• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Digimon Turns 20 Today. Let's celebrate the greatest series on earth

P

Professor Beef

Banned
arigato said:
What were the best Digimon games? I'm really interested in getting Cyber Sleuth and eventually Hackers Memory as long as the reviews are positive.
Click to expand...
Digimon World 1 has (IMO) aged terribly and isn't very fun if you're looking for an RPG. Others like it because it's like the actual Digivice game, but it's not my cup of tea. Plus it's confusing as hell if you're not using a guide.

World 2 is an RPG, but graphically its aged worse than any of the games I think lol. I remember it being fairly janky, but it's been a good decade+ since I touched it.

World 3 just absolutely completely sucks. There's a good Pokemon clone buried somewhere in there, but it's underneath tons of questionable (at best) design decisions that ruin the experience. I could go on and on about how much I despise it, but that's probably not what you're looking for. :p

World 4 is down there with 3. It tried to latch onto the X-Men Legends wave of success that a lot of devs were chasing after during that time period, but it didn't do so well. The Digivolving mechanic however, while very bad, did pave the way for the future games to "fix" it.

Digimon World DS/Dawn/Dusk were, until Cyber Sleuth, the best Digimon games in general. It took elements from Pokemon and Dragon Quest and carved its own identity in the process. Very straightforward JRPG with plenty of depth that's easy to understand.

Cyber Sleuth is the best one so far, if you're looking for a traditional JRPG. Mechanically, it feels like a direct sequel/upgrade to the DS games. Story-wise it has nothing to do with them, so you don't have to worry about playing the previous games. AFAIK there's no difference between the Vita/PS4 versions aside from DLC availability (someone could probably chime in because I still don't quite understand the availability issues).

The most recent game, Digimon World Next Order, is to Digimon World 1 as Cyber Sleuth is to the DS games. I haven't played it since I don't like World 1, but it looks fantastic tbh and is something you should dive into if you liked World 1 in any way.

EDIT: oop, new page, have one of my favorite censor moments:

klPt99O.jpg
 
C

Chaos2Frozen

Member
I really, REALLY, want another Tamer type story.

I don't mean specifically another Tamer Anime, but another story that does the balancing act of a 'dark' storyline for kids. I want to experience another D-Reaper arc.

And it's so easy to make it relevant! The internet is one of the darkest places in the world lol. Cyber Sleuth was in the right direction, they just need to go a little further.... Add a little bit more Evangelion mindfuckery....
 
P

Pluto

Member
I used to love Digimon, I watched it all the time back when it originally aired.

Digimon Adventure was awesome, a true classic
Digimon Adventure 02 had some good ideas but was also weird as fuck
Digimon Tamers was once again awesome
Digimon Frontier was decent but I missed them having Digimon partners.
Digimon Savers was okay
Digimon Xross ... I've never even watched it.

I really want to see Adventure tri but I'm waiting until it's finished, the long wait between movies kills all momentum for me.
 
U

Usobuko

Banned
Digimon Season Ranking

1 > 4 = 5 = 3 > 2


Paper Sparrow said:
For those interested in the 20th anniversary V-pets, the 2nd wave will be up for preorder later today in Japan. Since it's Premium Bandai exclusive, you'll need to order through an intermediary.

dyFF4Oa.jpg
Click to expand...

Man, kinda want.

I have quite a lot of these when I was a kid.

Crimsonlink said:
Every single digimon series has had one amazing hype song or more with the exception of Xros Wars Hunters.

Tamers songs make up a good portion of my music player list lol. Biggest Dreamer and Card Slash are staples.
Click to expand...

All the evolution songs from 1 to 5 are great. As a kid, they were really inspiring.
 
C

Chaos2Frozen

Member
I have songs from the first three seasons, none afterwards.

In order of preference (but very close margins)

1. Butter-Fly (S1 OP)
2. Biggest Dreamer (S3 OP)
3. One Vision (Bio Merge)
4. Beat Hit (DNA)
5. Slash (Card Slash)
6. Brave Heart (S1/S2 Digivolve)
7. EVO (S3 Digivolve)
8. Target ~akai shougeki~ (S2 OP)
9. Break Up (Armor)
 
M

MaximumSpider

Banned
arigato said:
What were the best Digimon games? I'm really interested in getting Cyber Sleuth and eventually Hackers Memory as long as the reviews are positive.
Click to expand...
Cyber Sleuth and DS/Dusk&Dawn are the best you're going to get unless you like the gameplay of the world games.
I don't know, I was done with Next Order after putting in 20 hours and only just maling it to chapter 2. I think I'm just garbage when it comes to the life sim.
 
woopWOOP

woopWOOP

Member
20th anniversary image is neat, altho most of the main characters sure look a lot like Taichi

I've only seen random chunks of the first show and small chunks of the sequel more than a decade ago, all in weird dubs and probably censored. I remember really liking it tho. It had this villain of the week format, but with this continuous adventure story built around it. I remember this giant whale mon dying and these two goofy villain characters biting the dust and although I wasn't paying much attention I knew this was some more serious shit than your average Pokemon episode. I've never seen the show in order and I kind of want to now.
Apparently other shows get a lot darker? Digimon genocide, wtf? Okay, now I'm really curious

Also Butterfly is a great opening and is one of few anime tunes I bothered to put on my mp3 player to jam out to once in awhile.
 
C

CrimsonN0

Member
Chaos2Frozen said:
I have songs from the first three seasons, none afterwards.

In order of preference (but very close margins)

1. Butter-Fly (S1 OP)
2. Biggest Dreamer (S3 OP)
3. One Vision (Bio Merge)
4. Beat Hit (DNA)
5. Slash (Card Slash)
6. Brave Heart (S1/S2 Digivolve)
7. EVO (S3 Digivolve)
8. Target ~akai shougeki~ (S2 OP)
9. Break Up (Armor)
Click to expand...
Man, Digimon does have some pretty good music.
Also, out of habit of never deleting anything and just transferring everything from one computer to another, it looks like I still have a strangely large amount of digimon music...for some reason I have a song sung by Etemon.
Also, all these character singles and duets...man, I guess, there's actually a lot that are hit or miss.
 
UberTag

UberTag

Member
Kalentan said:
When do we get Tamers 2?

Need to start my yearly re-watch soon.
Click to expand...
Prologue said:
latest


I want to believe
Click to expand...
Lynx_7 said:
As good as that fanart looks my heart tells me Toei just wouldn't be able to do it any justice these days. Like, Tri started alright as a neat little throwback to the original but these last few episodes have been increasingly disappointing. I don't think a Tamers sequel would fare much better. If anything, a proper Tamers sequel would be even harder to pull off correctly.
Click to expand...
Chaos2Frozen said:
I really, REALLY, want another Tamer type story.

I don't mean specifically another Tamer Anime, but another story that does the balancing act of a 'dark' storyline for kids. I want to experience another D-Reaper arc.

And it's so easy to make it relevant! The internet is one of the darkest places in the world lol. Cyber Sleuth was in the right direction, they just need to go a little further.... Add a little bit more Evangelion mindfuckery....
Click to expand...
Any chance they could drag Chiaki Konaka out of pseudo-retirement? He'd easily do a Tamers sequel justice.
Hell, I doubt I'd watch it without him involved.
 
1

1upsuper

Member
Is Next Order the best World game? I love monster raising sims but only ever played the more traditional JRPG Digimon games.
 
T

TheOasis

Member
I've loved the Digimon series ever since I first came across the original adventure series. I watched the English dubs first and the original Japanese versions of 01, 02, tamers and parts of frontier and savers over the years. Needless to say, I consider the Japanese version superior as they portray the vision of the creators more accurately (depending on the sub) and then there's the fact that the English dubs replace the iconic music with generic pieces which is a damn crime if you ask me.

Here's how I'd rank the series, from best to worst: Adventure > Tamers > 02 > Savers > Frontier > Xros Wars (bailed at death generals arc). I haven't watched Appli monsters.

I re-watched Adventure 01, my favourite season, recently (mostly due to tri) and it definitely holds up even though there's some pacing issues early on (later episodes don't have this problem and are pretty great).

Chaos2Frozen said:
I have songs from the first three seasons, none afterwards.

In order of preference (but very close margins)

1. Butter-Fly (S1 OP)
2. Biggest Dreamer (S3 OP)
3. One Vision (Bio Merge)
4. Beat Hit (DNA)
5. Slash (Card Slash)
6. Brave Heart (S1/S2 Digivolve)
7. EVO (S3 Digivolve)
8. Target ~akai shougeki~ (S2 OP)
9. Break Up (Armor)
Click to expand...

Well, my preferences are quite different to yours. For me the order is like so: EVO > Brave Heart > Biggest Dreamer > Break Up > Butterfly > Slash > Beat hit > Target > One Vision.

However, my top 3 are interchangable depending on how I'm feeling on the day lol.
 
V

Verelios

Member
JeffZero said:
How's the new show? And how far along are those tri specials?

Savers > Tamers > Adventure > Frontier = Xros Wars > Adventure 02 IMO.
Click to expand...
Very good list if you don't include the second season of Xros Wars, it's pretty much what I think too. Savers is the GOAT, no comparison.

Edit: Just watched episode 54 of Adventure 1...going to have to reinvent my list, kick everything down and remember why I loved Digimon so much to begin with while trying not to cry.
 
T

TMaakkonen

Member
1upsuper said:
Is Next Order the best World game? I love monster raising sims but only ever played the more traditional JRPG Digimon games.
Click to expand...

It probably is, as it streamlines a lot of bullshit, but original game does have this yet to be achieved again charm. However, without a guide, original game is so wonky, its likely that only those who grew up with it love it to death.

A lot of anime rankings here? Might as well try:

Adventure > Tamers > 02 > Frontier

Appmon and Tri are unfinished, but so far I’d say Appmon is below Tamers and Tri is probably gonna be either just bit better than 02 or worse.
 
G

GetDigitized

Member
TMaakkonen said:
It probably is, as it streamlines a lot of bullshit, but original game does have this yet to be achieved again charm. However, without a guide, original game is so wonky, its likely that only those who grew up with it love it to death.

.
Click to expand...

You only need a digivolution guide for DW1, the rest of the game you can figure out, unless you're going for 100%.

I agree on next order not matching the original, it improved in some areas and is worse in a lot of others.
Negatives:
Fishing is literally pressing x with no interaction, quests are fetch quests & the level system for enemies is confusing at first.

Positives :
Digivolving doesn't require a guide, better graphics (although the camera angle sucks), much larger selection of digimon. Town building on top to digimon recruitment.

I think it comes down to motivation and inspiration. The first game was developed when there were only v-pets, no anime and 3d video games were a recent innovation. It feels like the developers genuinely had a passion to make an great game.
Next order lacks creativity and seeks to feed on nostalgia android felt more rigid, they didn't want to experiment or do anything unique with it.
 
R

RalchAC

Member
Man, Adventure is timeless. I watch it once every year and I love it every time I watch it. It's one of the best shows for kids ever done and I absolutely adore the symbolism behind the crests.

Planning on buying Hacker Memory next year, and I may bite and get Next Order too.
 
T

The Shadow Knight

Member
Mortemis said:
can someone explain to me how the hell do I feel nostalgia for the digimon opening in japanese even though as as a kid I watched it in english, wtf

anyways, is Savers actually good? stopped watching digimon after frontier (other than tri rn), and I'm always down for some good digimon
Click to expand...

I experience the same. In my case I'm pretty sure it's because I've watched the sub a good number of times at this point. It's not so much that I'm nostalgic for the sub, but that I've come to associate the nostalgic feelings for the Dutch dub(my OG version) with the sub as well.
 
R

Ravelle

Member
Digimon remains great.

The games are pretty fantastic as well.

Some of my favorites are Digimon World (PSX) & Digimon World Dusk & Dawn (NDS)

Digimon New Order tried really hard to be a successor to Digimon World but they cut some corners that prevented it from being a perfect sequel. Like it was mainly trial and error and you needed a specific and strong enough digimon to progress the story, a lot of reincarnations were needed to beat story bosses.

I really want a sequel to dusk and dawn, it didn't have 3D models but had a massive amount of digimon, big evolution trees, armor digivolutions, DNA digivoluions, fusions, parameters you needed to have before you could get that really strong Digimon.

The Digimon Farm was really cool in which you could store your digimon, it's a the PC in pokemon but instead of them collecting dust you could train them in specific stats and you could see them walking around.

And like most Digimon Games it had an actual story.

Oh and Cybersleuth was a fantastic game, finished it and have a complete team of 7 Great Demon Lords

Can't wait for the sequel, even if it's more a bit of the same.
 
T

TheOasis

Member
Does anyone else really like the "Royal Knights"? I've been a fan of them ever since I watched the "X-Evolution" movie. It makes me genuinely happy that they did something interesting with them recently in the Cyber Sleuth game and, by the looks of it, maybe even in Adventure Tri
with Alphamon and Hackmon being foreshadowed to have big roles in the plot.
I was disappointed in how they were handled in Frontier and Savers.

IMO, they're probably one of the best concepts in Digimon series: A group of 13 knight Digimon with godlike power that serve the god of the digital world, Yggdrasil, but with the twist that they all have their own views on how to best follow Yggdrasil's orders while also trying to balance this duty with their own personal ideals. Of course, this often leads to conflicts of interest between the knights which creates infighting and, I mean, who doesn't like mecha-like knights duking it out in flashy action scenes?

Unlike other Digimon groups like the partner Digimon throughout the series or big bads like the Dark Masters and Demon Lords the same Royal knight can be a force of good or bad depending on the situation and will gladly die a hero or a villain.

You gotta love how unique they are in the grand context of all the other Digimon out there.
 
F

freeofgreed

Member
Wow what timing. I just finished rewatching the first 3 seasons in Japanese and am playing through Cyber Sleuth right now. Overflowing with Digimon pride lol.
 
K

KuwabaraTheMan

Banned
T

Toad.T

Banned
Master Milk said:
in4lilithmon
Click to expand...

That's another thing that always stood out to me about the series: It's usage of the mythologies of other cultures to create cool looking designs. It's probably why I eventually went to SMT.

and you thought i was gonna talk about the overabundance of waifumon/husbandomon
 
I

Ithil

Member
I was big into Pokemon when the first Digimon series hit. I naturally was hostile to it as I assumed it must be a cheap clone of Pokemon, and so I reluctantly checked out an episode, expecting to and intending to hate it. It wound up being the last episode of the Devimon arc, so it ended with a big climax and a cliffhanger.

I realize now that my subconcious reaction was "What? A plot A hook? Continuous story?", all I knew was I went in intending to hate it and wound up kind of wanting to see what happened next. I ended up not watching more, but a few months later I caught another episode, one from right in the middle of the Vamdemon arc, the most serialized and high quality part of the whole season, so of course I wound up taping it on VHS to watch after school daily and pretty soon Pokemon was out the window as my favourite.

The key factor looking back was absolutely that Digimon actually had an ongoing storyline and character development while Pokemon had no plot and static characters, it was just standalone episodes with a repeating endless loop of seasons. I was super sad when I reached the season finale of Digimon back then and it was all over (until I went back to see the first half of the season that is) but nowadays I can understand how important it was for it to end and wrap up the plot rather than just continuing forever.

Adventure = Tamers > Adventure 02, never watched past those in spite of my huge fandom
 
T

TheLostBigBoss

Banned
I remember watching Tamers when I was a kid, and getting really confused why and how they had practically naked kids on a TV show on Saturday morning.
 
P

Pandora012

Member
Savers was the last digimon season I watched. Out of the first 5 I think season 2 and 4 were the worst for me.

Can not wait until the next digimon game comes out. 2018 is too far away.
 
G

GetDigitized

Member
Windam said:
Happy birthday, best mon series!



Never beat it as a kid. I think I got to Drill City once and then I got lost on what I had to do.
Will never beat it as an adult.
Click to expand...

Go back to it on an emulator, its still fun. Dunno what drill city is, you mean the cave at the start or the machine town?
 
C

chbrevolution

Member
Digimon will always be one of my all time favorite franchises. I'm glad I could enjoy both Pokemon and Digimon at the same time.

My rankings for the Anime are

Top tier: Adventure, Tamers, Xros Wars 1 (parts 1&2)

Good/Great: Frontier, Savers

Average: Adventure 02, Xros Wars 2 (part 3)

I'm not going to rank Appmon and Tri since they are still running.
 
F

freeofgreed

Member
KuwabaraTheMan said:
Multiple people hating on Tamers?

Have I wandered into some sort of alternate reality?
Click to expand...

I literally just finished re watching it the other day. The only issue holding Tamers back is the pacing. Unfortunately it's a big issue. The series is slooooow as fuck. Especially surprising considering it's aimed at elementary school students and compared to how fast paced the first 2 seasons were. The first arc is super slow, then things pick up around the time the Devas show up, then it slows to a crawl during the first half of the digital world arc, then it picks up again during the second half of that arc. And for the D-reaper arc, I know I'm commiting sacrilege but it didn't need to be 15 episodes long. I enjoyed it and it had some really good concepts and scenes, but it could've been done much better in half the amount of episodes (I'd argue even less than half but let's just settle with half).

Everything else about Tamers is on point. Great cast, great character development, best Digimon designs out of any season, great music, and a unique tone. Just the pacing was poor as hell.
 
T

TMaakkonen

Member
TheOasis said:
Does anyone else really like the "Royal Knights"? I've been a fan of them ever since I watched the "X-Evolution" movie. It makes me genuinely happy that they did something interesting with them recently in the Cyber Sleuth game and, by the looks of it, maybe even in Adventure Tri
with Alphamon and Hackmon being foreshadowed to have big roles in the plot.
I was disappointed in how they were handled in Frontier and Savers.

IMO, they're probably one of the best concepts in Digimon series: A group of 13 knight Digimon with godlike power that serve the god of the digital world, Yggdrasil, but with the twist that they all have their own views on how to best follow Yggdrasil's orders while also trying to balance this duty with their own personal ideals. Of course, this often leads to conflicts of interest between the knights which creates infighting and, I mean, who doesn't like mecha-like knights duking it out in flashy action scenes?

Unlike other Digimon groups like the partner Digimon throughout the series or big bads like the Dark Masters and Demon Lords the same Royal knight can be a force of good or bad depending on the situation and will gladly die a hero or a villain.

You gotta love how unique they are in the grand context of all the other Digimon out there.
Click to expand...

Design wise they are great, althought Cyber Sleuth felt like last time they really should go all out with them. Otherwise they are in danger of getting tired of.

Demon Lords are also great. Honestly, Olympos 12 is the one group I really dont care about. Whenever someone suggests to bring ALL of them, I'm never too excited about that. Probably lucky that its Royal Knights and Demon Lords that are popular ones in terms of groups.

I guess if you really think about it, a lot of RKs share somesort of draconic theme.

Alphamon's possible pre-evo is half-dragon, Omegamon's half is also half-dragon, technically Magnamon is dragon or atleast pre-evo is, Dukemon has draconic armor, Dynasmon is wyvern dragon, Gankoomon has firey dragon spirit, Jesmon looks very draconic & Ulforceveedramon and Examon are dragons. So like only 4 arent based on dragons lol.
 
A

Auxiliary Bro

Member
Man, I have such a long history with Digimon. Weird to think it's only been 20 years!

Like most, Tamers is my favourite. A lot of my friends throw the idea that it's just nostalgia around, but my dudes I hated Tamers when I was a kid. The idea that my favourite characters were just a show or whatever that cards were based on now? Awful. I ended up watching it later when I was closer to 18/19 and my GOD I adore it. Generally I think Digimon is a series of decent quality that I just like to follow, but Tamers really stands out as just a really good anime.

As for the others, well... My lack of understanding for why people like Savers rivals other people's understanding of why I like Xros Wars. Just gotta agree to disagree. I'm sure we can all agree that Xros Wars Part 3 was the hottest garbage of all time though.

I haven't kept up with the new series since the pilot was weak (which is fairly common and understandable) and I figured I'd join when it started getting good. I don't know what it's like now, but maybe I'll give it a go after this thread.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Digimon Survive | Review Thread
Analysis Review Platform
7
1K
Rambone replied
Monster Hunter 20th Anniversary website opened | Possible Announcement coming soon
News Hype
3
633
Thick Thighs Save Lives replied
MACROSS -Shooting Insight- is coming to the West on Nintendo Switch, PS5 & PS4
News
24
2K
Heimdall_Xtreme replied
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Legends of the Zone Trilogy Available Today - $40 Together, $20 Individual (Games are BC on PS5/Series, no Native Release)
2 3 4 5 6
256
17K
GinSama replied
Fallout - Series Reviews
14 15 16 17 18
898
43K
Senua replied
Top Bottom