Again a good hunt this summer! (part 1)

KLM Boeing 777-300ER - 'Fulufjallet National Park'

It's been a while since I have had updated the blog. And as we speak, I'm back from another summer holiday trip. This year I went back to Osaka (Japan) and of course Hong Kong to pay a visit to my grandparents. The trip starts with a comfortable flight with a KLM Boeing 777-300ER to Osaka. We had a row of 2 seats at the back of the aircraft. These seats required an additional fee of € 30,00 (Thugs!). After the gate closed it became clear the seats behind us weren't occupied, so.....I moved a row back and we were both having a lot of space. From that retrospective the extra fee was a bargain to gain an extra seat! 

Hero Gangu - Nippombashi, Osaka

The focus of this story will be on the Transformer/ Collectible hunt. Since I have been Osaka earlier and Hong Kong is practically my second home, I won't do much of city-trip review. Of course I will upload some pictures of the trip itself. Should you be more curious about the cities themself, take a look at these links: Osaka; Hong Kong.

So first stop is Osaka. The hotel Kikuei is situated in Namba, the southern part of Osaka. Very crowded and from the hotel, one of the 3 centered Transformer retailer was visible: Hero Gangu, Nippombashi. (site is Japanese only)

1st batch along with me in the Rimowa

The loot here was quite good: Fansproject Causality CA-03 Thundershred.
The other two pieces were more than JPY 12.000, while this one was only JPY 5700. I tried to find out why, but there were no signs of being eventually a K.O version, so that's a bargain. Secondly I was looking everywhere for the now hard-to-find Encore 15: Mini cassettes vol. 1 consisting Ravage, Eject, Rewind and Buzzsaw. Guess what...I found it here. It was JPY 9800 (€ 71,00/ US$ 94,00). Considered the availability and the price on ebay it's a steal.

Super Potato - Namba, Osaka

Furthermore my 2nd loot from Jungle Entertainment (Site do have English!) consists: 
- TF Encore 16 Bruticus (Scramble City)
- TF Collection 07 Sideswipe (Takara)
- TF UN-04 Megatron Cybertron Mode (FOR SALE!)
- TG-14 Voyager Class Soundblaster + Buzzsaw 2x (1 for my brother)
- TG-12 Deluxe Class Air Raid
Both TG were available for a 'wooden nickel'.


The last resorts for a good hunt were both Mandarake shops in Umeda and Shinsaibashi. Thanks to the toy-shop map of Heroic Decepticon!

Gold!!!

Furthermore we bumped in Namba on Super Potato, a shop for retro-gaming.
This is also a heaven for the good old days of the Famicom/NES/Superfamicom etc. It is really incredible when you see their inventory. Next time, I'll grab something from here!

Well, that's it for now. Part 2 will follow soon!


Hereafter some images during the Japanese part of the trip

Tsutenkaku Tower 103 m

The new Rimowa Salsa Deluxe!

Sunset during flight KL0867 to KIX

Nismo March.....(GT-R?)

252 meters of depth (or height)

Osaka Prefectural Government Sakishima Tower

Osaka by Night - Umeda Tower (173 m)

LCC from Japan: Peach - Airbus A320-200

 

Leaving Osaka Japan - Kansai International Airport

A Successful Dinosaur Hunt!

1st stop HKIA

As said a few months ago, I was travelling to Singapore & Hong Kong in mid August. One of the objectives was hunting for some collectible Transformers. The then (there is actual news as of September '13) very hard to find Masterpieces were among them. De citytrip started with a four-days stop in Lion City Singapore.

Botanical Gradens

My brother hasn't been in Singapore yet. Since the city has much in common with it's rival city Hong Kong, it was both a new and familiar experience for him. Aside from the usual sightseeings, we were also hunting for TF collectibles.
Our first attempt was at the Funan Digital Life Mall. Although it is a mall for electronics, there are some good shops to get some TF's. My brother got his superbargain: Encore 05 Ratchet for SG$ 25,00 (about US$ 19,00).
I also got my Encore 18 Skids.

1st batch

The next day we got our first Hasbro Masterpiece, Thundercracker at the Toys 'R Us in Harbour Front - Vivio City. We were planning to get this one in HK, but the price was also lower than expected, so we picked up this one here. On the third day we went to the famous China Square Central. This mall has a somewhat steryle impression. We got there actually too early. Like in HK, the shops aren't open untill noon. But we had to go in for some cover as it was raining outside. We decided to come back later that day/evening.
Guess what......I found my piece of gold MISB at the shop: Ace Ventura (2nd floor).

Gundam docks at Hong Kong

The same day my brother found his MISB MP-08 Grimlock at the MRT location of Simply Toys! We were both very happy to get these MP's since they are hard to find in MISB for half the price on ebay! After these acquisitions, our city-trip was a success already and there was much more to come.

Barely surviving the shipment per AIR!

The total amount of collectibles is quite a long list. I'll put it on the bottom of this blog. In Dragon City Hong Kong we bumped on the Gundam statue at Times Square (Causeway bay). The project Gundam docking at HK was running from July 26th till the 1st of September. We got a lot of TF's and Gunpla hobby stuff at Mongkok area (Hobbybase at Sino Centre) and at In's Point (Yau Ma Tei). Our main targets are Masterpieces (from MP-08 on till current issues. The pre-MP-08 issues are in my opinion not worth collecting, since I want them all in de same scale), TF Encore G1, Generations/United, Henkei and Classics. I also picked up a few MP's I already owned, but this was just for my webshop Morgenroete Inc. to resale.

Totalled box of MP-12, shame on you HK Post!

The MP-09 Hotrod/Rodimus Convoy was also a bargain in a set of 2 consisting MP-09 & MP-10. The most valuable items were carried in my suitcase, but a large batch had to be shipped per Airpost by HK Post. They have dissapointed me. The M4 package arrived in terrible condition and the box was nearly totalled although the box was very strong by itself. Luckily, my brother advised me to let the items in their respective plastic bags!!! So the damage was reduced to some Encore boxes (Devastator) and 1 MP-12 Lambor. This was a bummer, because it was an item to sell. I had to reduce my asking price since the item wasn't MISB anymore. The outerbox was damaged, but luckily the item itself was in perfect condition. 

Aside from the TF huntings, I got some other stuff like MGS - Legacy Collection for PS3, Some Gunpla, an extra battery for the DSLR and a 1:43 scale model car of the Super GT - Xanavi Nismo Z.


So the conclusion for the hunt this summer is a successful one. Especially my hunt for the Dinobot Grimlock MP-08! It was truely a good Dino-hunting!

Below are some impressions and items acquired.
You can click on the images to enlarge.Sorry for the last picture which is somewhat blurry.

 

HK skyline seen from ICC (Kowloon West)

CBD Singapore

Comfortable flights

Encore & Giant Type-61!

Dutch glory Doutzen Kroes!

 

Size difference G1 & Giant-Type 61!

Generations VC + DC & G1

2nd batch!

Whole bunch (both)

   

    







Listing:
TF Masterpiece
- MP-08 Grimlock
- MP-09 Hot Rod/ Rodimus Convoy
- MP-10 Convoy (for sale)
- MP-12 Lambor (for sale)
- MP-12T Tigertracks
- MP-14 Red Alert
- Hasbro MP - Thundercracker

Encore/G1/Classics/Universe/Commemorative series
- Devastator (Encore 20)
- Skids (Encore 18)
- Hoist (Encore 14)
- Insecticons (all 3 - Universe G1)
- Astrotrain (Commemorative)
- Wincharger (G1 loose)

Generations/United
- Tracks (United)
- Warpath (United)
- Springer (voyager class)
- Sandstorm (voyager class)
- Jazz (Deluxe class)

3rd party & misc.
- TFC - Uranos : Blackbird + Phantom ray
- TF Autobot bag

RPG Classics

Although the Role-Playing-Game genre has been around for a long time, I didn't care about it till the mid 1990's. Before this era I was very hooked of the 1-on-1 Beat-em-up's like Streetfighter II (Turbo), Fatal Fury and the KoF series.
The following RPG-timeline describes the developments from 1992 till today, with spotlights on the classics on the SNES.
In the fall of 1996, it was like I stood up on a day and must have thought there must be more than no-thinking games like SF etc.
So I bought Secret of Mana, which I also purchased a few years earlier, but swapped it for another game due to not understanding the RPG genre.
I was hooked again and the RPG virus never left me since. Because it was also fall in the lifespan of the best gameconsole ever, the SNES, my brother and I were hunting for all the greatest RPG's on this system for about two years.
The result was a very impressive list of great RPG's. Most of them were in new condition.
A unique feature at the time for Secret of Mana (16-Meg) was the real time action where most of the rivals were menu-driven or turn based. The latter method was because of the limited processing power to realise real time action. There was also a 3-player mode which gave the players more fun. My brothers and I are still playing it nowadays!
Father of the SNES RPG is without a doubt 'The legend of Zelda III - A Link to the past' (8-Meg). In those days - and still- a fantastic in-depth story with lots of action released by Nintendo itself.
Squaresoft (Good old times without Enix) was already a specialist in RPG's and had released Final Fantasies 1 -3 for the NES. Though the story of FF IV (8-Meg) was very good and today's classic, the graphics were reminding of a pimped NES. Till winter 1994, Square releases her Golden Egg - Final Fantasy VI (FF III in the US) with rendered graphics, great music and a epic story stored in - at the time huge cart - a 24-Meg cart. Since then Square's star has rised to heaven and the following succes were even greater. This time, there was besides the turn based, the introduction of active time battle, better known as real-time battling menu-driven. In 1994, just after finishing FF VI, Hironobu Sakaguchi put together the so called dream team consisting Yuji Horii (Dragon's Quest), Akira Toriyama (Dragon Ball) and Sakaguchi himself to work on a project which turned out to be the best RPG ever - Chrono Trigger (32-Meg!). Aside of them, there was the debut for music composer Yasunori Mitsuda. It was a gamble, but it turned out fantastic. Mitsuda asked too much from himself and suffered from exhaustion. Nobuo Uematsu finished his soundtrack with a few tracks, but Uematsu states that the credits goes to Mitsuda.
This game was special because it didn't had to change the field screen to action/fight screen. A few extra menu's appeared when confronting the enemy and there was a smooth transition in the music. The unique style for the Chrono Series was also the Tech-ability. Depending on which character you were using, you could spread a great arsenal of magic and fighting combo's, just fenomenal! Of course the active time battle system was featured here.
Besides of all, there were multiple endings, depending on what kind of decisions you had made in the past. Now this is Chrono (time) Triggering at highest level!
The new game+ feature boosts up the replay value. You can replay the game without searching all the valuable items/ techs once again.
Later in 1999 Sony would also release a 'sequel' named Chrono Cross. This is not a really sequel, because it has no direct connection to the events of Chrono Trigger, but takes place in the same universe about 20 years later. The extra dimension of CC was that it also junps to parallel universes, which explaines the title Chrono Cross.
Due to the arrogance of Nintendo to keep the support of cartridges, Squaresoft switched and gave the licenses to Sony to release titles for the Playstation. This is because the CD-rom (and later DVD-rom) could store much more data, which gave more opportunities and possibilities.
The results are known, FF VII till FF IX were cashcows for Sony. Many people claim that FF VII is one of the best episode that has been made. It was a high quality title with a good in-depth story. For me, FF VI is still the one above all, nothing beats the 16-bit era. FF VII & FF VIII was a little change in tactics and technical choices. The party you were playing consist 3 characters. Why Squaresoft made this choice is unknown. In FF IX was a return to the roots.
The characters were more animated like and the music is familiar with the pre-32 bit era. The party you're travelling with consists 4 characters, like before.
The summons are mostly the same as in FF VI.
In the early 2000's Squaresoft merged with Enix, it's rival company, to the biggest console RPG developper. The merger is comparable with that of Boeing and McDonnell Douglas in the aviation-world.
Critisism said it hasn't brought that good to the development of the products, I agree. The saga continued on the PS2 with FF X to FF XII. Now in March 2010 the 13th episode awaits for the PS3.

Do you look forward to Final Fantasy XIII?

A few titles (brandnew) acquired during our hunt late 1990's:
Chrono Trigger, FF III (US), Secret of Mana, Secret of Evermore, Super Mario RPG, Breath of Fire 1 & 2, Lufia 2, Terranigma, Illusion of Time, Seiken Den Setsu 3 (Secret of Mana 2), Treasure Hunter G, Romancing Saga 3.

New additions

It has been quite a while since my last post. So it's about time to present my newest additions to my Home Theatre & Home Entertainment. This time it is a mix of modern computergaming and old school retro gaming.
At the end of October I bought the new PS3 Slim with a 120 GB HDD. I already know the possibilities and a few systempushers like Metal Gear Solid 4, CoD 4 Modern Warfare and the newly released CoD MW2 have convinced me. The PS3 slim has more HDD space and a renewed OS. A few features didn't come anymore with this version, but it's worth it. PS2 support is not available, which is a downside, since the PS2 is still the cashcow after 9 years of life. Directly after release I purchased the Hardened Edition of CoD MW2. This version includes besides the game disc, a steelbook case, plastic overall sleeve, a booklet with concepts & art-work and a voucher to download the first CoD, known as CoD Classic.

Furthermore, there is a new handheld. The Nintendo DSi black is a lovely gadget to play present games, but also timeless classics as Chrono Trigger DS.
I love this game and also got the original brandly new SNES cart title from 1995 (purchased in 1998).

Speaking about the SNES, i already own an PAL version and share a US SNES with my brother. But if this one dies, it will be difficult to play US games. And I got a good library of fantastic SNES RPG's. So'I purchased a spare US SNES on E-bay.
It took me € 55,00 shipping from US included, but hey......this brick is gold! The US controller, RF-switch and AC-power adaptor are rubbish, but I got a tons of PAL controllers and accessoiries. Ow...a Super Mario World game pack was also a freebee.... Nice!
But aside from it's uncool design (known as the Brick) the US SNES has a few points over the PAL version. It supports RGB-signals which was comparable with HDMI nowadays. The colors of the US SNES were far more brighter, colorful and thus superior to it's PAL nephew. Another good thing is that the Brick is running on 60 Hz due to NTSC, which is 17 % faster than the European counterpart and the black boxes on the top and bottom of the screens will not be shown.
Later this year I will spent an article about the classic SNES RPG's.
For now, i present a few screenshots which are upscaled by my superb Onkyo beast and full blown all channel stereo (There wasn't any Dolby Prologic II or DTS HD yet in 1995). The shot of CoD MW 1 & MW 2 is a little blur. Apologies for that.
(All pictures are taken with Sony-DSC P8)

Which type of gaming do you like? Retro, Modern gaming or both?