THE LIBRARY
Collector guides, cover censuses, and edition answers, documented issue by issue. Every page answers one specific question, completely.
SAINT SEIYA
20 shelves
The Saint Seiya Manga Gallery
Every Japanese tankobon cover of Saint Seiya, volumes 1 to 28, Jump Comics, Shueisha, 1986 to 1991, each with its release date, plus the English first volume…
What is the Saint Seiya Final Edition?
The Saint Seiya Final Edition is Akita Shoten’s shinsoban reissue of Kurumada’s manga, begun June 2021, and the fifth life of the series in print after the…
Are the Saint Seiya covers the same in Japanese and English?
No. Viz Media’s Knights of the Zodiac (2004–2010) replaces Masami Kurumada’s Jump Comics cover art with a different illustration program and an American trade…
How can you tell a first printing of Saint Seiya?
By the colophon. Japanese tankobon print their impression history on the okudzuke page; a first printing of Saint Seiya reads as the first impression with a date…
What Saint Seiya video games are there?
The complete Saint Seiya game census: the Famicom RPG pair of 1987–88, the Game Boy and WonderSwan chapters, the PS2 and PS3 Dimps fighters, and the mobile era…
What were the Saint Seiya Famicom games?
Saint Seiya: Ougon Densetsu (1987) and Ougon Densetsu Kanketsu Hen (1988): Bandai’s two-part Famicom RPG of the Sanctuary arc, the first exported to France on…
What are the Saint Seiya PlayStation 2 games?
Two Dimps fighters: Saint Seiya: The Sanctuary (2005) and Saint Seiya: The Hades (2006 in Europe, 2007 in Japan). Neither reached North America.
What are Saint Seiya: Brave Soldiers and Soldiers' Soul?
Dimps’ PlayStation 3 and 4 arena fighters (2013 and 2015): the first Saint Seiya console games to cover all three manga arcs, and the first to be released in…
What is Saint Seiya Episode.G?
Megumu Okada’s Gold Saint prequel: serialised in Champion Red from December 2002 to June 2013, twenty volumes plus a volume 0, followed by Episode.G Assassin and…
What is Saint Seiya: The Lost Canvas?
Shiori Teshirogi’s telling of the previous Holy War: Weekly Shonen Champion, August 2006 to April 2011, twenty-five volumes plus sixteen Gaiden volumes, with a…
What is Saint Seiya: Next Dimension?
Masami Kurumada’s own sequel to Saint Seiya, drawn in full colour and published irregularly in Weekly Shonen Champion from 2006 until its conclusion on July 4,…
What is Saint Seiya: Saintia Shō?
Chimaki Kuori’s Saint Seiya, told through Athena’s female attendants the Saintias: Champion Red, August 2013 to July 2021, sixteen volumes, with a 2018 anime…
What other Saint Seiya manga are there?
Beyond the big four: Dark Wing, Rerise of Poseidon, Saint Mariya, Kurumada’s Episode Zero and Origin shorts, the Gigantomachia novels and France’s own Time…
Why is Saint Seiya bigger in France than in America?
Because France met it first, whole, and at full volume: TF1’s Club Dorothee from 1988, an uncut wave across Europe and Latin America, while America waited until…
How was the 1986 Saint Seiya anime made?
Toei Animation, TV Asahi, October 1986 to April 1989: 114 episodes directed by Kozo Morishita and Kazuhito Kikuchi, designed by Shingo Araki and Michi Himeno,…
Why did the Hades chapter take so long to animate?
The TV series ended in 1989 at Poseidon while the manga ran to 1991. The Hades Chapter OVAs finally arrived in three waves, 2002 to 2008, on satellite and pay…
What are the Saint Seiya films?
Four Toei features of 1987–89, the 2004 Heaven Chapter Overture that stalled a trilogy, the 2014 CGI Legend of Sanctuary, and Hollywood’s 2023 Knights of the Zodiac.
How does Masami Kurumada draw Saint Seiya?
From a rejected karate manga to Sorayama-inspired armour: the documented making of Kurumada’s Saint Seiya style, hot-blooded composition, the Star System cast,…
What are the Cloths in Saint Seiya?
Sacred armour keyed to the 88 constellations, ranked Bronze, Silver and Gold, worn by Athena’s Saints and carried as constellation-shaped Objects in their Cloth…
What is Saint Cloth Myth?
Bandai’s die-cast Saint Seiya figure line: launched in late 2003 beside the Hades OVAs, heir to the 1987 Saint Cloth Series, rebuilt as Myth Cloth EX in 2011 and…
SAKAMOTO DAYS
2 shelves
What WSJ issues have Sakamoto Days on the cover?
All 23 feature covers, 2020 to 2026, plus the anniversary trap to avoid.
What WSJ issue has the first Gear 5 chapter?
2022 No.17, and the cover is Sakamoto, not Luffy. How to identify the issue.
SERIAL EXPERIMENTS LAIN
18 shelves
The Serial Experiments Lain gallery
Every object in the Serial Experiments Lain shelf pictured or described: the anime’s covers, the PlayStation game, the artbooks, the soundtracks and the…
What is Serial Experiments Lain?
Serial Experiments Lain explained: the 13-episode 1998 Triangle Staff anime, its premise, its makers, and why a small late-night series won the Japan Media Arts…
How was Serial Experiments Lain conceived?
Yasuyuki Ueda’s original-project gamble at Pioneer LDC: Lain designed as a multimedia experiment across anime, game and manga, the game script written first, and…
How did Yoshitoshi ABe design Lain?
Yoshitoshi ABe’s character design for Lain Iwakura: the forelock Ueda demanded, the bear pajamas Kishida demanded, the unused transforming hairclip, and the…
What is An Omnipresence in Wired?
An Omnipresence in Wired (1999): Yoshitoshi ABe’s 128-page Lain artbook documented, its transparent slipcover, the AX Layer illustrations with Konaka’s text,…
What is ab# rebuild, the second Omnipresence?
ab# rebuild an omnipresence in wired: the 2005 Wani Magazine remake of ABe’s Lain artbook and its 2006 Digital Manga Publishing English edition, compared with…
What is The Nightmare of Fabrication?
The Nightmare of Fabrication: Yoshitoshi ABe’s 18-page full-color Lain manga, a dōjinshi collected in An Omnipresence in Wired, and the PlayStation game’s…
What is the Serial Experiments Lain PlayStation game?
The 1998 Pioneer LDC PlayStation game documented: a two-disc “network simulator” designed by Konaka and Ueda, built from therapy files and diaries, ignored on…
How is the Lain game different from the anime?
The Serial Experiments Lain game versus the anime: same protagonist and themes, a different plot, Touko Yonera the psychiatrist, the imaginary friend, the role…
How did fans bring the Lain game to the West?
The untranslated Lain game’s fan afterlife: the 2008–2014 script translation, the 2021 lainTSX browser port, and the 100% decompilation completed in September…
Who wrote Serial Experiments Lain?
Chiaki J. Konaka’s writing of Serial Experiments Lain: his horror-film influences, the Godard typography, the Alice in Cyberland inheritance, the three spellings…
What music and sound define Serial Experiments Lain?
Lain’s sound world documented: Akira Takemoto’s ambient score, Reichi Nakaido’s songs, the three Pioneer soundtrack albums including BOOTLEG’s CD-ROM, and the…
What is the Wired in Serial Experiments Lain?
The Wired explained from the sources: Lain’s definition of the network, Protocol Seven, the Knights of the Eastern Calculus, the staff’s cited ancestors from…
What are the Serial Experiments Lain DVD and Blu-ray editions?
Lain on disc, documented: Japan’s five-volume releases, the Яesurrection and TV-BOX sets, the 2009 Blu-ray RESTORE, Pioneer/Geneon’s four American volumes, the…
What did Serial Experiments Lain do for its 25th anniversary?
Lain’s 25th anniversary in 2023, documented: the Layer 3301: De-Cipher alternate-reality game, the AI lain chatbot voiced from Kaori Shimizu’s archives, Ueda’s…
What is //signal., the authorized Lain fan game?
//signal. documented: Team MJM’s officially authorized Lain derivative game under NBCUniversal’s lainTTL guidelines, Konaka’s recommendation, the May 2025…
What is worth collecting from Serial Experiments Lain?
A documented collecting map for Serial Experiments Lain: the 1999 artbook and 1998 paper trail, the two-disc game and its Official Guide, the three soundtracks,…
Why is Serial Experiments Lain still loved?
Why Serial Experiments Lain endures: the festival prize and the scholarship, the Funimation rescue, the Duvet virality, the anniversary experiments, //signal.,…
SHADOW HEARTS
16 shelves
The Shadow Hearts Box Art Gallery
Every region’s box art for Koudelka and the Shadow Hearts trilogy, Japanese, North American and European covers with the disc sets that define a complete copy.
Are Shadow Hearts covers the same in Japanese and English?
No: all four Sacnoth games, Koudelka and the Shadow Hearts trilogy, received different box art in Japan and the West. The four regional pairs, compared.
The history of Shadow Hearts
From Sacnoth’s founding by Square expatriates in 1997 through Koudelka, the three PS2 Shadow Hearts games, the studio’s dissolution, and the Penny Blood campaign.
What is Koudelka?
Sacnoth’s 1999 PlayStation horror RPG: one haunted Welsh monastery, three leads, grid battles, full English voice acting on four discs, and the foundation of…
Who made Shadow Hearts?
Sacnoth and Nautilus: the Square expatriate studio Hiroki Kikuta founded in 1997, Matsuzo Machida’s creative takeover, Aruze’s ownership, and the 2009 dissolution.
What is Shadow Hearts (2001)?
Sacnoth’s 2001 PS2 RPG: Yuri Hyuga and Alice Elliot across a Lovecraftian 1913, the Judgement Ring’s debut, and a launch that collided with Final Fantasy X.
What is the Judgement Ring?
The Shadow Hearts battle system explained: the spinning disc behind every attack, spell, item and shop discount, its fighting-game and pachinko origins, and its…
Why is Shadow Hearts: Covenant the beloved one?
Covenant’s reputation, documented: 240,000 copies, a Metascore of 85, IGN and RPGamer game-of-the-year honours for 2004, the two-disc scale, the free first game…
What is Shadow Hearts: From the New World?
The third and final Shadow Hearts (2005): Johnny Garland and Shania in Prohibition-era America, the Stock gauge battle refinements, the tight schedule, and the…
Who is Yuri Hyuga?
The Harmonixer hero of Shadow Hearts: his Devilman-inspired design, the voice in his head revealed as Koudelka, the Fusion gift, the Mistletoe curse, and his…
How do the Shadow Hearts endings work?
The full spoiler account: Koudelka’s pendant endings, Shadow Hearts’ Atman condition, why Covenant follows the bad ending, its two doors for Yuri and confirmed…
Why did the Shadow Hearts series end?
The structural answer: Aruze’s 2007 exit from game development, Nautilus renamed and merged away by 2009, cult-scale sales, Universal Entertainment’s retained…
What is Penny Blood?
Matsuzo Machida’s Shadow Hearts successor: the 2022 Double Kickstarter triumph, the lawsuit over undisbursed funds, the exhausted budget, and the verified status…
What Shadow Hearts strategy guides are there?
The documented shelf: BradyGames’ Covenant guide (2004), Prima’s From the New World guide (2006), the missing English guides for Shadow Hearts and Koudelka, and…
Collecting Shadow Hearts in English
The collector’s map: disc counts and catalogue numbers for all four games, the Promotional Copy variant from the Covenant pre-order, the Japan-only editions, and…
What is the music of Shadow Hearts?
Kikuta’s Koudelka score with Catherine Bott and a school choir, Hirota’s “beautiful yet destructive” trilogy soundtracks with Mitsuda, Iwata and Ito, and the…