Just recently, I shared my thoughts on why Game Freak should finally revamp the Pokémon Anime. While reading through some of the comments, I thought to myself if Anime is really a gloried infomercial or advertisement for a source material. If that were the case, would Anime necessarily lose creative merit because of this?
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The Art of Making Anime from Video Games
In a post that Kai as posted this week about how video game is adapted into a show. While I have shared my thoughts about anime adaptations and challenges involved with it, video game adaptations are a different story as the experience is not static. As adaptations of video games (excluding visual novels) become more popular as seen adaptations of The Idolmaster, Persona 4 and Neptunia, how do they achieve this while making it enjoyable? (Image Source)
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Damsel and Distress Redux – Is there a Sexism Problem in Video Games?
For a while now, I have been silent on gender issues in video games because it’s very controversial. But today, I’m going to share my thoughts about it and why the issue is overblown. At the same time, the video game industry needs to be addressed because more females are playing video games. (Image Source)
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Anime Fatigue: How I deal with it and Take a Break
Despite watching and blogging about Anime non-stop for over five years, one can eventually get fatigued from watching the same things over again. There are a few notable reasons why some people usually get tired and stop watching, which I will share along with past experience and what I do to prevent fatigue. (Image Source)
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Tamayura and the Power of Photography (With Vacation Photos)
After finishing the first season of Tamayura Hitotose and watching a few episodes of the sequel, it showed the little things of life as Sawatari Fu becomes interested into photography. While watching the show, I felt that photography has something special for the fact that photos can capture special moments in life along with having the power to change someone’s life. (Image Source)
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More on Region Locking – Why this practice needs to be abolished.
In an editorial several months ago, I criticized briefly on region locking on streams. This month, Ryu Shoji from Bulbanews wrote a good editorial on why Nintendo should go region free after Microsoft changed their DRM policy, effectively abolishing region locks. Considering that licensed Anime and streams is region locked and most Anime fans play video games, I think this will be a great topic to talk about since I am against region locking for various reasons. (Image Source)
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The Life Lessons I Learned From Watching Anime
Back in February, I shared my thoughts on why I continued to watch Anime. Still, the special thing about Anime is its ability to cover a wide range of topics and in some instances, show the little things in life. It makes me wonder, how does Anime presents this? (Image Source)
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Examining the Dark Side of the Anime Fandom – The Anime Fan Dumb
If you look at any fandom, you will bound to find obsessive fans that take things seriously and start berating people for not having the true fans or going on the rampage when the couple he/she wanted doesn’t happen. Or maybe you might come across an elitist anime fan that says your taste in Anime is crap. To me, I think an Anime Fan Dumb exists for the fact that a small percentage of the fans in the whole fandom are obsessive. (Image Source)
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Views and Thoughts on Bad Anime – Is Anime Getting Worse?
Last week, Yumeka and Froggykun discussed of about liking bad anime, which got me thinking: What makes a bad show? Last year, I shared my thoughts on what makes a good Anime. However, the other side of the quality scale is a bit more controversial. (Image Source)
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Attacking the Anime Fandom – The Negative Implications for the Anime Industry
Last week, Nintendo decided to take away monetization of videos such as reviews, Let’s Plays and reviews from their fans. While copyright law is very complex when it comes to fair use and making derivative works, attacking a fandom by taking down Youtube channels, banning fanart and sending cease and deist letters to take down fanmade games can hurt their goodwill and reputation.
While we have seen this with video games with Sega taking down Shining Force videos last year and Husbro putting an end to a fan-made My Little Pony fighting game early this year, what about Anime? Yes, it exists and there are very negative implications that can occur from fan backlash. I will focus on several reasons why companies should not attack the fans for making fan generated content and instead, should support them. (Image Source)
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Anime Blogging: Reflecting on how I evolved as a Blogger
Just recently, Yumeka and Kai reflected on how their writing changed over time. When I saw their posts, I became interested to share my experiences of writing about Anime since mine has changed quite a bit since I started blogging back in my freshmen year of college. (Image Source)
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Backlogging Anime: Why and Taking a Look Back
Several weeks ago, Kai shared his thoughts about the anime he put on his backlog. During my anime blogging career, I have picked up shows and on some occasions, get pushed to the backlog. There are many reasons I end up doing this, which I will share along with some notable Anime I backlogged. (Image Source)
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Censorship in Anime – Looking back at the Past and Why its Ineffective
When Idolmaster Shiny Festa got released in the United States, it’s apparent that they have removed swimsuits scenes from the game. When I heard about this, I got the idea to write about censorship in Anime since I knew about some pointless changes in the Pokémon anime. Besides the awkwardness, there are some reasons why they do this such as the differences in cultural values. However, some of the reasons why changing or censor some things is not acceptable in my opinion.
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The Dark Side of Male Characters – Weak-Minded Male Leads
Last week, I focused on how females are being more capable. Some may be asking, what about male characters? While I have seen a few shows with strong males such as Kritsugu Emiya from Fate Zero or even Ledo from Gargantia, most of the romantic harem comedies or slice of life have weak beta male characters. I blame myself for watching a lot of these shows, but there are some things that really bother me a lot about them. (Image Source)
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Ore no Imouto 2 Editorial – Hobbies and the Influence on Life
From the look of a timid Saori to the one we know already, this episode shows the hobbies’ everlasting effects on people as it enables them to know other people with the same interests and even become friends. (Image Source)
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Disney Princesses vs Females in Anime – The Problem with Damsel in Distress
Last weekend, I have watched Nostalgia Critic’s video on the princess hate. After watching it, I think he has a point since this trope exists in all types of media. The problem lies with Damsel in distress, which became a negative stereotype for females because it’s over usage. In particular, Disney Princesses tend to play this trope a lot, which is a bad representation of how women are portrayed in real life.
In Anime, it’s the opposite most of the time since some female characters take a bigger role. This is the main difference compared to Disney Princesses. (Image Source)
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Tiger Moms and Eagle Dads – Strict Parenting in Anime
Just recently, something has come into my mind about how parents raise their children in Anime after watching the 8th episode of Tari Tari. With the stereotype of Asian parents wanting their children to succeed such as the Tiger Mom and Eagle Dad, some of these stereotypes are also present in Anime. This is because Asian countries typically value education a lot, which is why they tend to rank high on science and math. For that, I’m going to explain what these terms mean with examples from various shows. (Image Source)
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Dog Days and the Power of Escapism in Anime
While watching Dog Days, something came into my mind for another topic to write about from Anime regarding escapism. Although I analyzed Iyashikei’s escapism along with friendship and healing last far, of course adventure/fantasy shows such as the one I have mentioned and Sword Art Online has many elements of escapism though it’s setting, characters and their abilities. I’m just fascinated how they accomplish this aspect for these genres in general, which want me analyze them and share some thoughts about it focusing on a fantasy world called Flonyard. (Image Source)
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What Makes a “Good” Anime?
In a perfect world, most fans would enjoy all the anime that gets produced. Sadly, this isn’t the case since we do not know what the show will give us until we watch it. This leaves us with the usual remark, “It gets better, I swear” which is frequently used as a defense. I’m a firm believer of that because any show can have a potential of becoming good. This leaves us with the question, what exactly makes a good anime? I will explain just that along with my experiences.
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Anime Blogging and Longevity – The Challenges Ahead
I want share some thoughts about Anime Blogosphere’s longevity since this post sparked my interest. Ever since the first Aniblog Tourney finished in 2010, good amount of blogs have died at the 1 to 2-year mark while new ones pop up. Only a handful ever passed the three years and beyond mark. There are many factors I have explained such as time management issues. However, there are other aspects that I haven’t covered, which I like to share. (Image Source)
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Iyashikei, The Art of Friendship, Escapism and Healing
In recent years, shows involving schoolgirls doing cute things have become considerably popular, especially in the second half of the 2000s. Although some people argue that these works don’t have any substance, for others, it gives a feeling of happiness and refreshment. Shows like K-ON, Hidamari Sketch, Sketchbook, Tamayura, and A Channel along with the acclaimed Aria series and Ikoku Meiro no Croisèe, which don’t set at a school setting. So, what are in these shows that give this present feeling?
Iyashikei (癒し系), which means “healing series” in Japanese is what it says on the box. It’s a genre that focuses on the lighthearted aspects of life with little to no conflict. If you look further, there are several qualities in this genre, which contributes to feeling such as the emphasis on friendship, the setting and an easy-going feeling. (Image Source)
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Nichijou and Kyoto Animation’s take on Creativity
In the past few years, the Slice of Life genre gained a lot of popularity. Many of these shows while similar have unique stories. As I explained in my editorial about the genre back in 2010, there is really no defined definition of what makes a show a Slice of Life.
In particular, Kyoto Animation has pushed few of the most popular shows of this genre. Lucky Star and K-On has a huge following for cute characters, but both of them have two different premises. The former focuses on the anime subculture and the latter, the true essence of friendship. On the other hand, Nichijou takes a spin of the genre with less emphasis on characters and more on ingenious comedy (Image Source).
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The Reason why I Anime Blogging and the Social Experiences
In the past few weeks, there has been some discussion on why fans decide to blog about Anime. It’s true that blogging takes time and dedication, but there are many reasons why people continue to do it.
For me, I have been blogging for nearly 2 years and a half now and I have my own reasons for blog. I decide to do it not for popularity, but to enhance my experience as a fan of Anime. (Image Source)
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On Taste Testing and Dropping Anime: My Anime Viewing Experiences.
Just a few days ago, a blog post at the Behind the Nihon Review had myself thinking about the usefulness of the three-episode test I have been using for the past three seasons and questioning the rationale of dropping Anime. As we all know, fans have different tastes and expectations when it comes to the shows they watch. After I took a look of the three episode taste tests and the number of shows I dropped in the past two years, its quite obvious that dropping Anime is rather difficult for myself and I haven’t found a good reason to do so (Image Source).
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