A Package from the "God of Music"

Finally had the time to make this post as i've been busy w/ school and watching the playoffs. So anyways, as i mentioned last week, my DJ MAX Portable 2 Night Black Orpheus Package Limited Edition came in last week and this post will be dedicated to the lovely swag that it contains. Thus, you can decide if this rare puppy was worth my 200 bones CDN.

So first up is the box. As you can see from the box Play Asia sent me, it was quite huge. Had to unwrap about 5 layers of bubble wrap to get this baby out. And this is how the sweet Night Black edition looks:

The box is quite heavy and very sturdy. It opens up ala magnet lid. Here's the inside of the box showing how the soundtrack, game and puzzle is placed:

The PSP cover and actual holographic case/cover, as well as inside the case w/ more awesome E.L. art.

the jigsaw puzzle box itself is thick and sturdy and also opens up ala magnet style. The puzzle pices are in ziplock bag. The postcards are placed underneath the puzzle pieces along w/ the exclusive Night Black poster/guide for the poster. Here's the what the inside of the jigsaw puzzle box looks like:

And here's the exclusive Night Black postcards:

Next up is the visual artbook, which is hidden underneath the game and soundtrack. This baby is huge and the paper is nice and glossy. There's about 80 something pages consisting of artwork, making-of (storyboards, production sketches) and a small section w/ the staff. Very well worth it.

Soundtrack is next. Contains 3 CDs titled Black, White and Red. Black and White are mostly songs from the game, while Red is remixes of selected songs from the game. It's formatted basically the same as DJ Max Portable 1's soundtrack.

Last swag to be included is a NB ranger mask hidden way underneath the box. There's five colours and I got green.

Two things to note is the insert that comes w/ the game. There's an ad for the upcoming DJ MAX Invitational Live concert (cool) and another teaser ad for Pentavision's next game. It's currently titled Project S4 and looks very cool as it has a chick w/ sword and gun. The website can be found here and i guess it's expected to launch on the 27th.

Don't feel like talking much about the game aside from the fact i'm loving it like the first. The new fever system is way awesome and i love the soundtrack, much moreso than DJMP 1's (though most would disagree). The soundtrack for 2 is more varied and i listen to a variety of music in general. While DJMP 1's music was really great, it had too many tracks that sounded the same. However, i found the videos better in 1. But that's just personal taste. There's a lot of good ones in 2 and i've yet to unlock 'em all. My fave video so far would no doubt be Syriana, that is linked to the awesome Outlaw (which is also in DJMP2 along w/ a few other DJMP1 music vids). So, in the end was the limited edition worth it? Yes and no. The game itself is amazing. The artbook is gorgeous w/ lots of beautiful artwork (and one of the main reason why i wanted the LE). The soundtrack is audio orgasm as i love the music more than DJ MAX Portable 1. The insert booklet is really nice too. The rest of the stuff is a no, it's junk and cost almost nothing to make. I could do w/out 'em. The postcards are nice though and definitely like Night Black's selection of postcards more than Metallic Silver. The puzzle obviously kicks Metallic Silver's ass too. I'll probably do the puzzle once i get a frame for it (what?! i have to spend MORE money on this? :P ^^). So the real downfall is the price through a middle buyer. If one was able to achieve this straight from Korea for a little under 100 bucks US, definitely worth it. So, looks like i've decided to keep this knowing that i'm one of the special 1000 ppl in the world who owns this version ^^.

While I'm talking about gaming, last week's announcement of Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix definitely has me hyped. The reason is mostly due to the awesome redrawn artwork by my current fave comic studio Udon. And those who've been following my blog, know how much I love Udon and their Street Fighter, Darkstalkers, Rival Schools and Street Fighter Legends comics (i might do another Udon collection pic one day). On that note, i'd like to mention that i bought Gen 13 #7 last week solely cuz Alvin Lee (my fave artist from Udon) and M3TH (also from Udon) were responsible for the art.

As for gaming purchases this week, i'm contemplating on P3 Fes. I own the JPN P3 and plan to get the US one (which has been delayed once again to July). However, i'm not far in P3 and currently don't have the drive to play it right now. So i might sell it and get Fes as i'm still unsure if Atlus USA is releasing Fes. I've decided not to get KOF Nests Collection cuz it's a collection of the WORSE KOFs. So i would hardly be playing it even if i did get it. That and cuz I already own the PAL 2000/2001 (uncensored ;)) collection on the PS2 by Ignition as well as the crappy port of KoF '99 on the PSX by Agetec. Though it is a crappy port, at least it's got a kick ass gallery that this collection does NOT have. Plus, KoF 99 is pure crap (stupid game that introduced strikers). Now that i'm on SNK news, i must mention of the latest media of my most anticipated DS game that appeared on most JPN game sites today yesterday (yeah, i was doing this post last night but couldn't finish ^_^;), Days of Memories:

Go to the usuals like Impress, Gpara, Dengeki Online, eg.nttpub for the same screenshots. Last bit on SNK news is this sweet IGN interview today last night w/ SNKPUSA's Ben Herman. The interview mostly dicusses the SNK and the Wii's VC as SNKP plans to release Neo-Geo games in the summer. So there's a lot of discussion what games they plan to release as well as online functionality w/ the Wii. It also mentions their future plans w/ Wii, 360 and PS3. Herman also notes that Fatal Fury Battle Archives 1 is expected to release in June for PS2 in NA, while the announced Art of Fighting collection should street at the end of April or in May. Though, i'm excited that SNKPUSA is finally releasing these games in NA, i probably still won't buy cuz i already own them and just can't afford double dipping. The only game i would double dip on is KOF XI. Even though it's broken, it's still fun and i luv Elisabeth ^^. However, i can't wait for their VC lineup! gimme some NAM, football frenzy, baseball stars, windjammers, etc. etc.

Latest Famitsu scores:

Final Fantasy XII Revenant Wings (NDS, Square Enix): 9 / 8 / 7 / 8 - (32/40) - cool, but still a FF that didn't deserve a sequel
Panel de Pon DS (NDS, Nintendo): 8 / 7 / 8 / 8 - (31/40)
Meteos: Disney Magic (NDS, Disney): 8 / 8 / 7 / 8 - (31/40)
One Piece Unlimited Adventure (Wii, Bandai Namco): 7 / 7 / 7 / 7 - (28/40) - not bad not bad for a shonen anime game
Test Drive Unlimited (Xbox 360, Microsoft): 9 / 8 / 9 / 8 - (34/40)
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas (Xbox 360, Ubisoft): 9 / 9 / 9 / 9 - (36/40)
San-X Chara Sagashi Land (NDS, MTO): 6 / 7 / 6 / 7 - (26/40)
Hana Deka Club: Animal Paradise (NDS, Agatsuma): 5 / 7 / 5 / 5 - (22/40)
Choco Inu no Sweets Depart (NDS, TDK): 6 / 5 / 6 / 6 - (23/40)
Momotarou Dentetsu DS: Tokyo & Japan (NDS, Hudson): 7 / 7 / 7 / 7 - (28/40
Negima!? Dream Tactic Yumemiru Otome Princess (PS2, Konami): 6 / 6 / 6 / 6 - (24/40)
Rogue Hearts Dungeon (PS2, Compile Heart): 6 / 4 / 5 / 5 - (20/40)
Elvandia Story (PS2, Spike): 6 / 6 / 6 / 5 - (23/40)
Binchou-Tan: Shiawasegoyomi (PS2, Marvelous): 5 / 4 / 4 / 4 - (17/40)
The Dog Island: Hitotsuno no Hana no Monogatari (PS2, Yuke's): 7 / 6 / 6 / 6 - (25/40)
The Dog Island: Hitotsu no Hana no Monogatari (Wii, Yuke's): 7 / 6 / 6 / 5 - (24/40)
Super Black Bass: Kitahankyuu o Tsuru (NDS, Starfish): 4 / 4 / 4 / 4 - (16/40)

Nothing in Famitsu really interests me much this week: Beautiful Katamari Damacy (Multi) = meh (the graphics look better but not that much); Wild Arms XF = meh (looks good but i'm not a fan of the WA series)

2nd hint for my 'special' post in the future:

this one may be tricky but it's not Amano related, instead, anime-related. Since i posted an anime version, here's the hawt Amano manga style version:

T & @ss 2 The MAX

Since y'all know that I follow DJ MAX Portable 2 closely (yesterday i had a scare w/ the JPN LE, turned out to be false thankfully) Ruliweb would like to show ya the opening movie and screenshots from it. Contains some 3D, 3D cel shading animation (really good), static images and modes from the game. It's okay but I was expecting something that would top the awesome (and 'fanservicey') Korean animated intro. I hope there's another intro cuz some games contain an 'opening' AND an 'intro', if you get my drift. Somehow, i doubt it as the OP song is featured in full as well as 'the band'. Oh well, it sux if that's the only opening/intro as one would've expected something bigger and better w/ the profits they made. Here's some pics from the intro from Ruliweb if you haven't already clicked on the above link. HAWT!

DJ MAX Portable 2 Vocal Paradigm 2 was also released today w/ hot e.l featured fully on the cover. yum. Need to check this out as i've been listening to vocal paradigm 1 for a month now.