Anime Cons

Game publishers continue to get a growing influence in, or perhaps rivalry with, Hollywood, as evidenced by news that Microsoft will be producing a series of short films based on the already famous Halo game, but without the involvement of Hollywood. The seven anime-style films will be under the complete creative control of Microsoft staff, who will approve the major storyline and visual decisions for each film.

News of the new Halo series premiered at Comic Con, with news also that the creative director will be Shinji Aramaki, also the director of Appleseed and Appleseed Ex Machina.

The debate over dubbed anime versus English subtitles has roared through many years, as fans often cite that they are concerned that bad translation, or perhaps translation that tries too hard, overwrites the original storytelling created by the Japanese artists. The new release of Ponyo will be interesting as there will be no special transliteration done to the voices, but voice actors will be watching the video, also trying to match the lip movements, and recording several times to see what works.

Interestingly, Tina Fey plays Ponyo's 'very modern mother'.

One of the most widely known anime publishing, and licensing, companies has announced that the InuYasha series will soon be available in the iTunes Store in the United States and in Canada. To promote the new availability, a free download will be available starting today through the end of August.

InuYasha is the story of a half-demon questing for the shards of a sacred jewel that will turn him fully fledged demon.

On the Japanese Audition website you can find a casting call for Muse Entertainment that reveals that are developing a Sugar Town anime series. The series will be based off of Kohime Ohse’s 2001 seinen manga "Heart Sugar Town," which only had released a total of one complete volume.