It's a nice feeling waking up in the middle of the afternoon, walking to your front door, and finding a fresh package waiting for you. Well, maybe not so nice if that package happens to be a bomb; thankfully no one has successfully assassinated me yet. Anyways, I've got some new posters that came in today. These posters aren't printed on typical poster paper; these posters were printed on cloth. For those familiar with them, the material is very much like the stuff used on anime/game wallscrolls. Much more durable than regular poster paper.

This poster is of Kyo Kusanagi (of King of Fighters) facing off against Ryu (of Street Fighter). The image is taken from the box cover of SVC Chaos: SNK vs. Capcom. The poster sizes up at approximately 40" x 24". An epic clash between two fighting icons? Yes indeed.

Second, I've got here a poster for Valkyria Chronicles, a game that I endlessly praised last year. Featuring the main stars of the game Welkin and Alicia, this poster also measures up at about 40" x 24"

Finally, a poster for one of my favorite games: Persona 4. This image is also taken from the cover art for the game. This one measures up at around 24" x 30".

As for the something special in the title, it's not another poster that came with the others above. Actually, it's technically not something that 'just arrived' today, but rather I just finished building today. While it may not be as impressive or glamourous as my home-built arcade cabinet, I just finished building myself a new arcade stick:

This stick uses 3/4" MDF for the four sides, 1/2" MDF for the control panel, and 0.093" Lexan (Polycarbonate) for the protective top and bottom panel. For the curious, polycarbonate is very similar to acrylic (plexiglass) except that it's much easier to cut and doesn't crack as easily. The only downside is that it is much more prone to scratches than acrylic.

Components-wise, I'm still using Happ Competition buttons, but mixed up the plungers and bodies of a few to mix it up a bit. The joystick itself I went with a japanese stick this time, specifically a Semitsu LS-32. Thanks to the low profile of japanese sticks, I needed to cut and rout a pocket for the mounting plate and main body of the joystick, which is a bit more involved than the mounting of the sticks used in my cabinet.

I used the leftover paint from building the cabinet to paint this stick, and adorned the top with some art I put together. The image is of my character Ragna from BlazBlue on his stage. The inside of the stick I left as a flat white from the primer, and covered it with a clear sheet of Lexan.

In the end, the new arcade stick came out pretty nicely. Though my basement is now covered in sawdust thanks to the router spitting it everywhere during the extensive amount of routing needed on this project. Does anyone want to come down here and clean my basement?

--JT

Continuing my latest trend of Tekken related stuff, today's showcase is the Tekken 6 Artbook. Normally, this book is only available packed in with the $150 Tekken 6 Limited Edition (which also comes with a Hori arcade stick); however, thanks to the magic that is ebay, I was able to get my hands on it without having to shell out for the LE. The Tekken 6 artbook is around 100 pages and has a hardcover. About a third of the book is comprised of full page high-res CG art of most of Tekken 6's cast set to backgrounds of stages in the game.

Then there's a handful of pages showing a small collection of CG art of the more popular characters from the series history. It's real interesting seeing the evolution of the characters that have been around since the series' inception like Kazuya Mishima and Paul Phoenix.

Beyond that, there's a huge chunk of the book dedicated for designer's sketches and illustrations of most of the cast. Most of the sketches are of the various outfits that can be used in-game to customize the characters.

Capping off the end of the book are the sketches for all of the guest costumes done by popular manga artists, which has been a staple of Tekken's console versions for the last few games. For Tekken 6, only Zafina, Jin, Anna, Asuka, Lars, Roger Jr., Lili, and I think Yoshimitsu got special costumes.

--JT

I've been kind of itching to try out my new capture device, and what better way than while I'm screwing around with Tekken 6? So what's on the cutting floor today? Two videos of me screwing around against various ghosts in Tekken's ghost battles mode.

The first one features Jin Kazama, who I just started using again a few days ago. I haven't really used him much since Tekken 3/Tekken Tag because I didn't really like the changes he went through starting in Tekken 4. However with his latest tweaks in Tekken 6 along with the new bound moves, I'm finding him a lot of fun to play with again. Just need to work on mixing up his highs/lows more and work on the timing for his electric wind god fist.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMOOfmd3TH4

The second video is of my old standby Lee Chaolan. Unfortunately, this isn't exactly my best Lee play; I kept missing big juggle follow-ups, didn't incorporate throws enough, and had very little defense. Oh well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDsQpzFgn7g

For anyone wondering, I'm using a Hava Titanium HD to capture this video. I think it gives me moderate quality video; and while it is more expensive than most capture devices, I love how it allows me to play in HD while it records in SD. Most capture devices that I've seen can't do that. Anyways, enjoy.

--JT