I’ve been bouncing between a lot of media recently, and was finding it hard to zero in on a specific topic for this week. So instead, I thought I’d just do a bit of a scatter shot and mention all the different things I’ve been checking out lately.

Dragon’s Dogma 2 is a weird game. It’s not quite like any other game I’ve played, and that’s both a good thing, and a not so good thing. It’s full of friction it’s ways I like, and some ways I could do without.

On March 1st, Akira Toriyama passed away due to an acute subdural hematoma at the age of 68. A private funeral was held by his family who grieved his passing. One week later his death was announced to the world, and the whole world mourned.

Unicorn Overlord, which isn’t the greatest name, but anything with Unicorn in the title gets points from me, is a tactical role playing game from Vanillaware. Vanillaware games are like a rare treat, coming out only every couple of years, always certain to be interesting, if not outright delicious.

One pleasant trend with games in 2024, seems to be the return of the demo. After seemingly becoming a thing of the past, or inadequately replaced by timed trials, available only at high tiers of subscription services, like playstation premium, demos seem to be making quite the comeback.

After being rather disappointed with Final Fantasy XVI and really enjoying Final Fantasy VII Remake, I felt a little trepidation about the next entry into this trilogy. Thankfully, the demo went a long way to assuage my fears, and I excitedly picked up a copy at my local book/game store, even if the discs were misprinted here in Japan.

This winter anime season didn’t have much that grabbed my attention, but there was one unexpected treat, a new season of Blue Exorcist. The first season aired all the way back in 2010, the second season in 2017, and now, in 2024, we get a third.

I mentioned this title in the main blog in reference to my adventures in Shibuya, so I thought exploring this title further would be a fun little cross promotion. This will also serve as the first entry in a (hopefully) continuing series of explorations into titles that have been deeply influential to me as a person, a gamer, and a game designer. 

Welcome back to class! Hopefully you all found an anime during our 101 course and at least dipped your toes into the world of anime. Assuming you’ve all at least seen an episode or two of anime by this point, let’s learn more about this beautiful art form. 

The 2024 anime season seems to be off to a bit of a slow start. Other than continuing anime, not many new series have caught my eye. There was one though that seemed to be fairly heavily promoted, Solo Leveling.

Was going back to school, moving to Japan, working as an English teacher and starting a blog just the longest con to give me a place to write game reviews? Perhaps. Granblue Fantasy is the first game kicking off another stacked year of RPGs, and I was delighted to jump in.

As this little slice of my blog is dedicated to both gaming and anime, I thought it might be interesting to explore the relationship between the two. I was first introduced to video games as a young kid, and anime followed shortly behind.

Hopefully after last week's crash course you’ve all been binging anime, or at least given it a try. Now let’s see if I can tackle the monumental task of turning you all into capital G Gamers.

There’s usually two kinds of people, people who watch a lot of anime, and people who’ve never given it a try. There’s a rare, third breed of people, people who have seen a few titles and enjoyed them, but don’t watch anime regularly. This is an article for people who’ve never given anime a try.

“Mr. Hunter, what is an Otaku anyways?”, I hear you ask. Great question dear reader, grab a nice cup of coffee or tea and allow me to explain.

Well, I made my top list for games this year, so it only seems natural that I do the same for my top anime this year!

For as long as I've been following gaming blogs like Kotaku, or gaming podcasts like Triple Click and Remap radio, I've often thought about my own top 10 list of games each year.