Long time no see, everyone! This is Nomake Wan with a little update on the recently-announced Wangan Midnight movie. The official news site has been updated with a little snippet about the news conference in which the movie was officially announced. Here's an English translation for all of you who can't read Japanese.

On April 27th in Roppongi, the news conference announcing the new production occurred with Yuichi Nakamura, Kazuki Katō, Kōsuke Yonehara, Masaki Sata, and director Atsushi Muroga appearing on stage.

In the assembly hall the "Devil Z" Fairlady S30Z and "BlackBird" Porsche 911 Turbo also made their grand appearance!!

Please, by all means look forward to the public release of this newly started production!



So there you have it! The earlier release announcement actually didn't mention whether the movie would be live-action or animated, but this particular release confirms that it will, indeed, be a live-action adaptation. While that makes me somewhat depressed, I suppose that a proper modern-day adaptation would be cool. If they do it right and it's realistic, this could be very awesome. And just think... there'd probably be a blu-ray release of it as well!

Let's hope that the film does very well in theaters this summer. If so, you can bet that there will be more Wangan Midnight content in the future! Perhaps another season of the Anime? Who knows. In any event, see you next time!

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Good evening WME,

Earlier today, the official website of Kodansha Comics¹ has confirmed that a Wangan Midnight live action movie will be open in theaters over the summer. Similar to the manga / anime plot, the theatrical release will be focused on a high school student named Akio Asakura who salvages the "Devil Z," a custom-tuned Datsun Fairlady S30Z with a supposedly cursed history.

The movie is going to star Yuichi Nakamura, Ryōko Kobayashi, Kazuki Katou, Megumi Matsumoto, and Yoshihiko Hakamada. More information on the movie will be available at the official homepage soon. - http://www.wangan-movie.com²
Click here to speculate and talk about this release.

• ¹ Kodansha Comics is the publisher of Wangan Midnight manga series.
• ² Courtesy of Michiharu Kusunoki / Kodansha, Wangan Midnight The Movie Production Committee.

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Greetings WME memers,

This update will bring you up-to-date with the current progress WME is making in terms of members count and posting activities. For comparison purpose, data from 2007 to 2008 was added alongside. Both set of data were taken from April to March on a weekly basis. Trend lines were also added to the graphs for simplified viewing.

WME has been growing steadily since mid 2007. From 10 new members per week to 35 new members toward the end of 2008. One interesting fact is there seemed to be a big dip in new members in both December 2007 and 2008. I believe that is the Christmas / New Year long weekend.



As far as posting activities go, we've seen a much bigger increase in 2008 compare to 2007. Posts per week has increased at least 3 times. From roughly 1000 posts weekly toward the end of 2007 to as high as 7000+ posts weekly toward the end 2008. It is also worth mention that we had a huge dip in both December as well. Posting activities almost grind to a halt around December in both 2007 and 2008. The number of posts per week really started increase beginning June 2008. I believe that is when summer started.



Posting activities as of late has returned to roughly 700 posts per day, that accounts for about 5000 posts weekly, which is slightly lower compare to earlier this year. With the current rate of posts being made per day, we will hopefully reach the 500,000 posts milestone by the end of January 2010.

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Good evening WME members! I am sure most of you, if not all, have noticed the new 5-star rating system located in forum view and topic view. This system is just like any of the rating system you see on the net. The only and the most important difference is the fact that it is possible to close a thread with this system. Allow me to explain. We come across a lot of useless threads in the WMMT section very often. They are usually started by newcomers who do not spend the time to read the pinned topics and rules. And as we know, the Moderators / Admins are not online all the time, members like you have no choice but to report a useless thread. Wouldn't it be nice that you have some partial power in determining the fate of a thread at times like that ?

This is where the new rating system comes in. By voting the thread down, the thread will be closed without any staff present on the forums. How would this work ? Currently, the algorithm will only activates when the thread has more than 7 ratings, less than 25 posts, has less than 250 topic views, was started less than 24 hours ago and not a pinned thread. The algorithm will change and adapt over time to prevent abuse. Now, I've been considering this for a long time before putting this system online due to its easily abused nature. But if this works, I will implement the same system to each member. (so that each member will have a rating, and when it gets too low, the said member will be temporarily banned.)


This is a major step toward having a self-regulated community. In a highly diverse community such as WME, self-regulation is very important because Moderators / Admins will not be able to help at times due to language barrier and other communicative obstacles. I hope this system will be in good hands and will not be abused by the members, namely you.

The rating system can also be used as a regular rating system. It can be served as an incentive for topic starters to create better threads in order to receive higher ratings. It can also be an indicator of how resourceful a thread is before you even click in it.

If you have any questions, please feel free to post them here. I'll try to answer them. Thanks for supporting WME.

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Hello and How de do neighbors. I am the old and original Admin coming back to help out for a while. Who knows I may stay permanently. Im hoping to add a few new things here and there. And bring more exclusivity to Wangan Midnight Expressway. Remind others why they chose this site or maybe why they should join.

First off, I would like to announce my Wangan Midnight DVD Box Campaign. As some of you may know, all the original Wangan Midnight movies were released earlier this year on DVD for the first time in a box set collection. Including exclusive behind the scenes features. I would like to buy that box set and release it here on WME for everyone to see.

The box set is pretty darn expensive and would be bought for the forum. So I am asking everyone, if they would be able to donate any contribution, it would be greatly apprecieated.

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