Dammit Monday, I said Demons Out!

Hello there Zone Base readers! A new week is upon us and... I've got a cold. Somehow the crazy weather here in the south has given me a case of the sniffles. Not fun, but I've got a fun week in store for you! But before we get to that, let me tell you about this weekend I had. Saturday the Mrs and I stopped by a local toy store that recently relocated to a much better location and I plan to visit more often. They were fully stocked with all sorts of cool toys. There was Transformers, Gobots, kaiju, MOTU, vintage video games... you name it, they had it! I picked up a G1 Flamefeather and a Leader-1 figural pencil sharpener and will definitely will be back more often. I also picked up a Super7 Godzilla Monster Island blind box and a Transformers Hot Wheel while at Walmart! Mechagodzilla was in the blind box and the Hot Wheel was Age of Extinction Crosshairs (I've always liked him). 

Unfortunately, Walmart's Transformers selection was still fully stocked with leftovers from last year, so nothing new there. Store stock is always a little barren at the beginning of the year, but extra movie stuff doesn't help. I ordered the Legacy United G1 Optimus Prime and plan to order a few bots a week. Last year around this time, I almost completely switched to online orders... looks like it's headed that way again. I feel asleep Saturday night watching the Transformers Channel like a boss.

I may have feel asleep like a boss, but I woke up like a chump. A sniffly nose and a head cold, bleah. While I got a bit done Sunday, I had planned to organize my toy room some, but wasn't feeling up to it. Instead, I played Pac-Man World Re-Pac. The e-shop had it on sale for $7.50 and that was an easy buy! I loved the Pac-Man World games back in the day and had been meaning to play this new edition for some time now. It definitely was a good way to ride out a cold. Well, I'm still not feeling great, so another day of Coricidin and rest awaits me. Like I said around the beginning of the post, I've got a fun week in store for you. Thank you all for reading and please don't forget to share with your friends!

Weekly Update 4/1/24

Empire of Old weekend was quite the adventure. I've made my thoughts on the movies known in the past two posts, but my birthday and Easter were pretty great! The Mrs absolutely spoiled me on my birthday as did my Mother and Brother. I got all sorts of toys and cool stuff. Too much to list here. Ate some great food, probably too much... but I'll get back on the wagon Monday. Just had a cheat weekend instead of a weekly cheat day. It was a special occasion! Well, I'll keep this weeks update short and thank all of you for reading Zone Base! There's a fun week of content coming for your eyeballs. Please don't forget to share the site with your friends, and Mutual High Fives all around!

Making Monday Rock

Oh crap, it's Monday. Thanks for coming back for another week here on Planet Zone. I had a pretty great weekend that I wish would have lasted longer. Saturday was a busy day that pretty much saw me get no rest, a lot done, and even family dinner at Olive Garden. While the Mrs's car was at the garage for some minor work, we went to Barnes and Nobles and Spirit Halloween. I got a cool book on Japanese folklore and black magic. It has a great guide on yokai and even a directory of spells and rituals. Spirit was fun, but disappointing. Our local one for the past 2 years has been opening up later in smaller locations with less stock. I miss the grander stores with impressive displays and mini walk throughs. The Mrs did pick me up a cool vintage style vampire mask from a visit to the store earlier in the week. I love those.

I picked up Trashmaster and a Micro Galaxy Squadron blind box from Target. Haven't gotten all the Junkions yet unfortunately, but happy for the ones I find. Later a trip to Walmart resulted in the last two Toxitron Collection Transformers I needed! The set is complete!!! Now to focus on the remaining Beast Alliance toys that may be harder to find as the movie line winds down. I hope to pick up Studio Series Ultra Magnus soon. I don't have a Paetron, so one didn't get pre-ordered. Not to be outdone, my Mom suprised me with a MOTU Origins Snout Spout! It was a good weekend for toys!

I spent a lot of time watching Universal Monsters movies Sunday and playing F-Zero 99. Playing F-Zero 99, not winning. That game is pure chaos. Earlier Sunday, I took the Mrs to Five Below for a Squishmallow event. This time it was new Halloween themed ones. The first store we went to hadn't had their stock, which was disappointing. That store usually goes fully into the events and even has their own meet and greets. So we went to the next one that had their crap together! She got her plushes and I finally found the Authentics Optimus Primal!

Oddly enough there was a cosplayer dessed as Alucard from Hellsing walking around. She was with another anime fan type, so I'm assuming there was a nearby event. The past week Ive seen a few of the leather jacket and sunglasses while wearing those fast food uniform black pants type of anime fan. Those seem to be an evergreen type of fan here in the states... am I the only one who's notices? Feels like a lifetime of seeing them grazing in the wild.

I had extended to watch the new TMNT movie this weekend, but didn't work it in. After this months Transform Squadron gets recorded today, I might. Thanks to each and every one of you for reading Zone Base. The number of you keeps rising and I really appreciate it. If you like what I'm doing, thanks! If you could, would you mind sharing with your friends? I don't ask for anything, but I'd love for anyone who'd like to read Zone Base to have the chance. I've got a fun week planned, let's get it started!

Weekly Halloween~ Men's Magazines

If I told you this was a magazine ad... you probably wouldn't believe me. Thanks to the general oldness of the production, it just looks like something straight out of the dark web. But no, the Rokurokubi is just there to sell us on this men's magazine. Honestly I'm a little lost on why they went this route, but you'll never see me complain about Yokai appearing in any media.

Dang, feels like I got cursed just watching it though.

Aiming for a good Week

Another Monday has cursed us with it's presence, but at least a new week on Planet Zone is here to ... I dunno, do something. Like you all, I wish there was more weekend to enjoy. Such is life I guess, and if it means anything, I've got a fun week of posts to hopefully help get you to next weekend. 

As far as toys go, I got a few. Transformers Earth Spark warrior class Optimus Prime and Tacticons Bumblebee and Megatron. I originally planned to get just a few Tacticons... and since getting Optimus last week... I'm hooked. They give me Mini-Con energy and that's all it took. They're surprisingly fun, simple little bots. Hopefully they'll be as fun to collect as Mini-Cons were.

I stated off Sunday waking up early and watching Tokushoutsu. I do love that channel and Sunday morning just the proper time to indulge in it. A stop by Five Below later provided a little extra fun. I picked up another copy of the Yokaiden manga... I still haven't read the last one, but I do love some yokai. It's February and hankering for Halloween is running wild in my heart. So of course spooky shit is more than welcome. 

The store also had a new surprise for me. Bakugan figurines! Instead of the normal changing little orbs, figurines of a few Bakugan as they appear on the show. I got a white and blue Hydorous. The figures are sold in two alternate colors and come with cards and coins. Pretty neat! I should get this week started, there'sstuff to do. Thanks to everyone for reading. If you could, please share my posts with your friends. That'd be awesome.

Weekly Halloween- Haunted Lavatory

Public restrooms can be scary enough sometimes, let alone the ones ata  school. Though I think a ghost terrorixzing you while sitting in there just might be worse than some bully banging on the door and laughing.  Depending on who tells you the story, Hanako-san was either murdered by a stranger or a parent in a school restroom. Sometimes the story says she (sadly) killed herself or was the victim of an World War II air raid while in the restroom.

All of the origin stories are pretty sad. If you choose to summon Hanako-san, you must individuially go inside a girls restroom inside a school, knock three times on the third stall and ask if Hanako-san is present. If she's there, she's answer with form of 'yes, i am'. You'll then see a ghostly or bloody hand. Either that hand or Hanako-san will pull you into the toilet or straight to hell! Or maybe just eaten by a three-headed lizard for disturbing her privacy. Like most urban legends there's a lot of variations depending on who's telling the story. I'm assuming that person didn't actually attempt it themselves...

Weekly Update 10/10/22

A new week has begun on Planet Zone bringing robots, monsters, and misadventure! The weekend is already over, so that means some fun posts for you all! Thank you so much for reading and please share with your friends!

This weekend I didn't do much. The Mrs and I went to a Halloween Squishmallows event at Five Below. That was really it aside from some shopping. Unfortunately there wasn't any Transformers I needed at the stores. Well, there was a Tonkanator, but I'm not making any big purchases this close to Christmas. I did pick up two Micro Galaxy Squadron blind boxes,  and Bakugan Evolutions Wrath and Griswing at Walmart. Grabbed Playmates Godzilla Terrestris at Target in addition to ordering the 40th Anniversary edition He-Man.

At Five Below they had the small figure versions of Monsterverse Godzilla, Kong, and Mechagodzilla. I'd been looking forward to these guys for awhile now. Playmates did a small series from King of the Monsters that never showed up here, so these are a welcome addition. They're a little bigger than the minis that Jakks Pacific made a few years back and seemingly better figures.

I also picked up my Halloween mask for this year. I won't go into much detail here as it'll show up on my Happy Halloween post as usual. It's pretty great! Two more Kinder Surprise eggs were picked up as well. I haven't opened any of this weekends blind toys, so here's hoping for more costumed kids I need. Just 3 more to complete the set. Halloween is in full effect on the site. We've got a few more weeks and I wish it wasn't flying by so fast. I spent Sunday watching Yokai movies on DKUTV full of the spooky spirit and hope your enjoying the Pumpkin Spiced Mayhem too!

Weekly Halloween: Kid Dracula

 

Now you're playing with power: Spooky Power! Considering the new week posts are just me complaining about never finding Studio Series Soundwave and everyday is Halloween... what I'm saying is we're going to start each week with the spooky shit. Don't worry, Halloween is still the same on the site. We just need more of it dammit! Not to mention the mini Halloween later this year.. what? You saw nothing. Weekly Halloween will be a little something spooky to start off the week here on Planet Zone! 

Kid Dracula is a weird little Castlevania spin off that features Alucard as a little boy. Kid Dracula calls himself the Demon King and Galamoth (another demon) comes to challenge him for the title. Alucard takes his fathers cape and has a spooky adventure through the castle fighting all sorts of ghosts, goblins, monsters, yokai, demons, and other creepy crawlies. It's been released on several different platforms and isn't too hard to play these days.

In the Haunted House

 

I can't think of a better way for us to have fun on our spooky week than walking through a haunted house. What? Oh, no, don't worry. They'll be plenty more spooky stuff coming throughout the year. Every day is Halloween on Planet Zone after all. This specific haunted house in in a theme park called Suntopia World and is pretty unique. While it isn't full of jump scares, it is fairly uncomfortable. If someone or something was out to get you, they'd be able to hide among the props as you walk around.It'd be the perfect place for something really scary to happen.

GeGeGe New Week

It's a brand new week here on Planet Zone and I've got a bunch of fun planned for the week. I didn't do a whole bunch this past weekend, just a trip to Walmart and Target on top of doing stuff around the house. Actually ended up at two Walmarts as my grocery pickup was Sunday at a different store. We also stopped by the Dollar Tree which should be getting new Final Faction figures soon. Looking forward to that. Just hope I can find the Master of the Universe mini figures there. It feels like I've been looking forever.

Speaking of dollar stores, there's been sightings of a NEW Halloween army set at Dollar General. There hasn't been a new set since 2018 and I've been really hoping it'd be a more regularly updated thing. I can't wait until my local stores start their spooky stocking. I grabbed a bunch of fun Halloween stuff at Target's dollar spot. They have these great build kits with colored skeletons. Super neat.

Walmart has these cool skeleton action figures in their seasonal area. Turns out they're bootlegs of a much more expensive figure. That's going to be a post soon. I was hoping to find this triceratops skeleton sold with the usual animal skeletons decorations. They're still stocking the section, so I'll just keep waiting for that one. I love these things, perfect He-Man/Battle Tribes monsters.

Speaking of Target, I usually get something Starbucks when I go. Word to the wise, vanilla bean frappuccino with about 3 pumps of strawberry puree. Amazingly good, tastes like a milkshake. I got a new hoodie while out. When you wear as many as I do it's a big production getting a new one. Usually involves donating older ones to the Goodwill. My new ones looks like a solid new addition to my arsenal and the ones departing are appreciated for their service. 

I still haven't found that Stratos Eternia Mini, and Fright Features are still impossible to find locally. It's pretty frustrating after waiting so long for them, but I'm glad to see them selling well. Eat it naysayers. Ghostbusters rule. I picked up Cyberverse Cheetor, the new deluxe version. I'm glad the line is sticking around, I love it. Hopefully I can grab some of the new Dinobots. They look amazing.

It's that time of year where I have to make a list to help out the wife and relatives for Christmas presents. There's a great new yokai story book I'm putting on that sumbitch. The upcoming Kitaro haunted house at Universal Studios Japan makes me wish collections of his manga were easier to come by. Love that guy. We decided to cancel our trip to the Florida park this year before I had my health problems. It was a hard decision, but at the time we thought it would be a good idea since covid keeps going up and down. We just thought it'd be a good idea, with delta and my recovery, it turned out to be. Well, time to run some errands. Thanks for reading Zone Base and thanks for your continued support. I really appreciate it and please share with your friends!

Also, would you all watch a TikTok made by me? I like making short videos on occasion and it's obviously the best place for them. Kinda debating it.

In The End, It Was A New Week

I heard a story once, that it was Monday and that meant a new week on Planet Zone. According to the kids on the playground, there's a new Not as Brightly Lit available as well. If that's your sort of thing. There's a fun week planned ahead for you readers. Please share with your friends and help it spread. Don't forget to put salt at your door. You never know what's trying to come in.

Sword Of Demons

Demon Sword/The Legend Of Acala is a game that might just be the definitive hidden gem of all time. Chances are you saw an ad or two for the game and later lucked up upon it in a clearance bin. That's what happened to me. I saw an ad or two then later got it dirt cheap at KB Toys. From what I can tell, this is pretty much the only way to get the game.

Demon Sword plays a lot like Legend of Kage or maybe even Ninja Spirit in that you run like crazy and mow down enemies with your sword. Jumping propels you forward into the air turning your swordsman into a helicopter of death. You play as Victar and must gather all the piece of the titular sword to defeat the demon currently ruling the world. As you play through the levels and gather pieces, the sword gets bigger and more powerful.

In addition to your growing sword, there's also projectiles like darts. These obviously come in handy for bad guys just out of range. You'll acquire magic spells that come in handy when fighting level bosses. The bosses and bad guys are various demons and yokai in bizarre hellscapes. It's pretty awesome. As normal during the time, the U.S box art depicts more of a standard mid evil fantasy setting, however Japanese advertising gives a better idea of the actual game.

Speaking of difference between the American and Japanese versions, in Japan the game is longer and has more items/magic. I remember thinking I achieved the impossible upon beating the game that one weekend in the seventh grade. Now I wonder if I could repeat history with the Japanese version. Probably not. Demon Sword was one of those things that was MY thing. I'd draw (badly) the characters on my notebooks, and dream up potential sequels. I'm sure to this day though, that I've never said Victar correctly.

Replay: Never Really Alone

 

Summer is a Spooky Season.

Kaiju Con.Line Report

I normally do a weekend report post on Mondays, but seeing as I did a virtual convention this weekend... I thought I'd just do a con report. Though some of what I did will be peppered throughout the report as... it's a weekend report post in a way.

To explain Kaiju Con.Line, it was a free virtual kaiju convention organized by Kyle of Kaijucast. There was no G-Fest this year because of covid-19, so Kyle organized a bunch of live streaming panels, and other online activities under the banner of Kaiju Con.Line to give fans of rubber suited monsters something to do this weekend in place of the annual gathering.

It was pretty nuts as there was not only the various live stream panels, there was watch parties all over the place. Either affiliated or other groups running their own thing. Not to mention Tsuburaya ran an Ultraman stream and Shout Factory ran a Kamen Rider stream all weekend. There were a million discord chats and various online vendor rooms to buy from dealers in name of the weekend. I've got a t-shirt for the event on the way from the official store, because I needed to support this. It's great when fans come together to do something positive.

As I've said a million times before, traveling to conventions is getting harder for me to pull off. A state or two over is one thing, across the country... dude. So I've been wanting something like this for awhile. That way I can participate while still handling my home and work life. This literally was a breeze. I've mentioned before that I work at night. Because I do. So when I got off work Saturday morning, I had some things to do. While shopping at these stores I would pop in and check in on con stuff. I've went to stores during a con before, but I've never bought mulch while at a con before.

During these errands I picked up some of the Bandai Godzilla 65th anniversary sofubi boxed figures I've been needing. I just need Anguirus and Hedorah to complete the set! Target and Walmart had no new Earthrise sadly, but in time I assume. I did score some face mask adjusters at Staples though. I've got a big old head and in the new normal of wearing these things, sometimes they are just a touch too small. It's nice to not have sore ears. I need to pick up the Playmates Space Godzilla. I've got all of the Playmates Godzilla figures except him and I might as well complete the set. I mean, duh.

I spent the rest of Saturday with the cons panels playing while I did various things. Eating pizza? Right in front of a panel. Putting together newly bought furniture? Right in front of a panel. I'd pop in and out of panels and watch parties also. That was something really cool. In my living room, I'd just watch the panels on TV. Up in my room, I had it running on my tablet fully taking advantage of picture in picture video screens. Muting subtitled videos to listen to the audio from live streams. That was neat.

Later on in the night, I'd watch the replays from panels I missed while running errands and when I took a nap. Finally around 3am I went to sleep as dude... tired. Sunday we worked on our yard, same thing. Break time, pop in on phone. When we got done, same thing. Either watch a missed panel or a stream. Though I only did one at a time. I was a little worn out from putting mulch out in the hot sun.

I need to go back and watch the rest of that Western monsters in Japanese fiction panel, it was pretty interesting. Unfortunately I wasn't able to pay the stream as much attention as I wanted to. Fortunately, it's available to view. I can dig this kind of convenience, it's easier to dig than some of those old branches out from under those bushes were.

Some of my favorite content was the show was in the opening ceremonies panel. There was a good 15 minutes of pre-recorded video messages from various actors and directors from various Godzilla, Ultraman, and other productions. They were generally messages of encouragement regarding the pandemic and pretty cool to watch. That western monsters panel I mentioned earlier and the Yokai War panel from Saturday I'd like to go back and watch in their entirety. Which I will.

The Kaijucast Reunion stream was pretty great as it pretty much went from kaiju discussion into trivia to musicians performing classic monster themes. Really neat. Daikaiju TV had a steady stream of watch parties going all weekend that was super fun to pop into and out of. If I was a better discord user, there were plenty of related chats going, but sadly I'm pretty bad at Discord. Though between the live streams and watch parties, I had plenty of live chat available.

In all, my first virtual con experience was a good one. There's others going on this summer and I'm pretty interested in doing more. While nothing beats the in person aspect of a con with other fans, this wasn't bad! I could see myself playing one of my micro consoles with my tablet nearby with a stream going. It was great to indulge myself in Godzilla and company with other fans in the company of my own home. Totally would do again.

GeGeGe No Kitaro- GeGeGe Panic!

GeGeGe No Kitaro Opening [Vinyl Disc Version]

Summer is around the corner, and summer is a spooky season.

Sweet Home The Famicom

You have once again entered the world of survival horror. 

Good luck!

Yōkai Dōchūki/Shadow Land

Yokai Monsters: Spook Warfare