Project A-ko Information Page

 

'Project A-ko' is an Anime parody of many other anime series. Released in the Japan in the late eighties, and the West in the early nineties, it is regarded by many fans as a classic, both as a parody and as a series in its own right. In the first, and many would say best, episode, everything from Robotech style giant mecha and spacecraft battles to Streetfighter or Dragonball martial arts fights occur, all with tongue firmly in cheek.

The three main characters, pictured above, are Magami Eiko (or A-ko, Red hair), an 'ordinary' schoolgirl with superhuman strength, Daitokuji Biko (or B-ko, gray hair), evil genius and heir to the Daitokuji Corporation, and Kotobuki Shiko (C-ko, blonde), A-ko's best friend. When A-ko and C-ko transfer to the prestigious Graviton High School for girls, school bully B-ko takes an immediate shine to C-ko, and an equal dislike to A-ko, and resolves to steal C-ko for herself. Matters are complicated enough, what with B-ko building ever bigger war robots to destroy A-ko, and finally resorting to personal combat in her Akigiyama-23 battle-armour, when an alien invasion fleet turns up intent on retrieving a lost princess....

ABOVE: A DVD capture of a typical free and frank exchange of views between A-ko and B-ko!

 

Although the true feel of the anime is difficult to get across with still pictures, I hope to at least give an idea of how the original characters were adapted to their MUGEN versions. ABOVE you can see my version of A-ko along with Kasugano Sakura, the character I adapted due to her similar uniform.

ABOVE: A somewhat dwarfed A-ko battles the Arashiyama Five, B-ko's final attempt to defeat her before resorting to personal combat. Unfortunately for B-ko, the Five succeed only in getting A-ko so angry that they last less than thirty seconds! This image, from the CPM Manga graphic novel adaptation, formed the basis for one of the more dramatic supermoves possessed by the MUGEN version of B-ko, seen BELOW.

Sakura is the unfortunate victim of the Five in this shot, which also shows why it was necessary to somewhat shrink them- all five robots ARE there, but it was necessary to spread them out a little to fit them in. The volley of lasers that they fire usually bounces an opponent around enough so that most of them are seen.

A-ko is of course possessed of her own somewhat crazy attacks. The comic book version of one of these is shown BELOW:

 

 

Throwing a tank at someone tends to be a good way of letting off steam! In the original anime, this attack is a countermeasure to an alien spidertank thrown by B-ko, so in the MUGEN version, the attack is set up so that if one of the two should decide to throw a tank, any attack button press by the other player will throw one back!

The MUGEN version of A-ko, complete with heavy-duty throwing weapon, is shown BELOW:

 

We haven't seen a lot of the MUGEN B-ko yet, so here she is, resplendent in her battle-suit. Unfortunately, A-ko and C-ko are not initially impressed:

 

 

Equally unfortunately, B-ko has a somewhat foul temper, and tends to take good-humored comments like 'Aint it cold in that?' rather personally. Here she is , BELOW, relieving some of her frustration with the infamous 'Black Jacovini Shooting Star Lash':

This sort of attack is tricky to get right in MUGEN, but nonetheless, B-ko can bounce people up and down with it, whilst shouting "DOWN girl! DOWN I said! And again!"

There's a lot more to 'Project A-ko' than I can cover in the space of this webpage. My MUGEN versions of the characters are available from this page. The videos are available from Manga Video in the UK, and Central Park Media/ US Manga Corps in the USA. Of course, should anyone wish to talk to me in person about my work on these characters, I'll be only too pleased to bring the tapes along...

Character Download Page- A-ko.

Character Download Page- B-ko.

 

Finally, another DVD capture for luck.....