Marie Crystal and Dana/Jeanne the episode begins with Dana/Jeanne shopping for a dress and after all the action is over she is finally able to purchase it much to the annoyance of Lana and Marie who seem to have a bit of feminine rivalry . In the Southern Cross version there is a bit more humor in the instance where Bowie enters the woman’s clothing store and is quite embarrassed when picking up a few items by mistake namely some girlish undergarments. It is reminiscent of the Macross Saga or the previous Robotech season where Rick Hunter is dragged into the dress store with Minmei only to be embarrassed seeing superior officers Lisa , Vanessa and Sammie from the SDF-1 in the store as he is crawling on the floor looking for something he dropped he is either worried about being mistaken for a voyeur or is just as embarrassed as Bowie. This scene has a cute yet not incredibly important moment which was omitted from Robotech , in Southern Cross Jeanne tears her dress while leaving on the Hover Bike much to the amusement o Lana and Marie. I have always enjoyed the last bit here where I think in the only instance of all three of the series of Robotech or it’s un-related foreign counterparts that characters face the camera and do some kind of sarcastic or intentionally zany wink. It is another funny yet unnecessary moment that lightens up the series and endears us to the female characters who have a feminine girlish side to their otherwise warrior/military duties and persona.

end of summer

Today was the first day in weeks that the temperature here in San Antonio didn’t go above a hundred. I was finally able to take my three dogs for a brief walk. I spent a portion of the day removing brush, tree limbs and even few small tree stumps to put out for the brush removal that is scheduled for this week. I did get a chance to watch two episodes of Robotech: the Masters. I watched the two episodes Stardust and The Outsiders. I am having more respect for the character of Angelo Dante and his voice actor Steve Kramer. Angelo seems to be one of the most realistic characters from the Army of the Southern Cross. He seems to act very rationally and skeptical. He has the persona of a real soldier and a down to earth personality that the script writers and the voice actor brought to life .