A Brief Review - Blue Exorcist

I was excited about watching Blue Exorcist as I had heard good things about it.  Long story short - it's not all it's cracked up to be.  

The story follows Rin Okumura, a boy who discovers he is the son of Satan.  For reasons I will not divulge (spoilers!), he decides to become an exorcist, thereby contradicting his own existence.  His twin brother, Yukio, is also an exorcist, and the two meet friends and work through their inner demons (pun intended) together.  The cast of characters is colorful, ranging from shy gardener Shiemi to the rambunctious Suguro (Bon).  My favorites of course are the demons - quirky Mephisto Pheles (if that isn't a dead giveaway, I don't know what is) and Kuro the cat.  Unfortunately, none of the female characters were very interesting in this show - a disappointment to be sure. 

Since the manga is still ongoing, I would love to compare the two, but alas I have not read the manga.  The first couple of episodes of the anime were well done and captured my interest immediately, but the episodes that followed quickly brought my interest down to almost nothing.  The strongest point was in the middle of the series, centered around Amaimon, one of the demon kings.  I now know the end of the anime was actually filler (!) and I think the content really killed the chance for a second season.  

The strongest music in the series is definitely found in both openings by Uverworld and ROOKiEZ is PUNK'D.  The background music added to the atmosphere of the anime, but not enough that I really took note of its presence.  The first ending theme, sung by 2PM, was also noteworthy.  

Overall, I would rate this anime a 3/5.  It's a shame it did not live up to its potential. 

A Brief Review - Riviera: The Promised Land (PSP)

I first played Riviera when it came out on the Nintendo Game Boy Advance.  Although I didn't finish the game in that playthrough, I remember being impressed with the characters, plot, and gameplay (especially this last category - it really pushed the GBA to its limits!).  So when my brother got me the PSP port for Christmas one year, I was understandably excited.

From what I understand, not much has changed in the PSP version - the sprites and graphics are basically the same, just a bit clearer on the PSP due to the backlit screen.  There is added art in a number of scenes, but the biggest change comes in the form of voice acting for the characters.  In the American localization, you can even choose whether you want the characters to speak in English or Japanese!  Rose, the talking cat, was especially hilarious in Japanese.  

The music also gets a bit of an overhaul, updating the instrumentation to be more suitable for the PSP.  Each track creates its own ambience, and the final battle music is one of the best I've heard.  The normal battle music can get annoying after a while (especially during training...), but the soundtrack suits the game very well.  

Overall, even though the port doesn't do much to enhance the original game, I would still give this a 4/5 rating.  The GBA version is harder to find nowadays, so one might as well go for the PSP port. 

Pokemon Johto

So I've been going on a big Pokemon music binge lately (probably because I preordered Pokemon X).  While I never really kept up with the Pokemon anime, this was my favorite opening from the series when I was a kid.  Johto Journeys was Season 3, and corresponded with the Generation 2 Pokemon games - Gold and Silver.  These games introduced about 100 new Pokemon, so the lyrics in the English opening for the season match nicely. "But you still gotta catch 'em all!"