As previously mentioned, Shota Matsuda (Hana Yori Dango) will reprise his lead role as the genius Akiyama, while Mikako Tabe (Kimi ni Todoke) will play the heroine Yuu in a new game. Also, Esumi Makiko plays Omega, a member of the Liar Game organization, which has revived the game with the goal of getting revenge against Akiyama for the previous game.

Ashida’s character Alice, another member of the organization, is close to Omega, and she is in charge of everything regarding the new game, including the game’s structure, the player selection, and the traps used against the players.

The spinoff drama will shed light on the relationship between Omega and Alice, as well as how Alice’s life came to be.

The spinoff will be shown on Fuji TV from 5-8 March. The 2nd movie will open in theaters on 3 March 2012.

Source: ANN, Tokyograph

The “Akagi Print Cookie 2012 (Valentine’s Day & White Day)” set comes with five 75-millimeter cookies, each with a different character’s face from the manga. Valentine’s Day orders must be placed by 6 February to be shipped around 10 February. White Day orders must be received by 6 March for delivery around 10 March.

Idea sounds interesting but I don’t think there are a number of females who are into manga or anime >_<.

Source: ANN

Actor Shota Matsuda (Hana Yori Dango) will reprise his lead role as the genius Akiyama, while Mikako Tabe (Kimi ni Todoke) will play the heroine Yuu in a new game.

The manga itself will resume in the magazine in November.

Toda Erika was the heroine in the first two seasons and 1st live-action film. Strange that she won’t be appearing in the 2nd film!!

Source: ANN

Final Fantasy Type-0 [PSP] will be out on 27 October 2011. More preorder details below:

Game: Final Fantasy Type-0 [PSP]
Release Date: 27 October 2011
Retail Price: 7,700 yen
Preorder at: CDJapan

Source: ANN, andriasang

On Oricon’s weekly chart of the top 100 manga in Japan, all 12 volumes of the Kimi ni Todoke manga are on the chart with the recently released 12th volume in the #1 spot. It has already sold 570,979 copies in its first week sales which is the highest that the series has seen.

Since Oricon began publishing its book sales charts in 2008, every Kimi ni Todoke volume from the 6th one onward has ranked #1 during its first week of sales. The last seven volumes have collectively sold over 1 million copies.

I watched the anime last year and did not miss a single episode every week. After it ended this year, I could not wait for the second season to come so I went on to read the manga. I rarely read mangas because I prefer watching videos than frames of still pictures, so for me it says a lot about the series.

Source(s): ANN

Also announced is the fourth compiled book volume which will ship on September 27.

It is not known whether the story of K-ON! will end there, keep your hopes up.

K-ON!! also known as K-ON! Season 2 premiered in Japan on April 6. The animation series is scheduled to finish its run on September 28. So it seems that K-ON! is ending this September, manga and anime series. I am sad indeed.

Source: ANN, Image

Oh yeah, it seems that every major manga publisher has joined forces to fight against these scan sites hosting thousands of pirated titles.

According to a spokesperson, these sites are among the most heavily trafficked sites on the web attracting millions of visits each month while earning advertising revenues and even soliciting donations and sometimes charging for memberships. The group also charges that pirated manga is now beginning to turn up on smartphones and other wireless devices through the use of apps developed “solely to link to and republish the content of scanlations sites.”

The force is strong, membership roster has the thirty-six members of the Japan Digital Comic Association, Square Enix, VIZ Media, TokyoPOP, the Tuttle-Mori Agency, Yen Press, and Vertical, inc.

Is this the end of online manga scanlation sites? I don’t see these sites earning revenue from readers (not that I saw).. But then again, the manga takes a long time to get a English release, so by then fans would have switched to reading online – faster and free.

I used to buy my manga in stores, but I don’t read manga anymore. =/

Source: Publishers Weekly via ANN

A while back I heard about a series called Kaichou wa Maid-Sama! (Class President is a Maid!) which was going to be animated this spring. After hearing alot of recommendations about it I decided to cheat and try out the Manga before it is released in April. I have to admit… at first I was quite hesitant. I personally prefer something more of the Butler Variety (there actually are butlers in this eventually, so I forgive it), but this series did exceed my expectations.

Kaichou wa Maid-Sama!
Volumes: 11 (Ongoing)
Genre: Shoujo, Comedy, School, “Romance,” MAIDS!
Publisher: LaLa

The story revolves around a girl who ends up in a school in which the demographics of the student body are 80% male and only 20% female. The school used to be an all boys school, and had only recently started enrolling girls, but because the school has a bad reputation very few girls were willing to go there. Our  stories protagonist Misaki is a very strong willed girl, and takes it upon herself to become the student body president and make the school environment more tolerable for the female students. She tends to rule with an iron fist, hates men, and will not hesitate to beat the crap out of the boys who don’t follow her rules. She earns both the fear and respect of most of the student body. Besides being so strong willed she’s at the top of the class and appears to be very mature.

That is what Misaki appears to be on the surface at least… but after school ends she heads to her secret part time job at a maid cafe! Its kind of an ironic job considering she detests men as much as she does, but we soon learn that her father abandoned the family leaving a huge debt, and she’s working hard to help her family and pay her tuition. Misaki somehow manages to balance her Grades, Work, Money, and responsibilities as the class president. Things seem to be going well until her secret is spilled. The coolest guy from her school, Takumi Usui, happens to find out about her job. He may be cool and good looking, but his personality is extremely irritating to Misaki. He is showing up at the shop EVERY SINGLE DAY, and she is worried he might black mail her about her secret job. We quickly find out though that this guy is either a crazy playboy stalker, or has fallen in love with her. He is willing to jump off the school roof to keep her secret safe if that will make her happy.

The plot itself doesn’t seem that original, but I’ve still enjoyed it so far. The female character has a kind of Newtype-Shoujo character; a character like Haruhi from Ouran. She has alot of inner strength which is different from traditional shoujo characters, but at the same time she’s girly deep down. She also seems to have some weird obsession with cross dressing which also reminds me alot of  Haruhi from Ouran. Usui the main male character also has some atypical traits for a shoujo series. First of all… he’s a stalker. The manga never explicitly calls him this, but every time Misaki goes anywhere, he is there watching her!!! Also, while Usui takes up the “Perfect at everything” and  “strong will protect my lover at all costs” type character, he’s emotionally pretty weak and confused. He actually reminds me a little bit of Tamaki from because of his family situation and princely airs, but Usui is much more aggressive,  intelligent and emotionally aware of his feelings for Misaki right away. There are one or two characters introduced later that I also like alot (A TRAP, and a childhood friend with an insatiable appetite… but I won’t spoil too much of the series before it even airs.) Actually my favorite three characters are the “idiot trio” which don’t even have an important role in this story xD

Since the manga is still ongoing I’m worried what the anime will do to end it (really, why can’t they wait for these things to end before animating them!?). I look forward to this in spring, and recommend comedy fans to watch it as well.

In the most current Arc, the Valentine’s day arc, alot has happened. I give this current arc a rating of 9/10— Its only beaten by Ren’s “Role Play” arc. Since alot happens in this arc, I’m only going to cover a summary of the last 5-6 chapters.

The first huge thing to happen this arc was Kyouko was kissed by her ex-love (and sworn enemy) Fuwa Shou. Not only was she kissed against her own will, but she was done so in front of all her co-workers, and Ren, the actor she respects most (who is secretly in love with her). This kiss was totally unexpected, I had to reread this chapter at least a dozen times! I was under the impression Shou was going to do something really stupid… he had been jealous for a while over her relationship with Ren, but also the incident with the goth “beagle” earlier in the arc. What really made him snap though was she mentioned she had a special valentine’s day/Birthday present for him. His kiss wasn’t a “loving” kiss though. He only managed to steal it by tricking her… He gave her a valentines chocolate… and then kissed with this the excuse that he was taking it back (this was a really long and embarrassing kiss). Later he explains his evil plot. He knew that after such an evil deed she would never be able to get her mind off him. Even though she would be fuming for loosing her first kiss to the man she hates most… at least she would be thinking about him. I find it kind of amusing that Shou’s thinking is so similar to the Beagle’s xD

Ren is not happy at all. He rarely lets his scary face get out, but even his manager catches his bad mood. Personally I would have liked it better if he just beat the crap out of Shou on the spot, but that would have been very out of character for him.  Kyouko’s immediate reaction is just complete and total despair. Her brain just isn’t functioning and she’s about to break down in tears (or rather she does)

Ren’s reaction is very typical though. He lectures her that a true actor wouldn’t even be phased by something like that. It wasn’t even a real kiss. Ren warns her not to let it happen again though. (His irritation with this whole situation is quite obvious to anyone with common sense, of course Kyouko doesn’t realize WHY he’s angry though, since she doesn’t know he’s in love with her.)

 Even after accepting this explanation, even though Kyouko is now “functional” she is still very angry.  She mainly reverts to super saiyan “I HATEHATEHATE SHOUTAROU” mode! Ren sees this and is angry and jelous but can’t really do anything more about it for the time being.Somewhere in her rage Kyouko remembers the Valentine’s day gift she had put aside for Ren, and decides its the opportune moment to give it to him. They go off to a side room and she gives him some wine jelly in a really fancy rose colored glass. She’s trying to act really happy… But Ren (being an expert at deception) totally see’s her angry face shining through and is ticked off.

In his anger Ren decides to do something… something to get Shou out of Kyouko’s head.I was having a fangirl heart attack at this moment… that finally after nearly 150 chapters finally something real would happen in their relationship. Even though it was just a little peck on the cheek… it effected Kyouko in a radical way.

Apparently Ren’s magic kiss had the intended effect… all thoughts of Shou were completely driven out of her mind… but…

The kiss had alot of negative effects as well. She is so embarrassed she can’t seem to do her acting role seriously. She looks like she’s about to have a nervous breakdown, she can’t think straight at all. And most of all she can’t look or think of Ren without turning bright red.At this point its the end of 149. I had no idea what would happen in the next chapter. I was really hoping for some real romantic development to occur. But at the back of my head I just had this bad feeling that Ren was going to talk his way out of this. Since he really loves Kyouko he wants her to be happy (and functional) as an actress, and she’s just not at a place emotionally where she can be in a romantic relationship and do that.

I mean… if she’s so immature that this is her reaction to a little kiss on the cheek, what would be her reaction if Ren, a grown man, really confessed his love for her. Besides that I don’t think she’s fully over her anger issues with Shou… I don’t know if she can fully embrace love till she gets over her issues with him. So like I had assumed… Ren takes the easy way out. He tells Kyouko that back in America, this his how he thanked all the female models, that it wasn’t something romantic. Then he goes onto lecture her like he always does.

I have to say I was a little disappointed that more didn’t happen after all the emotional build up of this arc, but I wasn’t really expecting much else either.  I’m hoping we see just a little bit more emotions from Kyouko, I find it hard to believe she can completely throw out her feelings about that kiss… but then again she is hopelessly oblivious, so I don’t expect much from her. Since this seems to be the conclusion of this arc, hopefully the next chapter (released January 4th) will be the start of a new one. I personally hope the next arc is focused on Ren! Maybe they could bring Ren’s parents, or at least dad, back into the story (I really liked the chapters with him.). We also need to know more about Ren’s past, and how come he grew up to be so twisted. To be completely realistic… I don’t think there will be any relationship development till we get both Kyouko’s and Ren’s full story. Even though we are officially 150 chapters into the story, there are so many holes left that need to be filled.

Anyways, this was an good arc (especially compared to the previous arc), and I’m really sad it will probably never be animated TT____TT

At least the arc ended with Ren admitting to being a Playboy =D (He definitely is!!!)

 Hopefully someone out there enjoyed my post and becomes a fellow Ren Skip Beat fangirl.

Kentaro Miura, the mangaka of perhaps the manliest manga in the history of manga, has turned to the dark side. It was quite some time ago fans learned of his Loli Idol Master addiction, which many seemed to think may have been interfering with his progress in completing Berserk, but this is the first time loli has appeared in his work, even if it is just a promo.

The Female character above is Schierke a young female witch who has joined Gatsu’s NEW party. Gatsu’s currently traumatized brain dead lover Caska, two ex-knights of the Church (One of whom is half crazy), a winey kid no one cares about, and two fairies makes up all of Gatsu’s current team.  Disregarding the fact that Schierke clearly has the hots for Gatsu, she is generally fully clothed in typical witchly attire. To clarify, this story takes place in a feudal era European type country, there were nothing bathing suits back then. In contrast, most of Berserk looks less loli, and more like this:

The contrast is pretty radical xD
The biggest concern right now is that the mangaka will DIE before he actually completes Berserk. The series has been ongoing since 1990, nearly 20 years ago, and it doesn’t seem to be nearing a conclusion anytime soon. The chapters come out at a very sluggish pace; in the last year about 6 very short chapters have been released, but most of the chapters were just pictures with very little dialogue exchange or plot progression. (Just imagine entire chapters of the three pictures above) The last year of manga could probably be fit into 10 minutes of an anime episode. So… PUT DOWN THE LOLI and finish your series already xD!!!

There has been rumors of a second season of the anime.  There is probably just enough for another season before they catch up, at that point fans will probably have to wait another 10 years for their to be more material to animate.

-Source: Sankoku Complex