Reply With QuoteIs it... good? I mean, from a more objective perspective of someone who haven't read or seen anything related to Fate/zero before (i think there are novels and videogames about it??).
First episode of Fate/zero was absolutely fantastic. I'm looking forward to getting my grubby hands on the next one as soon as possible. Ufotable is likely going to give us the first legitimately good Fate adaptation if they keep this up.
Is it... good? I mean, from a more objective perspective of someone who haven't read or seen anything related to Fate/zero before (i think there are novels and videogames about it??).
Have you ever watched or played Fate/stay night in one of its various incarnations? Fate/zero is a prequel that pretty much expects you to have experienced F/SN beforehand, so if you haven't done so then I cannot recommend it in any objective sense. It assumes far too much knowledge of how the universe works and (unless they go on to explain more in the next episode) you'd probably end up lost.
If they do end up explaining the details of how everything works, which may very well happen in episode 2, then this would function as a stand-alone story that would end up spoiling most of Fate/stay night for you were you ever to be interested in watching or playing it.
Last edited by Otagan; 10-02-2011 at 06:42 AM.
I'll keep to 3 shows this season: Persona 4, Fate Zero, and Working. I'll add more if you guys rave about something, much like Tiger & Bunny last season (at eps 13 now..wow it's great!).
As a community service, I watched Blood C, so you don't have to. Let's see how the spoiler tag works...
Spoiler: What happened after Saya stopped drinking coffee and eating guimauve and going to school...
Blood C is not finished yet. There's a direct sequel movie coming June 2, 2012.
Last edited by KaoFloppy; 10-02-2011 at 08:16 PM. Reason: forgot about the movie...
A friend of mine recommended Tekkon Kinkreet. I got about 50min in and... well, it just isn't doing it for me. I feel bad for the guy, he recommends me stuff and I never enjoy it, but I put him onto Steins;Gate and Tiger & Bunny and he loved them both.
Tekkon Kinkreet is gorgeous on Bluray. Storylinewise...eh.
Well I made it half-way through an episode of Ano Hi Mita Hana No Namae O Bokutachi Wa Mada Shiranai before a feeling of having seen it all before took over and I stopped. I'll come back to it later I think.
So I'm now onto Welcome to the NHK (NHK Ni Youkoso!) which is... surprisingly good. Seeing the world through the eyes of a weird shut-in, while having the far too nice to be real female anime character. I think there's even a fourth wall joke about that in there. Oh, and even if you don't enjoy the anime you have to give props to one of the best end credit sequences ever :)
Four episodes in and if it weren't for the need for sleep I'd keep going.
I watched the first episode of Phi Brain. Meh. I might give this another episode, I might not. If I am watching a show about solving puzzles, I don't really want someone to have a supernatural puzzle-solving ability that makes it so they don't have to reason it out. I did like the main character's childhood friend, though. At first blush she's a generic abusive tsundere, but she's actually played up as being the muscle and while she doesn't have very strong puzzle-solving skills, she has a great memory and observation skills. So she actually complements the main character pretty well.
But he just got supernatural puzzle-solving skills. And that sucks.
Edit: Quitch, Welcome to the NHK is really good.
I watched Phi Brain as well.
This is basically a low quality shounen fighting school anime, except it replaces the weekly randomly boss fight with a weekly random puzzle.
The puzzles (in the first one at least) are just not interesting at all. They just aren't. This is not a detective show and he is not solving mysteries of that sort, they are puzzles.
Going from watching the first episode and the preview of the second episode, there doesn't seem to be any reason for solving these puzzles, he just comes across a puzzle and solves it for no good reason. Don't expect some reason for him to be doing random puzzles or some grand plot that makes things interesting. Random Puzzles.
I also kind of liked the childhood friend, although she is 95% standard childhood friend who is overly violent, focuses on sports, tomboyish and a love interest.
The main character is also the standard shounen fighting schools lead. Loner, thinks he is the strongest and feels he is too good to join the gang under his seniors.
Among the anime i decided i would check out this season, this one clearly seems to be the worst by far. Although in the interest of full disclosure, i almost never like low quality shounen fighting school anime.
I also check out C3 (cursed X Cube X curious i think it was). It doesn't seem to be a super unique anime. The first episode hugely reminded me of Kannagi. On this note, going by the first episode, the description and the previews, this strongly sounds like a more action packed version of kannagi with much less singing (sorry, i always skip over the singing/karaoke scenes).
None the less it was enjoyable. Not great or a unique snow flake, but enjoyable. I always laughed when the female lead exploded on people. "Shut Up! I'll curse you!"
oh and I also thought Welcome to the NHK was really good as well, although it can be somewhat depressing at times.
I've been watching Mushi-Shi again.
It's becoming my favorite anime.
And I just bought a new HDTV 32" and it looks amazing.
When any season starts, I end up watching the first few episodes of a lot of shows and then drop a substantial number of them. C3 is actually first on the chopping block for the season so far. I always allow for more than a single episode, since the first one will not always be representative of the series as a whole, but I'll be damned if the first episode of this wasn't some of the most cliche trash I have seen in years.Originally Posted by Murbella
Mysterious girl, female childhood friend, high school boy whose parents live abroad... The "comedy" was shoehorned in, unnecessary, and (most importantly) unfunny.
I have it on reasonably good authority (and as is hinted by the last minute of episode one) that this show gets better. The question is whether or not "better" will justify my continued investment of time given the low starting bar.
I just watched the first episode of Maji de Watashi no Koi Shinasai. I liked it! Big battles, silly power levels, brief glimpses of likable characters... if you liked Sengoku Basara and aren't completely allergic to high school characters, check this one out. Just very light humor and fanservice that was amusing instead of annoying or offensive.
Kimi to Boku is going to take the place of Hanasaku Iroha as "slice of life I actually enjoy" this season. You can basically summarize the series as "cute boys doing cute things." Relaxing light humor. Despite what a lot of people assumed, this is not a homolust show. The boys have female love interests, but the show is focused on them and their friendships.
So, Hunter X Hunter #1. I thought this was an "alternate re-telling" of the original? Granted, I haven't seen the first episode in over a decade, but everything felt so familiar, even the voices, that I could swear it was the original. That said, I liked it, and I really hope they end up finishing the manga story this time around and avoid some of the filler.
But, noobs! It was one of my favorites after the first viewing! :P
Nope.
I watched the first episode of Horizon and, well, that happened. They sure animated the hell out whatever that was.
Everywhere I'm looking I see "alternate re-telling," including on that schedule posted a page earlier. ANN also says it.
I dug this as well. Completely over-the-top abilities and the action was non-stop start to finish. I also thought it was fairly well-animated, especially in the "super character A fights super character B" sequences, not when the supers were wiping the floor with the rest of the students. The RTS aspects reminded me a bit of early Code Geass too, which is one of my favorite takeaways from that series.
I like Chiharafuru #1. Karuta is a very, very Japanese game, so it might not be for everyone, but I found it a nice, relaxing show.
It occurred to me by "alternate re-telling" of HxH, they might mean "basically the same as the original, minus a lot of the filler" because the ANN page says they're going to follow the manga pretty closely, or at least it's implied. Which is just fine with me.
If anyone's had problems like me with watching recent vids (colors look weird etc.), it's probably because a number of groups have switched to using Hi10P encodes. While some advertise the switch (and give you a choice of encodes), others do not, AFAICT. I found this guide helpful (slightly NSFW masthead).
It's a "new adaptation" of the same story (the manga), so maybe they will change something, but it's not an "alternate re-telling", in the sense of "we are going to change shit here, forging a new story".
In other news, we have learnt today i am more trustful than ANN. :D
Welcome to the NHK up to the end of episode 7 was superb. I especially love the way they're pealing back the layers of his time in the literature club so you see him as a lonely and isolated boy clinging to this girl who, hides it better, but looks to be the same. Then they meet years later and little has changed, except he's hiding in his room while she looks to be hiding inside herself. I was really looking forward to seeing how these two meeting again changes their lives. They have similar problems and they clearly have a bond going back for years, so this all feels very natural and very adult. Then there's her farewell present to him when she leaves school...
Then episodes 8 and 9 trot along and suddenly we're heading into a disappointingly predictable anime tropes. We've got fake dating, accidental stumbles, blushing and love interests developing for little reason beyond the fact that they're major characters sharing screen time. Sigh.
I believe in you NHK, you can do better than this!
The guy is basically an anti social NEET, him latching on to attractive, friendly females isn't exactly some huge jump.
Okay, I need some steampunk with airships.
Last Exile?
I agree, but that's not what happens. She makes the first move.
Watching his obsession over take him was interesting and believable, someone has taken an interest in him for the first time since school, which is presumably why he's remembering the literature club now. I feel this is being thrown away for something much more rote.
Still, at least in 10 he's questioning all this himself.
EDIT: This hasn't stopped me from wanting to leave work and go watch more of this ;)
Last edited by Quitch; 10-06-2011 at 02:37 AM.
Persona 4 anime is a huuuuuuge improvement over the mess that was the Persona 3 anime.
Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai looks to be a pretty entertaining harem show. Probably the first thing I'll drop if I find that I have too much stuff to watch this season, but that's just because of my ambivalence towards harem shows. The characters so far are pretty fun.
Although there are airships in Last Exile, they are not steam powered. Still a very good series.
Steamboy might fit better.
Welcome to the NHK is still good but it's no longer great. I think after episode 7 it has lost some of its focus and we're stuck in mini-arcs where a problem arises which eliminates his progress and then by the end of the arc has been resolved, only for a new problem to occur.
The issue is that the show isn't really moving forward. Each of the first seven episodes built on the ones that came before, so it felt like one on-going story. It no longer has that feeling, there's very little development going on. I'm also disappointed that Senpai was thrown away in that mini-arc and her problems having seemingly all been fixed through a marriage proposal. Really? We're throwing her away but keeping cipher girl? I was hoping she'd play a bigger part than she has because her problems, and her history with the main character, make her quite interesting. That her happiness with another was almost enough to destroy him was something I'd hoped would be more drawn out and better explored.
Ah well. I'm at 17 now and I expect the formula to continue until about 21 or 22 when it will go into its sprint for the finish.
I was never the biggest fan of NHK, and it's one of the first anime I ever actually watched. I recall particularly enjoying a couple of arcs but finding the rest rather middling. I do think the lack of development is quite intentional as it serves to highlight the social issues the show is always bringing to the fore and makes them actual problems, not something that can be resolved by a single story arc.
NHK isn't a show that tops my list of recommendations to others, that much is for sure. I have it on good authority that the manga is considerably better, but have yet to verify that independently. One day that might be something I try. Time will tell.
There are too many new shows that I still need to watch, and a wall of text will likely come once I get around to the last few. Chihayafuru is faring well on a tentative basis, somewhat unexpectedly, but I don't know if my interest will hold up over time.
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