Shining Blade and Ark artbook released in west

[chevkraken]

Udon have announced the Shining blade& ark material collection would be released in west(like Shining wind and hearts artbook), the release date is planned for the end of the month.

I have the artbook in japanese, it's an excellent artbook with ton of artwork (every illustration and character art, location, weapon, ennemy...) but also some long interview about the games, the staff and even maybe some reference (It was in shining heart interview we learned Maxima(Sakuya title) was the name give to the leader of the shining force in honor of Max)

The artbook is actually in preordrer on amazon

Oh and the artbook already give an important info about the games. The director of the games (Sawada was producer) is the director of the first and the third Valkyria Chronicles, Takeshi Ozawa, he was just adviser and producer on Valkyria 2 because he was working on Shining Blade.

And actually, Tsuyoshi sawada had an assistant for the production, Kei Mikami, who was producer of the second Valkyria and third valkyria
Its important, because they are not part of media creates but from Sega(the Sega wow staff who made the original phantasy star, Sakura wars, Street of rage, Shinobi, Skies of Arcadia and valkyria chronicles). So mediacreate is just subworker just or on the game, they are not directing it

So Shining blade and Ark (and maybe resonance) are the first non arcade Shining directed by a first party studio since ROTDD, the second since Final conflict.

It's also confirm Shining licence is very important for Sega japan as SegaWOW is one of their main studio.

[DiegoMM]

Cool! Do you have any pics of the books?

[chevkraken]

There is only one book, the artbook is for Shining Blade and Ark











but there is also an artbook (released in west in 2011 or 12) for Shining Heart (and Shining Wind, Force Exa and Force Feather artbooks are also available in english since 2009/2010)

the artbook are all pretty long (200 pages)

[DiegoMM]

wow, beatiful!

[chevkraken]

actually, I think, Shining heart Artbook is more beautiful, longer, with more full page art. And if you love Tony Art, the best artbook is Tony's art from Shining. there no interview weapons or background, it just all Tony's art from Shining tears and Wind.

[Chaos Wizard]

That's pretty sweet.

Unlike a lot of people I thought bringing Tony in as a character artist for the Shining Series was a good idea. He is a solid artist, and in my opinion it helps give the new Shining games 'look'.

[chevkraken]

yeah, Tony was a good choice at the time he was choose, at this time, his style was really unique and very different from other japanse artist.

I don't always like how his style evolved for Shining,not enough heroic fantasy, not always enough cloth for girl) his style on Shining tears is the best(, but he is still a fantastic drawer, his boys are sexy, his girls are Hot and he have given a real identity to his branch of Shining game games. (where Shining force Neo, Exa, Feather and Cross lack identity)

Actually, his work is pretty similar to 3 of my favorite Artist Hyung-Tae Kim (Magna carta, blade and Soul and War of Genesis 2), Range Murata (Last Exile, blue submarine 6) and Yoshitoshi Abe(Lain)

And the similarity in their style are pretty logical.

Tony begun made his modern style as chara designer along Hyung Tae Kim on War on genesis Tempest. and Hyung main inspiration for art is Range Murata who work often along Yoshitoshi Abe

[Omega Entity]

Love me some Hyung Tae Kim.

[Chaos Wizard]

Yeah those dudes are sick.

I'd really like to see a return to legitimate knights and swordsmen though with a Tony Taka kind of twist. Admittedly however, my favorite post-Camelot Shining Game is still NEO. The final boss battle assuming you haven't power leveled, and the final dungeon after the storyline is completed pretty much sealed the deal for me. Being a Shining fan from '91 at age 7 with Shining in the Darkness, I'm all about the grind, and NEO though it left some to be desired as far as the storyline and the character acting was concerned was still fairly solid, and certainly was grind heavy at points. I also liked the soundtrack, and learned how to play the Cascade Castle theme on my Mandolin.

Edit: Truth be told I don't particularly care for most of the releases they've put out after the classic series because they are too cute, or involve something related to someone with amnesia and peoples emotions. I'd much rather strategically beat the dog shit out of an army with a group of specialized war machines with a comic twist aka like old school Camelot titles. But then again, look at what Camelot has done. Two Golden Sun games and a plethora of Mario Golf and Tennis games.

Feather excited me, I thought it was a step in the right direction, but then again wasn't Shining Wind like the #1 game in Japan at one point?

[chevkraken]

I also liked the soundtrack, and learned how to play the Cascade Castle theme on my Mandolin.

Shiro sagisu(Nadia, Evangelion, Bleach, Magi) at the soundtrack.

-- Fri Jul 31 2015 11:58pm --

oh, while we are talking about Tony art :

Here is a Tony fanart from one of the cult Saturn game Princess Crown, it was made just after the release of the game for Saturn

[Geoffrey Duke]

Hey Chev, since SF is dead, what else do you play?

The girls in Blade/Ark are really hot. That's the best way to describe them.

[chevkraken]

I play mostly Forbidden series XI(its the best game in the serie for me), some fighting game and arcade Sega game (Sega rally, Outrun arcade Online, Virtua fighter 5), some RPG i never finished for PSP and DS (the forbidden series 1 to 4, Shining soul 2 I never finished, Lunar) and some new survival horror (RE revelation 2, Fatal Frame 5 and Alien Isolation)

At the end of the month, I'll play Blade arcus from Shining

[Geoffrey Duke]

You know, I actually still need to play Princess Crown. It really uses the Saturn's full sprite handling capabilities.

Bah. The Saturn was the only console that I truly loved and hated at the same time.

At least VC was re-released anyway. Also, they are actually translating Yakuza 5? God I really need to catch up.

[chevkraken]

Yeah, Saturn game are also a priority for me, I bought Burning Ranger, Last Bronx and Magic knight last year and. I never made Shining force 3 scenario 2 and 3 (As I dislike the more serious Shining force 3 mood), I also need to make Lunar Magic school, Princess Crown and Dragon force too.

As the PS2 remake of Phantasy Star 1 and 2 remake are finished, I also need to make them

I have also bought a sega CD and a 32X in 2013, so I plan to make some games on the system .

And yeah, I know the reason I have any of the new system is mainly because there is no big Sega exclusive games (I bought the first Xbox for Panzer dragoon and Outrun, the PS3 for Valkyria Chronicles, the Wii for Mario and Sonic ans Smash bros brawl with Sonic, the WiiU for Bayonetta 2 and Sonic Lost world)

As Sega have registered a new Valkyria name, I hope they plan a new game in the serie (or a PC compilation with official trad for the 3 as it seems the future for sega in west is on PC)

[Geoffrey Duke]

I would have loved those Lunar games on the Saturn. I know they were translated for the PSX, but I'd still love to play the Saturn versions. Also, any chance Yakuza 5 will make it to either Windows or Xbox Live?

Bah. If it's any consolation, SF3 isn't as good as SF2. I might have felt differently if I had completed the whole SF3 trilogy when it was new, but overall, SF2 is simply perfect. The same is true for STHA.

Burning Rangers has a stunning 3D graphics engine for the time. It proved Yuji Naka's genius. I recommend playing the PS2 version of Last Bronx; it's arcade perfect. I have the Saturn version. I tried playing it with an RGB cable but it ends up being too bright, even if it removes the fuzz of the Composite signal.