Oh baby! Other sites on this blog network get to post boobs and retards all the time, but the game industry is usually too damn professional for me to score some good dirt (a 20oz is expensive, unless you find the dirt on the street). But finally (cracking my knuckles) I have some dirtbags for you readers. Hironobu Sakaguchi, the creator of Xbox 360's Blue Dragon and upcoming Lost Odyssey, had this to say about the PS3 and Ken Kutaragi:

“I’m not interested in the Playstation 3. The machine’s architecture is tricky, and I don’t like Kutaragi.”

Holy shit did he hit him hard, Kutaragi might be in the hospital for a while, Jesus, I hope he's okay after that. Hironobu is a beast. No need to throw tomatoes at me, I'm just as disappointed as you are. To fill the vicious void in your hearts, feel free to read through the SUX 2BU archives. I'm gonna chalk this up as a win for the 360 though, even though I hate Blue Dragon and think it's a piece of shit without having played it yet.

I'm still not excited about the first one, yet Blue Dragon creator Hironobu Sakaguchi has made it pretty clear that there will be a sequel. When asked what we should expect from the next one he said:

"Blue Dragon sold through more than 200,000 units in Japan and again it will continue to build momentum as we get into things like BD2 and BD3. And that's what we're hoping; to really build on the franchise. Maybe it'll take ten years (laughs) . . . We're in talks with Microsoft about development of a sequel. Specifics aren't finalized, but there's a possibility that it will be produced as an online title."

Two hundred thousand isn't that much though, considering the new Pokemon games have already sold over one million copies in America, with another five million sales over in Japan. Hironobu, you should have released Blue Dragon simultaneously with Red Dragon, you fail.

Okay anime readers, this one's for you. Studio Pierrot's first episode of Blue Dragon airs in Japan this Saturday. If you're looking forward to Blue Dragon on Xbox 360 in America, then downloading this show online is your only way of getting a look at the story until the game comes to the states in August. This video is a preview of how much more annoying the show looks than the game. At least the lame characters keep their mouth shut while you run around in the game. Some of the show's graphics are done in 3D, like in the anime series Last Exile, except it still looks terrible. Don't worry if you miss the first episode, in typical anime overkill fashion, there's 51 episodes planned for the series, you'll have plenty of time to catch up.

Hey Microsoft, where's the GDC news? Quit stalling! Here's all they've had to show lately, five new pictures of the American version of Blue Dragon, except most of them aren't even new, they're just fixed to display English. Good job Microsoft. I also threw in this picture to show how lame this game looks, I'm still convinced I'll hate it. Me and Akira Toriyama's art style don't mix - I'd rather play a game full of his Dragonball Z circular muscles and forky follicle hair styles than deal with his childish universe where everything looks like a clown zombie. Doesn't Hironobu Sakaguchi hold design meetings? No one said a simple blue dragon looks shitty, and is a terrible thing to base your game on? When Yu-gi-oh puts your title to shame with a single card, blue eyes white dragon, you know you've got a game that's potentially not worth playing. I mean, he's a game design legend, I'd let him name the game simply Dragon without questioning the man, but I draw the line at big cross-eyed Blue Bats. Worst summon ever. I must also point out once again that the environments looks insanely empty. I can't wait to point out this game's flaws when it comes out in August.

 

1UP had a pre-GDC meeting with the Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi who went on to make Blue Dragon and the upcoming Lost Odyssey. In their meeting, Sakaguchi's Mistwalker Studios revealed that Lost Odyssey will ship to Japan and America simultaneously this Christmas. They also said that the Japanese character audio will be dubbed over with lip-synced English voice actors. They didn't give any details yet on their mysterious Nintendo DS RPG game, Ash: Archaic Sealed Heat, but they did mention that it would also be out around Christmas later this year. And the update on Blue Dragon in the U.S. is that we'll have to wait until August, but there will be an extra dungeon you can download on Xbox Live.

If you're anxiously awaiting Blue Dragon's release in America, then you might want to check out its anime series overseas, which is starting in April. TV Tokyo will be broadcasting the Blue Dragon anime, and I'm sure there will be torrents up if you're willing to risk the download. The show was made by Studio Pierrot, the people who worked on Bleach and the famous Naruto series that went from anime fame to its own game series. The voice acting for the show won't be the same people used in the game, so that might upset some people, but at least it will give you something else to bicker about besides the neverending subs versus subs anime debate.

Blue Dragon was released in Japan on December 6th, and it's been rumored that America only has to wait until June 5th for our chance at playing the Xbox 360's popular RPG. Its Mistwalker creators are finally giving out the first round of Xbox Live downloads for their game, and it's all free. Kotaku says the download will be available at 8 PM in Japanese time tomorrow, and that gamers will be able to get two new difficulties ('hard' and 'super hard'). It also includes a replay mode that lets players start the game over without their stats resetting. The size of the download hasn't been announced yet, but Mistwalker will probably give out a few more downloads soon, so save some hard drive space.

Gaming store Gamestop has leaked yet another precious gaming piece of information on their Web site. The picture above is what their page for America's Blue Dragon game should look like if they haven't fixed their slip up yet. Scheduled to release on June 5th this year, it'll be sixty bucks for the highly anticipated RPG for the Xbox 360. For more information on the game that outsold Twilight Princess for a short amount of time in the 360-unfriendly land of Japan, you can check out the preview, the opening, and the special Japanese launch edition's  package. I still don't think it looks that impressive.

I made it! Guns were ablaze, but I am on the plane! I just blamed the whole cop ordeal on some guy who went tanning too much for the Vegas flight to impress the girls. Convincing people he was Arab was a piece of cake, and speaking of food - here's the peanuts. And there they go, all gone, sigh . . . Well, while we get settled in and continue to rise in altitude, enjoy the video above. It's not true flight, but a Dragon game is the best I have for you for now. But I'll be back in 30 more minutes - I've already got my eye on the hot stewardess. The brunette one, not the fugly blonde.

I've been following Blue Dragon for a while now, and this preview video is the best look yet now that the game is out in Japan. Sofar, I've gotta hold on to my predictions, I still see this game as being highly disappointing. Some of the battle system looks really solid - using the dragon shadows for fighting should be cool, and using the attack circle radius to include enemies that are also enemies of one another should be awesome as well. The story even starts off with an exciting beginning that matched the fantasy mood greatly. But beyond that? There's some robots and another 100 or so levels of running around in empty environments. I hate how empty it looks - look at the battle environments too - a big white box? Could we at least put a bump map somewhere? Every game hypes itself, we always assume there's a lot not shown that we have to buy the game for. The preview mentioned a ton of cinematics, so that should be fun, but that's also to be expected. I have a gut feeling that I won't very impressed.

In Japan . . . wow. Granted it's just one week of sales we're talking about, but Twilight Princess isn't that old for a console that Japan really likes. I'm really surprised to see the RPG community in Japan shift sales this strongly for a console they statistically can't stand. Although Blue Dragon doesn't deserve all the credit, Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess has dwindled all the way down to number 17 on the game sales charts over there. That Japanese market is quite the fickle crowd.