So, Pikmin 3 was released a couple weeks ago. I’m probably going to buy it once I have enough money to afford it. Something about commanding tiny plant men to kill things and find treasure on what appears to be a post-apocalyptic Earth fascinates me. In commemoration of the game’s North American release, the Operation Rainfall Retro Commercial Research Team (in other words, me) will take the opportunity to show you the commercials that accompanied the release of each Pikmin game in this week’s Retro Wrap-Up.

Here are the highlights of this past week.

The bidding for Atlus continues, with Sega and J Trust Co. showing interest in the company.

Rose Weitz reviewed ibb and obb for the PSN, Will Whitehurst reviewed Oz no Mahoutsukai ~Another World~ RungRung for the PSN, Brad Williams reviewed The Raven: Legacy of a Master Thief for the PC, Mac and Linux, Josh Speer reviewed Chain Blaster for the 3DS and I reviewed EarthBound for the Wii U’s Virtual Console in this week’s Games of the Past review.

Square Enix is still thinking about bringing Final Fantasy Type-0 to the west.

Hailee Kenny talks about Celes Chere from Final Fantasy VI in this week’s installment of Building Character.

Capcom is releasing a special Capcom Essentials bundle for the PS3 and the 360.

Justin Guillou finds some nice deals on Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy and Zero Escape: Virtue’s Last Reward in the latest installment of Pricefall.

Some screenshots depict a follow-up to Persona 4 Arena being tested Akihabara and Osaka.

In addition, Persona director Katsura Hashino decides to tease us about some unannounced titles in the franchise.

Justin Graham reviews Rurouni Kenshin: Trust & Betrayal in this week’s Anime of the Past review.

Pandora’s Tower has officially dropped to $19.99 on Amazon. If you missed out on the game, now’s the perfect time to snatch it up.

FUNimation has acquired the rights to a bunch of anime series, including Cowboy Bebop and Wolf Children.

The Downpour Podcast crew talk about some of their “rage-quit” moments in this week’s episode of the Downpour Podcast.

Finally, Square Enix filed a trademark for what appears to be a new Mana game. Will it be a new, true installment in the Mana series, or just another cynical mobile/social game?

Kyle Emch
Kyle has been studying music at college for about three years now. He's played the piano since he was 6 years old and has been recently been learning how to write music. He has followed the Operation Rainfall movement on Facebook since it started and was happy to volunteer for the website. Just don't mention Earthbound or the Mother franchise around him.