Oh hey, awesome, a video game enthusiast community! Hopefully, it isn't as retarded as GameFAQs or IGN or anything like that. I bet there will be discussions about the latest games, old favorites, and more! Maybe people here are old enough to remember the Nintendo Entertainment System? Who knows! There is one thing I am worried about... I really, REALLY, hope that people don't talk about anime nonstop, and that there is a horrible divide amongst the community over what is essentially a non-issue.
Woops.
So... Anime. I hear it is for jerks. I hear lots of people think it is terrible. I also hear that people who love anime love the exact same set of shows and nothing beyond. What, you say Cowboy Bebop was awesome? Thought Neon Genesis Evangelion was a deep, thought-provoking show? Maybe you like that Naruto show that kids seem to love these days like kids used to love Dragon Ball Z back in the day. Well, it seems like every single time anime is brought up in the Giant Bomb community, it devolves into a shitstorm of stupidity. Congrats, everybody! Those of you who hate anime sure are loud and obnoxious about how much you hate it! And those of you who love anime sure won't shut up about how much you love it! Who is the real winner in this fight for supremacy?
My Personal Opinion of Anime?
This is long and unnecessary, go straight to the next section.Honestly, I didn't give a shit about anime growing up. It was all video games and terrible B-movies for me. I took some Japanese language classes in high school because I thought it was weird that there was a Japanese language class in my high school, and boy, when I took that class, what a terrible mistake that was! Keep in mind, this was back in 2000, I didn't have the internet, and most of your memes and stupid 4chan/Genmay-related bullshit hadn't been invented yet. Yet even back in those days, all your anime fan stereotypes were represented. Japanophiles, people talking non-stop about the anime they were watching, mentioning they only took the class because they watch anime, and more! I put up with two years of that crap, and made out alright. Unlike the rest of the class, who failed out because learning a new language was too difficult, I did alright. My conversational skills are pretty awful, but my reading and listening comprehension was fine.
For the uninformed, the Super Robot Taisen franchise is a series of strategy RPGs made by Banpresto that involves series crossovers of giant robot anime. As this was the fourth game in the series, most of the shows present in the game weren't shown in America (for the most part), so I had no idea what any of these characters were. All I knew was that all the robots didn't seem to fit in with one another, except the Gundam stuff (at the time, Gundam Wing was it, I had no idea there was anything beyond that (I hated Gundam Wing)). Looking into it, I learned that most of the shows represented in the game were older giant robot shows from the 1970s and 1980s. And the reason I really got into this was because, even though I didn't give a shit about anime, loved B-movies, especially old giant monster movies like Godzilla and Gamera. Giant robots was just the next logical step.
Hooked on anime? No. I was hooked on giant robot shows. This all came at a terrible price, however. For every good show, there were several awful shows. Everything I know about anime was because I wanted to better know the stuff that was going on in these games. Unfortunately, the stuff I didn't like in the games reflected when I watched the shows. For example, I didn't like the EVA units or the characters from Evangelion when I played games featuring them. When I watched Neon Genesis Evangelion, I realized why. As a strange aside, I did love Space Runaway Ideon, which was thematically similar to Evangelion, only it was made over a decade earlier.
My opinion on anime? It has horrible fans, a terrible sub-culture, and a lot of shows seem to pander to their awfulness.
Giant Bomb Loves Anime
So you love anime and want to defend its honor in the halls of the Giant Bomb message boards? Good for you, I hope you have a sound argument to bring to the table, as defending anime is a difficult task. Wait, what are you doing? What is that? OH SHIT NAW, it's a list of "shows you think are good". What the hell is that going to do? Well, let's see what is on your list of "good shows" shall we: - Shows that were featured on Toonami; Gundam Wing, Tenchi Muyo, whatever.
- Shows that were featured on Adult Swim; Cowboy Bebop, Fullmetal Alchemist, whatever.
- Shows that were aired in Japan at 1:00 a.m. whose target demographic is shut-in otaku in their 20s and 30s, and most of it is creepy and you have to download it via the internet because no company in America will...oh wait, ADV started doing that before they folded, nevermind.
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