T5W#267-Top 5 PS5 Trailers from the Playstation 5 Event

Last week, Sony held a special event to reveal the launch date and pricing of the upcoming Playstation 5.  Not taking into account the preorder debacle it’s still facing, the Playstation 5 looks to be one of the best things to happen to gaming in a long time.  This is no doubt thanks to the fact that it has a decent slew of launch titles ready to go and some highly anticipated titles coming in 2021 and beyond.  As luck would have it, we got new looks at many of these upcoming titles and some were pretty surprising.  It’s an easy Top 5 list to put together (and my third video game centered Top 5 in 3 weeks.  Do I go for a fourth next week or try to find something Anime related to talk about?), the Top 5 PS5 Trailers from the Playstation 5 Event.  Let’s get to it.

Psycho Pass 3 Part 3 Episodes 5-6

A suicide bombing disrupts the opening ceremiones for the Mitake Special Religious Zone.  Unit 01, present during the attack, takes lead on the case which finds three suspects, each the head of a separate religious group opposed to the Special Zone’s existence.  Could three people of pure peace who can uncloud the harshest of hues truly be responsible for this act of violence?  The investigation sends Kei and Mao undercover in one of Tokyo’s largest religious sanctuaty’s, Heaven’s Leap.  But there’s danger lurking there as well as on the outside as the master manipulators of Bifrost enact their most dangerous gamble yet, one that could mean the end of several members of Unit 01.

While not as strong as last weeks pair of back to back awesome episodes, this weeks continuation of Psycho Pass 3 remains pretty good.  The continuous world building and exploration of social aspects of the Sybil controlled Japan continue to be fascinating and watching things get dire and dire for the cast keeps things on the edge of your seat.

FIF#120-Battle of the Planets

As the Earth expands it relations with those among the stars, it finds itself threatened by hostile Alien invaders.  To protect them, a special team is commissioned, specifically trained to deal with enemies from space.  They are Mark, Jason, Princess, Tiny and Keyop.  All five have been given special training and bird like costumes, gadgets and vehicles they can use to combat those who would attack their homeworld.  They are G-Force and they will always be ready to partake in the Battle of the Planets.

While Anime is pretty everywhere you can think of today, decades ago it was trying its best to make a splash here in the US.  While Akira would provide that beachhead in the late 80’s, some earlier attempts were made as far back as the 1960’s with Astro Boy and Gigantor (aka Tetsujin 28-go).  A couple years back on First Impression Friday we covered the three series that made up Robotech: Super Dimensional Fortress Macross, Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross and Genesis Climber Mospeda.  Over the next couple of weeks we’ll be looking at a couple of other popular Anime titles of US yesteryear.  The first of those is the first adaptation of Science Ninja Team Gatchaman…Battle of the Planets. 

T5W#266-Top 5 Classic Super Mario Games

It’s hard to believe Mario is turning 35 this year.  I can remember back to my first encounter with a Nintendo Entertainment System, playing Super Mario Bros for the first time and becoming addicted to gaming.  I think a lot of people can say they’ve had the same experience.  I might not be as up on my Mario knowledge since I didn’t own a lot of Nintendo systems after the Nintendo 64.  Still, this blog has plenty of gaming content to it.  So in honor of the forthcoming Super Mario 3D All Stars, im counting down the Top 5 Classic Super Mario Games.  To qualify, any of these games had to come out on the NES, SNES, N64 or the Game Boy.  Like I said, I haven’t played any of the Wii and beyond Mario games so I cant include what I don’t have experience with.  Anyway, in the immortal words of Mario himself, “Here we goooo!!!”  

Psycho Pass 3 Part 2 Episodes 3-4

The death of a renowned psychiatrist puts Arata and Kei’s unit in the middle of a showdown between two political parties vying for the position of Governor of Japan.  One is a former Pro Wrestler.  The other a beautiful Ex-Idol.  With an unseen force manipulating events from behind a curtain, Arata and Kei venture forth into the slums of Tokyo for answers.  Between holographic experiments and powerful wrestling assassins, this could be the case that makes or breaks the pair in their career as Inspectors.  Thankfully, Chief Mika Shimotsuki has some allies who might keep them alive until the case is complete.

Oh man…this was good from the get go and is surprisingly getting better.  Everything that worked with last weeks premiere continued to work and improvements were made in some of the more troubled angles. And was it me or did Shimotsuki actually show signs of likeability at long last?  Honestly, in even beginning this review, im finding myself hard pressed to think of things I didn’t like right off the bat.  Everything just clicked: the new Unit 01, the likeable front runners for Governor of Tokyo, the action, the pacing, the return of Yayoi and the revelation that someone from Psycho Pass is living a pretty nice life outside of the Public Security Bureau.