Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) return with two recent releases (well, one a re-release) to discuss. AL talks about the 3DS re-release of Luigi’s Mansion and how it holds up to its original release in 2001. Jared dives into the cowboy world of Red Dead Redemption 2 to see if all the hype was worth it.

Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) have reached 100 episodes of the Seasonal Anime Checkup OVA and decided that the only way to celebrate was to figure out what was the best out of all the anime, video games, and conceptual ideas we’ve had. So we did just that. It’s time to figure out what’s the best of the best and have some controversy along the way.

If you’d like to see our end results, click here to see the lists!

Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) and Jared return to the world of Life is Strange with AL having just finished Before the Storm. We take a deeper dive than previous episodes where we have talked about this game into the entirety of the game and whether or not if the game works as a whole or if there are parts that were completely unnecessary.

Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) see everyone get together to work on the school festival and how it comes together with what everyone’s doing during it.

Jared and Anne Ladyem see how the third years deal with the impending fact that they will be going their separate ways soon and then things get incredibly weird at the end.

Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) see the conclusion of the Hakodate arc as Ruby, Hanamaru, Yoshiko, and Leah work together to create a new song and we see the formation of Saint Aqours Snow.

Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) see what happens when Aqours heads to Hokkaido to see how Saint Snow do at the Love Live regionals, Ruby trying to deal with Dia leaving soon, and Ruby looks to help out Leah.

Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) finally get to the point of the season where Aqours sees if they’re able to save their school or not.

Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) see how Aqours handles Chika learning a very hard dance routine that the third years originally attempted to do but failed. Too bad Chika doesn’t understand the meaning of too hard.

Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) see how the unlikely duo of Yoshiko and Riko handle having a dog come into and out of their lives.

Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) finally get to one of the more interesting episodes of the season where Dia has to figure out a way to get close to the younger members, but how does that change from Japanese to English?

Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) see how Aqours deals with the dilemma of having to perform in two places on the same day. Do they split up, prioritize one or the other, or attempt to pull off performing twice at full strength?

Jared and Anne Ladyem (anneladyem.com) see that Aqours now have a deadline to get prospective students and they split up into two groups to try and come up with two different songs for the forthcoming Love Live competitions.

Ayano Hanesaki has been through the ringer during her journey in HANEBADO!, but how does her journey end? Does the match with Nagisa end up helping or hurting her in the long run? Will she finally break free of her mother’s chains or does the show fumble that encounter? Clickthrough to see exactly what I thought about how HANEBADO! wraps up.

The debate between subs and dubs will rage on until we are long gone. In reality, it is an absolutely silly fight as you should watch which version you are more comfortable with and will enjoy better. When I decided to get back into anime in 2013, one show I constantly saw gifs of on Tumblr was of the 2009-2010 series, K-ON!. For whatever reason, I decided upon the Sentai Filmworks English dub of the series (not to be confused with the other English dub that preceded Sentai) and breezed through both seasons and the movie. The performances of the cast are good on their own and accentuated the show for me in many ways. Looking at the cast of the dub today, it is clear that the K-ON! dub should be viewed as an all-star cast and perhaps one of the best dubs of the 2010s.

Boy, 2017 sure was bad. Video games were one of the few bright spots of the year. As per previous years, there will be supplemental awards first before we dive into the Top 10. There will be spoilers so please beware as you read.

It’s no secret there is a divide within the entirety of the Persona franchise. A large and vocal majority came with the releases of Persona 3 and Persona 4, with even more coming in after the recent release of Persona 5. Of course, as the names of those games suggest, they are not the beginning of the series. For that, you have to go back all the way to September and November of 1996 to the release of Revelations: Persona in different regions. Both versions of Persona 2 would come even later with Innocent Sin coming in June 1999 for Japan and Eternal Punishment in June and December 2000 for Japan and America. One of the big reasons that people have a hard time going back to the first three games is that they are different than the games that would come later. The battles, demon negotiating, dungeons, and lack of social links make the split in the series a large divide. If you were like me and somewhat disappointed with Persona 5, perhaps now is the time to take a look back and see exactly what makes up the earlier games and in particular, Persona 2 Eternal Punishment.

Back on the Seasonal Anime Checkup OVA Episode #18, I mentioned how Persona 5 was currently my least favorite game in the series. That statement might lessen when I decide to attempt a second English (third overall if we’re counting the Japanese version) playthrough, but as of now, and with other facets surrounding the game, it remains that I am disappointed with the game. The game does have good aspects, like revamping the battle mechanics and a good majority of the cooperation/confidant social link characters are great and some of the best in the series. However, Persona 5 is by no means perfect or the greatest game ever made. It may in fact be your game of the year for 2017 and I cannot dispute that as opinions are subjective, but the game is not infallible to criticism like some people might think it is.