The Virgola is a fictional machine designed as a video game original for the crossover mecha game Super Robot Taisen Z (Super Robot Wars Z). By “original,” we mean that it does not appear in any anime. So far, this includes Original Generations anime seasons 1 and 2.

The Setting

The Virgola is first presented as a series of three prototypes being flight tested to gather data for eventual adoption as the Earth Federation’s next generation mass-produced humanoid weapons system.

SRW Z is not only a cross-over of mecha, but of dimensions. Consequently, this Earth Federation is merely the one in which Mobile Suit Gundam Z: A New Translation (i.e. the three-part movie version) takes place. During an AEUG attack on a lunar base, the only force deploying fast enough to respond is Glory Star, the test pilot group responsible for testing the Virgola units. However, time and space bend and warp, and the members of Glory Star are warped into another world… where finally, a “Dimension Bomb” (from the sci fi series Orguss) leads to a strange new world mixing many worlds at once…

The Virgola

Full Height: 19.8m

Full Weight: (Reference) 51.4 metric tons for Unit 1

Power Supply: Minovsky Reactor + “Sphere”

Armor Composition: Unknown

Mechanical Designer: Mika Akitaka

Mysteriously, the Virgola itself was as astonishingly general purpose machine. Amuro Ray calls it a “Shoe-Fitter” in that it will suit the style of any pilot at any skill level, while providing a high level of offensive power through the use of its primary weapon, the Gunnery Carver (above, right side).

In the original test machines, the three Gunnery Carvers were used for firing high velocity slugs (“Straight Turret”), blunt physical attacks, and three entirely distinct modes of special attack unique to each unit: a “Jack Carver” (a giant jackknife), a “Barley Scythe” functioning as a beam weapon that reaps the harvest, and a “Ray Straight Turret” beam attack capable of straight line mass destruction. In addition, each unit carried a “Ray Pistol,” a hand-held beam weapon used only for rapid fire assault purposes or as an emergency weapon.

This reinforced the Virgola offensively, but was of no assistance defensively. While enjoying broadly high specifications, the Virgola was not equipped with either a shield or a sword for use in close combat, and its armor was not especially resistant to enemy attack. As such, the Virgola units could be one-shotted by a powerful enough attack…

Glory Star

Stepping back from the setting, Glory Star’s concept was mixing military trappings with a college sports team. As such, the uniforms look like dress uniforms (we never see any representations of spacesuits for any member, though we should not take this as meaning they don’t exist but rather as a style decision by the developers). Numerous battle phrases are like cheer phrases motivating the team on to victory. Pride, in particular, is a theme. For that matter, the name just begs these comparisons.

Go, Glory Star! Go! – Denzel Hammer

The members are Denzel Hammer, a veteran squad leader and instructor with a gift for gunnery, originally piloting Unit 1; Toby Watson, a usually happy-go-lucky pilot whose attitude screams “jock” but with a hard, serious edge in the midst of battle, specializing in melee with Unit 2’s Barley Scythe; and Setsuko Ohara, a relative greenhorn whose lunar base sortie was her first actual combat. While having an extra affinity for gunnery, her future is wide open, and she is one of the most player-customizable pilots in Super Robot Wars gaming history.

Left to Right: Toby, Setsuko, Denzel

Tragedy and Awakening

Just before the Dimension Bomb sends a number of worlds smashing together and fusing into one strange Earth, the mysterious Asakim Dowen appears and murders Denzel, who had swapped machines with Setsuko due to damage to her Unit 3 (which the veteran could handle better than she could).

Following a time when she was blown into Paradigm City (of “The Big O“), Setsuko recovers her own (quite bitter) memories and travels across the world, searching for Toby. At the end of her journey, she finds Toby – in pursuit of Asakim. Joining together, they fail to deal a decisive blow – apparently something Toby has failed at a number of times while on Asakim’s tail. Together, the two pledge to continue Glory Star, no longer as paid members of a formal military, but helping those who strive to put the world right (which by now has long included the AEUG people, since the Titans are, well, jerks!).

Of course, they also pledge to avenge Denzel (a.k.a. “Chief”).

Instead, Asakim lures the two away from the main force (which by default becomes named “Zeuth”) and even though reinforcements appear on both sides, Asakim fakes his own defeat only to turn around and wreck both remaining Virgolas, slaying Toby and instilling fear and terror into Setsuko with a physical beating in the flesh, until a “savior” named Raven arrives to save Setsuko… for now.

And so, Setsuko is alone.

Setsuko Ohara

Setsuko is young, well-meaning, very earnest and sincere… and is left with deep emotional scars after Toby’s death, which came a short while after Setsuko had finally shared her budding romantic feelings for him. He was fond of Setsuko as well, in a way that wasn’t quite as, well, teacher-student as with Denzel before his own death.

Virgola Unit 1, having already incorporated the remnants of Unit 3’s Gunnery Carver, was now infused with Toby’s Barley Scythe and his combat data. This Virgola Kai (Improved Virogla) could accommodate a 20% increase in pilot skill from Setsuko before maxing out. Thus, the onus was on her to break through the “wall” as she followed the half of Zeuth that allied itself with PLANT (in the Seed Destiny plot), which was then allied with the Diana Counter (from Turn A Gundam), which proved to be only one Moonrace (lunar dwellers) faction, and the Super Robot forces with less of a problem with military methods of operation and devoted to fighting alien threats.

Thus, there would be no lack of hard, bitter fighting for Setsuko. Slowly, she improved, but when it was time to test her spirit against Asakim and his succubus-like minion Xine, Setsuko broke down, her spirit still filled with fear. Yet mysteriously, Toby Watson – not dead?… – appeared to save her from being finished off by Xine, before disappearing again to pursue the enemy.

Finally, she answered the call to face her personal demons alone, and while Raven returned to support her against an assault in force by Xine (using AI-controlled machines to back her up), the entire Zeuth detachment showed up to provide support. Knowing she was not alone, Setsuko found new reserves of strength and Xine was once again driven off.

While stopped at a base belonging to Chimera, Raven’s force (part of their “enemy” the Earth Federation, but secretly aiding Zeuth and claiming to be dedicated to improving the world), a truly mad (as well as ugly) scientist belonging to Chimera offers to overhaul the Virgola. Setsuko ignores entreaties to turn the skirt-chasing geezer’s offer down and wants to become stronger however she can.

The resulting Virgola Glory was, externally, simply fitted with a wing system that allowed non-transforming flight in an atmosphere and overall improved agility. Armed with this unit, Setsuko once again answered a call to do battle with her personal demons, this time from “Toby.” But mysteries remained.

As the scientist explained to Zeuth’s members, such as Amuro and other interested pilots with high technical aptitudes, the Virgola in and of itself was nothing special… but the Gunnery Carver was, with parts that were “black boxed” and could not be externally analyzed. Furthermore, and this was the big mystery, the Virgola was over-specced to the point of being able to handle 200% of its own internal reactor’s power output.

What was the mystery of the Gunnery Carver? How could its secrets be accessed? Perhaps by something that could not be compelled by science, such as reacting to a human emotion? Love, perhaps? This was dismissed at the time, but in short order, these questions would be partially answered… in the worst possible way.

The Valkyrie of Sadness

Setsuko after Toby’s death. “For today only… let me cry…”

While the Virgola’s maneuverability had been greatly improved, the heartened Setsuko underwent a breakdown in the Gunnery Carver, rendering it inoperable. Forced to rely on the Ray Pistol, Setsuko engaged the mysterious black crow machines that seemed to work with Asakim everywhere, along with a mysterious ally of Asakim, Rand the Wandering Mechanic, and his construction machine colored, giant wrench using, super robot style Gunleon.

Even though the Virgola dealt with the crows entirely adequately with only the Ray Pistol, the Gunleon and its pilot, Rand, had great reserves of strength, and enormous power. The Virgola was nearly destroyed in a single blow. On the verge of death, Toby once again emerged to knock back the Gunleon. Finally, both turned to face the Gunleon together…

…and “Toby” shot Setsuko’s machine in the back.

The mysterious powers at Asakim’s command allowed him to temporarily borrow the illusion of Toby, down to his voice and tiny mannerisms, to fool Setsuko… and to truly crush her spirit once and for all, for that was the path that rested between him and his objective.

And so, “it” happened.

The Sphere

The central part of the Gunnery Carver was a second power source, but what called to it was not love, but sadness – true, soul-crushing sadness. Setsuko had found the depth of despair, and now, the Sphere awoke.

The Gunnery Carver lost its false shell and took on its true form, the Nautilus Carver, a weapon that seemed to pulse with its own life force, with a “barrel” that resembled a nautical creature.

Doing great damage to Asakim’s machine with her new power, the emotionally shattered Setsuko learned to turn her despair against her enemy, and strike hard.

Forgive the horrid resolution; it was hard to find a pic. – J

Setsuko would continue to pilot what would now be known as the Virgola Glory until the end of the game, though it later underwent a later evolution as the further betrayal of Raven – secretly one of Asakim’s comrades – further sent Setsuko into the depths of despair, beginning a process of transformation of her body. First, loss of taste; then, temporary blindness… but her sight returned, and she was able to continue fighting until the conclusion.

The Virgola Glory

Aside from the wings, the Virgola Glory gains special weapons from the Nautilus Carver:

– A straight line MAP weapon (that is, affecting a bunch of squares in a row) with two “ammunition” shots. That is, once clearing the relatively low morale requirements, she can fire the MAP weapon twice and not suffer any depletion of her machine’s “Energy” reserves, but will then be unable to fire the weapon until resupply or, more likely, until the stage ends, you go through intermission, and sortie for the next battle.

– A “Nautilus Carver” Attack that combines the blunt strike, Barley Scythe, and Jack Carver style attacks into a single high powered attack that will penetrate any “barrier”.

– An improved Ray Straight Turret style attack that has the best and most satisfying attack animations on Setsuko’s side. It’s long ranged, it hits hard, and it leaves stardust behind. It is called, “The Glory Star“! I consider it completely worthy of the name.

Character & Mecha In Game Terms

As mentioned earlier, Setsuko is one of the most customizable characters in SRW history.

In actual gaming terms, she receives all of the “pilot points” (which can be used to purchase skills or raise parameters of pilots) that Denzel and Toby received until the moment of their deaths. Thus, she truly does inherit the spirit of Glory Star. How you use that advantage is up to you.

For fully half the game, Setsuko is, put bluntly, a below average pilot in an above average machine. In particular, her “Skill” rating – which governs critical hits, how easily others critical or use special skills against you, etc. – is low. She is adequate, and handles her weapons well, but she is nothing special.

After her personal awakening, she gains a bonus to all of her parameters across the board. This still doesn’t make her an Amuro Ray, but it’s a start.

Remember, her main characteristic is that she gets a huge load of Pilot Points earlier than other people. She can use whatever high end skills you prefer to purchase with all this at a much earlier stage than others. Later, she just piles on, because, well, the MAP weapon combined with her The Glory Star attack and a high overall attack ability means she’s wiping stuff out left and right, earning more Pilot Points in the process.

Personal Quirks

Setsuko’s default tendencies are as follows:

• Heavy support attacker. Her “native” Support Attack skill rises to level 4, meaning she can follow up one unit’s attack with her own up to four times in a row, provided she is adjacent and not ineligible for some reason (can’t support an air attacker from the ground). This is her only true “starting” skill.
• Unlocked: SP Regen. This means, once she awakens, she is one of the precious few characters in the game to restore ten “Seishin Points” (often called Spirit Points, at any rate, what’s used for in-battle power-ups that are unique to every pilot) at the start of every Player Phase (player turn). This is a huge help over the course of a long battle…
• Platoon Leader Bonus: +10% Damage With All Shooting Attacks. This is just gravy, but still, it comes up. This means The Glory Star, the MAP weapon, and the bread and butter Straight Turret attacks will get a +10% to damage until the end of the game.

Another thing anyone wanting to use her might want to think about is, the Virgola is not inherently high defense, but Setsuko has a higher Defense stat than typical “real robot” pilots (i.e. Gundam series pilots). While any sane player is using special equipment to combat the Virgola’s defensive deficiencies – barriers, armor enhancements, maneuverability enhancements, plus my favorite, throwing money at the problem and upgrading – it’s not a complete package.

While I tend to prioritize skills that help me destroy the enemy faster and easier, at least early to mid game, giving Setsuko the skill that boosts defense, accuracy, and critical hit rates the closer your mecha’s HP get to 0 may not be a waste of time at all. Take the attitude that, in this game, you will get hit; it’s just a matter of time, and how bad the enemy wants it. And barriers aren’t foolproof; Tri attacks (squad team-ups) and weapons like the Nautilus Carver itself (though that’s yours…) will breach a barrier and go straight to HP damage.

But oh well. The bottom line is, early on, the extra pilot points are an offset for Setsuko being raw; later, there are few truly bad choices. You stock her up on whatever skills make sense for you. I’ve tried lots, such as giving her an S rating in Air and giving her a Minovsky Craft to boost the Virgola’s own rating to S, meaning it’s better than C, B, or A. That makes her take less hits too. Combined with the SP Regen and Seishin skills like Concentrate, you won’t be hit much like that, either.

And That’s A Wrap.

Some may wonder why I bothered to do this. Well, basically… I wanted to, and things flow a lot easier when I’m writing about something I personally like. That’s kind of why, even though the blog stats say Gundam 00 still brings people in, it’s hard to write about that because I was never a fanboy, just a viewer. Really loved the visuals, and the machines were pretty good, but I hated the humans ^^ Relatively speaking.

Setsuko, though, I like, on a gut level and many others. I like a lot of main character candidates, but this one is the antithesis of spouting taunts at the enemy and laughing at the opponent’s demise. (You know, like Asakim…) No, she’s doing this because she cares, and because she doesn’t want other people to have to go through the suffering she has.

More importantly, she becomes able to back it up – and in force, becoming a true Valkyrie avenging the souls of the dead, cutting a path through the battlefield, laying waste to those who deeply and richly deserve wasting.

By the way, Setsuko is a nice girl, fundamentally, and that’s not something you can teach. It runs deep. I find myself plenty willing to cheer her on.

By the way, Rand is the other potential main character, and their roles flip somewhat if you play him instead. He’s actually awesome. Rough around the edges to say the least, but even though he goes through his own challenges, he forces a more positive experience… and his machine is just a lot less likely to blow up than the Virgola. So there.

Nonetheless, Setsuko’s devastating in late games, and that’s how I like it. – J

A Recurring Cultural Theme

One issue continually revisited by Japanese video games, and the writing and storytelling culture that infuses it, is the idea that the world is corrupt in many ways, and it must be changed – but breaking it entirely is cruel and indeed, quite genocidal. So we half-break it.

What I mean is, in a game like Tales of Vesperia, the “end villain” isn’t really a villain in the sense of desiring nothing but ill; he’s just an enemy of all humanity because he figures that humanity is the problem. His being born human isn’t at all the point. He just sees humanity as destroying the natural world for its own sake.

In this case, leaving the world as it is leaves it hurtling towards destruction. Breaking the world and cleansing it of all mankind preserves the ancient natural world, at the cost of wiping out all of the infinite possibilities of humankind. The result that the “good guys” aim towards is to change the world, which violates the “protect the old order” stuff (which is why you have to fight that guy, since he intends to veto that plan), but which gives humanity a chance, and gives a new lease on life to a world that wasn’t all it could be by any stretch.

In the Final Fantasy series, generally speaking, any good that comes out of things is a result of overcoming an apocalyptic threat that threatens to destroy the world, space-time as we know it, and so forth. The entire world is rocked and changed and comes to the brink of destruction, but is spared through heroism and sacrifice and great deeds. The future is not dictated by this victory; instead, the possibilities that the future can hold are protected, and the exact form the future will take is left to others.

These kind of themes are simply too widespread in Japanese gaming, particularly in the RPG genre, to ignore. So the question arises, why? Why is this the form it takes?

I mean, totally aside from clearly defining something for the characters to do, which is kind of important for a game, why this form? Why not a good world to be protected nobly, for instance?

Cultural Memory

Let’s look, with as much sensitivity as we can, to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The world that native soil Japanese (“nihonjin”) knew was shattered completely. Now, things had been getting harder and harder, sure. It was war. The unrestricted submarine warfare on an island nation was having effects that it never achieved against the British isles. Nonetheless, the atomic bombings were a cataclysmic end to the world that people had known.

Yet it was not the end of all existence. Though Japan was fully conquered, its laws rewritten and all but the barest fig leaf of imperial rule left standing, this was the gateway to what eventually became a brighter future. In spite of modern economic stagnation, Japan is light years away from the ruin that it faced at the end of WWII.

In other words, the world known to “nihonjin” was half-broken – and things got better.

Now, this is not to say that everyone is happy with every aspect of the outcome. But, we’re talking about fantasy RPG’s here. One fantasy, which is really just a very big fantasy, is changing the world. Yet changing the world, without becoming the villain of your own story and being justly hated by all good peoples, requires a big set-up.

So, it’s entirely understandable that the “good ending” becomes change riding on the back of the villainy that aims to break the world fully rather than half-way. Without this villainy, the world could never have been changed; it would have remained stagnant. Yet the villainy is villainy because it aims to go too far in pursuit of a chimerical absolute, a final solution that is too final to resemble anything good people could want. Some sacrifices are simply too high – and this is coming from a nation that sacrificed plenty in pursuit of imperial war aims.

So every day, game players throughout the world participate in half-breaking the world. Except, in these cases, they are active participants searching for better solutions, not simply following blind ideologies because they offer a perfect path in theory.

To the extent that Shinto respect for nature shines through a lot of games, and movies and books as well, it is not just because nature is thought of as a good in itself. In addition, it is open-ended without the promise of absolute solutions. When a nation has been buffeted by cataclysmic negative change under the rubric of absolute nationalism, yet finds industrialization, corporatism and so forth to be lacking in soul and somehow hollow and incomplete, there is a reflexive cultural reach back in time to roots that feel safe, comforting, and non-threatening.

Most of what we see in video games concerning this isn’t actual Shinto; it’s emanations of the same general idea. Take the Tree of Mana in the Seiken Densetsu series (known in the west as Legend of Mana). This is basically a spin on Yggdrasil, the World Tree of Norse mythology. This tree also figures very prominently in the original Tales of Phantasia, while a merely giant tree is featured as the more or less guardian angel of an entire town in Tales of Vesperia, which is shown in the above picture (in blooming form).

So why not go all nature? Why not aspire to a world without humans? Well, totally besides the fact that we don’t, broadly speaking, try to commit self-genocide, we’re seeking a middle way that allows cohabitation with nature, and the enjoyment thereof, without strangling it. Also, the simple fact is, advanced technology is cool and entertaining. It draws us to games, comic books, movies, futuristic novels, and so on. These are the worlds of cyberpunk, mobile suits, and space ships.

In other words, an awful lot of this is just very elaborate expressions of our human search for a better way: not completely industrial and urban to the point of abandoning not only nature, but our very own human spirit… yet without abandoning the entire idea of civilization, without which we simply cannot thrive as a species.

In the course of this search, many more fictional worlds will be half-broken along the way. But if it’s not a cause worth fighting over, you can’t have the man vs. man and man vs. entity conflicts that make a story compelling. – J

Old Times, Good Times

Super Turrican is one of the games for the Super Nintendo that, owing to the system, had “Super” tacked onto the front. Featuring a man in an armored suit, with some similarities to Metroid, this action platformer featured some incredible synthesized music. I have included a sample of this music below from Stage 1-3.

My only personal connection with this game is through game rentals in my early teens, but I remember the music of this stage well, even now. Amusingly, in spite of the action nature of the game, this music instilled a Zen-like state of peace in my mind. Perhaps the better to go out shooting things with. Perhaps.

Listen for yourself and enjoy the experience. – J

This Blog Is About Art.

When you really get down to it, art is what this blog is about. Art is an expression of culture. Culture is my broader subject, but art is how I can best focus attention on that subject. For its part, art takes many forms, including anime and video games. These, too, express culture.

Recently, Gamespot had a “Why It Matters” feature on storytelling. Gamespot was eager to point out that this is not the same thing as “the plot.” Rather, a story in a video game is told through how the player experiences the game. This is a good observation, and one I wish to build on here.

In anime, the plot is not the entirety of the story. Nor is the script the story itself. Anime, built upon manga roots, is partly a visual medium; it is also heavily reinforced by sound, not only from the veteran-packed domestic voice acting (声優、seiyuu) industry, but by the wide varety of sound effects and music used to dramatize the experience. While sound effects and music are crisper, the experience has changed due to changes in visual technology.

Gundam 00 (double-o) is an excellent example of this. This was the first mecha show to really show us what could be done in full HD, though a great deal of praise must be given to Macross Frontier. While HD is something accomplished with extremely detailed, computer assisted backgrounds, older examples of inserting computer graphics into anime had spotty success, and felt jarring and unnatural much of the time. Comparing Gundam 00 to, let’s say, the original season of Aquarion, would result in amazement at the difference.

Put another way, Gundam 00 seems at home with an extremely high degree of technical wizardry. This is part of the story of the show, and a great deal of the artistic value of the show can be measured by how the story is told visually.

Now, I am well known among my friends for not being a great fan of the writing of Gundam 00, which I found to be far too mechanical for my tastes. Meant to be two seasons from the start, numerous events had to happen as scripted without any meaningful variation or the whole project would have been thrown off. Many characterizations were meant to be pretentious in one way or another. Overall, the whole show suffered from issues with creative genius… at the episode and show scripting levels.

Unlike some of my friends, I did watch the entire show and suffered through its difficult parts to see all the spectacular mecha in action. The mecha were absolutely not lacking in creativity; the designers did a lot of serious thinking, much of which is appreciated by serious fans who do a lot of chatter about the pretend physics details that interest them and draw them in. There’s a large “wouldn’t this be cool?” factor to it.

So, my personal feeling is that what success Gundam 00 has had – and certainly, it is considerable success – is thanks more to the creativity put into the machines portrayed in the show than the sense of grim inevitability of mankind’s sucking dragging down the present and the future which completely pervaded the script.

Put more bluntly, the experience that a great deal of people felt from Gundam 00 was better than the plot that they had to deal with. Therefore, they found Gundam 00 to tell a very compelling story as a whole. Certainly it is an epic story, but ultimately it’s all about touching upon possibilities and the what-ifs of the future, and if humanity can truly become ready for greater things (or will strangle itself to death first).

Well, the result is nine-tenths pessimism and one-tenths hope, which is not the ratio I go for when I watch a show, but that’s how it is.

In video games, many designers work hard to see that the story is told by the experience of the game much more than the plot. Now, let’s be honest here: sometimes designers go overboard and the plot feels thin as a result, too thin. However, let’s also not fault the reason for attempting such lofty goals; the sense of discovery of an unknown world, a world which we do not yet know, is a powerful motivation for playing any immersive game.

Properly accomplished, a video game draws a player into its world and uses interactivity and proactive player behavior to provide an experience that is more compelling, and more treasured, than passive artistic mediums where we are recipients of some kind of broadcast.

In this sense, we don’t play the game; the game plays us.

What I mean by this is, a video game is a structure and a system, but it is only the human element – the player – that makes it into entertainment. The game uses us to create a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts, and far greater than a passive experience using the same components could provide. The game provides the player with input, but the player’s reactions, thoughts, and plans are the output that is required for the creation of a real experience.

Of course, we’re the ones who enjoy the result. That is good.

The Persona 4 Case

Now, this is more of an afterthought for me rather than the thrust of my point (the point being that anime and video games are art mediums for providing a vivid experience in their own ways), but the announcement of an anime directly based on the video game Persona 4 resulted in a very ambivalent reaction among Japanese people.

Apparently, it’s not really the issue of “the game has been done already” and the story has already been told; rather, it is that the story was designed to be told at the pace of a video game, with the intensive involvement of the player, creating an experience that cannot be simply replicated by an animated show.

This has little bearing on whether or not the anime will be good on its own. It is simply a natural concern that the comparisons can only be harsh because, as vivid and entertaining as anime can be, there are things that video games are likely to do better.

This simply reflects how powerful video games can be as a medium. This isn’t your old radio -> television -> broadcast style internet. This is true interactivity. It’s a different animal. It is not just art – it is direct transmission of culture.

In the case of Japanese video games, there’s a lot of Japanese culture – or at least cultural ideas and biases – that are overtly and covertly transmitted.

But, enough general talk. Sometime in the future I’ll do posts on far more specific things. I just thought I’d cover the big picture while I had some time. – J

Go to this blog for full details on the announcement of Gundam Memories ~ Tatakai no Kioku. One small quibble: Japanese usually leaves singular and plural undefined. We silly Westerners default to singular when we shouldn’t. This could easily be read as “Memories of Battle” (as in, battle in abstract, indicating numerous battles) or “Memories of Battles.”

What caught my eye immediately is the very heavy similarity to Warriors Orochi (in the Dynasty Warriors family, a cross-over between that and Samurai Warriors games) in that mobile suits are separated into Melee Type, Sniper Type, and Speed Type (whereas Orochi was Power, Technical, and Speed). You are able to pick three mobile suits and, like Orochi, you can hot swap between these three while in a game stage.

This system was one of, if not the, best features about Warriors Orochi. Using this with Gundams seems to be a very interesting and promising idea from a gamer’s perspective.

Full series list below:

Mobile Suit Gundam
Mobile Suit Z Gundam
Mobile Suit Gundam Char’s Counterattack
Mobile Suit Gundam X
Gundam W Endless Waltz
Gundam Seed Destiny
Gundam 00 (including 2nd season)
Gundam 00: A wakening of the Trailblazer Movie
Gundam UC (Unicorn Gundam)

…Now personally, there’s nothing in here not to like. Even when I have my issues with a television show, I often find the mecha and even the characters refreshing when used in a video game.

Also, the more they stay away from retreading anything in existing Dynasty Warrior: Gundam games (or as I say it fast in loving Japanese, Gundam Musou) , all the better.

So, this actually makes me curious about how it’ll work out. The gameplay system is an immediate draw. We’ll have to see how it goes. – J

Savvy followers of mecha anime have long been aware that “bad guy” machinery is often built to be more interesting, both conceptually and visually, than the protagonist side’s machines. This trend did not invent itself. In many ways, it was begun back in the original Gundam series with the lowly Zaku.

Suspiciously close to the pronunciation of zako (雑魚）、Japanese for “small fry” (a term very frequently used in video gaming to describe anything not in the “boss” category; i.e. normal, regular enemies), the Zaku is the first, and most prolific, of the robotic behemoths called Mobile Suits (as opposed to Normal Suits, the Gundam series term for spacesuits) faced by the protagonists in the original series, Mobile Suit Gundam.

The Zaku is the Republic of Zeon’s first, and primary, mass-produced Mobile Suit during the conflict known after the fact as “The One Year War.” (Acronym: OYW) Having a mere one thirtieth of the on-paper production capacity of the Earth Federation, which dominated not only Earth but the vast majority of space colonies at the start of Mobile Suit Gundam (Acronym: MSG), what Zeon needed was not a single super-weapon, but a mass produce-able general purpose weapon that could dominate space combat. The “MS-06” Zaku is the 6th generation of development, though the first to see mass production.

Mobile Suits broadly share certain fundamental traits, so this applies to the Zaku as well as more advanced suits that came later:

• Computerized, automated balancing using the arms and legs as counterweights to assist maneuvering thrusters, i.e. verniers, to rapidly turn, and then stabilize, the Mobile Suit, giving it turn-on-a-dime capability (as well as “jinking” capability)
• A “main camera” housed in the head (the Zaku’s is the ubiquitous mono eye visible on the “face”)
• Secondary external cameras that endeavor to give a pilot a good view of what is around him
• Computer interpretation of pilot input, translating this input into physical actions by the mobile suit

This last part requires quite a bit of suspension of disbelief on the part of the viewer, rendering this firmly science fiction rather than pure speculative science. The idea that a Mobile Suit can move in human-like movements, however clumsy they may be shown as, is a stretch that we need to process to be able to just sit back and enjoy the show. That’s how it is.

The Zaku’s Characteristics

Beyond these basic features, the MS-06 Zaku has distinguishing characteristics that stand out even after 30 years of animation history.Technically, it’s the MS-06 Zaku II, because an earlier model that saw very limited mass production, the MS-05 Zaku I, existed and was combat ready, but only in extremely crude terms, and was markedly inferior in all respects. Any Mobile Suit might be considered better than none, but still.

Green Coloration

Zakus are green. That’s the way it’s always been; that’s the way it always will be. This holds true for just about everything but ace models with personal color schemes, such as the legendary One Year War ace Char Aznable, chief antagonist as regards the main protagonist of the series, 15 year old youth Amuro Ray.

Notwithstanding this, the basic model of every major variation is some sort of green. Minor variations, such as versions tuned for desert warfare (complete with desert camouflage), come in colors deemed appropriate to their purpose.

High Reliability

Considering that we are talking about futuristic machines here, the Zaku II is absolutely retro in concept. While it does employ a miniaturized fusion reactor made possible by Mobile Suit Gundam’s Minovsky Particle -based super-science, actual limb mobility is through hydraulic power, as basic and low tech as you can get. Thrust is provided by the use of super-heating a fixed supply of propellant; that is, gas that isn’t actually burning when it exits the thrusters. As you might imagine, this is far more effective and dramatic in space than on Earth, where limited rocket boosting and physical walking renders the Zaku II overwhelmingly earthbound.

Ease of Use

While it would be an exaggeration to say that anyone can pilot a Zaku, it’s like this: a normal pilot can put it through an incredible amount of abuse without breaking the machine. The Zaku may not be the thickest skinned machine when it’s being shot, but short of flying it into the side of a ship, you’re probably not going to total one through piloting alone.

This ease of use and low degree of sensitivity makes the Zaku an ideal training platform. Amazingly, even years after the One Year War, the victorious Earth Federation employed Zakus as “Red Team” units for training purposes, as seen in Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory. Not only did this create an unmistakable “enemy feel,” it was cheap; the Zaku is easy to maintain (relative to giant robots!) and hey, a few refurbished models beat having to manufacture your own stuff to get plastered by paint rounds.

Ballistic Weaponry

Here we get into the heart of the Zaku’s charm.

The Zaku, being essentially a giant infantryman, uses good, old fashioned bullets for its best known weapon, the Zaku Machine Gun, so named because its reliability and ubiquity was so great that it was employed by non-Zaku suits (particularly transitional prototypes).This is essentially a robot version of a Tommy Gun, the drum-fed .50 caliber machine gun used in the Prohibition era by Al Capone’s gangsters.

For the uninitiated, a machinegun fires bullets, i.e. slugs; inert metal rounds. A cannon, no matter the type, fires explosive rounds.

Zaku II’s typically employ bazookas for heavy work; these were used for attacking warships as well as early attempts to destroy the Federation’s Gundam mobile suit, which had special armor that simply was not being defeated by machine gun rounds.

Both weapons were employed in space and on Earth (or inside air-filled colonies) indiscriminately.

Zaku type mobile suits tend to have at least some kind of variation of the Heat Hawk, a tomahawk with an edge that is superheated via the nuclear reactor’s power a moment before being employed in actual combat. It’s crude, and no Zaku will ever be accused of practicing swordsmanship, but that’s part of the point: all the pilot has to do is hack and chop and this reliable, brute force weapon will chew through normal armor like a hot knife through butter.

Structural Strength

The Zaku is not a light machine. As a consequence, it is vastly over-engineered for structural strength (which is not the same as thick armor). The Zaku can accommodate extra-heavy backpacks, heavy weapons, and so forth, with no trouble at all. One might think of it almost like a pack mule, but it was a combat machine, so using it for mere transportation of supplies would be silly.

Numerous Variations

One of the biggest reasons for the lasting impression the Zaku made is the sheer number and weight of variations. Many of these were promoted as toy variations, with ace models receiving custom color schemes complete with pictures and biographies of their ace pilots, who existed completely outside of the original animated show, but who live on in video games such as G Generation Spirits.

The basic mass-produced model was the MS-06 Zaku II F-Type, which was the main model used for space combat early in the war. An even earlier C-Type had been used as a nuclear bazooka carrier during the first days of the war, when a huge amount of humanity’s population (most of which was in space colonies) died in the crossfire between Zeonic forces and very much not picky Federation Navy forces. This type introduced the distinctive “shoulder spike” look, used for ramming, and the opposite, limited shoulder shield, providing some extra protection.

The J-Type was customized for ground surface warfare, and consequently, boosting through an air-filled environment. While the F-Type could do this, it wasn’t very good at it, and the J-Type – equipped with leg-mounted missiles and using tank cannons as alternatives to bazookas – became the face of the months of grinding ground warfare.

The High Mobility Test Types (there are different flavors) were essentially the F-Type with souped up thrusters and verniers. These preceded later non-Zaku mobile suits but, in good hands, these machines performed exceptionally in the skirmishes against Federation forces that dominated space combat until the Federation blitzkrieg that ended the war.

Numerous types of Zaku had commander type variations, which consisted of tuning up the machine, which was not externally obvious, and adding a vertical fin to the forehead, which absolutely was obvious and provided a simple measure of who you should be following in a confused combat situation.

A very wide number of minor variations exist, such as for desert warfare, camera reconnaissance, underwater use, and so on. These exist because of the aforementioned virtues of the Zaku: such a fundamentally sound and rugged design that you could do these things and not lose basic functionality.

A Deep Influence On Mecha

Even though there have been numerous Gundam series, movies, OAV’s, and so on and so forth, Gundams can only be used to their full potential by ace pilots with exceptionally rare levels of talent.

To the contrary, anyone can picture himself in a Zaku, and a Zaku, in the right hands, is plenty powerful enough to do a lot of damage. Consequently, the Zaku is a more approachable concept that is easier for people to actually imagine themselves in (provided they were born in a dark science fiction future).

The Zaku is really the start of the idea of grunt mecha, i.e. mecha used by “grunts,” infantrymen fighting in the proverbial or literal trench warfare that dominates real warfighting. This is the concept, and the implementation thereof, that provides the realistic, gritty “war” feel to Mobile Suit Gundam, where even the lowliest machine is piloted by a human being, meaning that every victory comes with an extension of the terrible casualty rolls of war.

So, in many senses, the Zaku is where the gritty, realistic trend began. To this day, the Zaku is a standard by which all other grunt mecha are compared. Is it cool? Is it gritty? Does it have the right feel? Always, we look back to the Zaku and ask, is it like that? Is it distinct, but with its own feel that measures up?

In those senses, these are big, mechanical shoes to fill. – J

An Imagining of a Western Icon

This is an artist’s impression of Thor used as a representation of the mythological figure in the Playstation 2 game, Persona 3. As opposed to other games in the “Shin Megami Tensei” franchise, also abbreviated as MegaTen or SMT, the mythological entities in Persona 3 are alter-egoes, or “personas,” rather than fully corporeal entities. In other words, they’re on the inside, not the outside.

In this game, only the main character has the special ability to be able to “change his persona” and gain the strengths and weaknesses of the entity imagined.

“Thor” is one such being.

Although this is a new artist’s illustration, I first encountered the modern SMT impression of Thor in a classic, rather hardcore game, Shin Megami Tensei 3: Nocturne, where Thor was an in-game NPC (non-player character) for a fair bit of the game, operating as the 2nd in command of a militant demonic organization trying to bring order to a mad world in the ruins of a post-apocalyptic Tokyo.

To join this organization as part of the plot, you have to prove yourself by fighting Thor, and winning.

It is no cheap or easy challenge.

What I want to impress upon the reader, because those unfamiliar with these niche role-playing games would not be able to tell from the image above, is that this Thor, if he was standing at his full height, would be about three times the height of the player, putting him at oh, maybe 16 feet tall. He is typically shown on one knee because well, if he wasn’t, he wouldn’t have much of an angle to smash you to a pulp with.

Now, in Persona 3, gaining access to Thor – which you can’t do unless you go through some trouble in the game’s role-playing elements – gives you some other benefits. Being a non-corporeal, summoned “persona,” these spirits can be fused with “blank” weapons to create custom weapons infused with a supernatural presence. But when you fuse “Thor,” you get Mjlonir in your own, loving hands.

This is a special weapon which does not inflict physical damage. Rather, it inflicts lightning damage as if it was a thunderbolt in physical form. The weapon even provides a bonus, albeit a small one, to all lightning damage, including damage from the weapon itself.

But the weapon does not achieve its true power unless you use it with a re-summoned and maxed out Thor.

At top level, Thor has a few tricks that make acquiring his aid worth the trouble.

First, he gains a skill to increase the attack power of not just the main character, but the entire party, for the first three rounds of combat. This affects both physical and magical damage.

Second, he gains a souped-up lightning damage boost skill, increasing the power of any lightning attacks he has. He possesses a single-target, high level thunderbolt spell by default, but could have learned others through the acquisition process. Also, he has a combination attack with another persona, a Japanese thunder god, that is an all-enemy attack (rather than single target) and has a very high chance of inflicting Shock status, which temporarily paralyzes opponents and makes them very easy to bowl over. It’s a little expensive in terms of the player’s mystical energy, but the results are nearly game-breaking.

Third, and this is just icing on the cake, Thor’s highest level skill provides a bonus to the normal physical attack of blunt weapons.

This includes Mjlonir.

So with this combination, Thor + Mjlonir brings a lesser and a greater boost to lightning damage, an additional boost to physical damage with blunt weapons that applies to Mjlonir, and starts every battle with a three-turn license to do extra damage in beating the enemy to a pulp.

This is in addition to one of Thor’s default moves: using the spiritual hammer version to create a wide area shockwave that does huge helpings of blunt damage to all opponents. Plus, of course, Thor has beefy stats that make the damage as high as possible.

When you have Mjlonir in your hands, every problem really does look like a nail.

(I was waiting all post to write that line. – J)

Anyway, the point of all this is really saying, this started with an impression of a mythological Norse figure who did mortal combat with giants of legend, slaying them with the force of his might and the power of his mystical hammer.

In game terms, this is a well thought out homage to the mythological figure, and a lot of fun to play around with, especially considering all the trouble a person has to go through to get all this set up. It’s like a complete supernatural fighting style, all providing the player with some seriously souped up lightning and brute force powers to play with.

In cultural terms, this isn’t a Japanese version of Thor. It’s an adaptation of the Germanic pagan deity, taking the concept and running with it, dressing it up in game mechanics, the artwork you see at the top of this post, and model animations for when Thor (in spirit form) brings his mighty hammer down or reaches to the heavens (with his off hand) to call forth a crushing, brutal thunderbolt from the heavens.

Through it all, one gets the sense of Thor as a larger than life presence, both in physical dimensions and in the might at his command. Also, if you take a good look at the artist’s illustration, he really does look like a force of nature encased in flesh and armor, barely contained by the trappings of humanity’s image of him. He embodies the ferocity of the angry heavens, the soul of the Teutonic warrior, and the might of a proud race.

This is good stuff.

What I’ve tried to do here is demonstrate that even though this is an element of a foreign culture, and indeed, a foreign religion, it has been adapted into a Japanese role-playing game with its own distinct mystique. This is emblematic of how modern Japanese culture works: don’t dismiss other cultures – bring them in! Make them part of a larger whole. Honor excellent pieces with the care and attention Japanese people provide to their own culture, and share the result with the world.

And why not?

Since 1up.com was kind enough to put a link to a list of its Editor’s Picks for interesting stories in 2010, and more than a few touch on Japanese culture in general and gaming culture specifically (and certain personalities thereof), feel free to follow this link and take a look.

When I don’t have time for thousand-word posts, I do want to be useful and direct people to good content. I think this is a good example.

I don’t know how many of you have actually paid attention to this Catherine game coming from Atlus. To me, it’s something I want because it has that Persona look and feel. Here’s the thing, though: the marketing has been huge teases, all sorts of stuff on the character herself, the cast, and this being vaguely about some supernatural horror stuff.

Atlus does good supernatural horror, so that’s cool.

But, here we have an article at 1up.com that Catherine will get a demo because… er.

Hashino said that while “many people are excited” about Catherine, he noted that there was a pattern of confusion in the feedback he has received.

And… whose fault is that?!?! They’re confused because of your mystery-filled tease marketing campaign!! Cop up to your role in this, geez.

Or to use a Japanese-ism, don’t talk about it like you’re some unrelated third party.

Anyway, I’m still hoping the game comes out great. I’ll check the demo out. Maybe you should too.

In video game settings (ゲームの設定)…

Sound is サウンド (saundo).

Stereo is ステレオ (sutereo).

Monoaural is モノラル (monoraru).

The last one sounds like “monooral” as it is written in katakana.