The Goo Ranking website held a poll to see which “old guy” voice actor fans think is the coolest. The poll was inspired by the recent Tiger & Bunny film and about 1,054 fans weighed in. Here are the full results:
February, 2014 (Page 8)
As media consumption patterns change in Japan, leading to less advertising revenue and lower DVD sales, merchandising is becoming an increasingly important way for anime producers to turn a profit. Not that the hardcore fans mind being given the opportunity to purchase a poster or coffee mug featuring their favorite character, mind you. And if the products happen to be limited editions, with the premium pricing such a designation entails, well that’s just a nice extra bit of otaku cachet.
One fan, though, is selling off his entire collection in one all-inclusive package. Quite often this sort of thing is the result of finding a flesh and blood girlfriend who doesn’t approve of decorating your walls with pictures of scantily-clad anime babes, but the reason for this collector’s fire sale isn’t anything nearly so happy.
A volcanic eruption is terrifying on its own, but we just learned that, even more terrifyingly, the avalanche of hot rocks, ash, and gas that volcanoes spew can spawn giant tornado-like twisters.
This was caught on video after a pyroclastic flow from Mount Sinabung, a volcano in Indonesia that’s recently started spewing again after more than 400 years of dormancy.
There has been a lot of news over the record snowfalls in many parts of Japan. However, from people all along the Northwestern coast and in Hokkaido a collective “What about us?” could be heard.
As a reminder, one Hokkaido resident tweeted out this photo of their local Lawson. We’re sure of that because the sign is the only visible part on the store. It looks as if it worked too as the photo is currently doing the rounds on the internet and getting retweeted over 16,000 times.
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Google Translate, the tech giant’s online language translation service, is not always perfect (for example, translating “twenty” from English to Japanese gives us “20”), but it’s a nice, not to mention free, tool that’s available to anyone with an internet connection. Aside from being very useful, the site is also entertaining with plenty of funny tricks to be found, like how to make Google Translate beatbox.
Here’s another trick to add to the list! Just translate a bunch of dots into Japanese and you’ll be treated to a hilarious, and somewhat melodic, interpretation of those little round symbols that perch at the end of our sentences.
There are certain meats you can find at restaurants in Japan that aren’t exactly common in the western world. Whale is the one most likely to get foreign visitors up in arms, but with some pretty extensive searching, you can also find establishments serving up monkey and frog.
That isn’t to say Japanese culinary/cultural values are completely different from those of Europeans and North Americans. For example, people in Japan don’t really believe in turning dogs into food.
But turning food into a dog? That’s something the whole world can get behind.
On this day last year, we announced that 14 February was from then to be known as Fundoshi Day. With that grand statement made we waited a whole year for all you readers to go out and by some fundoshi, old-fashioned loincloths to help us again put the “fun” in Fundoshi Day (fun-do-shi = 2-10-4 in Japanese) this year.
And let me guess, you aren’t wearing your fundoshi, are you? Sigh… Alright, we’re patient people, so let us explain again why the fundoshi is the superior choice in underwear.
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While Japan has its own baseball and soccer leagues, the steady improvements in ability by Japanese players have ironically led to a talent drain in domestic games, as the best players get recruited to compete on bigger stages in the U.S. and Europe. These days, what really gets Japanese sports fans fired up is international competitions like soccer’s World Cup and the Olympic Games.
With the Winter Olympics going on right now in Sochi, Japanese TV is filled with nonstop onsite reports from the Russian city. In the scramble to get as much content as possible, though, one news outlet sent out its reporter so woefully unaware that he didn’t recognize the two Olympic medalists standing right in front of him, one of whom he was having a conversation with.
Despite being some of the most iconic anime villains ever, we’re still not sure how to feel about the monsters of Attack on Titan. On the one hand, they’re giants hell-bent on eating the tasty humans hiding behind the walls of their cities. On the other hand, there’s something unmistakably, well, goofy about them. Many of them have baby-like proportions and dorky haircuts. Quite often, they shuffle around listlessly, almost as if they can’t be bothered to chase after their terrified snacks. They have no concept of pants.
Somehow, the Titans have ended up with a sort of twisted charm that makes us unsure whether we’d rather fight them or keep them as pets. Luckily, with the new Attack on Titan smartphone game, you can do both!
Artist James Clyne (Avatar) recently posted the concept art he created for Warner Bros. stalled Akira live-action film. Clyne was brought on when director Ruairi Robinson was attached to the film. Since then, several other directors have came on gone, although most recently Jaume Collet-Serra said in an interview that he hopes Akira will be his next work. Maybe there’s still some hope left for the film?
Hello there, beautiful. Welcome to round seven of our weekly multiple-choice quiz! It’s been a busy and extra weird kind of week for news stories from Asia (yes, even by our standards), so we hope you’ve been taking notes and brought your thinking caps.
Join us after the jump for some Asia news-based brainteasers, and of course a few insults for underperformers.
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Single women in China are under such intense pressure to find a mate that some are resorting to renting “boyfriends” online to accompany them on dates and trips to see their families.
On Taobao, China’s biggest online marketplace, women can choose from hundreds of temporary companions and reserve them for hours or days at a time by paying a deposit.
Melanie Lee, a news blogger for Alibaba — which owns Taobao — recently decided to give the service a try, and she shared her experience via email with Business Insider.
Generally speaking, it’s considered bad form to suck face on public transportation, particularly in socially conservative countries like the Philippines, but perhaps lovers get a little extra leeway on St. Valentine’s Day, because the Manila Light Rail Transit is offering free tickets to couples bringing the romance today.
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The rare blanket of snow Tokyo received last week gave Japan’s capital city residents a chance to show off their creativity. Since it was a seldom seen treat that happened to fall over the weekend, everyone and their mother seemed to be showing off their newfound snow sculpting skills. But this Snow Pikachu has got to be our favorite. Sure, the bicycle-riding snow cat was pretty awesome, but we learned something here, people. Snow Pikachu evolves into Machochu. It’s a fact.
Some people like Valentine’s Day and some people don’t, but the least we can do is stay out of one another’s way. Gushy types can do their romantic stuff, and more cynical types can boycott in whatever way they like best. Everybody wins, right?
Well, a personal boycott wasn’t enough for one jilted lover in Shanghai. He decided to organize a mob of internet singletons to buy up odd-numbered movie seats for showings of a popular romance movie to ensure couples wouldn’t be able to sit together on the 14th.
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It’s Valentine’s Day in Japan, and as the tradition goes, women and young ladies across the country have been busy preparing homemade chocolates to give out to male friends, colleagues, and that special someone. But we’re not quite sure the recipients of these grotesquely accurate chocolate teeth will be too thrilled. Uh…do you eat it one tooth at a time?
If there’s one thing guys like more than chocolate, its gimmicks! If you happen to be doing some last minute shopping for Valentine’s Day your favorite beau probably wouldn’t sneeze at a standard box of chocolate, but if possible why not think a little outside the box? Better yet, why not think outside of the solar system: Planet Chocolates?
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I wouldn’t know personally because I basically use two plastic cups with some string attaching them for all my not-in-person communication, but I hear people with smartphones spend a lot of time and money trying to find the perfect case to protect and customize their technological doohickey.
There’s a lot to consider, after all: Will others enjoy the design as much as you do? Does the case affect the overall weight, size and shape of the phone to an unacceptable degree? Can you still fit it in your pocket after you snap the case on? Will people think you’re a creepy weirdo based on your choice of case? These are all questions normal smartphone users ask themselves.
Imagine yourself sitting down to a delicious warming winter meal. There’s nothing like nabe (Japanese hot pot) on a dark, cold evening. And there are so many choices! Pork, chicken, fish, seafood, monkey… Hang on a second … MONKEY?!
As soon as they heard that monkey hot-pot was on the menu at the Sakagura Niigata restaurant in Tokyo, a reporter from our Japanese sister site headed out to find out if it could possibly be true. Here’s what they found.
Conveyor-belt sushi is equally popular among tourists and residents of Japan alike. I mean, little plates of food that trundle by, with everything up for grabs? It’s brilliant! And cheap. Chains like Sushiro, Kurasushi, Kappasushi and Hamasushi offer a large selection of items starting at just 100 yen (about US$1)!
But what if you aren’t so big on the whole raw fish thing? Are you forced to forgo the cheap and childlike pleasure of stalking your next course as it makes its way around the counter? Of course not! After extensive research, we’ve got the very best of conveyor-belt non-sushi all picked out for you.
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