BotCon 2020?

Follow for more info in the near future.

— BotCon (@BotCon) February 1, 2020

Well that just came out of nowhere.

Friday Night Video Fright

Another busy Friday night, another movie night post here on the Base! Folks, I'll be honest, Friday is usually a pretty hard night for me. To make things worse, I've got some sort of head cold making me just a little miserable. It'd be a good time for comfort food, but first I need to finish this can of Cherry Bubly I thought would taste good (nope). I'm going to my happy place and bring you all with me. Sound good? Here's a long block of old Halloween commercials. I know it's only January, but let's face it, the month is like 6 years long. We could all use some silly fun. And what's more silly than.... I like Halloween. I'm just making an excuse to enjoy it in January. I see the site traffic, the Halloween stuff gets hits all year. You all like it too. We all can be weird together.

Kick Some Astyanax

Astyanax is one of those games that people tend to forget about. Not for any particular reason, it's pretty good, though admittedly 30 years after it's release I'm still trying to pronounce it's name correctly. Funnily enough, you don't play as the Greek Mythology character at all, you play as a guy named Roche. In the NES version you play as a kid named Astyanax, I have no clue why.

I'm sure most people are more familiar with the NES game, I was too until discovering the arcade version at my local Pizza Hut. It's one of those cases where a home version plays pretty similar to the arcade machine, but is practically a different game. So much so that it'll get it's own post sometime later. I'm talking about the arcade game today.

Bios- Calcar

It doesn't matter who suffers, it only matters that evil wins the day.

Cold and calculating. A single-minded walking computer. Carries in his photographic memory ever step of every Decepticon battle ever fought. Uses his vast knowledge to blood-curdling effect. As a tough all-terrain vehicle, defends with roof-mounted, four barrel, visible tracer missile fire. As a robot, it forms devastating separate weapon support.

By The Power of Poseidon's Fury

If you've ever been to Universal's Islands of Adventure, you've probably found yourself marveling at the gorgeous Poseidon's Fury facade. It's truly a sight to be seen, while opinions of the attraction itself may vary, there's no lack of love for the look of the place. It's awesome. Set in the ruins of a temple where a battle of good and evil takes place over a magic weapon... does that sound familiar?

 

Haunted Farmhouse

Guess I'll just stay away from abandoned farmhouses in Pakistan.

And Then There Were Two

The news about the two Transformers movies being worked on broke last night and everybody has been running wild since. It's plenty to get excited about, one we get another movie like Bumblebee, which is the movie everybody wanted since 2007. Two, a Beast Wars movie. Pure excitement and joy. I hope they get this right. A common mistake by those not in the know is just slap animal alt modes on robots and voila Beast Wars.

That's not it.

Beast Wars didn't necessarily have to have animal forms to be what it is and why it's so special. It's a quality of writing and characters that even twenty something later still mean the world to the fans of the show. I can be pretty forgiving of the movies shortcomings, but I can't promise I will be in the case of Beast Wars. It means something to me.

The other movie that is intended to be more like Bumblebee, yes please. That was just such a fun movie and a great time to be a Transformers fan. Not like the other times it's a great time to be a Transformers fan that click bait sites generically throw on their articles. It was a genuine moment where you could point to something and say 'THIS'. Bumblebee did that. 

Bios- Crosshairs

Don't shoot until you see the wires in their eyes

Meticulous, cautious, some would say overcautious -- won't take a shot unless he's sure he can't miss... won't waste ammo. Pinpointer, his dual rocket-propelled grenade launcher, can lock on target in less than .0003 seconds, but usually trusts Crosshairs to decide when to shoot. In vehicle mode, maximum speed: 160 mph, range: 750 miles; built for traversing rough terrain.

The Scary Ass Fright Zone

Earlier today I was playing with my new Master of the Universe Mega Construx figures and found myself thinking about what old stuff I'd like to see in the line. Which lead me straight to thinking about the awesome Fright Zone. The most somebody glued together some Halloween decorations He-Man bag guy spooky shit ever. It's every haunted cave you've ever seen and sold to small children. He-Man and his crew was the target of a lot of the Satanic Panic of the 80's and they kinda had a point.

Regardless, it was a cool play set with all sorts of scary stuff included. You had the before spoken haunted cave with a gnarly prison. A scary ass tree that would grab you without consent. But the most horrifying and diabolical feature... the puppet monster that'd eat the shit out of you. Thirty something years later and it just now occurs to me that the prison is a red herring. Yeah He-Man, just try to rescue Buzz-Off as seen in the above picture. Boom, monster eats your whole ass.

I don't know if you took notice in the commercial way at the beginning in my typical way of using old commercials to set the scene for a post, but the monster did not ever actually say The Fright Zone. Neither did the tree or Hordak even. It was just some guy yelling off screen. I cannot just explain how much a classmate of mine didn't believe me when I told him the monster doesn't actually say 'THE FRIGHT ZONE'. In hindsight, maybe his did.

Spectreman-pilot short

I'm not the biggest Spectreman fan, other than thinking he's cool that is. I thought I'd spend a little more time with him. Watch a little of his adventures, appreciate him more. I turned up a short pilot for his show, and man it's a doozy. Different costume, little more fever dream, but really fun. I definitely prefer this era of toku/kaiju shows. Not that I have anything against the more modern stuff (as I clearly enjoy it here as is), just man it's got a specific charm in these older shows. You know?

Video Format Change

Unlike the past few Mondays, I didn't make any videos today. I stayed pretty busy all weekend celebrating my wife's birthday and stuff not leaving me wanting to do much today. Well, other than work through a pretty big backlog of keshi/mini figures and put pictures of them on Instagram. I decided to put my videos on Instagram TV again as opposed to YouTube. I'm not deleting my channel, just realizing (again) my best fit.

I think sometime next week or this week I'll take a few of the ones I put of YouTube and stick them on my Instagram. Not that I've got a bazillion followers or anything, but I get a good amount of likes and views there. Not to mention, the kinda of thing I do goes over more with the crowd there. That and admittedly, while I watch a lot of YouTube, I like uploading to Instagram a million times better. If desktop readers noticed the return of the Instagram widget on the sidebar. That's part of my annual January arranging of the site. It doesn't really change much, but I do figures out a bunch of things over the course of the month while moving stuff around. Thanks for coming back to another year of Zone Base!

Bootleg Star Wars Tuna

 This is the way.

Dynamite Dinosours

Looks like another busy Friday night, time for another round of Ghostbusters!

Bios- Action Master Soundwave

Cries and screams are music to my ears!

A smooth-talking opportunist who uses his eavesdropping abilities on friends and foes alike. Equipped with advanced radio wave and energy sensors, photographic memory and newly improved 2,000 mile range transmission capability. Wingthing, his loyal, lethal cohort, is all too eager to carry out Soundwave's every vengeful whim and diabolical scheme. Upon command, Wingthing turns into a metal-piercing concussion cannon. It's difficult to say which one is more despised by the other Decepticons.

The Mamba And The Mummy

THE COBRA MAMBA, a fast attack copter with laser guns and missiles on both sides. A giant purple and black menace featuring two detachable attack pods and twin rotor blades that looked amazing when they weren't hitting each other. In 1988, while on a spring break spent at my Grandma's house, THE COBRA MAMBA went on it's most devious mission yet. A museum robbery. Did I mention I was in the 4th grade?

It's Takes Seasoning To Defeat Bowser

I guess they left out the scene where Mario takes a nap before rescuing Princess Peach.

The Car's Carbon Footprint Is Murder

Dracula, Frankenstein, The Wolfman. These are names likely to come to mind when thinking about Universal Monsters. There's one forgotten monster from the studio that just... look, can we forgo the clever introduction? I just wanted to talk about The Car. The Car is a movie about an evil car that just murders anybody for no reason given aside from it's possibly demonically possessed. Maybe.

Botbots Series 4 Stuffs!

In 2020, the new theme for the year is the Goldrush Games. BotBots tribes are competing in the Goldrush Games, a competition to see which tribes are the most mischievous! Winners win one of the shiny gold trophy bots from the Winner's Circle tribe! The mad dash to grab the gold is on!

The series 4 collector’s guide is now available to download from the updated BotBots brand page. This guide highlights gold bots from the Winner’s Circle tribe as well as other new tribes that will be available in 2020 such as…

·        Magic Tricksters – the tricky little tribe of bots from the magic store!

·        Movie Moguls – a band of movie buff bots from the movie theatre!

·        Science Alliance – mad scientist bots from the science store!

BotBots series 4 characters are now live on the Transformers website and the BotBots website!

Thanks to Rogers and Cowan for sharing this news with Zone Base readers.

Bios- Action Master Blaster

When the music is rockin', I'm rollin'.

He loves all kinds of Earth music, but Rock n' Roll is his favorite because it's hard and loud, like him. Fights hard, plays hard, lives hard... and makes sure everyone knows it. In combat, routinely performs feats of courage and daring that would blow the fuses on other robots. As a communications center, his broadcast range is 4,000 miles. His energon-powered Flight-Pack can propel at airborne speeds in excess of 120mph. Backpack converts to a signal-jamming, electro-scrambler gun.

Stairway Ghost

Guess I won't sit in stairwells while being filmed with a Vivitar camera.

The Power To Go On Tour

As an avid subscriber of Masters of the Universe magazine, I don't have to tell you I was sold instantly on the Power Tour. Though being in the third grade... I didn't get to make these types of decisions on my own. BBBBuuuuttttttttt the thing is pretty much all over the internet and I could watch it if I want to. Looking back, it might have been a good idea not to go as holy crap did Skeletor have his own haunted house at the show or something? I've made my joke about He-Man's villains being a bunch of Halloween decorations before, but holy shit ALL of the villains look straight our of a Spirit Halloween clearance sale. I'd like to point out that each time I typed Power Tour while writing this, I accidentally typed Pour Tour. Because Orko looked drunk.

Bought To Get Not As Brightly LIT

I'm just going to go ahead and talk about one of my favorite TV shows. I didn't say the best show ever, I said one of my favorites. It's occasional lack of quality actually might be one of the reasons I like it just so very much. That doesn't make sense, but neither do some of the episodes. I can literally loose an entire day just watching episodes from my DVD sets. Half the time fully enthralled, half the time laughing in a state of confusion as to what is even going on. BTW, this is where I say 'yeah, yeah' when somebody brings up the new show. I uh.. don't think I care. I'm 100% happy with the old show. Gnaw meen brah?

I still say my favorite episodes are the Halloween episodes. While I love spooky shit all year, clearly Halloween flavored spooky shit is my favorite variety. There's cool monster under the bed stories, and then there's monster under the bed stories after trick or treating. I may have a problem, but it's a fun one to have. That also is kind of the charm of the show, even the non-Halloween episodes feel like an old Halloween special. They just have that same vibe. I mean, check out the witch that scares a young Seth Green in 'The Monsters In My Room". Might as well check out the whole episode while you're at it. It's nice to see Seth Green long before you were tired of him in the early 2000's.

It's just the perfect show to spend a day with with a bunch of snacks. Some chips, some candy, maybe a frozen pizza. It's a good way to enjoy some spooky shit in January as well as October. Which as it's currently January, I'm just lost without orange pumpkins everywhere. I've got to make do and somehow I can equate grape soda and pizza with anything. Like Halloween in January!

The Golden Bat/Ôgon Batto

When aliens attack, the only solution is to travel to Atlantis to awaken the Golden Bat!

Invasions On VHS

I usually skip past the previews on my videos these days. I'm not sure if these little collections of kids videos still get promo spots before the movie starts. Admittedly, in today's world of on demand... it's probably just a blurb with a picture on the series Facebook page. I admit now that my nostalgia for VHS stems from really enjoying a trip to the video store. You know, that'd be a cool store to do again. It wouldn't have to actually sell videos, but maybe oddball things like snacks and merchandising. Maybe prepaid cards for services. Look, I just want to go to Blockbuster. Is that so wrong?

YouTube Channel Update

I updated the YouTube Channel today if you'd like to check it out. Still a work in progress, I think I need to work on my lighting more. I have some good lights that I didn't think I need to use as the area I'm using 'looks' like it's well lit. Of course in the finished video, it's a different story. Still trying to keep the videos short as I go, but ones a little longer than normal. It's a work in progress, and I'm enjoying it. I think next week I'll do Ghostbusters toys.

Snow Godzilla commeth

It's a cold morning and I'm compelled to post footage of Snow Godzilla from the Shinkalion movie: Shinkansen Henkei Robo Shinkalion the Movie: The Marvelous Fast ALFA-X That Comes From The Future. I've never watched Skinkalion, admired the toys, but man I need a vinyl toy of Snow Godzilla STAT!

Guns In Mystery Bags

Today I was thinking about something that's not unlike an earlier thought I had. What if Battlemasters came in blind bags? Not like the main guys, but a side line full of funky repaints? During the Unicron Trilogy Takara sold funky colored Mini-Cons/Microns in blind packaging and it was great! Battlemasters would be perfect to equip guys lacking in firepower. It doesn't even have to be Generations aimed either. Earlier this week I got the Cyberverse Sharkticons and Quintesson sets. It would be cool to have some firepower to give the bots in those sets. Or even some of the standard figures. Warrior Hot Rod sure would look sweet with a gun!

Phantom Of The Big Apple

Friday Nights are usually pretty busy for me, but it's always a good time to share something with you all.

Sometimes GI JOE fights monsters

G.I. Joe is the code name for America's daring, highly trained, special mission force. Its purpose: To defend human freedom against Cobra, a ruthless, terrorist organization who apparently has a ton of monsters just laying around. To be honest, I'm kinda at a loss at just how Cobra looses all the time. Even without monsters they have ninjas, punk rock pirates who's leader could just morph into other people. Some weirdo in a metal mask, a guy with a robot arm, a freaking mad scientist, a bootleg Dr. Strange, robot soldiers... and that's before you get to the secret city of snake people and the second (and better) leader who was a damn Frankenstein Monster with a portion of his parts coming from Dracula himself!

At some point Cobra decided to outright just start using monsters, because why the fuck not? The hell with those twins, we've got Mega Monsters! GI JOE had to make another special team called the MEGA MARINES to drive up in their Monster Blaster A.P.C to shoot a big ass rocket with. But not to be outdone, when Cobra took their antics to space, GI JOE had to utilize space robots. The Manimals would have come in around then, but something happened and they didn't see the light of day until the early 2000's. What are the Manimals you ask?

Freaking mutating solders that's what. I was lucky enough to score a couple on clearance at Kay Bee Toys and let me tell you, Manimals were freaking amazing. In case the Mega Monsters, snake people, and drug dealers weren't enough... mutant soldiers that changed into terrifying monsters should do the trick. With toys like Manimals, there's no rational reason for GI JOE not to still be on shelves. In the immortal words of Ronnie James Dio, it's always a mystery.

What if mutating soldiers and giant monsters STILL aren't enough? Well, just pull out the zombies I guess. Both Cobra and GI JOE have Eco Warriors teams. Utilizing things like toxic waste for evil, Cobra's cool Toxo-Vipers are awesome enough on their own.  Packing chemical sprayers and a shotgun... I just can't love these neon colored warriors enough. But you can't just go around squirting toxic sludge around and despite all the amazing stuff Cobra has, they have terrible quality control. Toxo-Vipers suits will eventually leak and create a new soldier called the Toxo-Zombie. I'm not kidding, they literally just call workplace accidents a new type of soldier. Somehow these new zombie soldiers were trusted with more chemical sprayers. At this point why the hell not?

At some point Cobra decided accidental zombies weren't enough and developed Zombie-Vipers. According to the bio-card on the back, Compound Z is a chemical that just turns Vipers into zombies. Zombie (a monster known for dragging it's limps) soldiers with big tentacles hanging off their arms. After ten years of The Walking Dead and people dispatching zombies with sticks, starting to understand how the Joes keep winning.

Dang, Gobots are Scary

I've been pondering what all to look for at Toylanta this year. Admittedly I'll probably not follow up on any of my plans, but I intend to keep an eye out for the things I'm keeping in mind. If somebodies got it for a good price, yep. Well... as you all know I fall into Halloween withdrawal around the first week of November. What's a dude in a spooky mood to do? Well, I do plan to look for Gobots. I've said it before, they're a good candidate for a toy show. Dude. Monster Gobots are just the thing! I has Halloween Robots in March?

Mashin Sentai Kiramager trailer!

Pretty neat!

Tomica Kizuna! Earth Granner!

ドライブヘッド以来約2年半ぶり！テレビ大阪・テレビ東京系列6局ネットにて4 月からトミカのテレビアニメ放送します。その名も…トミカ絆キズナ合体！

_人人人人人人人人人人_
> 　アースグランナー　<
￣Y^Y^Y^Y^Y^Y^Y^Y￣ pic.twitter.com/uXxvluaQOp

— タカラトミー@映画シンカリオン公開中 (@takaratomytoys) January 15, 2020

About two and a half years since the drive head! From April, Tomica's TV animation will be broadcast on TV Osaka and TV Tokyo affiliated stations. The name is… Tomica Kizuna is united! _People people people people people_ > Earth Granner < ￣Y ^ Y ^ Y ^ Y ^ Y ^ Y ^ Y ^ Y￣

New Authentics!

It feels good to be a dollar store gangster. News recently broke of more Authentics coming to stores soon! While I haven't gotten any of the Titan Changers recently sold at the stores, I've made no secret of my love for these not very expensive figures. Soundwave looks to be taking a cue from his Cyberverse incarnation... and not a bad step to follow. Ratchet looks pretty good, he'll probably be an Easter Egg shell like the Optimus, but I don't care! It's $5! Like I said, I haven't gotten any of the Titan Changers... but that Grimlock might be the gateway to those. These look like just the thing to hunt in discount stores very soon!

Zaxxon LCD

I'm horrible at Zaxxon. Though I imagine I'd be much better at a more simplified version like would be found on LCD. This commercial for Bandai's version is incredible. Original animation and cool Trapper Keeper graphics really sell the whole package. Honestly the unit itself looks pretty amazing on it's own. I kinda want to frame one and display it in a museum.

How did Mighty Max not die?

If there ever was a toy line that should and could make a return in today's world of smaller toys it's Mighty Max! I could easily see the little figures being sold in blind packs as well as with play sets. Mighty Max was great because you had this totally every Saturday morning cartoon looking kid in horrible situations. Damn, where are his parents? Literally Max is finding himself in some random evil fortress shaped like some random terror (a skull in this commercial). Not only is the evil fortress shaped like a random terror.... it's full of random terror! Monsters, ghosts, skeletons, demons, all out for Max's blood. I'm all for the backwards hat wearing cool kid and his fast ways... but let's face facts. They killed him.

If I had a Force, it'd be a Tiger one

With all the news around the upcoming Snake Eyes movie and new GIJOE toys on the way, it's been pretty hard for me to not get excited. GIJOE is another one of those things I grew up with that I've always loved. Sadly in more recent times the line has struggled to keep a presence in retail. I'm hoping this attempt is successful, because duh.

One of my favorite GIJOE teams is Tiger Force. A series of repaints using prior molds, Tiger Force made for some good looking toys. The above commercial states the premise of the new team and even outright admits that they're repainting older stuff. Though it makes sense (Tiger Force needs new gear!), the "use the enemies tech" ideology is a tried and true formula.

I really, really appreciate the original animation used in this commercial. It just looks amazing. Not to mention, like I said, Tiger Force just looks great. I don't expect for the new GIJOE stuff to revisit the old stuff much. Though if they did... I'd be pretty happy for some new Tiger Force toys.

Spooky Fruit

At some point fruit snacks went from legitimate dried up fruit to pieces of candy that's somehow more acceptable to eat as a snack. Sunkist was the king of the fruit snacks back when with their various bars and bags full of little odd shapes. While Spooky Fruit was perfect for Halloween, I'd be happy with it all year round. I'm pretty certain they were available for more than just Halloween, but I'm willing to admit I'm wrong on that. The space shapes pretty much were though.

Creepy Cousins

The other day I was pondering things to look for at Toylanta. Gobots are pretty high on the list. I always get one or two there. I love the little guys and thanks to their unfair 'poor mans Transformers' reputation, can usually get them pretty cheap. I decided to keep an eye out for Monster Gobots as I love them, but especially for Creepy. While I'd love to get the special mail away version as seen in the awesome commercial above... I'm not betting to hard on sucess with that. However, a standard version might not be impossible. He's mainly purple and black. Which brings a mental comparison I made years ago come to mind.

Look familiar? That's Transmetal Scorponok from the McDonald's Beast Wars Transmetals Happy Meals. It's not exact, but man they sure do look alike. Considering the first Beast Wars Happy Meal toys were all original characters, I wonder just how close it could have been to the Transmetal ones doing the same? Or perhaps using some other names not on shelves like one from the purchase of Tonka? Like... what if we were pretty close to Creepy as a Beast Wars character available with a kids meal? Probably not at all, but that similarity is super close.

Super Nintendo World Japan

Here is a special music video collaboration between @wearegalantis, @charli_xcx and @USJ_official celebrating #SUPERNINTENDOWORLD! The #Nintendo theme park experience will open in Japan this summer. #USJ https://t.co/2w1DR2nqhJ

— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) January 14, 2020

Dang, I'm really jealous of those lucky ones in Japan this summer.

YouTube Channel Updates

New videos for the Zone Base YouTube Channel are up! I'm still learning here (relearning, I used to make a lot of videos a good decade ago), so they're a work in progress. Intentionally making them short until I get better.

Transform Squadron 17- New Years Evil

Listen Now!

This month: Rob talks about fun stuff in 2020!

Battle Tribes Halloween in January!

SHOP NOW

I have been in serious Halloween withdrawal since November 1st. I've just been lost without orange and purple majesty all around. No crisp cool autumn air, no spooky shit everywhere, no pumpkin nothing. The spooky season doesn't start until June and I've got like half a year here until neon green skeletons tell me where to buy special pumpkin wrapper editions of candy I normally don't eat. Thank God somebody out there heard my despair. Spy Monkey Creations, creators of the awesome Battle Tribes and Weaponeers of Monkaa toys have came to my rescue. I'm not crying, you're crying. Don't worry, I got my order in already.

Visual Kei Robots or when I name something for no reason

I was thinking today about a specific look in robots and don't think I quite know how to word it. I really like the visuals of beast themed robots when drawn a certain way. Compare Beast Wars Neo to Beast Wars season one. The season one gang is very traditional Transformer in looks and design. Beast Wars Neo designs have a particular flair, look at the picture of Break for example. Homeboy is pretty and he knows it. I'm definitely fond of both looks that I'm poorly describing. It's a style all it's own that I just want to appreciate a little right now.

The look isn't cemented in a certain time frame or series either. Look at the Lio Kaiser members in Transformers Victory. These designs are pretty similar to Saint Seiya or Ronin Warriors. Maybe it's a particular look or style that I just don't know the name of. I'm just a fan not an expert. Think I'll just refer to them as visual kei robots. Because they're glam rock. I got my order of Mugenbine candy toys in today and the box art just got my brain going. I'm not a very stylish man, I dress painfully casual. But dude, I can appreciate those fancy pants robots.

The Ghostbusters have small business advice

As if I'm not already busting (hurr hurr) at the seams with excitement for the new Ghostbusters movie, Quickbooks has taken to using them in some of their more recent ads. Making for a fun commercial for what isn't normally an exciting subject. I've seen some folks point out that Slimer doesn't look amazing. That's a pretty decent looking Green Ghost made for a commercial that didn't have a feature film budget. It's the internet, somebodies going to find something to complain about. Man... I never thought I'd see the day that payroll software commercials would reduce me to a giddy mess.

Galactic Heroes from Cybertron

I like Transformers Armada. I liked it then, I like it now. I enjoy looking back at the fun time I had with it and at various alternate versions of it. For example, this commercial for the Korean version of Armada called Galactic Heroes: Cybertrons. It's funny how just something simple like another language, different music, and a new logo can make something you've seen a million times look new.

Looking back at the Gamera VMU game I was talking about yesterday and the catch 'em all-ness of Armada... man that really was a trope of it's time huh? Late 90's/Early 2000's, that was a general thing. I wonder why a Tamogochi style game for Armada didn't happen? I would be surprised if one did and I didn't know about it. The little oddball things usually get passed over by the news sites, but at the time they literally reported everything. So I guess I would have known.

The Unidentified Nebraska Drones

Weird things going on in the skies over Nebraska lately.

Sega dreams of Gamera (and so do I)

I've had Gamera on my mind today, because I like him. It's a little unfair that Gamera doesn't have the most shinning legacy, admittedly being widely perceived as a low rent wanna be Godzilla will do that for you. But man, it's really hard to hate a giant fire breathing turtle. For one thing, Gamera's fights have always been crazy violent. In his goofier children's movie roots to his more darker and gritty 90's movies... Gamera's fights are usually full of blood shed, severed limbs, and carnage all around. It's just insane.

The commercial above is for a Gamera VMU mini game. Gamera has had some good showings in video games and while the Dreamcast may have been short lived, it's still pretty well regarded. The VMU was really before it's time. A memory card that served as a portable gaming device. It was pretty limited, but in time I could have seen it developing into something special. Sadly we'll never know as the Dreamcast, as great as it was, pretty much had all it's momentum killed by the PS2.

The game is called Gamera: Dream Battle. Basically it was for sale in a neat package loaded on a VMU with an included Gamera figure. Pretty dang neat. It was the standard virtual pet/monster fighter type game that was all the rage at the time. If somebody had the prior released Mothra: Dream Battle VMU, they could battle those as well. That's pretty dang great, Mothra vs Gamera, the winner is you.

OJ Simpson will help you see the Transformers in person

What a world we live in. It just seems like yesterday OJ Simpson... yeah. I've never had Pioneer Chicken. It's a west coast chain... or was... I think there's like one or two left. The point is I've never had it. But if I had, I could have taken advantage of their coupon books for all sorts of discounts at Universal Studios, including free admission. That's super crazy. These days a ticket is around a hundred bucks a day. Back then, all I needed was a winner winner chicken dinner. If only the creative team at Universal would have included references to the old Transformers Base Camp in the ride. Though I guess the meet and greets generally reproduce the atmosphere. Unfortunately I can't get in for free with a bucket of chicken. Because if so, my arteries be damned.

Now on YouTube!

If you hadn't noticed the link over there ---> in the right sidebar for a YouTube account for the past few days, well it's for the new Zone Base YouTube account! I've been wanting to do this some time (with a few false starts) and finally hit the ground stumbling! My first post is a bit of a test trial with an inexpensive action camera. I took it to my local Dollar Tree to pick out some blind bag goodies and that joker is getting returned! I guess further out and about videos will be done with my phone or much nicer camera that's getting used for other videos. To not have an empty channel, I uploaded some older videos I had made during a prior attempt to do videos.

It'll be a rough start and I'll probably be horrible at this but... well, I guess that's just a fact. I'm not out to be a big internet celebrity and just like this very site here, it's just a way to enjoy my hobby with others. Really the videos will be an extension of the site (like my Instagram) and I plan to have regular updates there. Please Like and Subscribe! (I get to say that now)

Creepy Creepy Thangs

I was just thinking, I need some of Toyfinity's Mordles.

The Last Warwolf

When I was in middle school, the most amazing game came out. Werewolf: The Last Warrior. You can guess I was sold instantly. Play as a werewolf, post apocalyptic setting, evil mutants... how could I resist? Fortunately the game hit the discount bins pretty fast and I got a copy (if it wasn't a birthday or Christmas...). The game was pretty good I thought and I spent many nights with it.

As you can see from the play through video, it's a pretty standard fare NES action platform game similar to Castlevania. Great music, pretty decent graphics, all around not bad. Thing is, like most games from it's era, the Japanese version was pretty unique.

Distributed by Takara in Japan instead of Data East. At 13 I knew nothing about the various companies. There was no internet for me to learn such things and really, I was a kid. I didn't care. I took note of companies, sure, but it don't go much further than that. I did notice that the logo from some of my Transformers was on some of my games. Kinda like LJN, but Takara games were better. 

I'm not going to make it out like the two different versions are completely different games. But there is neat differences to take note of. In Japan, the game is named Super Werewolf Chronicle - Warwolf. I'm honestly not sure if I think that's a better name than Werewolf: The Last Warrior, but sounds like a series more than a stand alone game. I wonder if a series was planned? Being that the game wasn't that much of a hit (not really one at all), there wasn't any sequels. I don't think the Warwolf makes any other appearances in other Data East games either. With a name like that and a look at his design, it's not hard to fathom that somebody thought the character could star in multiple adventures. 

If you compare this play through with the above one, you can see the various differences. Mostly sprites here and there and story line adjustments. Going back to my theory of the game being a planned series, check out the 'The End' screen.

That's from the Japanese version. Sure looks like the Warwolf is ready for more adventures huh? Howling at the full moon, sword hand things posed for fighting. Yeah, we've got a new hero right? But check out how the American version cranks that up a Monster Jam notch. 

  
I want a t-shirt of that. Nothing says establishing a new hero more than that straight out of WWF glory in 1990. Weirdly enough, the game came out first in America by almost 7 months. You'd figure the timing wouldn't have been the best to launch a new series of games as the Super Nintendo was gearing up for release in America and already well underway in Japan. Perhaps it was planned for an earlier release and things happened. There's not really much information about the game out there aside from 'hilarious' articles about how bad the game is. It could be bad I suppose, just because I loved it in middle school doesn't mean it's a good game. 

I've seen random fan art of the game, the occasional perler bead creation or two, but that's it. I'd love to see some indie toys of the Warwolf. I guess any werewolf figure could stand in, but those sword arms man. He's make for a great keshi or sofubi. I could see Battle Tribes make something special from him. It just needs to happen, you know?

Sixliner!

TF Raw  put up a new cleaned up version of the Sixliner commercial this morning. It's really good to see these in better quality. I think the first time I saw them they were in tiny grainy Realtime videos. I was so excited to see then that I didn't care that you had to squint to make it out. To be frank (Hi, I'm Frank now), I was so used to it at the time that I didn't care. Though these days I can watch clearer than real life video on my phone, so having a nice cleaned up version like this is super nice. I'm so glad the new Micromasters are continuing into Earthrise. I'm still missing some from Siege, but man it's great having them on shelves.

New Years Day with Godzilla... and Michelangelo

Happy New Year! I hope all of you are enjoying the holiday and if your like me, taking in a little bit of the king today! Though I really wish I was watching this marathon! I mean... Michelangelo? Why the hell not, let's have some pizza and bring in 2020! Here in the south, it's considered good luck to eat some kind of greens on New Years Day. The green symbolizes money and accordingly eating greens on New Years Day will result in having money throughout the year! Godzilla and Michelangelo are green and we're ingesting them with our eyes. So hey, good times ahead right? Well, at least while the marathon is on.

Happy New Year from Zone Base!

Happy New Year!