Rampant Speculation Archives

What was the Ataribox & Can Atari make a comeback despite its history?

06/22/201706/15/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Atari teased that they were working on a new console apparently called the Ataribox but not much else was said. Many speculated how it would be able to compete with Sony and Microsoft while others thought it would be something akin to the NES CLassic from Nintendo. None of those seems quite likely though.

The history of Atari is a long and convoluted one. But to summarize it down the company has had various deaths over the years, from the first one in the video game crash, to the second one after the crash and it was divided up and sold as parts. So for many years we had Atari which was run by a French company called Infogrames that only used the name they had acquired from Hasbro

E3 2017 Predictions

06/08/201701/15/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Hype-Train, Rampant Speculation

E3 2017 is just around the corner so it’s time to make some predictions and what I expect we will be seeing at E3 this year. I may not have gaming industry sources but I do follow the industry somewhat and I basically went to University to understand how companies work so I have a pretty damn good idea of how a business operates. So this is not your average Joe armchair CEO prediction that you can find plenty of out there. No emotions when making any predictions either. I’ll mainly be analyzing he big 3 (Microsoft, Nintendo, Sony).

The Future of Nintendo’s Handheld Game Consoles & Portables post Switch

05/02/201701/12/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Rampant Speculation

For a long time many people had talked about Nintendo making a a hybrid system that was both a portable and a home console. Nintendo always denied that the Nintendo NX would be this very thing, and yet when the Nintendo Switch was announced it was this very thing. Now I may have my issues with the Nintendo Switch but I love the concept and for my current life style a “fusion” console is definitely what works best for me. But is this the death of Nintendo’s portables?

What we know about Nick’s Rise of the TMNT

04/13/201701/11/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Rampant Speculation

Lately we’ve had a few Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles announcements, the first was that Platinum Dunes’ Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles wouldn’t get a third entry which is a shame since I wanted to see more of that unvierse, more recently we got the sad news that the 2012 Nick CG show which apparently is now renamed as Tales of the TMNT, was going to be cancelled after the fifth season. This was also a bit upsetting since I felt that incarnation could’ve told a few more stories. But with death came rebirth as they also announced a new Ninja Turtles show called Rise of the TMNT which meant that Viacom was not done with the franchise and I don’t think this will be another The Next Mutation..

After the sale of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to Viacom I had always been afraid of the long term plans for the franchise. I knew in the short term we’d finally get a movie and a new show not to mention a bunch of licensed goodies. but what would happen after the franchise started to wane like it usually does in cycles? Unlike Mirage who could just reboot the turtles after a waiting a few years; Viacom could very easily put it in its vault like Disney does to its older franchises. Viacom has plenty of Nickelodeon IP’s and it does absolutely nothing with them. We’re talking big name franchises like Rugrats so it’s not unprecedented to think they would do the same with the Ninja Turtles after they made a return on their profit. We have indeed seen Viacom be more open to reviving their older stuff lately but there was nothing for sure for TMNT so it was nice to have the announcement that a new show awaits for us. But what exactly is the new show Rise of the TMNT going to be?

Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation Season 2: Everything we know

04/10/201701/11/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Rampant Speculation

I talked about Saban’s live action TMNT show, Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation and even went over every episode. Sadly the show only had one season, though it’s listed in some places as it having two for some reason. Apparently the only reason it was cancelled was because of licensing/money issues and not ratings. Saban wanted to cut costs and this was one of the more expensive shows that he had going on. Searching online I found that April O’Neil and Casey Jones would have appeared on a second season, also there were talks and even concept art that they tried to continue the show and changing it from live action to animated.

Regardless of what is actually true or not since information on this show is rather lacking and the above that I found didn’t have the best sources. So who knows what would have happened if a second season had happened, the show had tons of potential and like other Saban’s shows it could’ve gotten better over time. So why don’t we take a look at everything this show had to offer and the potential that it had for other seasons in general and the characters. And not only that, it’s also a review of how most of the original characters for the show had tons of potential and they should not be ignored, instead they should be used in new TMNT media to their full potential.

Is it finally cool to like Power Rangers?

04/06/201701/11/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Rampant Speculation

A new Power Rangers movie came out and with its release I saw many things leading up to it and even after the movie and that was media attention that the franchise hadn’t had since the fad of Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers back in the early 90s. Article after article in both mainstream geek culture oriented sites to main stream media outlets which just hasn’t been the case since the birth of the franchise. So I asked myself if it was cool to like Power Rangers again.

Like most kids I grew out of Power Rangers after Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers but unlike most it became impossible for me to watch the later seasons. Trust me, if I’d had the chance I would’ve forced myself to like it no matter how far they strayed from the original formula since I was so invested in the heroes. But the forced exile on the franchise might’ve been good since it left me to enjoy other things and wonder what was happening in the Ranger universe all these years. It wasn’t until one day in the mid 00’s I was channel surfing and I found Power Rangers S.P.D. on the Disney Channel and I decided to check out what Power Rangers was doing now. I began to laugh at how stupid it was and how much they had ruined the original formula. I mean police rangers? What were they thinking? But by the end of the episode I was a bit surprised that, “Oh, snap!”. I had actually liked it and decided to check it out.

Godzilla’s Revival Series in the Reiwa Era

03/31/201701/11/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Rampant Speculation

Godzilla movies have been divided into the Showa, Heisei and Millenium era’s to help represent the series that the movie belonged to. While the Millenium series ended a while ago it seems with all the new Godzilla projects in the works we’ve reached a new era. Some fan sites are already calling it the Reboot series, but is this name really appropriate?

The only thing going for it is that all previous movies always referred to the original Gojira 1954 movie as being the first and this is the first film that doesn’t acknowledge those events but even then Godzilla has gone through a lot of reboots so more than anything it seemed like Godzilla was no longer a relevant franchise until now again so it’s more of a revival so until the reboot series is cemented into the fandom I’ll just refer to it as the Revival series which started with the American Godzilla by Legendary in 2014.