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Neat footage surfaces of life in small Hiroshima town circa the 1930s【Video】

Mike
Dec 14, 2015
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The family of a Baptist missionary stationed in Japan in the 1930s sent DVDs of the Reverend’s home movies of the era to the Hiroshima town of Onomichi.

Japan, USA
(Hiroshima • history • Showa • video • YouTube)

Feature-length Mario Warfare released! Relive all your favorite moments at once【Video】

Master Blaster
Dec 11, 2015

If you enjoyed YouTube hit Mario Warfare when it first streamed you can now watch it in its full, uncut version. And if you’ve never seen Mario Warfare before…boy are you in for a treat!

Internet
(Beat Down Boogie • cosplay • Mario • Mario Warfare • nintendo • video • video games • YouTube)

The top 10 hardest Japanese words to pronounce – which ones trip you up?【Video】

Evie Nyan
Dec 8, 2015

In terms of pronunciation Japanese is surprisingly easy to get to grips with, but some words can be real tongue-tanglers! Here are 10 of the worst!

Japan
(Japanese • learning japanese • pronunciation • video • YouTube)

Dragon Ball & Attack on Titan’s theme songs—recreated with taiko, flutes, and beatboxing!【Video】

Preston Phro
Nov 27, 2015

Whether you’re a fan of anime or not, you’ll love Shinpu’s covers of Attack on Titan and Dragon Ball’s theme songs combining Japanese flutes, taiko, and even beatboxing.

Internet, Japan
(Attack on Titan • beatboxing • Japanese flute • music • taiko • video • YouTube)

Musician’s Japanese ‘translator’ has no idea what she’s saying, can’t get over her hair【Video】

Jamie Koide
Nov 25, 2015

When Australian musician Tal Wilkenfeld randomly asked a fellow coffee shop patron for translation help, we don’t think this was quite what she was expecting.

Internet, Japan
(bass • Billboard Live • funny • lost in translation • music • Tal Wilkenfeld • YouTube)

Watching these fish feed is a little freaky and frightening【Video】

Jamie Koide
Nov 22, 2015

Feeding fish is an innocent pastime — unless you’ve got a whole pond and a thousand fish instead of a small tank! Then it looks more like a horror movie!

China
(feeding • fish • nature • scary • YouTube)

Drumming prodigy Senri Kawaguchi wows in new video supporting the Japan National Football Team

Preston Phro
Nov 17, 2015

Teenage drummer Senri Kawaguchi, famous for her enthusiastic YouTube videos, appears in a stunning new video for the Japan National Football Team!

Internet, Japan
(drumming • drums • music • Senri Kawaguchi • video • YouTube)

【Monday Kickstart】Who can stay mad with squeaky shoes? Pouting toddler steals our hearts

Krista Rogers
Nov 16, 2015

A recent viral video of a young Korean girl initially pouting then breaking into giggles at the sound of her squeaky shoes is just the thing you need to kick your week off right!

Internet, Korea
(adorable • Monday Kickstart • squeaky shoes • toddler • YouTube)

EXO calls on the Force in their new Star Wars tie-in single【Video】

Jamie Koide
Nov 14, 2015

With just over a month until Star Wars: The Force Awakens hits theaters, Star Wars fever has taken the world by storm, and Korea is no exception! K-pop group EXO has recorded a tie-in single, named “Lightsaber”, for the Korean release of the film, and a music video for the song was released on YouTube earlier this week. As you may expect, it quickly went viral, reaching almost two million views in the last few days.

Internet, Korea
(collaboration • Disney • EXO • Hollywood movies • K-pop • lightsaber • MV • Star Wars • YouTube)

Japan has vending machines for just about anything, including emergency care

Jamie Koide
Nov 4, 2015

In the case of a cardiac arrest, every second counts, which is why over the past decade Japanese health organizations have deployed a large number of automated external defibrillators (AEDs) in public areas, with the current count somewhere over 300,000 units.

Eventually the country would like to see that number expand to one in every building, but for the time being the first priority is AED accessibility, leaving some foreign tourists surprised to find that AEDs in places that might seem a little odd at first: like vending machines.

Japan
(AED • cool • emergency care • medical treatment • technology • vending machines • YouTube)

Maru the cat enthrals us with his adorable animal costumes【Video】

Jamie Koide
Oct 29, 2015

Gearing up for Halloween, we’ve already seen our share of humans dressing up like cats, but how about some costuming felines? Of course, as we’re sure all you cat people out there already know, getting kitty dressed up in a ridiculous outfit is a lot easier said than done.

…Or is it? Turns out the owner of Maru, “the most famous cat on the internet” has devised an easy way to get even the most stubborn of felines to get into the Halloween spirit with these cute animal costumes.

Internet, Japan
(animals • cats • costumes • cute • halloween • kigurumi • maru • YouTube)

Fan theory suggests the Pokémon world has a super dark history 【Video】

Mike
Oct 11, 2015

When you think Pokémon, you tend to think cutesy creatures fist-fighting and zapping each other with lightning until one of the creatures is “knocked out.” Also, you may think of widespread, real-world epileptic seizures and perhaps the moral complications of a world in which the local fauna are pitted against each other in fighting leagues, used as slave labor and also happily eaten, despite their astonishing intelligence, but maybe that’s a story for another day.

What you probably don’t associate with the series is a devastating intercultural war that has wiped out nearly the entire adult population, yet there appears to be some rather compelling evidence that that’s exactly what happened in the Pokémon world directly before the adventures of the first game…

Internet
(anime • anime and manga • fan theories • Pokemon • video • video games • YouTube)

Roll cake-headed town mascot character attacked by group of men, woman inside injured

Jamie Koide
Sep 30, 2015

Upon arriving in Japan, one of the first things you’ll probably notice is the large army of characters being used to sell anything from services to stationary to automobiles, or giving tips on being a good citizen like when it comes to separating your trash or picking up your dog’s poop after it finishes doing its duty. Most of them are cute, but some are downright scary.

In recent years, yurukyara, literally “weaker mascot characters”, have slowly been taking over the country, with more and more cities and businesses allocating funds to coming up with the prefect representative character costume each year. Aside from being hot and stuffy inside, being a yurukyara seems like a pretty awesome job. Kids are happy to see you, people are clamoring to get a picture of you, and generally everyone loves you…

Or at least that’s the impression we got until news of a mascot character in a small Ehime Prefecture town getting attacked.

Internet, Japan
(characters • crime • Ehime Prefecture • news • regional mascots • Tartjin • video • wtf • YouTube)

An ad you won’t want to skip: Honda’s animated short is dropping jaws【Video】

Meg Murphy
Sep 23, 2015

Honda has come a long way since being founded in 1946. Now world-renown, the company has moved on to become the world’s largest manufacturer of motorcycles, as well as internal combustion engines. Automobiles aren’t the only things it produces either, with lawnmowers, planes, and robots among its list of products.

This new short animation, created by stop-motion masters PES, illustrates Honda’s unique transformation and accomplishments over the years. The two-minute film took a team of dozens of animators and illustrators four months and thousands of original drawings to complete. Keep in mind the fact that absolutely none of this is computer generated—a rarity in this day and age—which makes the animation all the more jaw-dropping.

Internet
(cool animations • Honda • PES • stop motion • video • YouTube)

Poignant video about inner beauty is an unlikely ad for a beauty clinic 【Video】

Aleisha Riboldi
Sep 22, 2015

At first glance, it looks like a trailer for a new movie or even a documentary about the pressures of beauty, popularity and social media. But in what is one of the most elaborate video commercials we’ve come across in a while, one beauty clinic in Thailand has gone to extreme lengths to advertise its services. Playing on the vulnerability of today’s millennials and modern societal pressures of beauty, they have produced a 14-minute short film which is as compelling as it is a disturbing.
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SE Asia
(advertising • beauty ideals • skin • video • YouTube)

In the classic battle of cat versus paper, who will win? 【Video】

Meg Murphy
Sep 21, 2015

Even if you haven’t been with us for very long, it’s not hard to see that we here at RocketNews24 love cats. Big, small, fit, fat, even stretchy, cats of all shapes and sizes win our hearts! We even love them when they’re wreaking havoc on small towns of people, like the devilish little cutie in this feline remake of a man versus monster flick…

Internet
(animals • cats • cute • funny • videos • YouTube)

The trailer for Tearaway Unfolded is the best kind of crazy!【Video】

Aleisha Riboldi
Sep 19, 2015

You might recall the PlayStation Vita release Tearaway, an adventure game in which players control a messenger on a mission to deliver a letter to themselves. The game, set in a world made entirely of paper, was widely praised by critics and won a number of awards.

Originally released on the PlayStation Vita, Sony’s handheld game system, Tearaway has received a remake for the PlayStation 4, titled Tearaway Unfolded. In the lead up to the October Japanese release date (the game is available in the US now), Sony has produced an absurd-but-awesome commercial to foster excitement among fans. The unusual trailer, which breaks away from many of the typical tropes of game launch videos, has received significant attention online. And we have a feeling it’ll put a smile on your face, too!
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Internet, Japan
(cool • Playstation 4 • Sony • video games • YouTube)

Why do cats love this middle-aged man so much? We don’t know, but we want to be him!【Video】

Preston Phro
Sep 18, 2015

Cats are peculiar creatures. Now, don’t get us wrong; we love them and their furry little faces, but they certainly do have some odd habits. From playing with showers to hogging your keyboard, they always seem to know just where to be to cause the maximum amount of inconvenience.

But no matter how inconveniencing your cat may be, we doubt you’ll have as much trouble as this guy who’s literally covered in cats! You might think drowning is cats is awesome, but…well, okay, you’re right. It totally is! But the real question here is: Why do these cats like this middle-aged man so much?!

Internet, Japan
(cats • funny • video • weird • YouTube)

Westerners discuss the hardest things about learning Chinese【Video】

Krista Rogers
Sep 18, 2015

The various related but often unintelligible Chinese language varieties collectively have 1.2 billion first-language speakers. Of those varieties, Mandarin, also known as Standard Chinese or Putonghua, has 848 million native speakers, which is higher than any other language on Earth. It’s no wonder that more and more people around the world are seeing the practicality of learning Chinese as a second language.

However, learning a second language takes time and effort, especially if the intrinsic features of your target language differ significantly from those of your native language. A recent YouTube video titled “Foreigners’ Difficulties of Learning Chinese” explores this exact scenario by asking four Westerners about their own experiences studying the language.

Whether you’ve already dabbled in Chinese yourself or are thinking about it, the short clip makes for an interesting watch for anyone looking to expand their linguistic horizons.

China, Internet
(Chinese • difficulties • language • second language • video • YouTube)

Fists of Absinthe: Short film about samurai, ninja and drinking is just what your life’s missing!

Preston Phro
Sep 18, 2015

Devoted readers will remember that we spoke with Japan’s first full-time foreign stuntman Chuck Johnson earlier this summer, visiting his stunt class and learning about the industry in Japan. At the time, we mentioned that Chuck was working a short film called Fists of Absinthe, which ended up being a collaboration between YouTube and Toei Studios.

We are happy to say that Fists of Absinthe is now available on YouTube for your viewing pleasure! We just sat down and watched it, and it was equal parts comedy and action—definitely a must-see for anyone who likes martial arts, samurai, ninja, or laughing their butts off. Check it out below!