The Ramen Shop

Platinum Games are masters in creating unique, vibrant and exhilarating action games with many of their projects such as Nier Automata and Bayonetta being some of the best in the genre. Their games focus on intensive, stylish combat and Astral Chain not only delivers on that front but is also one of Platinum's most unique games to date with its dual-character gameplay. Astral Chain places you in the role of a detective in a special police task force known as "Neuron" and your goal is to protect the futuristic city known as "The Ark" from mysterious creatures known as Chimeras. Using the Astral Chain, you tie yourself together with different Chimeras of your own known as Legions and take control of yourself and your Legion simultaneously throughout the game. Astral Chain's presentation is gorgeous and the game is easily one of the best looking games on Nintendo Switch. The sci-fi anime art style is striking and while the game runs at 30 FPS, it does

With Xenoblade Chronicles being one of my favorite games of all time, I am over the moon about the Definitive Edition coming to Switch next year. Not only is the game getting a major graphical facelift but new content will be coming to the game in the form of Bionis’s Shoulder which was a cut area that players found after data mining the game. I believe that we will be getting a lot more new content than just one area so here’s 10 of my hopes for additions and changes in Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition. Event Viewer Many of the changes that I wish to see come from additions that Xenoblade Chronicles 2 implemented and this first hope is one of them. Event Viewer was added in a patch in Xenoblade 2 and it allowed players to rewatch any of the full-motion cutscenes from the story. The mode also lets players change the ti

I’ve had my eye on Trigger’s ‘Promare’ since it was announced for a US Theatrical Release. It’s the studio’s first feature length film straight from the people behind Kill La Kill and Gurren Lagann, two of my favorite anime of all time. I had high hopes for Promare because of that and I’m so happy to say that it more than delivered. Promare’s everything that Trigger is known for in full force and is a love letter to the studio’s past work. Promare takes place 30 years after The Great World Blaze, a near cataclysmic event caused by humans that spontaneously combust into flames that ravaged the entire earth. These flame-wielding humans, now known as the Burnish, are discriminated against and branded as criminals with society reconstructing itself to withstand themselves against the Burnish threat. One such defense is the mech piloting firefighting troop Burning Rescue and over the course of the plot, new recruit Galo Thymos fights with his team to combat

Chapter 237 concluded Tenko’s backstory by showing the final stages of his path towards villainy while also continuing the fight between the League of Villains and the Liberation Army. This chapter revealed surprising new information such as how exactly AFO morphed Tomura into the person he is today and gave more insight into both of their characters. The first few pages showcasing how Shigaraki was actively avoided on the streets were harrowing as he was desperately looking for help while scaring everyone off due to his appearance. Shigaraki mentions how he believed he was being punished for murdering his family during this time and not only do I think that that’s the case but also that Shigaraki deserves it. While his intentions and mental state at the time were extremely confused during the situation involving his mother, sister, and grandparents, Tomura willingly murdered his father with his own hands while fully aware of what he was doing. His fe

Nothing could have prepared me for what was to come in Chapter 236. Within this chapter, we finally get to see the horrifying fate that befell upon Shigaraki’s family. In only 15 pages, we see Shigaraki go from being terrified upon discovering his quirk to fully embracing its power in order to murder his father. The start of the chapter was brutal with Shigaraki unknowingly using his quirk on his family dog with it only escalating further as he reaches out for his family members. Chapter 236 was absolutely harrowing and it surprised me to see how much Horikoshi didn’t hold back when showing the seriousness of the situation. Horikoshi has always been great at showcasing raw emotion with his art but never have I felt it as much as with Shigaraki’s mental breakdown upon accidentally murdering his family. The pages involving his mother and sister especially heartbreaking. The final two pages of showcase Shigaraki’s first true descent into his twisted nature and were b

One day after a mysterious flash of light, all of humanity turned to stone and several thousand years later, humans break free from their petrification and find themselves in an earth that has reverted back to its original state. Dr. Stone began as weekly manga series with an immediately intriguing premise alongside great presentation and characters that made it a fantastic read. As a fan of the manga, I was extremely excited for the anime adaptation. We’re now 3 episodes into the show and while as an anime it may not be doing anything groundbreaking, Dr. Stone proves to be a fun and entertaining watch that you should definitely check out during this summer anime season. Dr. Stone stars Senku Ishigami, a highschool genius who uses his intellect and scientific knowledge in order to survive in the new stone age that he finds himself in. He and his loud, enthusiastic friend, Taiju work together to discover a method to break people free from their petrificati

Chapter 235 began the long-awaited backstory of Shigaraki and so far it’s been every bit of heartwrenching as I expected it would be. It’s revealed that Shigaraki’s prime cause for becoming as twisted as he is was due to the physical abuse he suffered from his father, Kotaro Shimura, who rejected the idea of him becoming a hero. Despite these horrible actions, I ended up feeling sympathetic and heartbroken for both Shigaraki and his father because of what they both had gone through. Kotaro was the son of Nana Shimura, All Might’s predecessor. She ended up leaving her son in order to fulfill her duty as a hero and did not survive. Similar to Kota’s bias against heroes, Kotaro feels as if Nana prioritized saving complete strangers over her own family and thus refuses to allow any kind of benevolence towards heroes in his household. The chapter then climaxes with Kotaro striking Tomura after he discovers that his sister and he had gone through his belongings and dis

I didn’t initially expect much when going into Act-Age, especially with its first couple of chapters not doing much noteworthy besides laying down the foundation for its plot. However, as I kept reading I grew to really enjoy the manga for the way it handles its premise and characters. Written by Tatsuya Matsuki and illustrated by Shiro Usazaki, Act-Age follows Kei Yonagi, an aspiring actress who lives to support her two younger siblings after their mother passes away. Yonagi has an incredible talent for method-acting, a style that brings out believable emotional reactions by the actor placing themselves in the given scene. However, she takes this to an extreme level to the point where it seems like she can’t distinguish between the fantasy of a scene and reality. She initially fails to find gigs due to this potentially self-destructive behavior however a highly acclaimed director, Sumiji Kuroyama, recognizes her potential talent and takes her under his wing to culti

The fight between The Liberation Army and The League of Villians has begun to reach its climax and with it, we see more of Re-Destro’s Quirk and Shigaraki’s memories returning to him. The chapter starts right after the shocking reveal of Re-Destro’s stress-based quirk and three of Shigraki’s fingers being completely torn off. This initially comes off as a massive blow for Shigaraki due to him needing to lay all five of his fingers on an object to disintegrate it. However, this injury causes Shigaraki to have more flashbacks of his family resulting in him beginning another Quirk awakening being able to damage Re-Destro using his two remaining fingers and break free from his hold. Re-Destro quickly knocks Shigaraki back down to the ground and the chapter ends with Shigaraki getting back on his feet and Re-Destro being informed that Gigantomachia has begun to attack the city. The pacing of this chapter was well done with it balancing the fight between R

The Legend of Zelda is a series that has a dear place in my heart. One of my favorite aspects of the series is its phenomenal soundtracks; they are a large reason for me getting into music as a hobby and becoming a musician. Over the years I grew to love video game soundtracks and appreciate how they can be incorporated into the gameplay itself. This made me fall in love with 2015’s Crypt of the Necrodancer, an indie rogue-like where everything from enemy movement to player action had to be in time with the beat of the music. It became one of my favorite indie games of all time so imagine my surprise when I learned that the developers behind it, Brace Yourself Games, were not only creating a sequel but said sequel would also be a cross-over Zelda game. After playing through Cadence of Hyrule I can firmly say that it is both a monumental moment in indie developer history as well as an extremely enjoyable time for rhythm game fans and Zelda fans alike.

Granblue Fantasy is one of Japan’s biggest mobiles games and its the next series in line to get the fighting game treatment from Arcsystem Works. Despite the mobile game not officially being available in the West with players having to jump through some hoops to play it in English. Arcsystem Works is still committed to bringing Granblue Fantasy Versus to the West with its closed online beta being playable throughout May 31st and June 1st. As a casual GBF player, I can confidently say that GBFV is not only an absolute treat for fans of the mobile game but also an extremely solid game on its own that fighting game fans should look out for. Check out some matches from the closed beta.  New Gallery 2019/5/31 Lance vs Ferry bitrate 6504 kb/s height 720 duration 00:03:57.62 fps 29.97 width 1280 originaldate 2019-05-31T17:26:07.000000Z Gran vs Ferry bitrate 6463 kb/s height 720 duration 00:02:21.57 fps 29.97 width 1280 originaldate 2019-05-31T12:47:50.000

Video game adaptation films have notoriously been less than stellar throughout history. Because of that, Detective Pikachu as a concept is something that shouldn’t have worked on paper. Basing the first live-action Pokèmon movie around a spin-off game where Pikachu talks with a human instead of a traditional story around battling with other trainers is a huge creative dare. Despite this, Detective Pikachu makes the idea work more than well and proves to be an absolute delight for Pokèmon fans. Detective Pikachu is the perfect representation of real-world Pokèmon society. There are so many instances of Pokèmon interacting with the world in unique ways and the CG of the movie really helps sell the realistic versions of Pokèmon while staying true to each creature’s original design. The VFX doesn’t always hit the mark with the set pieces, with one scene, in particular, being noticeably lackluster but the Pokèmon themselves always look fantastic. Unlike

Dragon Ball is one of those series that feels like everyone under the sun has experienced or at least has heard of. Even my grandmother can at least recognize Goku as the guy in the orange karate gi with the spiky, golden hair. However, my experience with the series is a unique one as unlike seemingly every other person my age who enjoys anime, I didn’t grow up with Dragon Ball. I was the prime target audience for Dragon Ball as a child. Not only did I play video games and enjoy action-orientated shows like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Avatar: The Last Airbender but I also took mixed martial arts classes for a large portion of my life as well. However, for some reason, I never tried giving the show a shot. It may have been due to my parents thinking it was too violent for me at the time or a general lack of interest at the time but regardless of the reason, I never sat down and tried watching it. As I got older and became more into anime, I started to realize