Video Backlog: "Battle Arena Toshinden"

Publisher: U.S. Manga Corps (Central Park Media, USA)
Format: Region Free DVD, NTSC, Japanese Dialogue with optional English Dub and English Subtitles
Length: 2 Episodes x 28 minutes
Production Date: 1996
Currently in Print (as of writing): No

Story Outline: Eiji Shinjo is still worried by the memory of his tournament battle with the champion Gaia. The battle was cut short by an evil organisation unimaginatively named “The Organization”. Eiji is also in search of his long lost brother Sho. Add in the a mysterious warrior who is hunting down the champions of the previous tournament and using their own moves against them. Eiji teams up with close friend and rival Kayin Amoh to stop the warrior and to defeat “The Organization” and their evil plans to take over the world (or whatever).

Mini Review: Fighting anime. Pretty much, they’re all the same aren’t they? Impossible moves, lost siblings, same old tired crap. This short OVA is no different. Same old boring plot based off a video game that we’ve seen a million times before. The whole thing made very little sense to me. This is the real problem with these types of anime. I’m not a gamer, will never be a gamer, so why can’t they expand a bit on the story so those who haven’t played the game know what the hell is going on? But then again the characters and situations are just one dimensional anyway. It's quite hard to get involved in the story or the characters or even care about what is going on. While for the majority of the series the animation is quite good, the opening action sequence looks woeful. Masami Obari directed and this seems to that point in the 1990’s were his work took a serious nosedive, which personally I think he has never recovered from. If the characters on the DVD cover look familiar, Tsukasa Kotobuki of “Knights of Ramune & 40 Fire” and “Saber Marionette J” did the designs. The animation in this series was OK I guess, so it’s 3 out of 10 for that alone.

Remaining Backlog: 21 months (it's much easier this way than listing the number of discs).