Ashton wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

Ashton wrote:

Is it the sexuality part or the theory part of it that you don't want to review?

the type of things I cover are like games or anime or fantasy novels or whatever, this instead is a study, the sexuality is not the part that ticks me off, it's just that this isn't something I have much expertise in talking or is generally something i'm that interested in, it's like if you told me to talk about nietzsche or camus or whoever, yeah there is a lot of meat there but it's just not the same as analyzing slice of life anime which is what I actually enjoy

play Chrono Trigger, I know it takes longer than 15 hours but can you make an exception?

already played chrono trigger (DS port), you can actually see the movies/anime/games i've already played on my signature.

-------------

chrono trigger is a RPG released by square in 1995, it's about time travel and stuff, I genearlly had a good time with it but I can't say I agree with the 4.5/5 rating it has on backloggd.

While it is a RPG, it doesn't have the most complex or profound plot, the characters are well written but I think the setting of time travels is missing on nuance. Time travels are a notoriously hard genre to write a story in and for it to work, mainly because of plot holes and generally just trying to have the story make sense, while chrono trigger doesn't have any holes, it also doens't really explore the setings very much, in many ways their depiction of the past feel stereotypical at best and boring at worst.

I know i'm asking for too much but I didn't really see that cultural shock traveling across time, I want for it to do spicy things with their time travel, not just go "oh this age has dinosaurs".

The combat uses the square ATB system, I do not like ATB. In ATB combat the turn order is actually based on real time, each character has a meter that charges up passively and when it fills up they can make an attack. This is the same combay system final fantasy has.

ATB combat is made with the idea of responding to the criticism of classic turn based combat being boring and slow. I personally heavily disagree with this notion, I fucking love spending 20 minutes per turn just thinking (shoutout to chained echoes, but we need to understand the era it was created in.

Nowadays, clasic and complex turn based combat is not exactly common, instead, the dominant combat system nowadays is real time action. uit bacck in the day, turn based combat WAS dominant, mainly because it was actually really easy to implement and required very little resources, so it was a perfect fit for this more primitive age of videogames

the problem with ATB is that you're sacrificing the complexity of the combat just to have more "dynamic" fights, the combats are made so you can think of the right move and win on the fly, it doesn't require you to stop and think, you will say "oh but you can set it so it stops time after the bar fills up in the setting", but that doesn't change the fact that the inclusion of wait style ATB is more an accesibility mechanic than anything else, the combat is still made so you can win without thinking too hard, and having the ability to wait and think doesn't change that

Also I played sea of stars recently which is directly inspired on chrono trigger and thought it was a lot better ngl, still have some big flaws IMO but it's a step up

so in the end, it's a game with a kinda average plot and kinda average combat, it's serviceable but far from what I would consider peak, placed in C tier, will update OP tomorrow since i'm currently sleepy.

Achromalia wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

Achromalia wrote:

i fear these could be plot-light suggestions, so i don't know if they'll be valid, but i'll leave one of them here anyway, and any that don't apply can prompt me to send the next. i don't know why i was sitting on them, i guess i just didn't think they'd be worthwhile

+ ace combat 4: shattered skies

I already did 0 and it didn't exactly fit also I didn't exactly like it so I don't think i'm playing more ace combats

understood

mm, let me try other things i vaguely remember

+ "my happy marriage"

already linking the very legal website lmao brave, I can do it yeah, will watch, will update op tomorrow as I said tho

Patatitta wrote:

Achromalia wrote:

mm, let me try other things i vaguely remember

+ "my happy marriage"

already linking the very legal website lmao brave, I can do it yeah, will watch, will update op tomorrow as I said tho

oh

oh right

so

i forgot that that was what that was

Patatitta wrote:

Ashton wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

Ashton wrote:

Is it the sexuality part or the theory part of it that you don't want to review?

the type of things I cover are like games or anime or fantasy novels or whatever, this instead is a study, the sexuality is not the part that ticks me off, it's just that this isn't something I have much expertise in talking or is generally something i'm that interested in, it's like if you told me to talk about nietzsche or camus or whoever, yeah there is a lot of meat there but it's just not the same as analyzing slice of life anime which is what I actually enjoy

play Chrono Trigger, I know it takes longer than 15 hours but can you make an exception?

already played chrono trigger (DS port), you can actually see the movies/anime/games i've already played on my signature.

-------------

chrono trigger is a RPG released by square in 1995, it's about time travel and stuff, I genearlly had a good time with it but I can't say I agree with the 4.5/5 rating it has on backloggd.

While it is a RPG, it doesn't have the most complex or profound plot, the characters are well written but I think the setting of time travels is missing on nuance. Time travels are a notoriously hard genre to write a story in and for it to work, mainly because of plot holes and generally just trying to have the story make sense, while chrono trigger doesn't have any holes, it also doens't really explore the setings very much, in many ways their depiction of the past feel stereotypical at best and boring at worst.

I know i'm asking for too much but I didn't really see that cultural shock traveling across time, I want for it to do spicy things with their time travel, not just go "oh this age has dinosaurs".

The combat uses the square ATB system, I do not like ATB. In ATB combat the turn order is actually based on real time, each character has a meter that charges up passively and when it fills up they can make an attack. This is the same combay system final fantasy has.

ATB combat is made with the idea of responding to the criticism of classic turn based combat being boring and slow. I personally heavily disagree with this notion, I fucking love spending 20 minutes per turn just thinking (shoutout to chained echoes, but we need to understand the era it was created in.

Nowadays, clasic and complex turn based combat is not exactly common, instead, the dominant combat system nowadays is real time action. uit bacck in the day, turn based combat WAS dominant, mainly because it was actually really easy to implement and required very little resources, so it was a perfect fit for this more primitive age of videogames

the problem with ATB is that you're sacrificing the complexity of the combat just to have more "dynamic" fights, the combats are made so you can think of the right move and win on the fly, it doesn't require you to stop and think, you will say "oh but you can set it so it stops time after the bar fills up in the setting", but that doesn't change the fact that the inclusion of wait style ATB is more an accesibility mechanic than anything else, the combat is still made so you can win without thinking too hard, and having the ability to wait and think doesn't change that

Also I played sea of stars recently which is directly inspired on chrono trigger and thought it was a lot better ngl, still have some big flaws IMO but it's a step up

so in the end, it's a game with a kinda average plot and kinda average combat, it's serviceable but far from what I would consider peak, placed in C tier, will update OP tomorrow since i'm currently sleepy.

Achromalia wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

Achromalia wrote:

i fear these could be plot-light suggestions, so i don't know if they'll be valid, but i'll leave one of them here anyway, and any that don't apply can prompt me to send the next. i don't know why i was sitting on them, i guess i just didn't think they'd be worthwhile

+ ace combat 4: shattered skies

I already did 0 and it didn't exactly fit also I didn't exactly like it so I don't think i'm playing more ace combats

understood

mm, let me try other things i vaguely remember

+ "my happy marriage"

already linking the very legal website lmao brave, I can do it yeah, will watch, will update op tomorrow as I said tho

I actually agree with your analysis on combat. I too prefer turn based combat as opposed to ATB, maybe it's because I get stressed out with ATB?? (Xenoblade would be a perfect franchise for me if the combat was turn based)

I guess we will agree to disagree on everything else though.

Anyways, am I allowed to suggest another game then? Or am I limited to one recommendation?

Ashton wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

Ashton wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

Ashton wrote:

Is it the sexuality part or the theory part of it that you don't want to review?

the type of things I cover are like games or anime or fantasy novels or whatever, this instead is a study, the sexuality is not the part that ticks me off, it's just that this isn't something I have much expertise in talking or is generally something i'm that interested in, it's like if you told me to talk about nietzsche or camus or whoever, yeah there is a lot of meat there but it's just not the same as analyzing slice of life anime which is what I actually enjoy

play Chrono Trigger, I know it takes longer than 15 hours but can you make an exception?

already played chrono trigger (DS port), you can actually see the movies/anime/games i've already played on my signature.

-------------

chrono trigger is a RPG released by square in 1995, it's about time travel and stuff, I genearlly had a good time with it but I can't say I agree with the 4.5/5 rating it has on backloggd.

While it is a RPG, it doesn't have the most complex or profound plot, the characters are well written but I think the setting of time travels is missing on nuance. Time travels are a notoriously hard genre to write a story in and for it to work, mainly because of plot holes and generally just trying to have the story make sense, while chrono trigger doesn't have any holes, it also doens't really explore the setings very much, in many ways their depiction of the past feel stereotypical at best and boring at worst.

I know i'm asking for too much but I didn't really see that cultural shock traveling across time, I want for it to do spicy things with their time travel, not just go "oh this age has dinosaurs".

The combat uses the square ATB system, I do not like ATB. In ATB combat the turn order is actually based on real time, each character has a meter that charges up passively and when it fills up they can make an attack. This is the same combay system final fantasy has.

ATB combat is made with the idea of responding to the criticism of classic turn based combat being boring and slow. I personally heavily disagree with this notion, I fucking love spending 20 minutes per turn just thinking (shoutout to chained echoes, but we need to understand the era it was created in.

Nowadays, clasic and complex turn based combat is not exactly common, instead, the dominant combat system nowadays is real time action. uit bacck in the day, turn based combat WAS dominant, mainly because it was actually really easy to implement and required very little resources, so it was a perfect fit for this more primitive age of videogames

the problem with ATB is that you're sacrificing the complexity of the combat just to have more "dynamic" fights, the combats are made so you can think of the right move and win on the fly, it doesn't require you to stop and think, you will say "oh but you can set it so it stops time after the bar fills up in the setting", but that doesn't change the fact that the inclusion of wait style ATB is more an accesibility mechanic than anything else, the combat is still made so you can win without thinking too hard, and having the ability to wait and think doesn't change that

Also I played sea of stars recently which is directly inspired on chrono trigger and thought it was a lot better ngl, still have some big flaws IMO but it's a step up

so in the end, it's a game with a kinda average plot and kinda average combat, it's serviceable but far from what I would consider peak, placed in C tier, will update OP tomorrow since i'm currently sleepy.

Achromalia wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

Achromalia wrote:

i fear these could be plot-light suggestions, so i don't know if they'll be valid, but i'll leave one of them here anyway, and any that don't apply can prompt me to send the next. i don't know why i was sitting on them, i guess i just didn't think they'd be worthwhile

+ ace combat 4: shattered skies

I already did 0 and it didn't exactly fit also I didn't exactly like it so I don't think i'm playing more ace combats

understood

mm, let me try other things i vaguely remember

+ "my happy marriage"

already linking the very legal website lmao brave, I can do it yeah, will watch, will update op tomorrow as I said tho

I actually agree with your analysis on combat. I too prefer turn based combat as opposed to ATB, maybe it's because I get stressed out with ATB?? (Xenoblade would be a perfect franchise for me if the combat was turn based)

I guess we will agree to disagree on everything else though.

Anyways, am I allowed to suggest another game then? Or am I limited to one recommendation?

you can request as many things as you want, even at once if you want to

Too bad you didn't enjoy sora no woto as much, it's a great piece. Have you ever been to Cuenca at all? I traveled there from Madrid out of curiosity after seeing it in the anime. Totally improved my impressions of the city vibes.

Kobold84 wrote:

Too bad you didn't enjoy sora no woto as much, it's a great piece. Have you ever been to Cuenca at all? I traveled there from Madrid out of curiosity after seeing it in the anime. Totally improved my impressions of the city vibes.

never went to cuenca myself sadly

My Happy Marriage

-----------

uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

This anime is about a girl who lives in a prestigious family in 19th century japan who is absued by the rest of her family due to her not having super cool supernatural powers that is forced into a arranged marriage with another family who does treat her right.

When I talked about her I mentioned about how that movie was in many way a analysis and showcase about the way we speak and percieve romance in the current era vs what romance really is, about how we have this perception that love will always win at the end and that any hurdles can be overcome. This anime is the exact opposite, it's romance purely as a resource, as a way to distribute responsability and work in a household

There is no love in a arranged marriage, in the anme they were already engaged before they met each other for the first time, however, they are depicted as the perfect couple. And while it does make sense in the anime why the girl is happy, I very much don't really agree with the points it's trying to make or the general philosohpy behind it.

The perception of romance in 19th century japan and the perception of romance today are entirerily different. In that era arranged marriages and stuff were commonplace, but that doesn't mean it's really right. In this case the female protagonist had been severily abused in her household, so when she moves out due to her marriage she becomes happy and "falls in love" with the hot male protagonist.

But the male protagonist isn't exactly the best husband, he just treats her with slight respect. We as the viewer percieve them as a really good guy because it's presented that way, but we only percieve him as a good guy because we have been anchored to compare it to her previous living situation, but if you look at it more coldly, during the anime there is never anything shown that could suggest that the two protagonist could even be remotely compatible with each other, there isn't any romance by our modern definition

in reality what is happening is that you're taking a traumatized and depressed girl, getting her out of that bad situation and then especting sex in return and for her to take the role of a wife in 19th century japan which again wasn't the best place to be in since women rights weren't really as of yet

while yes, it does make sense that she is happy and whatever, I don't think any of the actions that the two characters made where illogical or plot holes, but I don't like how the romance is depicted, the anime never really tries to get you to think about the nature of the relationship or whatever, they're just expecting you for to see that, go "how cute!" and accept it without really thinking too much about it

also, spoilers, but major delabreaker for me. This anime falls into the trope of "you know not being special or super cool is fine as we can expect everyone in society to be like that" only for that character to suddently gain the super cool special powers which kinda undermines the point of "being normal is fine" because you say that but then you're NOT willing to actually write a character like that or for the character to be happy while they're normal and I just despise that

also the family of the protagonist feels a little bit too antagonistic?, like yes I get that they're supposed to be abusive and stuff but I think it reaches a point where it's so abusive and antagonistic you don't even believe something like that could happen IRL which kinda just leads to you not taking it that seriously, it removes a lot of the emotional weight it could have had

Also, this anime really isn't a romance at all, the relationship is kinda set in stone from the start and as we've said there isn't anything shown that we could consider romance today, it's more about the relationship and the marriage being attacked from different angles and sources and that whole plot with the super cool special powers

I didn't enjoy this anime very much and I think it has pretty terrible messeging, D rank.

review the diary of a wimpy kid: the getaway






yea

JLuca913 891 wrote:

review the diary of a wimpy kid: the getaway






yea

denied

this is why people (or at least me) stopped giving things for you to review a long time ago, you're way too picky

like at least TRY reading the book before you go out and deny it. you're literally judging a book by its cover :sob:

when it comes to trying to get you to review things i feel like i'm a parent trying to get my child (which in this case, is you) to eat something new for dinner (which in this case, is reviewing a piece of media), but the child just refuses to take a bite because it looks bad.

sametdze wrote:

this is why people (or at least me) stopped giving things for you to review a long time ago, you're way too picky

like at least TRY reading the book before you go out and deny it. you're literally judging a book by its cover :sob:

when it comes to trying to get you to review things i feel like i'm a parent trying to get my child (which in this case, is you) to eat something new for dinner (which in this case, is reviewing a piece of media), but the child just refuses to take a bite because it looks bad.

dude i'm sorry but have you seen the things I review?, have you seen what places high on the tier list?, has 260 reviews not given insight to my tastes?, I need things that have meat to it, and childrens books are not it. I'm not being picky at all, i've watched a lot of stuff and read a lot of stuff I wouldn't have if this wasn't for this thread, this is an exercise for me to go outside my comfort zone and experience new things, but the point is that I need to have something to talk about after I finish reading it, some sort of analysis I can do something I can say about the book and this just isn't it.

I gotta admit my diary of wimpy kid request was pretty stupid

So now I've changed my mind and

You can review Mission Impossible 7 (movie)

this helpfully digested some of my ambivalence toward it... i was not really picking up on these problems explicitly (except little pieces of the text/subtext/context of arranged marriage and women's rights, because it was evidently set in awful conditions, but i clearly had not gathered enough awareness to digest it) and needed more clarity on what could have been going on

...i think it was one of the last anime shows i watched, sometime within the last year

or maybe it wasn't? i wish i knew what exactly i've been seeing/doing in these past few years...

anyway, i specifically remember starting it and somehow seeing some of myself through the protagonist's passivity and fears and unfairly self-critical thoughts so i was blurrily attached between that and the very... unfamiliar contexts of these settings (culturally, interpersonally, while also knowing this is part of a narrative but not knowing how to take note of what composed that narrative in real time), knowing they were different from life as it is now. i remember uncritically submitting to the course of the story, vaguely wanting to like the husband and in many ways being led by the "vibes" of the story to still feel like there was something sweet in it... but ultimately this reminded me of how little substance there was when much of the story was presumably founded on being someone with minimal power or specific skills beyond housework who could finally find escape from exploitative and dehumanizing abuse or despair. it didn't inspect power or culture, it didn't explore the troubles of trying to find or build skills in this ecosystem beyond being his complementary housewife (and the part i recall from later in the story clearly doesn't count), it didn't explore the features of the relationship that much beyond hoping he's happy and learning that he's happy with you and finding that he wants you to be happy too (i think? i forgot a lot of what happened in the middle other than family drama) and it seemed like i was attached to the thought of being able to heal through comparatively kind people, but realistically it would never be a sufficient or helpful analogue at all...

it's not necessarily explanatory (as in, the following observation/impression is not assumed to be fully correlated or causative of my blurry acceptance) but i notably am not very sure how romance forms for different people, and it's hard to know how exactly i would relate to it myself... while at the same time i'm often very fixated on stories About it, wondering what connections between people mean and wondering what i could possibly want or hope for. but i doubt i've ever really had or held onto reliably representative expressions of healthy relationships, and i've regularly drawn my guesses/impressions from scarce or otherwise sensationalized examples in fiction and the various things people describe online. my own family life doesn't really have good examples of romance either, so, all of that is how i would contextualize (or, considering the way i've been writing my approval of the review, more like apprehensively self-justifying) the fact i didn't really process any of this and understand their roles and implications during the anime, if i remember correctly then i was exactly that person you described in thinking "oh... that's cute ;v;" and had not thought ahead

i'm wondering what made it so hard to just view it as clearly and realistically as you seem to...

inexperience with life? detachment from reality and implications? things which i obsess over the consequences of that i forget about immediately if i'm in a different mood or setting that reframes my limited awareness. it's frustrating, tiring, unclear, but

it's helpful to get clearer vision from other people. i just wish i understood how to not rely so heavily on them for feeding and anchoring my own thoughts, but if i don't, then i often find i'm drifting off into my own bubble-world and lost in self-indulgent things that couldn't ever have existed. too many critical questions, too tired to know where to start and endure answering them

again, ty for the review, will hopefully recommend more things i want to see reviews for soon

JLuca913 891 wrote:

I gotta admit my diary of wimpy kid request was pretty stupid

So now I've changed my mind and

You can review Mission Impossible 7 (movie)

do I need to watch any of the other mission impossible movies beforehand

Patatitta wrote:

JLuca913 891 wrote:

I gotta admit my diary of wimpy kid request was pretty stupid

So now I've changed my mind and

You can review Mission Impossible 7 (movie)

do I need to watch any of the other mission impossible movies beforehand

no.. I don't think so because I haven't watched the other mission impossible movies before and the only one I've watched is the number 7 one and I still understand the story so

Achromalia wrote:

this helpfully digested some of my ambivalence toward it... i was not really picking up on these problems explicitly (except little pieces of the text/subtext/context of arranged marriage and women's rights, because it was evidently set in awful conditions, but i clearly had not gathered enough awareness to digest it) and needed more clarity on what could have been going on

...i think it was one of the last anime shows i watched, sometime within the last year

or maybe it wasn't? i wish i knew what exactly i've been seeing/doing in these past few years...

anyway, i specifically remember starting it and somehow seeing some of myself through the protagonist's passivity and fears and unfairly self-critical thoughts so i was blurrily attached between that and the very... unfamiliar contexts of these settings (culturally, interpersonally, while also knowing this is part of a narrative but not knowing how to take note of what composed that narrative in real time), knowing they were different from life as it is now. i remember uncritically submitting to the course of the story, vaguely wanting to like the husband and in many ways being led by the "vibes" of the story to still feel like there was something sweet in it... but ultimately this reminded me of how little substance there was when much of the story was presumably founded on being someone with minimal power or specific skills beyond housework who could finally find escape from exploitative and dehumanizing abuse or despair. it didn't inspect power or culture, it didn't explore the troubles of trying to find or build skills in this ecosystem beyond being his complementary housewife (and the part i recall from later in the story clearly doesn't count), it didn't explore the features of the relationship that much beyond hoping he's happy and learning that he's happy with you and finding that he wants you to be happy too (i think? i forgot a lot of what happened in the middle other than family drama) and it seemed like i was attached to the thought of being able to heal through comparatively kind people, but realistically it would never be a sufficient or helpful analogue at all...

it's not necessarily explanatory (as in, the following observation/impression is not assumed to be fully correlated or causative of my blurry acceptance) but i notably am not very sure how romance forms for different people, and it's hard to know how exactly i would relate to it myself... while at the same time i'm often very fixated on stories About it, wondering what connections between people mean and wondering what i could possibly want or hope for. but i doubt i've ever really had or held onto reliably representative expressions of healthy relationships, and i've regularly drawn my guesses/impressions from scarce or otherwise sensationalized examples in fiction and the various things people describe online. my own family life doesn't really have good examples of romance either, so, all of that is how i would contextualize (or, considering the way i've been writing my approval of the review, more like apprehensively self-justifying) the fact i didn't really process any of this and understand their roles and implications during the anime, if i remember correctly then i was exactly that person you described in thinking "oh... that's cute ;v;" and had not thought ahead

i'm wondering what made it so hard to just view it as clearly and realistically as you seem to...

inexperience with life? detachment from reality and implications? things which i obsess over the consequences of that i forget about immediately if i'm in a different mood or setting that reframes my limited awareness. it's frustrating, tiring, unclear, but

it's helpful to get clearer vision from other people. i just wish i understood how to not rely so heavily on them for feeding and anchoring my own thoughts, but if i don't, then i often find i'm drifting off into my own bubble-world and lost in self-indulgent things that couldn't ever have existed. too many critical questions, too tired to know where to start and endure answering them

again, ty for the review, will hopefully recommend more things i want to see reviews for soon

I want to make clear that i'm in the minority here, this has a pretty good score in MAL and people also seem to be enjoying S2, so don't take my opinion as absolute

also, on the comment of "to see things as clear and realistically as yoU", that just comes to me watching things very critically and having certain tastes in media, while watching I was already thinking what to write for this thread. Also, I can't not admit that the reason why I personally spotted some of the things I consider problems are because I already disliked the anime at a surface level, it was not like I liked the anime then I started thinking about it and started disliking it. I feel if you for some reason do want to do as me and develop a more critical eye the only thing you have to do is just start doing this. I don't mean making a thread like this one but just take things ythat you enjoy and break everything in elements and explanations that make sense tyo you, think "why does this evoke a certain feeling" and just go on based on that

going further than that, I think you already have said vision, you already make insanely long analytical comments in OT, like the one you already did, the difference is that you search the answers in yourself and I search it in whatever i'm looking. You don't seem to want to atribute negattive traits to any media that you've seen another person enjoy, as you can't really fanthom the idea of someone enjoying a thing that you personally may consider bad written, I personally don't really have that way of looking at things

JLuca913 891 wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

JLuca913 891 wrote:

I gotta admit my diary of wimpy kid request was pretty stupid

So now I've changed my mind and

You can review Mission Impossible 7 (movie)

do I need to watch any of the other mission impossible movies beforehand

no.. I don't think so because I haven't watched the other mission impossible movies before and the only one I've watched is the number 7 one and I still understand the story so

googling it says that it's recommended to watch both 5 and 6 before 7, I know you didn't request 5 and 6 but may I watch them too?

Achromalia wrote:

this helpfully digested some of my ambivalence toward it...

i was not really picking up on these problems explicitly (except little pieces of the text/subtext/context of arranged marriage and women's rights, because it was evidently set in awful conditions, but i clearly had not gathered enough awareness to digest it) and needed more clarity on what could have been going on

...i think it was one of the last anime shows i watched, sometime within the last year

or maybe it wasn't? i wish i knew what exactly i've been seeing/doing in these past few years...

anyway, i specifically remember starting it and somehow seeing some of myself through the protagonist's passivity and fears and unfairly self-critical thoughts so i was blurrily attached between that and the very... unfamiliar contexts of these settings (culturally, interpersonally, while also knowing this is part of a narrative but not knowing how to take note of what composed that narrative in real time), knowing they were different from life as it is now. i remember uncritically submitting to the course of the story, vaguely wanting to like the husband and in many ways being led by the "vibes" of the story to still feel like there was something sweet in it... but ultimately this reminded me of how little substance there was when much of the story was presumably founded on being someone with minimal power or specific skills beyond housework who could finally find escape from exploitative and dehumanizing abuse or despair. it didn't inspect power or culture, it didn't explore the troubles of trying to find or build skills in this ecosystem beyond being his complementary housewife (and the part i recall from later in the story clearly doesn't count), it didn't explore the features of the relationship that much beyond hoping he's happy and learning that he's happy with you and finding that he wants you to be happy too (i think? i forgot a lot of what happened in the middle other than family drama) and it seemed like i was attached to the thought of being able to heal through comparatively kind people, but realistically it would never be a sufficient or helpful analogue at all...

it's not necessarily explanatory (as in, the following observation/impression is not assumed to be fully correlated or causative of my blurry acceptance) but i notably am not very sure how romance forms for different people, and it's hard to know how exactly i would relate to it myself... while at the same time i'm often very fixated on stories About it, wondering what connections between people mean and wondering what i could possibly want or hope for. but i doubt i've ever really had or held onto reliably representative expressions of healthy relationships, and i've regularly drawn my guesses/impressions from scarce or otherwise sensationalized examples in fiction and the various things people describe online. my own family life doesn't really have good examples of romance either, so, all of that is how i would contextualize (or, considering the way i've been writing my approval of the review, more like apprehensively self-justifying) the fact i didn't really process any of this and understand their roles and implications during the anime, if i remember correctly then i was exactly that person you described in thinking "oh... that's cute ;v;" and had not thought ahead

i'm wondering what made it so hard to just view it as clearly and realistically as you seem to...

inexperience with life? detachment from reality and implications? things which i obsess over the consequences of that i forget about immediately if i'm in a different mood or setting that reframes my limited awareness. it's frustrating, tiring, unclear, but

it's helpful to get clearer vision from other people. i just wish i understood how to not rely so heavily on them for feeding and anchoring my own thoughts, but if i don't, then i often find i'm drifting off into my own bubble-world and lost in self-indulgent things that couldn't ever have existed. too many critical questions, too tired to know where to start and endure answering them

again, ty for the review, will hopefully recommend more things i want to see reviews for soon

ADDENDUM: another thing that slipped my mind... in thinking that i viewed it thru her pov while also accepting my detachment whenever something happened that i wouldn't naturally/intuitively think or say (my thoughts were led by hers, and i'm very used to stories and protagonists being hard to expect relating perfectly/deeply/substantively with, making it normalized and habitual and easy to uncritically ignore),, i neglected to really consider that this isn't really a person i relate with so much as a person i vaguely thought could symbolize and carry things i haven't digested, so i didn't even really inspect her character her either, let alone the husband's, so that's... worrying

in the case that you or anyone else would have thoughts on that, it would be very appreciated to hear from you ^-^

Patatitta wrote:

Achromalia wrote:

this helpfully digested some of my ambivalence toward it...

i was not really picking up on these problems explicitly (except little pieces of the text/subtext/context of arranged marriage and women's rights, because it was evidently set in awful conditions, but i clearly had not gathered enough awareness to digest it) and needed more clarity on what could have been going on

...i think it was one of the last anime shows i watched, sometime within the last year

or maybe it wasn't? i wish i knew what exactly i've been seeing/doing in these past few years...

anyway, i specifically remember starting it and somehow seeing some of myself through the protagonist's passivity and fears and unfairly self-critical thoughts so i was blurrily attached between that and the very... unfamiliar contexts of these settings (culturally, interpersonally, while also knowing this is part of a narrative but not knowing how to take note of what composed that narrative in real time), knowing they were different from life as it is now. i remember uncritically submitting to the course of the story, vaguely wanting to like the husband and in many ways being led by the "vibes" of the story to still feel like there was something sweet in it... but ultimately this reminded me of how little substance there was when much of the story was presumably founded on being someone with minimal power or specific skills beyond housework who could finally find escape from exploitative and dehumanizing abuse or despair. it didn't inspect power or culture, it didn't explore the troubles of trying to find or build skills in this ecosystem beyond being his complementary housewife (and the part i recall from later in the story clearly doesn't count), it didn't explore the features of the relationship that much beyond hoping he's happy and learning that he's happy with you and finding that he wants you to be happy too (i think? i forgot a lot of what happened in the middle other than family drama) and it seemed like i was attached to the thought of being able to heal through comparatively kind people, but realistically it would never be a sufficient or helpful analogue at all...

it's not necessarily explanatory (as in, the following observation/impression is not assumed to be fully correlated or causative of my blurry acceptance) but i notably am not very sure how romance forms for different people, and it's hard to know how exactly i would relate to it myself... while at the same time i'm often very fixated on stories About it, wondering what connections between people mean and wondering what i could possibly want or hope for. but i doubt i've ever really had or held onto reliably representative expressions of healthy relationships, and i've regularly drawn my guesses/impressions from scarce or otherwise sensationalized examples in fiction and the various things people describe online. my own family life doesn't really have good examples of romance either, so, all of that is how i would contextualize (or, considering the way i've been writing my approval of the review, more like apprehensively self-justifying) the fact i didn't really process any of this and understand their roles and implications during the anime, if i remember correctly then i was exactly that person you described in thinking "oh... that's cute ;v;" and had not thought ahead

i'm wondering what made it so hard to just view it as clearly and realistically as you seem to...

inexperience with life? detachment from reality and implications? things which i obsess over the consequences of that i forget about immediately if i'm in a different mood or setting that reframes my limited awareness. it's frustrating, tiring, unclear, but

it's helpful to get clearer vision from other people. i just wish i understood how to not rely so heavily on them for feeding and anchoring my own thoughts, but if i don't, then i often find i'm drifting off into my own bubble-world and lost in self-indulgent things that couldn't ever have existed. too many critical questions, too tired to know where to start and endure answering them

again, ty for the review, will hopefully recommend more things i want to see reviews for soon

I want to make clear that i'm in the minority here, this has a pretty good score in MAL and people also seem to be enjoying S2, so don't take my opinion as absolute

also, on the comment of "to see things as clear and realistically as yoU", that just comes to me watching things very critically and having certain tastes in media, while watching I was already thinking what to write for this thread. Also, I can't not admit that the reason why I personally spotted some of the things I consider problems are because I already disliked the anime at a surface level, it was not like I liked the anime then I started thinking about it and started disliking it. I feel if you for some reason do want to do as me and develop a more critical eye the only thing you have to do is just start doing this. I don't mean making a thread like this one but just take things ythat you enjoy and break everything in elements and explanations that make sense tyo you, think "why does this evoke a certain feeling" and just go on based on that

going further than that, I think you already have said vision, you already make insanely long analytical comments in OT, like the one you already did, the difference is that you search the answers in yourself and I search it in whatever i'm looking. You don't seem to want to atribute negattive traits to any media that you've seen another person enjoy, as you can't really fanthom the idea of someone enjoying a thing that you personally may consider bad written, I personally don't really have that way of looking at things

mm. in my case, i often wish for understanding and sight through others' eyes because i don't trust my own-- often times the lengthy analyses i write are doubting themselves, justifying various facets within them, critiquing themselves and their own tentative conclusions while hoping other people might consider similar things and possibly echo back with something that carries those questions in mind and possibly answers them with things i'm just not able to see... maybe i would have some depth of sight, but i find it hard to convince myself of its salience and applicability for the scenarios and settings around me when not universally proven, as well as when attempting to test my suspicions would appear to have more risk and consequence than i'm willing to bear

so... all of that is my reasoning (in reference for "if for some reason [...]") which very tentatively motivates(?, because it might be inaccurate to imply i have the volition for it, i rarely ever do) me to want to carry the real-time eye that you seemed to. i hope it's not perceived as uncritical or insincere flattery (i add this because it came to mind as a possible thought), but to me i genuinely view your vision as very useful-- in real life, i am often frozen and inattentive and... too blankly/blindly reactive rather than proactive, so i don't find myself able to trust that i can respond to anything with good clarity and reasoning. i submit to events around me in real-time, i'm often more naturally habitually inclined to quietly numbing myself so that i'm not panicking, and i generally rely on any slightly-trusted person accompanying me to lead or anchor me in whatever scenario i'm in-- either that or i have to be in particular places situated for particular things that i'm familiar with

all of that is to represent where i seemed to believe a more presently-aware critical eye would be relevant and applicable, because if i can't live in the present and reason through my surroundings in the moment and improvise, then i may not really live any life at all (in finding work, in carrying any ambitions, in establishing relations with people and maintaining healthily stable and meaningful friendships that facilitate mutual growth) and i will burden/neglect/disappoint everyone who pities me enough to support my survival... instead, my eye is moreso centered on the past and future, except they're not very confident visions and are hard for me to substantiate and trust and work with, and i don't believe them to be well-informed

anyway!! i'm really surprised someone noticed that in me, your comment on what my attitude seems to be toward media the people seem to enjoy. unless i'm misreading it, it seems like you're interpreting me to be apprehensive about critiquing things people like. in my view, i believe that's because i often try to "absorb" a selected variety of attachments people have to certain things/media, and in a way i'm more focused on sympathizing with people and attempting to view them favorably and i am very inclined to assume there is merit in something because people have connected with it in someway (if not through the substance of the work itself, then often it's through how it carries the things it symbolizes in other peoples' eyes). connected to that habit, there are a number of insecurities/fears and sources of dread that motivate the desire to like things other people like, but one of the most notable among them is the desire to Be Those People, either to be among them or to effectively mimic/steal/absorb their life experiences and personalities into myself. but in truth, i cannot do any of that, and the most i have done is make the person i am now learn to enjoy some of the things they did, and i adopt some of their behaviors in turn in with very transparently out-of-place inconsistency in texture/flavor...

i'm not sure what i make of your following claim of "you can't really fathom [that people would like something you see problems in]" or how you would apply it, that doesn't seem to resonate yet but i may be missing something about myself or about the intended semantics of that statement

but, your advice seems useful, and i hope i can attempt that to some effect... thank you again for your thoughts <3

Patatitta wrote:

JLuca913 891 wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

JLuca913 891 wrote:

I gotta admit my diary of wimpy kid request was pretty stupid

So now I've changed my mind and

You can review Mission Impossible 7 (movie)

do I need to watch any of the other mission impossible movies beforehand

no.. I don't think so because I haven't watched the other mission impossible movies before and the only one I've watched is the number 7 one and I still understand the story so

googling it says that it's recommended to watch both 5 and 6 before 7, I know you didn't request 5 and 6 but may I watch them too?

actually ACTUALLY, i forgot that I watched the mission impossible 6,not 7 🤐

But yeah sure you may watch all of them too

JLuca913 891 wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

JLuca913 891 wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

JLuca913 891 wrote:

I gotta admit my diary of wimpy kid request was pretty stupid

So now I've changed my mind and

You can review Mission Impossible 7 (movie)

do I need to watch any of the other mission impossible movies beforehand

no.. I don't think so because I haven't watched the other mission impossible movies before and the only one I've watched is the number 7 one and I still understand the story so

googling it says that it's recommended to watch both 5 and 6 before 7, I know you didn't request 5 and 6 but may I watch them too?

actually ACTUALLY, i forgot that I watched the mission impossible 6,not 7 🤐

But yeah sure you may watch all of them too

sure thanks will watch 5 and 6

Mission Impossible 5: Rogue Nation

if the mission is impossible how is that they have completed 5 of them,,,

Mission Impossible is one of the biggest action film franchises, it features cool fights, explosions, cars, people being badass, etc. It's the living stereotype of a american action film, it's all of the good and the bad of this genre destilated and condensated in a movie.

The movie is about how the impossible mission force is disbanded due to a terrorist group called the syndicate, and their (impossible) mission is to find and defeat the syndicate. The plot is very goofy and very much just a excuse to have cool stunts. It doesn't try to anything very interesting and also it kinda does feel a little bit nonsensical givv en how easy it would have for the syndicate to kill the protagonist

so how cool are the stunts?, I would say they're okay. This movie isn't reinventing the wheel, the fights don't really have gimmicks, they are your typical fist fights, your car chases, the most original scene is one where ethan hunt has to dive into a big submarine server to hack the security of a place they were infiltrating

I have a bit more I want to say about this film but I will watch 6 before doing so to flesh out my thoughts.

Placed on C tier

Mission Impossible 6: Fallout

Everything I said about the previous movie applies to this one as well, it's mostly about the stakes rather than the stunts themselves, the story is bad, and generally there isn't that much to bite on here

The plot in this one is extra nonsensical, it's about a terrorist group obtaining 3 nuclear bombs that the IMF must stop. there are some pretty nice plot holes, like the first scene they kidnap and convince the designer of the bombs for information on them, they convince them by making them believe the bombs have already exploded, however, as it turns out the location of the actual bombs will turn out to be entirerily different so like how the fuck did they convince them like you should have KNOWN those were not the right locations, there is a lot of things being kinda dumb in the plot like for example, why would you choose to blow the 3 bombs on the same location if your goal is to cause as much damage as possible and also placing the 3 bombs in the same place will make it like WAY easier for it to be deactivated

Now, regarding those things I said I would cover once I watched this one to flesh out my thoughts, there are multiple things. First of all, all of the characters seem slightly psychopatic?, like, in most action films the protagonist is often not really enjoying it, they do it because they have to, in mission impossible they kill everyone with a smile in their face. William brandt in a scene was like "ohhhhhhhhhh this is so boring that I have to sit back and like hack stuff why can't I go in and shoot people" and i'm like wtf is wrong with you

Their concept of morality is also extremely fucked. The mission is not their first priority as it should be when there are 3 nuclear warheads about to explode in a unknown location, instead, that is the life of their friends, they're willing to risk their lifes to save 1 person. Seeing this you would go "ah, they are moralist and pacifist, I see, they do not want to kill anyone" that is absolutely not true, because the moment someone crosses them they kill them like if they were flies.

This point is actually brought up in both movies i've seen, as the CIA representative kinda go "dudes you should focus on the mission, casualties are to be expected in both sides" which i'm like THANK YOU SOMEONE SMART IN THIS MOVIE but then they make her comically villainistic to a point where I cant vouch for her either. That just showcases that the writing of the characters is very flat, they're either super cool and their life is worth more than the lifes of the entire rest of the planet or they're bad and deserve to be killed without showing mercy.

I know this movie is just meant to have cool stunts and stuff but like come on, can you make the characters not slightly psychopatic?

also, I don't think they know how to write women either, because every time there is a woman on screen there is genuinly sexual tension between them and the protagonist, and it's like whyyyyyyyyyyyy

placed in c tier I guess some of the stunts were cool I guess (also while I did enjoy this movie less than the prevous and retroactively made me enjoy the previous even less, I am not going to edit the rating, this is probably a D tier but i'm putting it in C tier just because I want to keep things consistent and I don't want to change my previous ratings)

Patatitta wrote:

Mission Impossible 6: Fallout

Everything I said about the previous movie applies to this one as well, it's mostly about the stakes rather than the stunts themselves, the story is bad, and generally there isn't that much to bite on here

The plot in this one is extra nonsensical, it's about a terrorist group obtaining 3 nuclear bombs that the IMF must stop. there are some pretty nice plot holes, like the first scene they kidnap and convince the designer of the bombs for information on them, they convince them by making them believe the bombs have already exploded, however, as it turns out the location of the actual bombs will turn out to be entirerily different so like how the fuck did they convince them like you should have KNOWN those were not the right locations, there is a lot of things being kinda dumb in the plot like for example, why would you choose to blow the 3 bombs on the same location if your goal is to cause as much damage as possible and also placing the 3 bombs in the same place will make it like WAY easier for it to be deactivated

Now, regarding those things I said I would cover once I watched this one to flesh out my thoughts, there are multiple things. First of all, all of the characters seem slightly psychopatic?, like, in most action films the protagonist is often not really enjoying it, they do it because they have to, in mission impossible they kill everyone with a smile in their face. William brandt in a scene was like "ohhhhhhhhhh this is so boring that I have to sit back and like hack stuff why can't I go in and shoot people" and i'm like wtf is wrong with you

Their concept of morality is also extremely fucked. The mission is not their first priority as it should be when there are 3 nuclear warheads about to explode in a unknown location, instead, that is the life of their friends, they're willing to risk their lifes to save 1 person. Seeing this you would go "ah, they are moralist and pacifist, I see, they do not want to kill anyone" that is absolutely not true, because the moment someone crosses them they kill them like if they were flies.

This point is actually brought up in both movies i've seen, as the CIA representative kinda go "dudes you should focus on the mission, casualties are to be expected in both sides" which i'm like THANK YOU SOMEONE SMART IN THIS MOVIE but then they make her comically villainistic to a point where I cant vouch for her either. That just showcases that the writing of the characters is very flat, they're either super cool and their life is worth more than the lifes of the entire rest of the planet or they're bad and deserve to be killed without showing mercy.

I know this movie is just meant to have cool stunts and stuff but like come on, can you make the characters not slightly psychopatic?

also, I don't think they know how to write women either, because every time there is a woman on screen there is genuinly sexual tension between them and the protagonist, and it's like whyyyyyyyyyyyy

placed in c tier I guess some of the stunts were cool I guess (also while I did enjoy this movie less than the prevous and retroactively made me enjoy the previous even less, I am not going to edit the rating, this is probably a D tier but i'm putting it in C tier just because I want to keep things consistent and I don't want to change my previous ratings)

ay thanks for the review


I rated the movie good because it was one of the first movies I've seen after the pandemic and I don't really watch movies that much, so when I watched this movie I actually enjoyed it a whole lot

remember, my opinion is not law, my ratings and opinions are as subjective as they get, you don't need to justify yourself for liking the movie or whatever, in fact call my analysis shit if you think it's like that

all your analyses are shit
will not elaborate

metro last light

burgernfat wrote:

metro last light

should I play metro 2033 first?

Patatitta wrote:

burgernfat wrote:

metro last light

should I play metro 2033 first?

the game sorta tells you what you do in 2033 so it's not really necessary. also i guess i should warn you since a lot of people get upset about these things, this game crashes a lot. as far as i know there is nothing you can do to outright stop the crashes, but disabling advanced physx helps to reduce them.

Does Last Light Redux not fix the issue?

will play metro but honestly I may not be able to start it for a week or two since I need to finish any of the videogames I'm currently playing before starting it

watch Life of Pi

abraker wrote:

watch Life of Pi

sure

life of pi

really good movie, I enjoyed

I would like to say that religion is a touchy subject in films and in media in general, but it actually really isn't, almost everything that I have consumed that involves religion frames it in a negative light. There are very few examples of things i've watched being sympathetic torwards religion. First they complain about the church being corrupt and that translates also into science being like cool and like we have math and equations and we can prove thing and the religious text makes no sense and

Look, i'm not religious myself, I'm not even agnostic, but I love seeing a movie being actually compassionate torwards religion, not only does it frame it in a positive light, but it makes some pretty interesting analysis and really has points to back their position

The movie is actually a conversation between two men, one person who is very sceptic and the second person who promised to tell a story that would make them want to believe in god. While in the movie they're directly talking about god and frame it as a conversation about god, the point that it makes aren't exclusive to proving that god exists or not, and that is becasue as I've just said, it's just a story that would make them want to make them believe in god. To give them faith, they aren't going to try to prove that god exist, because that cant be proven, but to show the benefits of having faith in something, be it god or be it anything else.

pi in the story is a exceptional and very smart man, one that starts believing in religion. But unlike most people, pi would start seeing good points in every religion, they didn't take part in a single religion, they were a hinduist, a christian and a muslim all at the same time. By doing so they're disregarding the structure and teachings of each church, as no religion really allows you to believe in other religion. In fact a member of their family tells pi to just choose one, but that is missing the big picture here

believing in god and praying made pi's life better, they didn't care if the religions were at direct odds with each other, as long as they have faith, they could harvest benefits from them.

The ending also kinda confirms and reinforce that theme, as the story is shown to (likely) be a invention, and they in a very small ammount of time tell them a story that is more grounded, both stories can't be proven, so you just have to choose what to beieve in

I also really like that in the survival segment of the movie, more than anything, the psychological needs of pi is the main point. Something that many other stories about survival would have skipped. In the philosophy and religious beliefs of pi all life is sacred and he is no one to take away a life, be it one of a animal, like for the example, the big fucking tiger in the boat that wants to eat them. But pi doesn't just try to not kill the animal, they try to keep it alive.

This sounds really dumb, and it likely is very dumb, but pi manage to justify their decision, they have faith in their morals, which translates them to not killing the tiger, and by keeping the tiger alive, they're giving themselves meaning to their life, to take care of the tiger. The fear and needs of the tiger keeps pi sane

I think the movie just makes a lot of really good points generally, I do think that comparing science to religion is kinda missing the point, yes, religion is a way to explain the universe, but it's more than that.

If you disregard religion and focus entirerily on science, you may find yourself gravitating and teaching yourself philosophy, because having direction and meaning in your life is kinda cool, (or fuck it, some philosophies disregard those concepts but like being confident in that philosophy, having faith on it, makes your life better, and that's the point). And that philosophy aspect is the one thing religion and churches offer you that raw science can't ever offer you.

also the movie just looks like really fucking good, nothing much to comment on there

just a really good movie, I wish more pieces of media didn't frame religion in such a negative light, I enjoyed it a lot, A rank.

-----------

have yet to start metro

not sure if it already has been requested but paprika

has been one my favorite movies so far

Aireunaeus wrote:

not sure if it already has been requested but paprika

has been one my favorite movies so far

you can check if I have done something or not doing control f on the OP, I have a list of everything that has been covered.

Anyways, i've not done paprika, but I do have watched it (again, you can check what I have seen or not by my signature)


-------

Paprika

Not very different to perfect blue/millenium actress tbh

The plot of paprika is that a technology is invented to access people dream and stuff, it's generally surrealistic, and like perfect blue or millenium actress, it's focused heavily on that idea of not being able to differentiate reality and fiction

My general problem is that it wasn't too memorable?, like I'm struggling to really remember what happens in it, I will say that when I watched this movie I already had seen the two other already mentioned, and this movie just doesn't do things that differently, and also not really better than the other two. The animation itself isn't also very crazy, which is kinda surprising because movies like this tend to be more avant garde in that front. The OST is stellar however

it's better than inception tho

i'm sorry I just don't have much to say about this movie, placed in B rank because I remember being good and that all the satoshi kon were roughly equal in quality

Patatitta wrote:

it's better than inception tho

iirc inception was inspired by paprika

abraker wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

it's better than inception tho

iirc inception was inspired by paprika

do not use discord links for images, also, didn't know that but it makes sense tbh

Patatitta wrote:

Aireunaeus wrote:

not sure if it already has been requested but paprika

has been one my favorite movies so far

you can check if I have done something or not doing control f on the OP, I have a list of everything that has been covered.

Anyways, i've not done paprika, but I do have watched it (again, you can check what I have seen or not by my signature)


-------

Paprika

Not very different to perfect blue/millenium actress tbh

The plot of paprika is that a technology is invented to access people dream and stuff, it's generally surrealistic, and like perfect blue or millenium actress, it's focused heavily on that idea of not being able to differentiate reality and fiction

My general problem is that it wasn't too memorable?, like I'm struggling to really remember what happens in it, I will say that when I watched this movie I already had seen the two other already mentioned, and this movie just doesn't do things that differently, and also not really better than the other two. The animation itself isn't also very crazy, which is kinda surprising because movies like this tend to be more avant garde in that front. The OST is stellar however

it's better than inception tho

i'm sorry I just don't have much to say about this movie, placed in B rank because I remember being good and that all the satoshi kon were roughly equal in quality

Understandable grading lol but i did find the animation and plot interesting. With the music really giving the lsd or trippy vibe lel.

Aireunaeus wrote:

Understandable grading lol but i did find the animation and plot interesting. With the music really giving the lsd or trippy vibe lel.

Susumu Hirasawa is the goat.

Behrauder wrote:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/52865/Romantic_Killer

never seen any reverse harem, i'm down to give it a go

also, I started metro a few days back, I think i'm halfway through, i'm impressed ngl, better than I expected

Patatitta wrote:

abraker wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

it's better than inception tho

iirc inception was inspired by paprika

do not use discord links for images, also, didn't know that but it makes sense tbh

it's hard to use anything else when on phone >_<
fixed the pic tho

Romantic Killer

This anime starts being fairly good and then for some reason gets in freefall for the last couple episodes like what the fuck happened there

this anime is about a nerdy woman who only plays videogames and watches anime and has 0 interest in romance that attracts the interest of a certain fantastical creature that confiscates all of their videogames, chocolate, and cat, and forces their parents to move out in a case of borderline child abandonement to turn their life into a otome game with the goal of her finding a boyfriend

for as morally dubious as the premise is, the actual anime actually works fairly well (up to episode 10 or somewhere along those lines). The animation are really good, the character designs are interesting, the situations are so absurd that the comedy is effective, nothing there I disliked.

Going a little bit more in depth into the animation, what makes it work for me is just how fluid it is, in part because of really well done 3dcg, the characters also constantly switches artstyles to represent a character mood and to make visual gags

A thing I liked is that the main protagonist keeps fierce to her promise of not falling in love, which would seem weird, since most people argue the opposite with this type of anime, to go "ohhh come onn confess your love alreadyyyy", but I wouldn't have liked the idea of just abandoning your values or ideals by getting into a relationship and the character going "thank you for holding me at gunpoint and forcing me to become a fundamentally different person by what could count as sexual harassment!!!"

The first half of the anime are the main characters being introduced, having funny absurd romantic situations, and seeing the love interest compete with each other, but there is a limit to how many characters you can introduce. Even in VNs where there are lots of girls to choose from, they force you to pick a "heroine" up to a certain point, which both reduces the ammount of screentime the other characters have and marks a ending point for the addition of new characters and romantic interests. This anime realizes that and sidesteps by going full drama past a certain point

the tone of the anime up to this point is very light, but when the switch happens, they start covering a lot of very serious issues such as rape or stalking or whatever and it kinda stops being a comedy, they actually treat the topics with respect but they don't go very in depth on it

my problem comes with the last couple chapters, when we get into the stalker plotline. I think they drop the ball hard. It feels like they didn't know how to write a ending to a anime like this, so they kinda create a comically villanous character that is just very poorly written, and to have this character endanger the life of the protagonist. The plot is extremely contrived, and there are some borderline plot holes, like how at the very end where the protagonist is free from the spell tries talking to everyone about what has going on, that she apologizes for not being able of telling them and that it was entirerily her fault, which was NOT the case, as she had actually tried telling people before but that just triggered intense stomachal pain that prevented her from doing so

they also get dangerously close to the line of the characer abandoning her morals or being written into starting a romance with some of the characters, in many ways it feels like they wanted to write her with kazuki and started preparing the grounds for it but then backed down at the last minute and then went with the last chapter where she once again falls into the control of the spell and forces a ultimatum on her getting a bf before high school ends which teases a second season to then cut to the new riri going to another person teasing again the second season except that both teasers are in direct conflict with each other and also this anime is based on a shounen jump manga that concluded and i'm pretty sure the anime covered 100% of this so I have no fucking clue if they're even going to do a second season

so yeah, they just dropped the ball hard with the ending

placed in B rank still

----------

still playing metro, I think i'm more than halfway done idk

Patatitta wrote:

Romantic Killer

This anime starts being fairly good and then for some reason gets in freefall for the last couple episodes like what the fuck happened there

this anime is about a nerdy woman who only plays videogames and watches anime and has 0 interest in romance that attracts the interest of a certain fantastical creature that confiscates all of their videogames, chocolate, and cat, and forces their parents to move out in a case of borderline child abandonement to turn their life into a otome game with the goal of her finding a boyfriend

for as morally dubious as the premise is, the actual anime actually works fairly well (up to episode 10 or somewhere along those lines). The animation are really good, the character designs are interesting, the situations are so absurd that the comedy is effective, nothing there I disliked.

Going a little bit more in depth into the animation, what makes it work for me is just how fluid it is, in part because of really well done 3dcg, the characters also constantly switches artstyles to represent a character mood and to make visual gags

A thing I liked is that the main protagonist keeps fierce to her promise of not falling in love, which would seem weird, since most people argue the opposite with this type of anime, to go "ohhh come onn confess your love alreadyyyy", but I wouldn't have liked the idea of just abandoning your values or ideals by getting into a relationship and the character going "thank you for holding me at gunpoint and forcing me to become a fundamentally different person by what could count as sexual harassment!!!"

The first half of the anime are the main characters being introduced, having funny absurd romantic situations, and seeing the love interest compete with each other, but there is a limit to how many characters you can introduce. Even in VNs where there are lots of girls to choose from, they force you to pick a "heroine" up to a certain point, which both reduces the ammount of screentime the other characters have and marks a ending point for the addition of new characters and romantic interests. This anime realizes that and sidesteps by going full drama past a certain point

the tone of the anime up to this point is very light, but when the switch happens, they start covering a lot of very serious issues such as rape or stalking or whatever and it kinda stops being a comedy, they actually treat the topics with respect but they don't go very in depth on it

my problem comes with the last couple chapters, when we get into the stalker plotline. I think they drop the ball hard. It feels like they didn't know how to write a ending to a anime like this, so they kinda create a comically villanous character that is just very poorly written, and to have this character endanger the life of the protagonist. The plot is extremely contrived, and there are some borderline plot holes, like how at the very end where the protagonist is free from the spell tries talking to everyone about what has going on, that she apologizes for not being able of telling them and that it was entirerily her fault, which was NOT the case, as she had actually tried telling people before but that just triggered intense stomachal pain that prevented her from doing so

they also get dangerously close to the line of the characer abandoning her morals or being written into starting a romance with some of the characters, in many ways it feels like they wanted to write her with kazuki and started preparing the grounds for it but then backed down at the last minute and then went with the last chapter where she once again falls into the control of the spell and forces a ultimatum on her getting a bf before high school ends which teases a second season to then cut to the new riri going to another person teasing again the second season except that both teasers are in direct conflict with each other and also this anime is based on a shounen jump manga that concluded and i'm pretty sure the anime covered 100% of this so I have no fucking clue if they're even going to do a second season

so yeah, they just dropped the ball hard with the ending

placed in B rank still

----------

still playing metro, I think i'm more than halfway done idk

I didn't expect to say this, but I agree with you. I also found the ending totally weird.

Metro Last Light:

Enjoyed it way more than I expected.

First of all, I didn't have any stability problems while playing metro, only your typical problems of the windows key not working and that sort of stuff, but it didn't crash on me a single time. Surprising since I initially wanted to play metro exodus a couple of years back but decided against it because I could not get it to run properly.

Metro Last Light is the second part of the metro franchise, a shooter game franchise adapted from the metro novels. They're about political conflicts and paranormal happenings in a world where the nukes fell and everyone is refuged in the metro to avoid the radiation.

The gameplay is your typical shooter stuff, metro doesn't do anything that any other game haven't done already, but I don't think this is a negative. Games should not be 100% original in all fronts, if there is a gameplay system or narrative structure or whatever that just fits perfectly with what you're trying to pull off, why not use it?. I say all of that but metro does have a fairly important gimmick. The game can be play entirerily HUDless, think dead space but instead of shiting your pants you're in playable russian literature. Althought I personally didn't play it with the hud off

But even while having played it with a UI, the game feels extremely immersive. Having to switch the filters of your gas mask, there being multiple stages to reloading a weapon (in the sense, that it doesn't go from your current ammunition ammount to max, but it goes from your current, to 0 or 1 bullet if you have one loaded on the barrell, to full, so if you get interrupted you may only be left with 1 bullet, which gives more tactical depth to reloading), obtaining your recourses by basically exclusively looting corpses, they're small details in isolation, but in combination, it really makes for a immersive atmosphere.

Having said that, while it's immersive it's not realistic. I once tried to blow up a door with a shotgun to make my life easier and it didn't work, or the fact that there conveniently placed gas masks in situations where you may lose yours. I know this may be irritating for some, I got annoyed for similar details in games like GTA V or cyberpunk, but for metro?, I like the rest of the game enough for it to be easy to overlook those details. Now, do I think the game should be realistic?, I think it would have helped if they managed to find even more organic ways to deal with those elements, it would have made the game even better, but as it stands now, I don't think it's an element that actively detracts from the experience

The graphics look really good, you may see it now and go like "oh the texture models aren't the most high quality", but do they need to be?, of course if it looked the most perfect state of the art possible it would be better, but having said that I think the graphics look really solid and hold up really well

A thing metro does that I feel infinitively makes the game look 20 times better is the subtle shading that it has.



This is probably the screenshot where I find this effect to be more noticeable, if you look at it, you can notice some purple splash and some very visible smog. IRL, this wouldn't work this way, if you look at it in a video, you can see it's not just purple light, but more a camera effect, the purple will move with you as you move forward. I don't know exactly the science of this effect in reaility but i'm pretty sure they're trying to emulate how the game would look recorded by a camera, instead of how it would look in reality, and it works very well.

The plot is engaging, artyom is a mute protagonist, we can only really hear their inner voice in the book quotes that appear on the loading screens. This feeds into the fantasy of it being us who are scavanging the metro for resources and barely holding on to life. Because the plot until the last quarter of the game is that, just trying to survive in any way possible. You get in problem with factions but less because of ideological differences but more because everyone is trying to do what they think they must do to survive.

The paranormal stuff with the dark ones is interesting but I feel i'm lacking the context from the previous game to really say anything substantial on it

My only real complaint is the morality system, I did not enjoy it very much, I don't really think a morality system like the one metro has really belongs in the game. Basically, if you do good actions in the game like sparing people or not ignoring coversations you get good points, and if you don't do those things, you get bad points, and in the very end of the game, the last cinematic is different depending on how many points you have. I feel it doens't really fit with the theme of the game of "doing what you must to survive", and the way it's implemented in the ending also doesn't feel the most organic

I really enjoyed this game, will def play the other metros at some point, placed in A rank.

---

Queue empty

I'm currently playing FFXII and it's great but also really long so idk if you wanna do it.

Karmine wrote:

I'm currently playing FFXII and it's great but also really long so idk if you wanna do it.

yeah not rn, also please wait until you finish to request stuff

Patatitta wrote:

Karmine wrote:

I'm currently playing FFXII and it's great but also really long so idk if you wanna do it.

yeah not rn, also please wait until you finish to request stuff

Yeah ik, I've finished Dynasty Warriors Origins, it's not as long but I don't think it's your kind of thing.
There wouldn't be much to say since it's based on actual history you're likely not familiar with.

Review Ghost Trick. It's very short.

Kobold84 wrote:

Review Ghost Trick. It's very short.

already played it a few years back

--------

ghost trick

ghost trick is a mistery/puzzle games where you play as this ghost who has the ability to hunt different objects. Apparently it's also by the director of ace attorney but I didn't know that when I played the game (or had even played ace attorney by that point)

there isn't that much I have to say about the game, I played it, it was solid, less than ace attorney tho. I feel that feeling of solving a mistery isn't as strong in this game, mainly because there is a layer of abstraction between solving the mistery and the actions you take in game. In ace attorney you need to think about the statements given and find contradiction in those. Ghost trick you often just solve puzzles by just checking what x does, or in general not thinking about the broader mistery and just in the specific situation.

The story is pretty solid, I didn't really expect the twist and I think it's well done

placed in B rank

has wukong been done before

reffty_gag wrote:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/2236/Toki_wo_Kakeru_Shoujo

already watched

--------

The girl who leapt through time

Great movie, a classic.

The girl who leapt through time is about that, a girl who has the ability to jump through time, and as any teenage girl would do, she starts abusing that skill to get out of uncomfortable situations which lends her in even more trouble.

In many ways this is very comparable to groundhog day, as they are both very famous, very quintesential romance movies about time travel. This is 20 times better than groundhog day tho. This movie is way more respectful torwards it's romance, as it's done from the perspective of a teen anime girl, while appealing to the same demographic (female teens), so it's very bubbly with it's romance

You need ot understand the movie from that perspective, yeah, you watching the movie probably could give a better use to time travel, but can you blame the girl for that?, her actions make perfect sense given the context, and this movie does have a really strong emotional hook

other than that, this movie doens't really get too crazy with their concepts, but it's a really good movie

Placed in A rank

-------

McEndu wrote:

has wukong been done before

You can see what has done and not done in the OP, wukong has not been done, but I wont do it because a pirated version does not exist and I do not want to spend money on this thread. Also I think my pc isn't strong enough to run it anyways

Behrauder wrote:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/28223/Death_Parade

watched that a week ago I enjoyed it will do tomorrow as i'm going to sleep now

Behrauder wrote:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/28223/Death_Parade

-----------

death parade

amazing anime, really enjoyed

death parade is a anime about recently deceased pairs who get summoned to some sort of bar, and are forced to play a "lethal" game during which they reflect about their life and slowly come to the realization they are already dead. After that, they are judged and are either sent to be reincarnated on eternity in super hell (the void)

death parade is a anime that hits really hard emotionally, it tackles heavy topics and seeing someone basically break down in real time like it happens in episode 1 for example is really painful. However the focus of the anime is not on these experiences and the lifes of this people, but more about the people judging them

The arbiters recieve all the memories of the two people being judged, but according to them, that information is not enough. It's not fair to compare someone who has suffered a lot, who has gone through traumatic events or even participated in a war to someone who has born into a rich family and lived a comfortable life without much trouble until they die. So they try to force really painful situations to bring out the worst in people, that way they have full context.

That is a concept I had never really heard before and I think it is a weird moral problem under that system of beliefs, some people just have it worst, they have more opportunity to sin, and I don't think it's fair that someone should be reincarnated or sent to the void just based on that. Following that up, I get how you would get the idea "you need to push everyone to their limit", tho I don't agree with this.

Let's say you have been the nicest person your whole life, then you die, you go to the bar, you go into hysteria, turn into an asshole, and do something awful. In this anime they would probably have gone straight up to super hell and I don't agree with that, I don't think it's fair, I don't think it's our darkest moments that define us, what we would have done in moment of hysteria that doesn't really manifest into anyones life 99% of the time.

But, the anime is well written, and it recognizes that this way of judging is not optimal, in fact, the whole theme of the anime is about the imposibility of judging someone

To make this more fun, when you're judging someone, you CAN'T read their thoughts like you would if you were absorbing their memories. So you have to interpret the motives and actions of everyone, and that is almost impossible to do, not viable when the stakes are so high. There is bias and trust involved and a lot of people would have very different opinions in each case

at the end of the anime we're shown a more "humane" way of judging people, but I still very much think it doesn't really tackle some of the root problems of judging people

seems the only real way to judge people is to not do so, to reincarnate everyone, but under the system of this anime, would that be catastrophic for humanity or not?, how necessary is judging?, yes, everyone in this anime struggles to find a solution but try it yourself, it's just really fucking difficult to actually fix this problem under these rules

the concept of the soul is also interesting, when you die you're either reincarnated or sent to the void, where your soul will be forever alone in nothingness for eternity (so basically worse than regular death). This implies what defines your actions is your soul, that if you had had a differnet soul you would have acted a different way during the game.

This is a scary thought, as it removes the freewill we may think we have. Also, this is never clarified but once a soul has been judged one, do you need to judge it for every single reincarnation?, does your actions change and taint your soul?, do you keep experiences from previous lifes?, idk, that's confusing



fun anime, really good, it's a thinker, A rank

------

queue still empty

https://myanimelist.net/anime/861/xxxHOLiC (24 episodes)

there is still a second season (13 episodes) and two OVAs with 2 episodes each.

Review Aharen-san wa Hakarenai.

Behrauder wrote:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/861/xxxHOLiC (24 episodes)

there is still a second season (13 episodes) and two OVAs with 2 episodes each.

I've read the manga and i'm lazy to watch the anime also can I just talk about the manga

Kobold84 wrote:

Review Aharen-san wa Hakarenai.

sure

Patatitta wrote:

Behrauder wrote:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/861/xxxHOLiC (24 episodes)

there is still a second season (13 episodes) and two OVAs with 2 episodes each.

I've read the manga and i'm lazy to watch the anime also can I just talk about the manga

I didn't read the manga (I just watched the anime), but if you're ok with that, sure!

xxxHolic

--------

ngl I don't remember very much from this

it's a manga made by CLAMP, arguably one of the most successfull and famous mangaka/mangaka group of all time, art is REALLY good but not as good as cardcaptor sakura clear card. Tho tbf shoujo mangas have always been on the front of art in manga, and in general in the front of almost everything, so it makes sense that xxxHolic, being a seinen, is a little bit more chill in that aspect

While the structure it has isn't episodic, it just kinda decides to go on indefinitively until it decides the manga has gone on for long enough that they start tying everything together and finish the manga

the story is about spirits, and the way it's executed it gives this feel of a traditional story, something you may actually see in real mythology, just adapted to a modern setting

I don't really have much else to say, I read it, I enjoyed it, I don't have many thoughts about it

placed in B rank

1. Dricam!!
2. Youchien Wars

~Yeah yeah they're both shounen Jump+ but I highly recommend the 2nd one.
~1st is finished while the 2nd is still publishing.

CLICKMACHINE wrote:

1. Dricam!!
2. Youchien Wars

~Yeah yeah they're both shounen Jump+ but I highly recommend the 2nd one.
~1st is finished while the 2nd is still publishing.

Will do both expecting to enjoy neither

Aharen-san wa Hakarenai

the more I think about it the worse it becomes, it's not good as a romance, it's not good as a comedy, it's not good as a romcom, or even as a typical chill school anime

This is a romcom school anime about a guy who meets a girl. And like most of those shows, there is a gimmick to the girl, and that is that as the title says, she's indecipherable, meaning she's basically expresionless. Expresionless characeres aren't nothing new in anime, they're a very common trope as it's considered to be very cute. It's seen as a cute, for some reason expresionless characters give the urge to protect them.

For this type of anime, that gimmick is lame, not only because it's not particullary original, which is actually not something I care about that much in this type of anime, but because it doesn't bring anything new to the table. Romcom anime already work a lot with missunderstandings to make comedy and the plot advance. So framing it as something new and unique to this anime just feels disingenuous.

Also, it generally doesn't even make that much sense?, because the main character is the only one that can really understand the girl, and they're also as expresionless, so uhhhhhhhhh idk. Also when they do understand them wrong which is a lot of times it's mainly because of the protagonist daydreaming situations that are clearly not the case.

Still, if it's just as good as not having a gimmick that would make it average, not bad. If I give you something and then take it away it should theoretically be the same as not having it in the first place. But this isn't the only flaw I see in this anime, I think my biggest problem with it is that it's just really, really, really poorly written

the plot is contrived as fuck, and not in the funny comedic way, I mean that characters motivations or personalities are writen, used as a plot device and then forgotten. For example, the main character talks to the girl in episode 1 because they want to be a popular guy. That plot point is abandoned started episode 2. It never gets brought up again, we never see them trying to make more friends, no nothing.

Another example of that is the girl being extremely quiet. There is a whole segment of trying to get to communicate with her that just leads to everything failing for whatever reason. But after the joke is done, they just forget about it, the character suddenly develops super hearing (i'm not kidding), and they can now talk to each other fine. After that this is completely forgotten, The superhearing is never mentioned again, every other character can hear them well, until one scene in the middle of the anime that once again use that to force a situation and then again forget about it.

You can't just make character traits appear only when they're convenient to you. That's just lazy writting. Also you may say "ohhhhhh it's a romcom anime you're not supposed to think that hard about it every anime does something like that" and no they don't, most animes are well written in that regard, also allowing things to be worse just because it's comedy or because your're just meant to find it comfortable rather than deep or whatever is such a shit mentality, there are no excuses for bad writting.

This anime also constantly baits for social media engagement. They literally copy the chika dance trying to go viral, they force clippable moments and talks about the trending thing such as fidget spinners, can't say those segments aged well.

I also mentioned that as a romance I think it's bad, not only because the character writting is weak as I said, but also, I never really felt much romantic tension between the two protagonists?, the female protagonist is basically a child, it's small, cute, to be protected and cared for, and the male protagonist does that. So it feels more like a brother/sister relationship, platonic love, so when they actually make advances it kinda feels from out of nowhere.

Those same advances are also not projected in the best way, because once again, they don't know how to make that part engaging, so they purpousely cut scenes to cut key details so that we the viewer wouldn't know and try to hold that tension and mistery for two episodes and I just don't get that move. And again, "other animes do it!", not really because this is a complete change on the POV of the anime. We had always seen the anime from the lens of the male protagonist and then it randomly decided you wouldn't do that anymore because we can't find a way for the anime to be good without completely killing any traces of consistency this anime may have had

Placed in D tier.

--------

nothing else to watch
haven't started to read

Dricam!!

bad

Dricam is a vertical manga published by shounen jump about racing, it was distributed in digital format first, physical second (if it even exists i've not checked), so it's made with phones in mind.

The plot of dricam is that there is this girl who is really good at driving and racing and drifting who gets into college and joins the drifting club. Drifting is a different sport than racing, the goal is drifting is just doing that, the most perfect drifts that you can.

There is a lot of pararellism here to initial D, the protagonist is a naturally good driver that comes out of nowhere and floors the pros by having really cool drift, but lacks a good vehicle and general theory and knowledge about cards and the sport they're participating in. I think one of the first races in the manga is actually a intial D type chase race.

One of the biggest differences and one of the first things dricam does to differentiate itself from initial D is having the protagonist lose a race. For context in initial D fujiwara is a force of nature, he's actually such a accidently badass and almost intimidating figure that takes up insanely gimmicky races that lead to almost certain death and comes out on top without thinking much of it. Dricam isn't aiming to be that style of story, it's a lot more light, a lot les intense, this is not a bad thing

the problem is when they try to make this plot of self improvement and grinding sport animes tend to have, there is no training arc when you're already on the top. So when they actually do try to create some tension during some races or whatever it just doesn't work out

The manga also takes a lot of time to get started?, because of the tone and the pacing you would be forgived if you thoguht it was a cgdct adjacent manga during the first half of the manga, whicl just makes the second half feel a lot weaker

One thing I found ver strange about this manga is the unusual lack of cars. I don't mean that they don't drive cars, they do, but all of the models and brand are censored, which is VERY VERY strange to see in any media about racing. People LOVE comparing and talking about the real life cars that they drive in stuff like this, they're almost as important as the characters. Again, the A86 Trueno is as legendary as takumi fujiwara. I'm not personally really into car so I don't really care that much but I feel not including brands and real life models is shooting yourself in the foot.

About the art, it's full color, but it's not particullary pretty. The coloring exists but it's nothing out of this world.

Now, as I said this is vertical, this is made with phones in mind, that changes A LOT of things. Reading vertical is a lot more dynamic, there isn't a distinction between pages, you just keep scrolling, it gives more energy, but in doing so you're sacrificing the big shocking full spreads. It's a lot more impactful to flip a page and see the big drawing than to slowly scroll to it. Vertical is also more limiting than regular, as there is less space to draw stuff, painting a landscape in vertical is a lot more difficult and generally worse looking than doing the same in horizontal

Paneling also takes a big hit, as it's basically inexistent, you have the drawings and then the dead white space to indicate a split between the drawings. I've not really seen paneling or art that original in vertical, much less in this manga.

Also, noticed that this is the same author as the next manga you requested, let's see how much they improved since this

Placed in D tier

--------------

next: Youchien Wars (Manga)

Review Button City (game)

roshan117 wrote:

Review Button City (game)

this?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1273750/Button_City/

Gonna put in a couple I found in my liked ones:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/40052/Great_Pretender

https://myanimelist.net/anime/35737/Pluto

Oh, and the Ibelin documentary

TeeArctic1 wrote:

Gonna put in a couple I found in my liked ones:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/40052/Great_Pretender

https://myanimelist.net/anime/35737/Pluto

Oh, and the Ibelin documentary

i'm pretty sure I have already done those two, and I don't cover documentaries as I don't like talking about non-fiction here, may watch on my own time tho, seems interesting

Patatitta wrote:

roshan117 wrote:

Review Button City (game)

this?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1273750/Button_City/

also, will assume this is right and start it this weekend

Patatitta wrote:

TeeArctic1 wrote:

Gonna put in a couple I found in my liked ones:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/40052/Great_Pretender

https://myanimelist.net/anime/35737/Pluto

Oh, and the Ibelin documentary

i'm pretty sure I have already done those two, and I don't cover documentaries as I don't like talking about non-fiction here, may watch on my own time tho, seems interesting

Patatitta wrote:

roshan117 wrote:

Review Button City (game)

this?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1273750/Button_City/

also, will assume this is right and start it this weekend

Cried at the documentary, really recommend it.

Anyhow, in that case, how about:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/46102/Odd_Taxi

https://myanimelist.net/anime/22789/Barakamon

https://myanimelist.net/anime/1210/NHK_ni_Youkoso

And the games Evoland and Evoland 2

already seen all those 3, will write about them whenever I feel like it (so maybe tonight or something, I want to get some things down in the day before I stop and write) i'm down to play evoland, I watched a playthrough as a kid of 1

Odd Taxi

kino

This anime is about a guy who drives a taxi and just meets very interesting people in the way, with everything building up to a central mistery. This is not the first story about taxies or the first with that general story structure, but odd taxi may do it the best

the conversation and dialogue in odd taxi feel very real, even with the characters that have very marked personalities, they feel plausible, but I would say a lot of that feeling is carried because of the protagonist

in many ways, the protagonist of odd taxi just acts as a observer, you could compare them to kino from kino no tabi in that regard, they are a not too upbeat individual and is not too judgamental, he just gives space to everyone else to express themselves, which in the context of the story works to build this portrait of the world. In this case them driving a taxi is just the best job narratively speaking, as you're just meant to drive, and the passangers just tells you their whole life.

It's also set in the modern day, which I think also has a strong element of charm, a lot of modern shows who try to talk about modern issues kinda fall through?, it's probably because we're living in it right now that it feels difficult to really represent it. When it's done wrong you get shows like oshi no ko, who's commentary on modern society feels more like a hook to bait viewers in rather than anything too substantial. In that show every real element is exaggerated in a way that doesn't really reflect society, yet odd taxi is able to make comments about our society in a way that feels more effective in real by just having that more relaxed and borderline melancholic atmosphere

Then you have the twist, what a GOOD twist oh my fucking god that is how you do it unironically top 5 twists in anything i've seen. When you watch something like fight club, and then see the ending you are surprised, the story makes sense when recontextualized, but it doesn't hit as strong as odd taxi, because odd taxi plays with your preconcived notions of the medium, it plays into certain tropes, it plays into the fact that anime logic is not 1/1 with reality. All of the hits are there, and they are VERY noticeable, way more than the hints for most twists, but they can hide it plain sight by just going "oh yeah most anime do that to make the story work you just got to hold your disbelief" and then it hits you with it and it's so fucking good

Placed in A rank

----------------

Barakamon

I really respect this anime

Barakamon is a slice of life anime about a frustrated caligraphy artist who kinda gets into artist block who moves temporarily to a small rural island where they end up taking care of a kid

Like sport anime, in slice of life, you don't need to be previously invested in the matter at hand to enjoy it. In slice of life it's probably even better if you're not invested in it beforehand, because they also tend to be very educative on the matter at hand, in this case traditional japanese caligraphy. But even beyond that, if you finish the anime without caring or really understanding caligraphy, that is fine, because it also has deep symbolic meaning

The caligraphy is a device for the protagonist to be stressed out, to be obsessed with work, which are in reality the main themes of the anime. Caligraphy is also a artistic medium, which mains they don't really have to worry that much about deadlines. You can do caligraphy in a very short ammount of time, the point is for it to be good. Another aspect of caligprahy being artistic is that the personality and emotional state of the protagonist is apparent on the brush strokes. As the anime progresses, and they grow as a person, that is reflected in the art.

The island that he moves in works as a relaxing and way lower energy environment than the big city, and I agree that it's a really beautiful place, ut I don't think that is what heals them as a person. The island is a small community, what makes them grow as a person is not the environment, is the fact that they're forced to interact with other people, forced to care for a kid. Such wonderful people as the people in the anime do exist in the big city, but they have never experienced it because they didn't have a incentive to talk to them. The culture of the big city is different, specially in japan, where it's notoriously antisocial

that broandens their horizons, makes them challenge a lot of their own beliefes and values, and what is what makes it growth, not the environment, it's the social relationships

Not my favourite slife of life but I can't deny it's really well written. A rank

-------------

Welcome to the N.H.K

Unironically amazing use of comedy, they knew what they were doing

NHK is about this guy who is a hikikomori, and then there is this girl who tries to help him overcome to their bad lifestyle. The anime at first is presented as a comedy, and it works. Hikikomori, while cruel, it's a funny concept. We point and laugh at hikikomori, because their life habits are absurd from our point of view.

Some of the reasons this happens is because when you become a hikikomori you become disconnected from the world, you lose a lot of your values and culture only to adapt certain radicalized ideals imported from the internet. This is apparent on the protagonist in NHK by the conspiracy theories they believe. They have been led to believe in that vision of the world, and they really don't know any better

Comedy in NHK works to soften us. It's like a romantic comedy, the comedy softens you up so then the romance can hit all that much harder. Yes, we're laughing at the protagonist, but believe it or not, we're also gaining appreciation for it, we don't consider them a bad person because you know, we like seeing them on screen. As the anime progresses we're more willing to engage with them on a equal level

the anime gradually loses it's comedy until it just becomes a very depressing drama. A lot of characters are introduced that live similar lifes to the protagonist at the start of the anime but you're no longer laughing. It draws a amazing picture on hikikomoris and the ugly part of internet culture, about ideology and escapism

That same technique of comedy but not is actually featured on some of my favourite movies, specially love exposure and brazil (1985).

I could write more but it's been a hour of typing all of this out and i'm tired, going to (re)watch shaolin soccer in vc now. Great anime, placed in A tier also

-----------

will start button city tomorrow, evoland 1 and 2 after I finish that one.

also the soundstrack of the anime is fire listen to this

Rate Fuwa Fuwa Spring Storm (it's a great album)

BluePyTheDeer_ wrote:

Rate Fuwa Fuwa Spring Storm (it's a great album)

I don't do music as it says on the OP

Youchien Wars

worse than their previous ngl

This is a action-comedy manga published by shounen jump. it's about borderline gang wars circulating around a kindergarten. The plot sounds insane, and that is the main hook of the manga. But the novely wears off fast

yes, the first volume or two can be funny, most of it's comedy is based on the surprise element, for example a character randomly pulling a gun killing someone, when you expected a fight or more character developement (like that on efamous indiana jones scene).

The problem is that it doesn't really refresh it's library of jokes often, so they kinda make the same jokes over, and over, and over again. You may say "ah it's just a bit every comedy thing has a joke that they just repeat over and over", but that only works when that is bundled with regular, fresh jokes. Every joke in a this manga is a bit, and after 13 volumes it gets kinda boring. It does hurt to see a new joke be made only for it to be repeated 3-4 times after.

Art is way better than in dricarm, but it's still not peak, art reminded me of kagurabachi.

Placed in D rank

--------

need to start button city

Patatitta wrote:

roshan117 wrote:

Review Button City (game)

this?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1273750/Button_City/

Yes, this one.

roshan117 wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

roshan117 wrote:

Review Button City (game)

this?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1273750/Button_City/

Yes, this one.

already started it, it's honestly surprisingly good

Button City

this game is as cute point and click game where you're a kid living in a utopia where everything is cutesy and fun and no pain exists and also everyone recycles and the cars are electric. You have a group of friends and mainly hang out around an arcade, the game revolves that arcade

the game purpouse is to be relaxing, comfortable, and dopamine inducing, the plot is very low stakes. While the game basically is very childish, I wouldn't say they're the target audience. I feel the story in a way is too tranquil to really appeal to that demographic?

I don't know, this is a game that in many ways plays with nostalgia, but not nostalgia for what you actually lived through, but a fantasized nostalgia, of a romanticized childhood that I can say with certainty no one has really lived. Living in a small house in a city with american style architecture except that it's a good city to live in and going as a kid as an arcade where the main game is a MOBA and living child cartoon level adventures

for the purpouse of the game, this works great, but I feel it's important to realize that thi was not your experience in life. With the internet and the americentrism of the internet it's easy to forget that, seeing "nostalgiacore" on the internet and feeling the need to relate

In this game there are a a few minigames, a MOBA one, a racing game one, and a rhythm game one, the rhythm game one is very simplistic, but the other 2 are really well designed, in the racing one there is snaking and the game incentivices you to discover how to snake which feels great, probably doesn't have that much depth to it but it works game for the reduced length of this game

the MOBA one is just kinda crazy, the map is interestingly design, the respawn system that basically kills spawncamping, it's actually a really solid game that if it had a little bit more content I could see it being a actual videogame

my only complaint is that the sidequest are kinda too fetch heavy?, outside that great game, placed in A tier

------

next: evoland

since you enjoyed metro last light, would you be willing to do exodus?

Exodus is fun

burgernfat wrote:

since you enjoyed metro last light, would you be willing to do exodus?

can I do metro 1 first and that way I finish all the metro

Metro last light's FOV makes me nausious.

Iirc even at max FOV it's at like 60 something. Terrible FOV.

Patatitta wrote:

burgernfat wrote:

since you enjoyed metro last light, would you be willing to do exodus?

can I do metro 1 first and that way I finish all the metro

i personally havent played 2033 so according to this thread's rules i cant suggest it but if you want to play it i'm not gonna stop you

burgernfat wrote:

Patatitta wrote:

burgernfat wrote:

since you enjoyed metro last light, would you be willing to do exodus?

can I do metro 1 first and that way I finish all the metro

i personally havent played 2033 so according to this thread's rules i cant suggest it but if you want to play it i'm not gonna stop you

yeah i'm going to play it, will list them both

I played 2033, its uh not good but essential for the story

Evoland

Good game, as a history of videogames it is lacking, but as a fun experience, it delivers

Evoland is a RPG videogame where you start in a very retro era of videogames, and you slowly go unlocking new features that in a way mimicks the actual growth and technological advances in videogames. So you first just move on a 3d space, then you unlock sound, then you unlock better graphics, etc.

This history of videogames as I say is lacking, there isn't much historical rigour if not any, this is apparent from the first moment of the videogame, where you walk right to a chest which unlocks walking left. There wasn't a moment in videogame history where you could walk right but not left. There order of unlocks and events is not accurate to reality.

But even if this is the way the game is marketed, this is not personally the way I percieved or played the videogame, and that is because the actual gameplay structure and gameplay loop of this videogame is very similar to DLC quest, a game that was also released around the same time as evoland that features a similar premise where you start with very little mechanics and go unlock them as the game progresses

from that point of view, the game is fun, it's short and it always keep a sense of relevance since every few minutes you're unlocking something new

The game is mainly divided into two gameplay styles, a FF7 clone, and a zelda clone which ends up being a diablo clone, for the diablo scenario they also mixed in MMO jokes in their equipement

I think the jokes landed, they were pretty funny

I enjoyed, placed on A tier

-----

next: evoland 2

https://myanimelist.net/anime/49938/Ame_wo_Tsugeru_Hyouryuu_Danchi

Do you already watch it ? If no, then i req this

reffty_gag wrote:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/49938/Ame_wo_Tsugeru_Hyouryuu_Danchi

Do you already watch it ? If no, then i req this

1- you can see if i've seen a anime or not by looking at my MAL which is on my signature
2- you already requested this, I already covered it, look at the OP, it's in there

bocchi the rock

Patatitta wrote:

reffty_gag wrote:

https://myanimelist.net/anime/49938/Ame_wo_Tsugeru_Hyouryuu_Danchi

Do you already watch it ? If no, then i req this

1- you can see if i've seen a anime or not by looking at my MAL which is on my signature
2- you already requested this, I already covered it, look at the OP, it's in there

oh shit, my bad

Scyla wrote:

bocchi the rock

already covered

Patatitta wrote here:

would have liked the railgun character as i'm actively watching the anime rn

roll all

I'm recommending the anime.

By the way, did you know that a new season has been announced?

Behrauder wrote:

Patatitta wrote here:

would have liked the railgun character as i'm actively watching the anime rn

roll all

I'm recommending the anime.

By the way, did you know that a new season has been announced?

yes, I know, also I will review it whenever I finish season 3 so between today and tomorrow

also, update on evoland 2: i'm working on it

Uhh checked my steam library, think these are some of those I found

Night in the Woods
Ori and the Blind Forest
This War of Mine
Bastion
Shovel Knight
Getting Over It (I have to inflict at least a little agony)

TeeArctic1 wrote:

Uhh checked my steam library, think these are some of those I found

Night in the Woods
Ori and the Blind Forest
This War of Mine
Bastion
Shovel Knight
Getting Over It (I have to inflict at least a little agony)

out of those I accept night in the wood, this war of mine, and bastion, since I have not much to say about gameplay centric games (tho i've already played ori, shovel knight and getting over it LOL), out of those, I have already completed night in the woods, soooo


---------------

Night in the woods

really good

Night in the woods is a game that I wouldn't really know how to describe with a genre. There is no real gameplay, you just walk around and talk to people. It's a narrative focused game first and it shows

the game is about a university students who drops out and returns to her decadent small american town, where she reunites with her old group of friends and then shit happens

The plot is very introspective, it's entirerily surrounding the protagonist psyche and the systems at hand that led her to that situation. The protagonist of night in the woods is very much kind of an asshole, however, the longer you play the game the more you understand why she acts like that, it doesn't imply that it's justified or the correct thing to do but you do understand her. Even when the plot gets crazier later, everything can be understood and taken as a metaphor, a representation of herself and her wellbeing

The way the dialogue is written feels very natural, and I would attribute it to a writing trend that has taken over indie gaming that maybe you could trace back to undertale. Whenever you play a AAA. Since forever, whenever you read a book or watch a movie, that dialogue isn't 1:1 what would be said IRL. It is more poetic, it is more contrived to keep the plot going, but if you look at night in the woods you would find the dialogue more raw, and that is because it doesn't take inspiration from the way dialogue is written in novels and films, but on how we communicate over the internet

this gives the dialogue a much different feel. It's sloppier it's dumber it uses less complex vocabulary but that is what makes it feel real. The game is also very slice of life-ish, as the game is just about the protagonist trying to live her daily life in peace and trying to find her way forward in life, so there isn't that constant tension of "oh we need to have this character just do exposition dialogue oh we need to make the protagonist say this to advance the plot"

placed in A rank, really great videogames, will update the tier list in a few hours as I can't do so rn

----------

still playing evoland 2, i'm close to getting the fragment of time so you can locate in what part of my playthrough I am rn

I have another one for you! Aqua Teen Hunger Force!

Offdensen wrote:

I have another one for you! Aqua Teen Hunger Force!

12 seasons no thank you

Patatitta wrote:

Offdensen wrote:

I have another one for you! Aqua Teen Hunger Force!

12 seasons no thank you

You don't have to go in order at all, the show has no plot really