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In 2013, the anime series “Attack on Titan” hit the world by storm, creating one of the biggest anime hits of all time. Come on, don’t pretend – if you’re here you know about it! Practically every single anime convention ever since 2013 has had at least one member of the Survey Corps among its ranks of cosplayers, and even today, in early 2016, the Internet is STILL buzzing with discussions about it! Hell, the anime was so successful that even the creators didn’t expect it to grow THAT big, which is why today, 3 years later, the second season is still in development. That didn’t stop the Japanese movie machine from releasing two live action movies of dubious quality, several animated features with footage from the show and, of course, countless ads featuring the titular Titans. And after playing numerous videogames based on the franchise, the latest of which (titled simply “Attack on Titan”) released weeks ago in Japan, I can’t help but stop and ask myself… Why? Why is this anime so unbelievably popular, to the point where it has overshadowed everything else released in the last 3 years? Let’s take a closer look.

First, let’s discuss the things the anime does really right. It doesn’t take a trained otaku to realize that the visuals are phenomenal. This is a show that spared no expense in crafting its visuals, and it really shows. While “Attack on Titan” looks great practically all the time, it really shines during the action scenes, which involves the main characters leaping around in an attempt to reach the necks of the gargantuan Titans. The camera spins around, tracking each member of the Survey Corps as they leap across buildings in a way that would make even Spider-Man jealous. It is by far one of the best-looking anime series to date, and I’m comparing it with the best, such as “Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works”. Another thing I really loved about it was the depiction of war and PTSD. While there isn’t such a thing as a draft in the “Attack on Titan” universe, a lot of young people are pretty much forced to either join the army and help fight an enemy that they don’t understand nor stand a chance against or starve on the streets. As such, when the Titans finally attack, it’s little wonder that everyone is absolutely, gut-wrenchingly terrified. Some even go as far as to take their own lives, considering that a preferable option to being devoured. Watching the first real battle of the anime gave me chilling “Enemy at the Gates” vibes as I saw these young people, literally on the day of their graduation, being slaughtered like cattle. It’s horrible, it’s hard to watch and I love every second of it.

There were, however, many things that I didn’t love. Can you give me a synopsis of “Attack on Titan”? Okay, so the main character Eren is living a peaceful life with his family… And then Titans attack and everybody he knows dies safe for his best friends Mikasa and Armin. He vows to fight and kill all the Titans, joining the army and training to become a soldier… And then Titans attack and everybody he knows dies, safe for his best friends Mikasa and Armin. Distraught, Eren decides to join the Survey Corps and leave the comfort of his own home in order to kill all the Titans… And then Titans attack and everybody he knows dies, safe for his best friends Mikasa and Armin. You seeing a pattern here? The anime doesn’t have a plot, it just has a series of skirmishes against the Titans, which I guess would’ve worked out fine if they were spread out across Eren’s lifetime, but after the initial Titan attack in his childhood the guy seems to be attacked by Titans every few weeks. It’s ridiculous. This war, if you can call it that, has been fought for thousands of years, and all of a sudden this dude shows up and survives numerous battles in the span of a month or so alongside his best friends? I call nonsense.

And speaking of the best friends, have you noticed that all of the characters are extremely simplistic? Eren’s entire character can be summed up in 5 words – “Wants to kill the Titans”. Mikasa, his best friend since childhood, is even simpler – “Wants to protect Eren”. Don’t even get me started about how problematic it is that a female character’s entire being and everything she does and feels is based around a male character, to the point where when Eren is considered dead Mikasa almost ceases to function as a human being in the middle of battle. Armin is the most complex of all, since he takes slightly more words to describe, but essentially he wants to prove that he’s not as useless as his friends despite being the worst out of them when it comes to killing Titans. But that’s another major problem, isn’t it? Eren, out of nowhere, has the ability to turn into a Titan at will. Mikasa, out of nowhere, proves to be the most proficient soldier who ever lived, even putting veteran Titan killer Captain Levi to shame. Armin is hinted to be a strategic genius, but I’ll leave him alone for now and just focus on Eren and Mikasa. Why are these two people so special when all of their compatriots die left, right and center? And more importantly, why are we even following them? This is supposed to be a war story, even if the enemy isn’t human. You don’t see the Terminator pop up to save Private Ryan in the movie, do you?

But at the end of the day, maybe this simplicity is precisely what makes “Attack on Titan” so popular. It’s not an anime that requires you to think too much. Its premise alone provides you with thrills, excitement and drama, so as long as the writers keep throwing Titans at us we’ll be happy. Not every anime needs to be “Ergo Proxy” or “Neon Genesis Evangelion”, after all. Sometimes otakus need comfort food – something that’s, as the meme goes, same same, but different, but still same. “Attack on Titan” is that comfort food, and it does its job well. Just don’t expect it to be a gourmet.

As some of you may already know, I’m actually a pretty big fan of online casino games, slots in particular. It’s not something that I obsess over religiously (you know, like anime), but it’s still an activity that I absolutely adore. The few of you who already know about it have probably read my previous article in which I complained that every single slot I’ve played which was based on an anime series has been, well, pretty damn bad. I was thinking about that a few days ago, more specifically wondering how to make them better. Ultimately, the question I ended up asking myself was this – if I could turn any anime into an online slot, which would it be? Now, keep in mind that I don’t believe that “Neon Genesis Evangelion” and “Ghost in the Shell”, whose slots I complained about in my article, are bad series – very, very far from it. But I do think that they weren’t suitable for slots. In this day and age, when online casinos are so advanced (especially the casinos that allow their customers to deposit with PayPal, which are typically top of the line), we can’t afford to settle for subpar slots.

So, what series are suitable, in my opinion? Well, first of all, we have to keep in mind that there’s a bit of a culture shock here. Anime is entirely a Japanese invention, and most series remain strictly in Japan, and when they do leave the island they’re mostly consumed by Anime fans and not the general population. The problem is that the circle of anime fans and the circle of online gamblers overlaps only a little bit, so we need to pick series which appeal to not only anime fans, but Westerners in general. As such, it’s a bit of a no-brainer to pick “Attack on Titan” as one of the best series that can be adapted into a slot. There’s more than enough characters and enemy variations to create more than enough symbols without having to resort to letters (just make all the major symbols characters and the minor ones Titans and you’re all done! In addition, you can also make a Titan Slaying bonus game where you need to navigate Eren or Mikasa as they leap through the streets, picking a direction and hoping to dodge all the Titans, with every kill netting you more money. See, this slot designs itself!

Another extremely popular slot is, of course, “One Piece”, which I’ve written about before. As you know, it’s the most popular manga in the world, by a gigantic margin, with every single volume that comes out topping the sales charts of its respective month, every year. “One Piece” is also a series with a whole ton of characters, which is a quality that lends itself very well to slots. And besides that, the main character can stretch his body like rubber – just think about the countless bonus games you could create with that! Maybe you can have him protecting his friends from cannonballs by punching them out of the sky or something. Or if you’re looking for a variation of the classic “cups” game which shows up in almost every slot (where you have a bunch of items laid out and you can select one or several, with a different prize hiding in each one), then you can always have the Grand Line in there! Have a bunch of islands that the crew can choose to visit in any order they want, with one island containing One Piece (and ending the bonus game, giving you a huge bonus) and one island containing Blackbeard (once again ending the game, but without the bonus). If someone wants to hire me to design this, please use the “Contact” form at the top of the site!

When you ask somebody who’s not really all that interested into anime to cite a couple of anime films, the responses are always the same. “Akira”, “Ghost in the Shell”, “Spirited Away”… But a lot of people will also mention another movie by the name of “Paprika”. While most anime movies don’t receive a wide release outside of Japan, “Paprika” did, and it’s very easy to see why – its stellar animation, mindbending visuals and story that’s confusing in all the right ways made it a hit in Japan, and won it a moderate success outside of it, which is about as much as anime movies can enjoy, really. “Paprika” is a very interesting case within the anime industry because its director, Satoshi Kon, has never actually made a bad movie. Not only that – he’s never made anything that hasn’t been absolutely and completely stellar. From “Perfect Blue”, which inspired a generation of Hollywood directors, through the brilliant “Millennium Actress” which showed the world how a character-driven historical drama was supposed to be made, to the amazing “Tokyo Godfathers” which is, by far, the best Christmas movie I’ve ever seen despite coming from a culture that celebrates Christmas by eating lots of KFC. His movies could be terrifying, but they could also be quirky and hilarious when they wanted, but most importantly, they consistently pushed the boundaries of what could be done with anime and animation in general as a medium. Still, I believe that none of his works give us a better look inside Satoshi Kon’s mind than his first and only foray into serialized anime, “Paranoia Agent”.

While “Paranoia Agent” has a semblance of an overarching narrative, it is, for the most part, an anthology show. Characters cross over from story to story, giving the semblance of an interconnected world, and yet for the most part each episode revolves around a particular character and the struggles that they’re undergoing. The theme of the show is how our mind gives our problems physical form, manifesting them and causing us to confront them. Each character is plagued by something, be it guilt, regret or a feeling that’s a bit too complicated to describe in a single word, and the primary antagonist of the series is a creature that confronts them with their issues, allowing them to achieve catharsis in the most unusual way possible. At the heart of the story is a young woman named Tsukiko Sagi, who some time ago created a mascot character that has since taken Japan by storm. The character, a small pink dog named Maromi, appears on keychains, posters, toys, and even has his very own TV show. Pressured by everyone to repeat her success, Tsukiko starts looking for a way to escape… and finds it when, rather conveniently, a young boy on roller skates attacks her in a parking lot, giving her an excuse to take a few weeks off. Naturally, the detectives assigned to the case are skeptical of the existence of such an attacker, until a second victim reports being struck by a young boy on rollerskates. Then a third, a fourth and fifth. Little by little, hospitals start filling up with people who have been attacked by the mysterious boy (nicknamed “Lil’ Slugger” by the media), and as such have been allowed to escape their problems. Is this a mass psychosis, or is something a lot more demented and mysterious going on?

From what you just read you might be thinking that every episode is the same – “Oh, we’ve got a guy who has some sort of problem and deals with it during the episode until Lil’ Slugger comes and hits him on the head”. Yeah, well… No. Episodes are as varied as they would be on an anthology show, and while the theme of Lil’ Slugger and his influence connects them all, building up to a climax which brings Tsukiko back alongside several other characters in order to solve the mystery once and for all. In the middle of this all too delicious hamburger we’ve got the meat, which consists of stories that are as varied as they come, and the best part is that they’re not all about people with problems that Lil’ Slugger has to solve – some are about people with problems caused by Lil’ Slugger, while some only tangentially involve him. For example, one of the earlier episodes is about a young boy who matches the description of Lil’ Slugger, and the rumors start ruining his life. Another episode is solely about a couple of housewives gossiping about who, or what, Lil’ Slugger actually is, with each trying to one-up everyone else in order to relay the most shocking account of the events regardless of just how ridiculous they sound. My favorite episode is when the members of a chatroom decide to meet up in order to commit suicide together, except one of them turns out to be a little girl, so the whole episode becomes about them trying to bring her to the authorities while pretending to be searching for a suicide spot. It’s surreal, it’s bizarre, and yet it’s presented in such an amazingly intriguing way that you can’t help but be invested in it.

I really can’t talk in depth about the nature of “Paranoia Agent” without getting knees deep into spoilers territory, but suffice to say that you’re in for a ride! If you’re interested in checking out a crazy, creative semi-anthology series from one of the world’s greatest animators, then you owe it to yourself to give it a watch! It’s worth every second!

For the next few blog posts, I decided to switch things up a bit on the blog! I’m usually talking about anime series from the 80s which are directly related to Saint Seiya, in some way, and by “directly related” I mean they’re Hokuto no Ken. Well, even though I’d never get sick of writing about Seiya and Hokuto, but I’m fairly certain you guys might get sick of reading about them if I don’t mix things up, so why don’t we fast forward a bit in the timeline and talk about some current anime that I’d recommend? At the end of the day, while 80s anime had a certain charm to it, anime from the last 10 years is also pretty darn great!

The first series I’d like to talk about is “Plastic Memories”, which is notable for being one of the best dramedies I’ve ever seen in my life. And I’m not just talking about anime, I’m talking about any medium here. It manages to take a setup that is so utterly depressing and make the best of it, because the characters choose to make the best of it. The drama comes naturally, but the comedy is enforced by your typical wacky character archetypes (the normal guy protagonist, the shy, quirky romantic interest, the tsundere, the aloof superior, the womanizer – you know the drill) doing typical wacky things. It sounds like a weird, even inappropriate contrast, except it really, really works!

“Plastic Memories” is set in the not too distant future where lifelike robots named Giftias are the latest trend. The robots don’t age, obviously, but other than that look and act exactly the same as humans – they can learn, they develop a personality based on their environment, they gain their own dreams, wishes and aspirations, hell, they even have certain civil rights! The only thing that differentiates them from humans, aside from the whole “no aging” thing, is that their lifespan is only 81920 hours – roughly about 10 years. After that, their memory and personality starts to fall apart, and if they’re left to deteriorate completely very bad things will happen (suffice to say, having a super-strong automaton without memories or a personality roaming the streets is not a good idea). In order to prevent this from happening, units known as Terminal Services retrieve Giftias shortly before their expiration date, by erasing their memories and OS, essentially killing them and then recycling their body to be used for a reinstalled OS – though the new Giftia will have a significantly different personality and no memories of his or her past life.

In case you didn’t grasp that, let me put it this way – their job is to go to families and take away their children, husbands, wives, parents or siblings, euthanize them and then recycle their bodies. It’s the equivalent of working as a doctor whose job is to do nothing but tell people their loved ones have died. It’s heartbreaking, heartwrenching and not something that anyone should ever have to do, and yet certain people have to because it’s better than the alternative. One of those people is Tsukasa Mizugaki, a high school student who flunked his final exams because he developed appendicitis. On his first day of employment he gets paired up with Isla, a Giftia who’s set to train him in the best way to retrieve targets (sometimes all you have to do is ask, but other times families are quite reluctant to part with their Giftias) and to assist him in his job. Naturally, it’s not long before feelings between the two blossom.

This is sort of where the beauty of “Plastic Memories” lies – it’s a brilliant drama, a brilliant comedy, a brilliant romance and a brilliant sci-fi all rolled into one wonderful package, and it is beautiful. I was often surprised about just how much I laughed, considering the overall rather depressing setting. The characters are all funny and memorable, including the regular cast and the side characters that they encounter during their retrieval missions. I really loved how, in merely 13 episodes, we were able to examine realistically just how many uses society would potentially have for human-like robots. The most common ones are, of course, children, but on several occasions we’ve seen humans being raised by Giftias, or them being used to do certain jobs such as being a bodyguard. And of course the anime doesn’t shy away from the darker side of humanity, with a particular character being a black market dealer who steals Giftias and reinstalls their OS so they could presumably be used as sex slaves.

Honestly, the whole retrieval aspect of the anime was the most interesting part for me, personally, but for better or for worse in the latter half of the series that takes a backseat to the romance between Isla and Tsukasa. And don’t get me wrong, it’s a great romance – unlike so many other anime romances, it doesn’t end just as soon as they decide that they’re a couple, quite the opposite. Sure, there’s a bit of a “Will they, won’t they”, but the moment they decide that they do want to be together after all (um, spoilers, I guess?) they start going on dates, joking about at home, stuff that normal couples do. After all, a Giftia’s lifespan is pretty limited, and they know that better than anyone. It’s not about crafting a relationship that will last – it’s about crafting memories that will.

I honestly can’t recommend “Plastic Memories” enough. It’s got everything you might want from an anime – action, drama, comedy, romance, sci-fi, you name it. There’s no reason for you not to watch it, so stop reading and get on it, people!

“Saint Seiya”, just like pretty much every huge anime franchise, has seen a ton of videogames based on it. Starting with “Saint Seiya: The Sanctuary” ten years ago on the now archaic PS2, the franchise has seen three more games based on it, with the latest, “Soldier’s Soul”, being released only a few months ago on the PS3, PS4 and, rather surprisingly, PC. While this may seem shocking, it’s really not – as I said, most big franchises of fighting anime have gotten plenty of games, including “Hokuto no Ken” (no, I’ll never stop talking about it on this blog, so sue me), “Bleach”, “Naruto”, “DragonBall” and so on and so forth. And admittedly, most licensed games haven’t been very good. Essentially, if you’ve played one of them, you’ve pretty much played all of them – they’re all 3D fighters with lots of flashy special attacks that play exactly the same way. “Ultimate Ninja Storm” is exactly like “Heat the Soul” which is exactly like “Dragonball Xenoverse”, minus a few differences.

Sadly, “Saint Seiya: Soldier’s Soul” falls into that same category of flashy 3D fighters, but I’m happy to say that it’s done well enough to definitely warrant the interest of both casual and hardcore “Saint Seiya” fans! First of all, it’s very important to note that this is the first “Saint Seiya” game that allows you to play through the entire story, starting from the tournament arc and finishing up with the Hades arc. And what’s even better is that the story in between the fights is narrated by fully 3D cinematics, which means that even if you know literally nothing about “Saint Seiya” or its story you can learn everything you need to know just from this game. I love it when games do that! By the way, “Hokuto no Ken: Ken’s Rage” does the same thing, just so you know. I told you I’d never stop talking about “Hokuto”! I should’ve titled the blog hokutonoken2014… But I digress!

About 40 characters are playable in both the story mode and in versus mode, which is really cool – I personally didn’t feel like anyone was missing from the roster, so that’s definitely a very good sign. Aside from story mode, you can play in a variety of tournaments and extra battles, against the AI or against your friends. One of my favorite features was the offline tournament mode for up to 8 players, which is something that’s pretty rare in these types of games! But at the end of the day, if you’re not a fan of 3D anime fighters, there’s not much in “Saint Seiya: Soldier’s Soul” that’s going to change your mind. The standard gameplay is the same – do some combos to fill up a meter at the bottom of the screen, then unleash special attacks while trying to avoid an opponent trying to do the same. It’s not exactly “Street Fighter” level of depth, nor is it trying to be. I don’t think you should hold it against it, though – not every fighting game needs to be a perfectly balanced tournament fighter. Sometimes, all we need is a faithful adaptation of a beloved storyline and some awesome sequences!

What do you think is the hottest manga right now? It’s okay, I know that, unless you’ve researched this, you probably don’t know the answer off the top of your head, but take a wild guess. “Attack on Titan”? Close. “Naruto”? That actually ended last year. “Bleach”? Hahahahahaha, no. Give up? Well, if you’ve read the title of this article, you should know that the answer is “One Piece”, a manga that has been running continuously for 18 years and shows absolutely no signs of stopping. How popular is it? Well, take a look at this chart of the best-selling manga in 2015. When we examine them by series, “One Piece” is at the very top with 14 million total volumes sold, which is 4 million more than the second place. But it doesn’t stop there! “One Piece” is also first when it comes to the number of individual volumes sold… And also second, third and fourth. May I remind you that there were only four volumes of “One Piece” released in the entirety of 2015, and those four are at the very top of the bestsellers list.

This isn’t a new phenomenon – the overwhelming majority of “One Piece” volumes have been at the top of the charts, barring unnatural circumstances. Even so many years after its inception, the series is still going as strong as it always has while other manga series have slowly dimmed away until nobody even cared about them. Why has “One Piece” persevered? Well, there’s three main things, really. First and foremost, it’s very well-crafted, almost to the point of perfection – nothing feels ham-fisted or heavy-handed. Second, its themes and characters are timeless. “One Piece” is about following your dreams regardless of what they are. In its world, even the most pathetic person can train and become a fierce warrior – we’ve seen several examples of this where utterly laughable characters put in the necessary work and eventually manage to become soldiers and fighters, acquiring the means to fight for their dreams. It’s a theme that resonates equally with all generations, and will continue to do so. And last, but not least, the manga seems like it knows where it’s going.

A lot (and I do mean a LOT) of mangas lose their steam after the first few arcs. A fantastic example is “Bleach”, where following the first two arcs (which seemed very well-crafted and thought out) we literally just got a repeat of them for the next two arcs, followed by some pointless fighting to close off the series… Except it didn’t end, it just kept on going, but nobody kept reading because nobody cared. In 2006 I still read “Bleach” every time a new volume came out in English. In 2016, I don’t even know if it’s still going or not. “One Piece”, on the other hand, has a very clear direction that it has established from the very first pages. We know exactly where the characters are going, and thanks to the manga’s structure, we even know just how far into their adventure they are. It never feels like the writer has ran out of ideas.

Overall, I think that’s really the most important aspect of a manga that hopes to live a life as long as that of “One Piece” – the mangaka (writer and artist) needs to know exactly where he or she is going with it, and make the story just as long as it needs to be. Readers don’t mind long stories. They do mind bloated ones, though. And on that note I shall leave you, dear reader! If you haven’t read “One Piece”, give it a shot – omnibuses of the first several volumes are available for pretty cheap on Amazon!

I’ve got to admit – I’m not the biggest gambler around. I don’t really like to play casino games, mostly because I’m really, really bad at them. No matter what I do I can’t seem to win at card games. I’m a dud at poker even when I think I’ve got good cards, and I’ve never won more than I’ve lost at blackjack. I do, however, quite like slots. There’s something awfully relaxing about watching the reels spin, and in the Internet age you don’t even need to go to a casino in order to play some great slots! Since I’m a huge anime fan, I recently decided to try and track down some anime slots… And boy, oh boy, was I disappointed!

As you know, there’s plenty of things you should consider when playing online slots with real money, such as RTP (Return to Player) percentage, bonus games, free spins and so on and so forth. With licensed slots, meaning slots which are based on movies, games or TV shows, there’s also the question of just how accurate the slot is to the source material. For example, if, say, there was a “Saint Seiya” slot with a romantic theme (hearts everywhere, bonus games that involve kissing girls, etc), then that wouldn’t be very faithful at all. Certain slots, such as “South Park”, “The Avengers” or “Pink Panther”, are really great at being faithful to the source material while also delivering a stellar slot experience. The problem is that slots based on anime don’t do either.

First of all, I have to say that I only managed to find two slots that are actually based on anime (there’s plenty of slots INSPIRED by the anime artstyle, but that’s not really what I’m looking for). Luckily, they’re both based on some of my favourite series, namely “Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex” and “Neon Genesis Evangelion”. Oh, and also both of them suck bad. Neither has anything to do with the source material outside of a few pictures. They have wildly inappropriate music and are very bare-bones, meaning that they lack any sort of cool bonus features or bonus games. Sure, one of them has a Free Spins bonus, but that’s something that all slots have anyway.

I’m not going to go into too much detail about why the slots are terrible, as I’m not a slots reviewer, but suffice to say they’re not that great, and I have absolutely no idea why. Both of these licenses are absolutely amazing, and I’d think that it’s literally impossible to make a bad slot based on them, but alas! It’s not like that’s some small license that the developers just didn’t treat with enough respect because nobody knows about it – both “Ghost in the Shell” and “Evangelion” are huge, especially outside of Japan. So what the hell?