Announced in conjunction with this year’s Jump Festa in Japan this weekend, the anime adaptation of Episode of Bardock is set to be streamed online for a limited time beginning 19 December 2011.

The “Bandai Channel” page unfortunately features some video content that will not play outside of Japan due to IP restrictions. While the 2008 Jump Super Anime Tour special was streamed online globally (and subtitled in multiple languages), this may not be the case with Episode of Bardock.

It should be noted that, as of this update, a blurb lower on the page about the streaming availability notes the 19th as being a Wednesday, which is not accurate (the 19th is a Monday; the 21st is a Wednesday). The most prominent splash notes Monday the 19th.

A preview of the feature was shown at Jump Festa this weekend in 45-50 minute blocks. A flyer handed out at the advanced screenings details the online availability, along with character profiles and a few screen shots from the special (photo courtesy of Radittsu0395). There is nothing confirming earlier rumors that a TV broadcast of the new anime will taking place in April 2012. However, it has been confirmed through various Japanese blogs that Masako Nozawa did return to voice Bardock and that Chilled was indeed voiced by Ryusei Nakao (Freeza, Coola, Tambourine).

Episode of Bardock was a three-part manga series penned by Naho Ooishi as a “sequel” to the character’s original TV special from 1990. One chapter per month was published in V-Jump, Shueisha’s video game magazine in Japan, over the course of August, September, and October this year.

UPDATE: The online streaming version of the animated Episode of Bardock adaptation became available on the “Bandai Channel” website at noon on December 19th in Japan, and is indeed region-locked.

Ultimate Blast (which we received internationally last month as Ultimate Tenkaichi) launched in Japan this past week on 08 December 2011, and the first week sales are in.

The game managed to push 44,593 copies on the PS3 (no 360 sales are reported, as per the norm for Japan and this franchise’s games) between its release date on the 8th and the reporting period’s end date on the 11th.

Last year, Raging Blast 2 pushed 47,610 copies its first week, itself down almost 10,000 copies from the prior year with the original Raging Blast.

Amazon Japan is filled with interesting comments from fans in its home land. While the few five-star reviews are short and to the point, the 57 one-star reviews (out of 100 total at this time) are moderately lengthy, occasionally praising the graphics, while noting “the bad” as “everything else”. Almost every single review notes the rock-paper-scissors basis of the game, something we discussed at length a few weeks back on our podcast while reviewing the game.

We reported back in October that Saikyō Jump will be switching from being published quarterly to monthly as of 03 December 2011, but at the time it was unclear whether Dragon Ball SD would be continuing. We are no longer in the dark as Shueisha finally updated their offical Saikyō Jump website yesterday with their new line-up, which does indeed include SD:

The super-popular manga Dragon Ball has gone SD!
The deformed Son Goku is waiting for you, so don’t miss this!!

The January issue of the magazine is out now, but it appears that Amazon Japan does not currently have any available for purchase.

The website was also updated with three preview pages of the upcoming chapter, which appears to be an alternate retelling of the first chapter of Dragon Ball… so it is possible that we may be getting a full retelling of the original manga by Naho Ooishi, in full-color SD form. With the first four chapters covering Goku’s training with Kame-Sen’nin, to the Freeza fight, to the Cell fight, and then to the Majin Boo fight, perhaps going all the way back to the beginning was the only natural choice.

Finally, they have posted a nice “Saikyo Survey” on the right side of the main page asking, “In order to be the strongest, who would you combo with?” The five options provided are Toriko (Toriko), Chopperman (One Piece), Rock Lee (Naruto), Son Goku (Dragon Ball), and Sai Jack (Saikyō Jump original character). As of this post, Son Goku leads all of the characters with 51% of the total votes, with Rock Lee in second with only 19% of the votes. It appears that Son Goku is still a beloved character by kids in Japan these days!

Our good buddy Lemmy has collected a bunch of “Cyber Monday” Amazon sale prices all in one convenient thread over on our forum. There are some pretty great steals here. If you did not grab FUNimation’s DragonBall sets earlier in the month when they were down around $15, you totally win out at a $12-15 price point for each today! Not only that, but Dragon Box 5 and Dragon Box 6 are each down to around $20.

See anything else good out there today for the franchise? Kick us a note, and we will add it if it is tempting enough!

Announced this past June, a special three-chapter spin-off manga titled Episode of Bardock was published in the August, September, and October issues of Japanese gaming magazine V-Jump. Written and illustrated by Naho Ooishi (also currently responsible for Dragon Ball SD as published in Saikyō Jump), with supervision by Akira Toriyama, the story was part of a larger marketing blitz to introduce a new Super Saiyan transformation for Bardock and his inclusion in the Dragon Ball Heroes arcade game, as well as a re-release of the TV special he debuted in (the first time the special ever received its own individual-disc release in Japan, coupled with the Trunks TV special).

An anime adaptation was just announced this week via the latest issue of V-Jump:

It was not specified whether the adaptation is meant for TV or home media release, but the recent announcement of the Plan to Eradicate the Super Saiyans streaming notes that an advance screening of this new Bardock-focused anime will be available at Jump Festa next month, scheduled for December 17th and 18th.

Preliminary (though unsourced) 2channel rumors are pegging the new anime for an April 2012 TV broadcast. The rumors also note Masako Nozawa returning as the voice of Bardock, and Ryūsei Nakao (Tambourine, Freeza) somewhat returning for the role of Chilled, previously voicing the character in-game for Dragon Ball Heroes. Interestingly, the post also already lists the role of Beri going to Aki Toyosaki.

The new anime is attributed to the “Dragon Ball Force Project“, also alongside (what may be a prior or working code name for one or more of the projects) the title “Saikyo Super Saiyan Secret Project“:

The “Bandai Channel” website defines this new initiative:

In order to take the first step towards new developments and further expansions of the “Dragon Ball” titles developing in V-Jump and Saikyō Jump, here’s a project for further awakening the force of “Dragon Ball”! It’s been conceptualized with S (Saikyou), SS (Super Saiyan), and S (Secret) as its keywords!

Our full Episode of Bardock written review is still on the way. In the mean time, check out Episode #0271 of our weekly podcast for a review straight to your ears!

A remake of the storyline from the 1993 Famicom game Saiya-jin Zetsumetsu Keikaku (“Plan to Eradicate the Saiyans”) appeared as an animated feature on last year’s Raging Blast 2 video game for the PS3 and 360, updated and retitled as Plan to Eradicate the Super Saiyans. Since then, it has only been available on the game disc itself.

While there is still no word about a home release, Shueisha has announced via the official V-Jump website that the feature will be streamed online in the future, though a specific time frame was not announced, nor any specific localizations.

This streaming initiative seems to be a follow-up to the online streaming of the Jump Super Anime Tour Special back in 2008, where after its debut at ten stops across Japan, the special was legally and freely streamed online, including subtitled versions in multiple languages.