Arcade Gamer Fubuki
From the screen writer of Cowboy Bebop and Escaflowne: The movie and animation director of Sakura Wars TV series. Fubuki is a girl whose only goal in life is to be the best at arcade games. She’s not much good at sports, but when it comes to arcades, Fubuki’s a whiz with her special super-powers. When an evil organization steals her powers to gain world domination, Fubuki’s dream of wining the World Championship is in danger. She and her friends must battle the wackiest bunch of villains ever in a quest to make playing games fun again.
Fubuki is a young girl with big ambitions, wanting to be the best at gaming no matter what the platform. Her best friend, Hanako Kokobunji support keeps practicing to be the best at gaming. Her inspiration to be the best was born in sadness, when her virtual pet passed away, the gaming legend Arashi, gave her a means to focus the universes gaming passion. When Fubuki is entered into the World Championship of gaming she has to battle the best of the regional tournament, before moving onto the national and World Championships.
In order, to beat out her first challenge she must utilize her passion to move on, her passion panties……..You heard it right, her passion panties, the universes gaming passion is in the focus of a pair of panties. With victory in the Japanese regional tournaments assured, Fubuki is warned by the mysterious man Mr. Mystery, that she doesn’t stand a chance against the rest of the nation unless she practices and focus her skills. He offers a further warning about the Gulasic group, an even more mysterious organization out for gaming and even world domination.
Arcade gamer Fubuki continues in the further episodes with the same line of whacky, sometimes nonsensical humor, and even wackier characters, with often crazy and almost pointless plot twists.
DVD contains the following Episodes.
Fubuki’s Explosive Debut – Fubuki’s must battle to become the best in Japan, but who is Mr. Mystery and what is the Gulasic group. With the introduction of Fubuki’s enemies and what are their intensions?
The Stolen Passion Panties – With Fubuki’s lost the Chizuru disqualified, she must practice for the official rematch looming. Fubuki and Hanako travel to Hell’s river, they meet another wacky character, but who is Honey? Is she as sweet or as her name implies or is she bitter.
Final Battle!!!! Dad’s the Overlord – With the world championships now underway, the Gulasic group has made their intensions known. What of Fubuki’s suspicious, is Mr. Mystery her father or his he just another player in the game?
A Reunion that transcends time – The leader of the of the Gulasic group has now made his presence known, in attempt to act on his vengeance of on the worlds technology. Will Fubuki and Mr. Mystery be able to beat the Leader in his world of X? Or will they be defeated and worlds gaming networks will fall to the hands of evil.
The animation for the series was amazing crisp clean. Every character seemed to have unique level of detail to them. The animation itself reminded me of a combination between Sakura wars and Love Hina. The audio as well is just plain amazing, offered in doubly digital 5.1, with English and Japanese. Other features of the disc include Japanese with English subtitles.
What can one expect from the special features from Arcade Gamer Fubuki? The special features in with the disc include, right from the main menu, when you pop the disc in and it finally loads up, you’ve given 2 options –Play movie or Debug mode – the debug mode leads to the features section of the disc. The screen for the features menu holds to an idea of gaming, with a “P1 / P2 Insert Coin” on the top of the screen, everything about this page makes it feel like you’re standing at an arcade machine.
Special features include an Art Gallery, trailer, TV spots, Festival Promotion trailer and even a bonus episode. The Art Gallery consists of various stills from the series, showing the characters in various poses, with several theme songs of the series playing over top of the images. The trailer for the series is a standard trailer just to give the idea of what the viewer can expect. The TV spots, are promotional clips that aired in Japan to hype up the series, with a synopsis of what can be expected dictated by the Japanese voice actress for Fubuki – Sakura Nogawa. In total there are a 7 of there promotional clips 4 for the first episode and the 3 for the 2nd episode. The Promotional video is from the 2002 Emotion film festival. The video features the opening song with a character introduction, and displays the main characters “special attacks”. Last but not least the Bonus episode, is an Arcade Gamer Fubuki – Special Story ~ Paradise beyond the wall~ I won’t spoil you with too many details but the story takes place gaming island with stalker Sanpeita, but I won’t go into too much, I’ll save it for those that chose to buy the DVD.
Overall, I don’t know how to think about this series. With the questionable idea of the Passion Panties and the constant passion shots, taken by the stalker Sanpeita. With that a side, it has an interesting story with a good blend of characters and the interaction between them. A funny story that just about everyone can enjoy without taking it too serious. As I was jokingly saying to my girlfriend, every time Fubuki used her powers, Man I feel like I should be in jail, there’s something just wrong about that.
All an all, I’m glad to add this disk to my collection, something fun to watch and get a few good laughs out of.
Animation: 8 / 10
Story: 5 / 10
Audio: 8 / 10
Video: 9 / 10
Extras: 7 / 10
Impact Rating: 4 / 10
Overall rating = 69%
Matt Capranos
