Category Archives: News

Microsoft Creates Official Windows 7 OS-tan

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As stated in the previous post, many of you are probably familiar with the OS-tan meme, which delights in portraying Windows operating systems as cute anime girls. Originally from 2chan, this meme has become extremely popular, spawning thousands of pieces of fanart, as well as flash videos, internet communities, manga, doujinshi, and even its own wiki. The Japanese branch of Microsoft has realized the huge marketing potential of this concept, and decided to create an official OS-tan for Windows 7, by the name of Nanami Madobe. This name is, naturally, a pun: “nana” is Japanese for “seven”, and “mado” means “window”. Images of Microsoft marketing featuring Nanami can be found below.

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Early Endless Eight Sales Indicators Poor

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Although official sales figures for the Endless Eight DVDs are still forthcoming, early indicators seem to reinforce Kadokawa’s pessimism about the much-reviled arc’s market potential. In particular, Akihabara’s various anime-oriented stores have seen low sales, with one employee describing them as “mortal”. Whether or not this will translate into poor sales overall remains to be seen; however, it’s not looking very good at this point.

Despite this, Akiba’s shops still feature a wide variety of colorful Haruhi promotional material, some of it emphasizing the fanservice aspects of the E8 arc. The variety of swimsuit designs featured throughout E8 seems to be a particularly potent selling point. Pictures of a few of these displays can be found below. For a peek inside the actual DVD set itself, check out this post over on Cartoon Leap.

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World War II, Now With Zombie Crusaders and Psychic Soviets

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The year is 1942. The Red Army valiantly battles the Nazi German invaders for Mother Russia’s future. However, a secret occult order within the SS, known as the Ahnenerbe, is resurrecting zombies from the Order of the Sacred Cross (a.k.a. the Crusaders). With these new Crusader zombies, as well as the prince of darkness Baron Nadya on their side, Nazi victory seems inevitable. The only hope… Russian Military Intelligence’s 6th Division, who is enlisting the aid of Soviet teenagers with superpowers to fight this otherworldly threat.

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CGI Sci-Fi To Trailer Revealed

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The second trailer for Fumihiko Sori’s To has been released, giving us a taste of what the director of the Appleseed film has in store for us now.

Kinda puts Gonzo’s CG to shame, doesn’t it? The original 90-second trailer can be viewed below.

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Halo Legends Preview

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Spike TV recently aired a preview of the short film The Babysitter, one of seven similar films that will make up Halo Legends. This particular film was animated by Studio 4°C, who also worked on The Animatrix and Batman: Gotham Knight.

Halo Legends is due for a Fall 2009 “limited release” (likely on Xbox Live) and a spring 2010 “full release”.

–Via Japanator

Aya Hirano Sings for Dragonball Kai

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Aya Hirano, who was recently cast as Dende in Dragonball Kai, will record a Dende character song for the upcoming Dragonball Kai Song Collection CD. The song, entitled “Cure~Boku ga Koko ni Iru you~”, will appear alongside other DBK music, including the OP “Dragon Soul” and ED “Yeah! Break! Care! Break!” by Takayoshi Tanimoto, and songs by Yo Yamazaki and Ryo Horikawa (Vegeta’s VA). The CD is set to be released on October 21st.

Dragonball Kai’s OP and ED, both rolled into one convenient video, can be found below.

–Via ANN

Gundam Rock Released

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It is the year 0079 of the Universal Century… and Andrew is ready to ROCK!

The original Japanese version of this song, called Soldiers of Sorrow, was first featured as the ending of the second Mobile Suit Gundam compilation movie, and has since become symbolic of the entire franchise. Rock musician Andrew W.K.’s English language cover of it, along with several other iconic Gundam songs, appear on his new album, Gundam Rock. This album, which becomes available on Amazon today, is part of Bandai’s 30th Gundam anniversary marketing blitz, which thus far has included a 60-foot (18.5 meter) tall Gundam replica statue (complete with themed weddings), a new television series, and an epic animated short, among other things.

Gundam Rock follows in the footsteps of Andrew’s 2008 album, The Japan Covers, in which he covered a variety of Japanese pop songs. Although reviews for his latest venture into Jpop are still forthcoming, the clips that have surfaced on YouTube indicate that this will be an album well worth owning for Gundam fans.

A Japanese TV news report about the album, as well as Andrew’s cover of “Fly! Gundam” can be found below.

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Sighs of Haruhi Suzumiya Ends

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With it’s fifth and final episode airing earlier today, the Sighs of Haruhi Suzumiya arc (episodes 20-24 of the Haruhi re-airing, and episodes 10-14 of the “second season”) has come to an end. This arc’s claim to fame (or lack thereof) was how unremarkable it was, at least compared to the huge storm of controversy that Endless Eight generated. Fortunately, Sighs has been well-received by the fans; especially in the case of the last two episodes where, by all accounts, the art improved to “near season-1 levels”.

Select screenshots from the episode are posted below.

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Kadokawa Pessimistic About Endless Eight DVD Sales

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It’s no secret that the fan reaction to Endless Eight has been highly negative. A Project Haruhi poll found that 69% of our readers hold a negative opinion of E8 (with 16% classifying it as “an absolute disaster” and 24% saying they didn’t even bother to finish watching the arc). Fans were further disappointed by E8’s ludicrously exorbitant DVD releases, which were priced at ¥6,930 (approximately $72 USD) apiece upon release. As a result of this atrocious marketing strategy, the E8 DVD releases all have very low user ratings on Amazon Japan, averaging around 1.5 stars.  Now, Kadokawa seems to be acknowledging that fans may be hesitant to spend hundreds of dollars to purchase a substandard Haruhi filler arc. The following text comes from an interview between Men’s Cyzo and an employee of the “Kadokawa Media Bureau”.

“Even in the company hardly anyone knows why it took eight repeated episodes spread across 4 DVDs with two episodes each in order to unravel the mystery thoroughly. We are aware of the fan reaction, but…”

When asked if the E8 DVD sales could match those of Season 1:

“Well… All that can be said is that it would be nice if they sell, wouldn’t it?”

Given that E8 aired late at night (which ensured low ratings and less advertising revenue), the fiscal success of the new Haruhi season likely rests on these DVD sales. Unfortunately, it seems even Kadokawa does not think their prospects are very good.

–Via Sankaku Complex (NSFW)

New Negima Feature in 2011

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Ken Akamatsu’s wildly successful shonen/fantasy/action/romance/harem/comedy manga Negima is set to receive an “anime feature”, tentatively set to be released in 2011. Based on earlier comments by Kodansha producer Yoichi Ishomoto, some are speculating that a Negima theatrical adaptation is in the works. This is only conjecture, however, as details are still scarce.

Akamatsu is, naturally, no stranger to adaptations of his works. Negima alone has thus far spawned two TV anime series, four OVA sets, a live-action series, a spin-off manga and a musical. However, thus far, these adaptation have all been disappointments, and by many accounts failed to live up to the original manga. Hopefully, this new project can reverse that trend.

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