Sean Akizuki's Fantasy Critic

  There's nothing wrong with creating an OC like Cole Young (or Alice in the Resident Evil movie continuity) IF they could actually just make it work. However, just thinking about how the Mortal Kombat movie raised some eyebrows (even some say that the PG-13 movie from 1995 was WAY BETTER) had me thinking about violence for the sake of it. Right now, it reminds me how I may have made the worst decision back in 2019 by getting Mortal Kombat 11 which just became a gorefest without a plot. Some fatalities are already too overkill or take too long to finish. Great gameplay but too grindy, not respecting people's work hours, and students' study hours by penalizing non-playing. Not to mention, Mortal Kombat 11 Aftermath's story mode SUCKS and just relied on Cary Hiroyuki-Tagawa to bail it out. I also didn't like the new Sindel who was evil all along and preferred her as the victim queen who ended her life to create a barrier between Earthrealm and Outworld.  The 2021 movi...

  Mortal Kombat (2011) is said that actually had Mortal Kombat II as its greatest influence. Really? While references to MKII are really obvious (such as how the arcade ladder goes in a way) - it can't be denied that the game is a near-perfect version of Mortal Kombat Trilogy . The game nearly has all the characters from MK Trilogy except for  Chameleon and Khameleon while Rain was later added as DLC but didn't make an appearance in the Story Mode. So, how does this game make me forget that MK Trilogy ever existed? We can discuss in many aspects how the game managed to fix the mess that's MK Trilogy and it should because of the two-generation differences in the systems they were in.  We can talk about significantly depowering characters for balance's sake Sure, one can argue that Sonya is somewhat broken or that some characters are broken. However, it's a far cry from what happened in MK Trilogy . Can you remember how some characters actually did some very irritatin...

  What I missed was that  The First Kamen Rider  celebrated its 50th anniversary last April 3, 2021. Yup, the show first premiered in 1971 and became a hit that lasted for two years. Like  Himitsu Sentai Goranger  in 1975 - it was a monster hit that Toei Ltd. didn't want to end immediately until they decided that having a yearly change was for the best. However, the Kamen Rider franchise wasn't exactly on a better road during the Showa era. A history of the show's run will tell us how the show was in a constant struggle during the Showa era. The popularity of  The First Kamen Rider  created  Kamen Rider V3  as a sequel. Unlike  The First Kamen Rider  -  V3  would be just a year-long.  V3  was quickly followed up by  Kamen Rider X  (which lasted for 35 episodes),  Kamen Rider Amazon  (which lasted for only 24 episodes), and  Kamen Rider Stronger  (which lasted for only 39 episodes). A...

I could remember how I previously wrote about how Scorpion in Mortal Kombat had an interesting development . What I've ignored in my blogging (due to how my relationship with Capcom has become rather stormy) is Sagat's rather cool development as an anti-villain turned anti-hero. Yes, Sagat was initially a villain for a good portion of Street Fighter until his redemption. He was once part of M. Bison's Shadaloo Kings along with Balrog and Vega. Yet, Sagat overtime became a good guy. The idea was somewhat placed in the Street Fighter movie and the failed American cartoon. The failed American cartoon had Sagat eventually defecting after finding out how M. Bison had gone "too far". The games did start to explore his role as a character manipulated by the bad guys like Scorpion was in Mortal Kombat .  Sagat did have his status as the champion of Muay Thai and the main antagonist of the underappreciated first Street Fighter game. Adon was also a character in that rather...

The Street Fighter series as a lot of interesting retcons (and bad ones such as Cammy's origins which came some time AFTER the Street Fighter II V Anime ). One of them is the addition of Evil Ryu - Ryu's variation that didn't come in until the Street Fighter Alpha series. The form made its debut in Street Fighter Alpha 2 Gold which was an update to the original game. Evil Ryu was basically a variation for Ryu like how Chun-Li had her Street Fighter II variation in the same game. The form of Ryu had nearly the same moves except he had a teleport, his shoryuken had more hits (which could potentially override Ken's superior flaming shoryuken), and he gains the Messatsu Gou Shoryu.  The retcon of Ryu's victory over Sagat (who was still a noble villain at that time) was changed. It turns out that Ryu himself was starting to succumb to Satsui No Hadou (Surge of Murderous Intent) which was the power Akuma had. Akuma was a bonus character in Super Street Fighter II Turbo wh...

While Ryu's Hadouken is better than Ken's -- Ken's Shoryuken is better than Ryu's. Ken was the first of the two to use a Shoryuken-based super-attack. Ken's first Shoryuken-based super was his Shoryuu Reppa and later added the Shinryuken. Ryu instead focused his energies on improving his Hadouken such as the birth of the Shinkuu Hadouken (which Ken could perform in a duo with Ryu in Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter ) and the Denjin Hadouken (from the Street Fighter III series). The Street Fighter III series also introduced Ryu's first Shoryuken-based Super Move in the Shin Shoryuken. Shin Shoryuken would translate as True Rising Dragon Fist while Shinryuken would translate as True Dragon Fist.  Ryu's Shin Shoryuken was introduced in the Street Fighter III arcade games - a game series that didn't enter until the sixth-generation consoles. The variations did appear in several other games such as the Street Fighter EX series and non-canon spin-offs su...

It's no secret that Liu Kang is indeed a Bruce Lee-inspired character. It was said that Jason Scott Lee (no relation to Bruce Lee) was Bruce Lee in Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story and was offered the part of Liu Kang and turned it down. The part of Liu Kang eventually went to Robin Shou (for the 1995 film) while the current film will have Ludi Lin (from that failed Power Rangers film). The character of Lee from Enter the Dragon was obviously given tribute in later films and games. There was the arcade game Yi Ar Kung Fu which had its main protagonist Lee fighting off deadly opponents. The concept also made it into Liu Kang when the low-budget hit Mortal Kombat was created.  The first game featured Liu Kang in a very Bruce Lee type of attire. Who can remember the way that Liu Kang was in the first game where he wore black pants and kung fu shoes? Lee's trademark appearance was made into Liu Kang and put into a bloody game. Interestingly, Liu Kang had nunchucks (which is obviously ac...