Reading Report: 01 February 2026

銀河機攻隊 マジェスティックプリンス

This was my golden week. I used some stocked up days in lieu and took the whole week off from last friday, so I've had 10 days with no obligations. It felt very restful and freeing to just do whatever I wanted all day. Kind of an interesting feeling considering I've always had this option but didn't appreciate it as much when it was my every day.

ファタモルガーナの館 現代編

A few immediate thoughts about the sequel story:

  • Seeing a VNDB length of ~8 hours filled my spirit with hope
  • Hearing voice acting filled my spirit with hope
  • The new art immediately felt like a huge downgrade
To address that last point, in practice I think it works, surprisingly. It's sort of a continuation of the way the original Fata Morgana would visually genre change during different stories, and I think it's basically appropriate for the modern, less superstitious timeline.
This is a story that was heavily implied to exist from the ending of the original game, and is sort of teased at the end of the prequel. The prologue immediately introduces Michel and Giselle, happily together, moving into a new home in France. They meet Maria, but she doesn't seem to have the same memories of past lives that Michel and Giselle are aware of. Michel has a dream of Morgana and still sees it as his personal goal to guide her into a happy life, but for now the game has decided that, one last time... it's time to remix the events of Door One.

The first chapter is a retelling of Mel and Nellie's tragedy. I was a bit disappointed that it takes back the "promise" left at the end of the original game. It seemed like a final kindness of fate that in the modern era they could finally be born into different families and love each other in a normal way. But, no. The sequel quickly reveals that Nellie and Mel are blood related and sets them on the cycle of pain again. However, it's not too bad. It's one last chance for them to do it right and accept each other as they are. I liked that the writing evoked the past but didn't just reproduce it, and I especially liked how Mel deals with the ghost of his past decisions. It was pretty good.

The second chapter is a chance of redemption for Pauline and Yukimasa (The foreign sellsword). It felt a bit shorter than the previous chapter, revealing that Yukimasa still deals with an internal bloodlust. The chapter resolves with Pauline convincing Yukimasa that, should his inner demon get completely out of hand, she should be his first victim because she can't stand the thought of him killing. It's sort of ridiculous, but they seem happy...

The third chapter stars, you guessed it, Jacopo and Morgana. I'm still mid-chapter for this one, and it's going okay, though I found some of the bickering just a bit much. I understand the story wants to demonstrate a realistic development of trust and kinship between the two characters, but it's just a bit exhausting to see Morgana and Jacopo fight again for the third time. There was a cute non-voiced moment that said the two played a racing videogame together. That's cute.

銀河鉄道の夜

I queued this up as my second book of the year a few weeks ago when I was rewatching Giant Robo. I'm in sort of a nostalgic mood this year, so this is a way to touch on the content (sort of) of 銀河鉄道９９９, a movie (also an anime series and manga) I enjoyed a few years ago. Apparently 999 is just inspired by this book so I don't expect any of the same moments, but it's also a very short book so I expect it to be a short and simple, magical adventure on a galactic train.

So far the two main characters, Campanella and Jobani, are at the Galactic Railroad station. I can't say I've been totally absorbed by the story yet, but it was sort of my back-burner media this week. I expect to have more thoughts by next report.

機動戦士Zガンダム

The rewatch continues. A few small notes: I had remembered Reccoa's defection as a much more sudden affair, so watching it happen over so many episodes was a bit tiring. I remember seeing that Tomino chastised Gundam fans for thinking her arc was a bit weird, but I think the fans weren't totally wrong. After having watched Char's Counterattack (see below) and I think Quess' defection was much more understandable. On the other hand, I really enjoyed watching Jerid's descent into self destruction. I think the first time I watched the show I didn't really pay attention to his relationship with Mouar and how it affects his decisions after her death. His confrontation with the other Titans soldiers when they insisted on standing down in episode 37 was quite good. I like how he mirrors other Gundam child pilots but is just constantly failing because Kamille happens to be his opponent.

銀河機攻隊 マジェスティックプリンス

Rose Three from Majestic Prince

This also included the Majestic Prince standalone episode and movie.

This anime was really only on my radar because I played the smallest tiny bit of Super Robot Wars 30 (a game I've had on pause for a while now...) and the cast of this show are early party members and I liked their theme and the designs of their robots. For anyone keeping track, playing as the Getter team in SRW 1 was the seed for me to start watching that show as well and I ended up as a super fan... I think Super Robot Wars is just really good advertising for robot anime.

Anyway... I really liked it. It's a fairly straight story without any big twists. I found the chemistry between the main cast to work really well. In a lesser anime I think the characters would fall into tropes a bit too much, but Majestic Prince showed restraint and never overdoes any of that stuff, particularly during scenes when the story needs to be serious. The enemy side were basically just villainous aliens with a handful of defectors who help the humans out, but I didn't mind the simplicity of the conflict too much. I also really adored the mini story arc of the secondary team, Team Doberman, and how their story impacts the main team, Team Rabbits, throughout. The weakest character for me was Ange, a latecomer to the team who is never really allowed into the main party except as a token effort. They get one episode that sort of focuses on them, but it doesn't really lead to any big development either, and their two defining traits end up just being "can't control their temper in combat" and "gender ambiguous". The movie very slightly addresses the former trait, including them in the final combat tech to defeat the big baddie, but it was a bit weird for the ambiguous gender thing to be remarkable within the story but then never resolved. I guess it doesn't really matter.

So Majestic Prince ended up being the highlight of the week for me. I fell in love with the main crew; Izuru, Asagi, Tamaki, Suguya, and Kei. I think they were all extremely adorable and I was rooting for them right to the end. Also their robots are so cool (especially Rose Three).

スーパーロボット大戦ＥＸ

Something I always think about when playing information-dense RPGs is, "I should take extensive notes and really map out the social space of this story." I decided that I might as well try that out with this game this week. The biggest takeaway from this is that it was dizzying just how many proper nouns come up in a few short scenes of SRW. Granted, many of the proper nouns were people and places who had come up in the previous story beats or even previous games (Masaki has been a staple since at least SRW2). Anyway enjoy a dump of some names and relationships I gleaned. Do note that it may not be 100% accurate. This was across chapters 14-16 (I'm currently mid-combat in chapter 16).

  • ラ・ギアス: The world of OG SRW. Some kind of dimension connected to Earth
  • ラングラン王国: The kingdom our heroes have sided with
  • フェイル: Prince of ラングラン王国. Heir to throne but he sacrificed it for political alliance that would save the kingdom's people...
  • テリウス＝グラン＝ビルセイア: フェイル's younger brother and not the rightful heir to the throne I think...
  • ザボト卿: He's doing the coronation. Evil sort of guy.
  • ナタリア＝ゾラム＝ラクシュミー: テリウス's mum, but something's off. She's from ノーランザ家, a foreign royal family. テリウス would be proud of his mother's heritage, so it can't be him being coroneted because of how she is being introduced... it's a farce!
  • アルザール＝グラン＝ビルセイア: テリウス's dad
  • テュッティ・ノールバック: Maybe フェイル's retainer or something
  • セニア: another one of フェイル's retainers
  • マサキ: Pilots Cybuster. Main character of this route.
  • ミオ: A young girl from Earth who wakes up in the OG world (if I recall correctly) and has a surprisingly good acuity towards piloting elemental robots. She's tough and has a great theme song.
  • カークス: Leader of one of the fractured kingdoms. He wants to control all of ラ・ギアス. Current baddie
  • シュウ: Masaki's cool evil brother? テリウス called him クリストフ
  • ラテル・アクロス少佐: One of カークス's soldiers
  • ミラ・ライオネス少尉: One of カークス's soldiers
  • アマハド・ハムディ: Comes as backup for カークス side, but マサキ seems betrayed by this. Former ally? He's from パレスチナ (Palestine) and explains his reason for choosing カークス's faction is because he believes they're most likely to win and he wants to end the war as soon as possible.
That doesn't even cover all of the stuff I saw, but I intentionally didn't take any notes on robot names. I also noted some locations, but it's sort of hard to put them in any logical place. On the one hand I don't think you'd need to take notes to really understand what's going on, but on the other hand I think it did help me actually pay attention to some of the big actors in the few chapters I played.

機動戦艦ナデシコ The prince of darkness

I finally got around to watching this movie sequel to Nadesico. It was fun and funny, though it was also like 80% just running around to find the crew of the original Nadesico and 15% mech stuff. It was a shame Yurika and Akito couldn't progress their relationship at all (on account of Yurika being frozen).

機動戦士ガンダム逆襲のシャア

This was premiering on YouTube so I hooked some friends into a voice chat and watched it with them. It was fun to explain some of the details of the story, and it was fun to rewatch. I don't have too much to add, though after finishing it I did feel confident with the 7/10 rating I previously gave it. Some great characters and mobile suits, but the story is a bit meandering.

アニメ　その他

I also watched the first episodes of the following anime:

  • 超電磁マシーン ボルテスVFIVE
  • 超電磁ロボ コン・バトラーVVEE
  • 勇者ライディーン
The connecting tissue might be clear from the names of two of these shows. They're all 1970s-era Super Robot anime. In fact (and I only found this out after watching the episodes), Combattler and Voltes are two parts of a loose trilogy of anime. Combattler and Raideen were also on my radar largely because of Super Robot Wars.

I don't have too much to say about each individually, but it was interesting to compare how each of these anime is aesthetically different. All of them have large child casts, but Voltes makes a point to introduce each of the five pilots as experts at something. The pilots in Combattler, on the other hand, felt a bit more grounded, and the pilot of Raideen, Akira, is seemingly chosen by the gods on a holy mission. It's sort of ominous (in a way a post-modern anime might explain as secretly malicious) how Akira's eyes glow red as he follows the booming voice's commands to boat out to sea to seek Raideen. I don't know if it's a permanent thing or not, but I liked how the bad guys petrified Akira's dad in the first episode to really set the stakes. Maybe he's just dead now. Either way, Raideen is pretty cool.