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Darth Vader in Death Star armour brandishes lightsaber katana, joins the Samurai force in Japan

A short time ago, in a country far, far away, a group of creatives at legendary toy-making company Bandai decided to fill a void in the figurine universe with a fearsome new character: Samurai Darth Vader.

The new model on the market is set to feature some awesome details, including a Death Star warrior helmet, a lightsaber blade and a pose-able hand for playing out those extreme death-grip scenarios.

Available at the end of December, this new incarnation of the Dark Lord is the latest in a lineup that also includes Samurai Storm Troopers and Samurai Boba Fett.

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Life Is Strange is coming to Japan, gets new voice cast & dubbed trailer 【Video】

The last few years especially have seen a notable increase in the number of western-developed narrative-driven video games. Notable entries include Telltale Games’ The Walking Dead, The Wolf Among Us, and of course Game of Thrones, which deliver their respective stories in downloadable chunks once every few months, leaving players itching to play the next episode and find out what happens.

Telltale pretty much cornered the market on this genre until French development studio DONTNOD Entertainment released the absolutely captivating five-part supernatural high school story game Life Is Strange. The game has been a surprise hit, selling over a million copies to date, with players falling in love with the endearingly complex characters, time-travelling mechanics, mellow game atmosphere, and killer soundtrack. In fact, the game has done so well for itself that publishers Square Enix have decided it’s time Japan got a piece of the photo-snapping, heavy decision-making, time-rewinding fun for themselves. Yep, Life is Strange is being released in Japan, and it’s getting an entirely new Japanese voice cast, too!

Check out the reveal trailer to hear Max, Chloe and the rest of the characters speaking Nihongo!

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How do 43 coins tossed through the air create one short but lovely song? Concentration!【Video】

Music is, without a doubt, one of the most powerful artistic mediums humankind has. It can move us in ways that are hard to understand or even describe, eliciting everything from tears to vicious mosh pits. Of course, one of its most renowned powers is helping people concentrate.

Take, for example, classical music, which seems to help students focus while cramming for finals or aid tired workers in getting through a long day. So, to promote their new drink Shuchu Regain (集中リゲイン), Suntory has released a series of YouTube videos demonstrating the power of concentration. Today, we’ll be looking at “the world’s fastest orchestra,” The Extreme Minuet, played by having 43 men toss coins into beakers from several feet away.

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Last Sunday morning, dozens of Tokyoites ran screaming through the streets of the Kamata neighborhood. Ordinarily, this would be cause for concern, but for cinema fans the world over, this is actually something to celebrate, as the crowds, caught on video, are proof that filming has begun for the newest made-in-Japan Godzilla movie.

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Online auction market booming for posters with cancelled, possibly copied 2020 Olympics emblem

The organizers of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics are still wiping the egg from their faces over the controversy surrounding the event’s possibly plagiarized, definitely dropped logo. Not only is the Organising Committee scrambling to prepare a new emblem, it also has to deal with recalling all of the promotional items it had already produced bearing the now cancelled design.

But with the rather convincing accusations that designer Kenjiro Sano copied the emblem coming so late in the game, some of those promotional materials have already made their way into the hands of private parties who are now reselling the sure to be rare items at a premium in online auctions.

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MegaBots wants your help to ensure American victory in the first ever giant robot fight

Earlier this summer, RocketNews24 brought you the breaking news that the United States’ MegaBots had built a giant robot and had challenged Japan who, to no one’s surprise, already had a giant robot themselves. This challenge for robot supremacy was quickly accepted and the ante was upped to include melee combat.

MegaBots couldn’t back down from a challenge they issued first, so it was back to the drawing board in preparation for next year’s battle for national pride. They have some ideas, but are going to need your help to “kickstart” an American victory.

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【Monday Kickstart】Adorable dog’s frustrated attempts to get a shower are too cute to ignore!

Summer in Japan can be brutal if you’re not used to the humidity. At least one of the writers here at the RocketNew24 office has melted into a puddle of and had to be reconstituted in a meat locker last month. Fortunately, the heat is starting to abate and autumn is in sight!

But while we’re happy we won’t have to worry about being liquefied anymore, there is one thing we’ll miss: Playing in the pool. We can’t do that once winter has set in and we’re missing the summer sun, but at least we’ll have this insanely adorable video of a dog whose owner steals its every attempt to get a shower.

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Fan fuses anime and reality in the same frame on tour of real-world Free! locations 【Photos】

There are many instances of anime successes rejuvenating tourism in some lesser-known parts of Japan, and one of those towns that benefitted from an anime boom is Iwami of Tottori Prefecture, the setting location for the hit anime series Free!.

Even now, two years since Free! first aired, fans are still flocking to Iwami to drink in the atmosphere of the town where their favorite characters “live.” A Japanese fan recently went the extra mile to combine some of the anime scenes and actual locations into a single frame, creating awesome 2.5-dimensional images that went viral and triggered the feels in fellow fans. Check them out after the break!

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Bus driver in Yokohama City announces warm message to the mother of a screaming child

We’ve all been in this situation at some point in our lives–trapped in a public place with a baby screaming its lungs out. While many people would react by repeating “Shut up!” over and over again inside their minds, one pro bus driver in Yokohama who experienced this exact situation on the bus he was driving took the high route by instead reassuring the mother that everything was okay.

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Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon is coming to Shibuya to become Pretty Soldier Sailor Shopper

The best thing about the Japanese entertainment industry milking popular properties for all their worth is that fans get a chance to purchase all the new merchandise that inevitably accompanies a brand new release. Sailor Moon fans have been witnessing a Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon renaissance with the recent anime series Sailor Moon Crystal and there have been so many awesome Sailor Moon goods that you could be forgiven for thinking fans had run out of money. However, you would be wrong! It turns out fans are getting their wallets ready for some more heavy shopping in Shibuya.

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Look like you’ve just taken a hadoken to the head with this dizzy birdy halo

Little birdies flying around someone’s injured head in cartoons and the like have been making severe physical trauma fun since time immemorial. Fans of Street Fighter II will also remember this age-old gag as that frustrating feature that would leave your character momentarily stunned and vulnerable to any attack.

Every time those baby chicks started circling, I’d suck air through my teeth and start violently slamming both hands on the joystick and buttons. Meanwhile, my opponent would just smile and slowly walk up to deliver some easy yoga noogies.

Now you too can recreate all that fun and mild annoyance with the Street Fighter II Piyoru Headband!

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Calling all plane otaku! Fly at home with a real-life steering yoke…with one small catch

ANA (All Nippon Airways) knows how to treat their fans. They’ve got Pokémon and Star Wars-themed planes, and now they’re doing something even more special: raffling off the actual steering yokes of a retired Boeing 767.

Do you want to have the ultimate flight simulator controller? Or finally complete your ANA-themed bedroom? Read on to find out how you can get your hands on a piece of Japanese flight history! But be warned: There is a slight catch.

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Stray kitten finds loving home, shortly thereafter takes over and becomes immersed in anime

When a stray kitten began following Japanese Twitter user @Kawasaki_Hina around like a little duckling, he decided to take her in and keep her for good. Within a short time, it became obvious the feline had made herself completely at home and had taken up a few of his ‘hooman’ hobbies to boot — including watching anime and playing the guitar.

Warning: Melt-in-your-seat adorable feline photos are coming up right after the jump!

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GAX-G1, the inside out umbrella that may have just revolutionized the age-old tool【Video】

Umbrellas have been around for a very, very long time. The oldest record of a collapsible umbrella dates back to 21 A.D. in ancient China. While that in itself is pretty crazy, what’s even crazier is that the core design hasn’t really changed.

Never say never, though! A Japanese company has recently released an umbrella that is backwards to any umbrella you’ve seen before…literally.

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3-D character bread trending on Instagram is way cuter and cooler than sliced bread

Three-dimensional character bread, called chigiri-pan, is currently trending on Japanese Instagram under the tag #3Dちぎりパン. These upright, puffy loaves are handcrafted by artistic bakers with more than a pinch of creativity and dollops of love. We’ve already spied loaves in the shape of some popular Disney, Ghibli, San-X, and Moomin characters, among others. Perhaps one of the following creations will inspire you to try your hand at making some chigiri-pan for yourself!

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Japanese ad’s swimming salmon cutlets confuse, educate children about dinner comes from【Video】

In Japan, not only is sliced salmon a dinnertime staple, but it’s a cute mascot and candy too. And salmon also has one other crazy property that sets it apart from all other fish: it can still swim around even after it’s been sliced into cutlets. Apparently…

But while all of us adults know that’s not possible, some kids might not, and one Japanese television show decided to do an experiment to see how kids would react to swimming cuts of cooked salmon. Do the kids know where the fish on their plate actually comes from? Watch the video to find out!

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This group of Japanese kids tear up the dance floor at the World of Dance competition 【Video】

There was an overflow of talent, skilled dancers, and amazing performances at the World of Dance competition held in Los Angeles last month, but this boy’s dance group from Japan made a particularly strong impression on the audience. Not only were their moves awe-inspiring and beautifully synchronized, but the fact that everyone in the group was of high school age or younger made their dance all the more incredible.

Watch the full video below and be blown away by the high-flying flips, spins, and awesome soundtrack!

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French twins dancing to koto performance in Kiyomizu-dera is as beautiful as it is odd【Video】

Of all the cool dance videos we’ve seen this summer, the one by the Dancing Strawhats and Koharu Sugawara was perhaps our favorite. The video did an excellent job of mixing contemporary dance and music with traditional scenery and clothing, and it was this juxtaposition that really captured our attention.

A new video by another group of contemporary dancers has captured our attention today, but this time it features Kiyomizu-dera, one of Japan’s most famous temples, and some lovely music by an incredibly talented koto player. We are in love with this video and we bet you will be too!

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Japanese Twitter user accidentally transforms his pet Pomeranian into a Shiba Inu

So we all know that Shiba Inu are the cutest dogs ever. But what happens when you have a pet that isn’t a Shiba Inu? Do you dress them up in cosplay? Conduct adorable experiments on them?

How about just turning them into Shiba Inu instead? That’s what happened to one Japanese Twitter user, who accidentally had his Pomeranian groomed to look like Shiba Inu. He posted the photos of the adorable aftermath for everyone to see, pretty much proving that if you believe hard enough, anyone can become a Shiba Inu.

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If you’ve got the cash, you can pre-order this stunning Ghost in the Shell ukiyo-e print

A critical darling, Ghost in the Shell may well be one of the most beloved anime in history. Its compelling story, engaging characters and beautiful art all combine to make one of the most exciting franchises we can name, so it’s little surprise that 25 years after its release, the film remains a fan favorite to this day.

In celebration of the first film and the entire franchise, a special product has been announced: a limited-edition series of ukiyo-e prints featuring images from Ghost in the Shell! But when we say limited-edition, we really do mean limited — only 300 copies will be made!

And they won’t come cheap either…

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