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[Lucumo]

People in general love it, but it's apparent two/three episodes in that every episode will boil down to an internal monologue about the same thing.

Hm, that's a shame then. I guess now it goes down even further in my list "to eventually watch".

Oh good, so it wasn't just me. I remember buying the whole TV series after watching the OVA and could not get into it. Ended up trading it in to some used place for like...2 bucks credit? Worth it.

There is also Mahou Senshi Louie/Rune Soldier which shares the setting but that's even worse...not that the OVA was really good itself, as it suffers from some typical problems from that era such as sudden jumps/skips in the story. Can't complain about the animation though and if one is a fan of D&D, it's a plus.

 

[Crimson_Echidna]

"Old man yells at cloud, claims anime was better in the 90s."

 

[caliph95]

"Old man yells at cloud, claims anime was better in the 90s."

#78

 

[Fancyarcher]

It may be that simply anime doesn't appeal to you as it once did when you were younger. Happens to everyone.

"Old man yells at cloud, claims anime was better in the 90s."

To some I'm sure it was. "Times change though", they say.

 

[petran79]

The best science fiction anime of the past couple years is Fafner Exodus.

I meant sci fi without mecha. Had heard of Fafner but never got interested. I see I have to watch the first series,the movie and then a second series, produced a decade later. Would have preferred better continuity.

Might give it a try later.

 

[shawnbuddy]

I'll yell at that cloud. Anime has definitely changed since I got into it in the early nineties. Too much moe, too many pathetic romantic fantasies and not enough adventure.

 

[phaze]

I meant sci fi without mecha.
Might give it a try later.

Harmony seems to be missing from your list.

Also, reducing Shinsekai to just "thematology" is awfully reductive. While it's an uneven series, it's a work with plethora of high points, direction, story, even animation wise.

 

[Blackleg-sanji1]

Hm, that's a shame then. I guess now it goes down even further in my list "to eventually watch".

Don't listen to that indefinitely go watch for yourself it's a really good story with some awesome Music.

 

[Lynd7]

There are a bunch of great shows/films coming out, just need to try and find it. Listen to some podcasts and you'll slowly get good shows to try. There's probably been an uptick in quality compared to say to around 2010 or so.

Also, I'm enjoying Your Lie in April, so thanks to whoever suggested it earlier.

 

[Tertullian]

Hm, that's a shame then. I guess now it goes down even further in my list "to eventually watch".

Put me in the camp that just couldn't stand the constant and repetitive monologuing, and the glacially slow plot development. I mean, I get that stuff doesn't have to constantly happen for a story to be good. But if it's gonna take ten episodes for us to even get to the next major competition, it has to be enjoyable to just hang out with the characters. And I did not find it enjoyable, because of that damn constant monologuing. It's a show that doesn't just tell rather than show, it tells and tells and tells and tells...

 

[ChamplooJones]

Anime has changed but there's still good shows out there. A few months ago I binge-watched Death Parade and I was really surprised by how much I loved it.

Also, let's not act like there wasn't crap being released during the 90s either. Just like back then you just gotta weed through the trash to get to the goods.

 

[Lev]

I'll yell at that cloud. Anime has definitely changed since I got into it in the early nineties. Too much moe, too many pathetic romantic fantasies and not enough adventure.

I felt the same way then Death Note came out when Moe was well established in anime already. Then GiTS SAC, Monster, Ergo Proxy and Psycho Pass came out too when I lost "hope".

You might not like the majority of stuff that comes out but there might be one or two new anime that comes out and interests you.

 

[Vilix]

It could use more mecha outside of Gundam. Otherwise I'm good.

 

[shawnbuddy]

I felt the same way then Death Note came out when Moe was well established in anime already. Then GiTS SAC, Monster, Ergo Proxy and Psycho Pass came out too when I lost "hope".

You might not like the majority of stuff that comes out but there might be one or two new anime that comes out and interests you.

The last one I just loved was Azumanga Daioh. Oh, and I thought the Assassination Classroom manga was fun, I guess. Didn't try the anime.

 

[casiopao]

U are not looking deep enough? The recent 3 season ago Arslan Senki is one of my fav.^_^(adapted from old novel though)

This season Shoukoku no Altair is also great for those loving political and warfare fans.^_^

 

[RangerBAD]

U are not looking deep enough? The recent 3 season ago Arslan Senki is one of my fav.^_^(adapted from old novel though)

This season Shoukoku no Altair is also great for those loving political and warfare fans.^_^

It was an adaptation of a manga that is an adaptation of an ongoing novel series, but, yeah, I loved it too. Also worth noting that the author of the books wrote LotGH. Shoukoku no Altair will hopefully turn out good. You reminded me of Banner of the Stars now. We need more of that. ; ;

 

[Astral]

Ok just watched Redline. I said cotdamn. What a gorgeous and fun movie. Fantastic dub too. What other anime movies are there that are as visually impressive as this? I already saw Sword of the Stranger years ago as well as GitS and of course Akira.

 

[Tye The Czar]

Echoing everyone else, SAO was a cool concept executed poorly, but tricked lots of people into liking it for 12 episodes. The definitive way to watch it is through the Abridged Series.

Also, disregard anyone who talks trash about Log Horizon. It's still the gold-standard for writing in an anime about MMORPGs.

But yeah. I feel the same way. I'm outgrowing a lot of anime tropes that are clearly aimed at teens or otaku.

 

[Ratrat]

Ok just watched Redline. I said cotdamn. What a gorgeous and fun movie. Fantastic dub too. What other anime movies are there that are as visually impressive as this? I already saw Sword of the Stranger years ago as well as GitS and of course Akira.

Your Name.

 

[ChasingComets]

Ok just watched Redline. I said cotdamn. What a gorgeous and fun movie. Fantastic dub too. What other anime movies are there that are as visually impressive as this? I already saw Sword of the Stranger years ago as well as GitS and of course Akira.

Everything Satoshi Kon made.

 

[petran79]

Harmony seems to be missing from your list.

Also, reducing Shinsekai to just "thematology" is awfully reductive. While it's an uneven series, it's a work with plethora of high points, direction, story, even animation wise.

Both were based on novels. I want original concepts!

Harmony as a movie was good, since it was directed by 2 animator veterans.I was focusing on TV series

Shinsekai Yori while good, unfortunately lacks cyberpunk. Because I have a soft spot for Aria, I'd rate the Neo Venetian girls above those messed up Espers. Much higher.

 

[casiopao]

It was an adaptation of a manga that is an adaptation of an ongoing novel series, but, yeah, I loved it too. Also worth noting that the author of the books wrote LotGH. Shoukoku no Altair will hopefully turn out good. You reminded me of Banner of the Stars now. We need more of that. ; ;

I am huge Avid Yoshiki Tanaka fan which is why i love promoting his series(except Tytania conclusion arc)*_*

For Shoukoku, the early part is the opposite of Arslan as it is much slower. It is on Invasion Arc that it begin going crazy good.^_^

Just think it as Kingdom but about Turkiye.^_^

 

[Vermillion]

Someone has probably said it in a 9 page thread, but like... if you liked Naruto, watch My Hero Academia.

 

[clarknova156]

Fan service is slowly ruining anime. We get a billion of those shows each year and they get 12 episodes and are gone. We get maybe 1-3 shows of quality that probably won't stick around. It sucks but that is reality. However anime is getting bigger in the west so that might change. Kinda like how consoles are huge in the west but on life support in Japan.

 

[casiopao]

Fan service is slowly ruining anime. We get a billion of those shows each year and they get 12 episodes and are gone. We get maybe 1-3 shows of quality that probably won't stick around. It sucks but that is reality. However anime is getting bigger in the west so that might change. Kinda like how consoles are huge in the west but on life support in Japan.

90s era had literally tons of fanservice anime too. It is more that u guys are not that deep into anime during that era lol.

Love Hina, Maison Ikkoku, Lum, Ranma all is literally fanservice anime bruh. And that is not counting anime like DNA2 which is also harem anime which is quite bad.(but i likey.^_^)

 

[BudokaiMR2]

Fan service is slowly ruining anime. We get a billion of those shows each year and they get 12 episodes and are gone. We get maybe 1-3 shows of quality that probably won't stick around. It sucks but that is reality. However anime is getting bigger in the west so that might change. Kinda like how consoles are huge in the west but on life support in Japan.

Yeah, as others and myself have pointed out this is just because you don't have a filter on the releases like we did when we were limited by broadcast schedules or physical media releases.

That's the reality and it's honestly not that hard to grasp. Not sure why so many people fail to grasp that aspect.

When I look back at 1990s releases, I still only find a handful of shows per year that I would consider good/great.

 

[nkarafo]

Anime has changed. It became cheaper and more mainstream. There are more cheap TV shows and less higher quality movies/OVAs. The drawings are less detailed on average, the animation is simplified and they rarely do hard to animate scenes by hand anymore, they use CGI.

Traditional good quality animation and detail in OVAs and movies is why i loved anime in the 80's/90's. Even stuff like Neon Genesis Evangelion was nice to look at despite being a TV series. Now 90% of it looks like crap, moves like crap and the designs seem to pander to the mainstream anime, fan service demographic.

"Old man yells at cloud, claims anime was better in the 90s."

Technically (animation/detail) it was. You had more OVAs and movies. They used to draw difficult and complicated scenes with strange camera angles and rotation by hand. It was a common sight in the 80's/90's but now it's rare. You mostly get crappy animation or CGI now.

 

[phaze]

Anime has changed. It became cheaper and more mainstream. There are more cheap TV shows and less higher quality movies/OVAs. The drawings are less detailed on average, the animation is simplified and they rarely do hard to animate scenes by hand anymore, they use CGI.

Traditional good quality animation and detail in OVAs and movies is why i loved anime in the 80's/90's. Even stuff like Neon Genesis Evangelion was nice to look at despite being a TV series. Now 90% of it looks like crap, moves like crap and the designs seem to pander to the mainstream anime, fan service demographic.



Technically (animation/detail) it was. You had more OVAs and movies. They used to draw difficult and complicated scenes with strange camera angles and rotation by hand. It was a common sight in the 80's/90's but now it's rare. You mostly get crappy animation or CGI now.

Vast majority of anime is hand drawn still.

And the TV stuff today looks vastly better than your average 90's anime.

 

[woopWOOP]

The great thing about these anime threads is learning about cool shows and movies I otherwise wouldn't have known about. Added like 6 more to the list, thanks!

 

[nkarafo]

And the TV stuff today looks vastly better than your average 90's anime.

I disagree completely. 80's/90's OVAs had much more detail in the cells and had more hard to animate scenes.

I don't care much for cheap TV series in any era.

 

[The First Guardian]

One of my friends who know me and is really into anime recommended me to watch The Flowers of Evil and From The New World. I haven't finished From The New World yet, but I can't believe these two animes! They're very very very very different from what I expected from animes and just plain awesome. Both are from 2010s too. Can't wait to watch more of these awesome shows.

 

[caliph95]

I disagree completely. 80's/90's OVAs had much more detail in the cells and had more hard to animate scenes.

I don't care much for cheap TV series in any era.

OVAs are not your average anime tv show to be fair

 

[Chairmanchuck]

I think thats why so many people shift from anime to manga.
I mean we get like 3 LN adaptions each season (at least thats how it feels like) and a lot of anime adaptions aimed at teenagers/Otaku, but not really that much Seinen manga adaptions.

Where is a Billy Bat adaption? Blood Alone? Asano Inio stuff? I am a Hero? Vinland Saga? Liar Game (damn, that LA adaption was horrible)? Sprite?

There is so much you could adapt and I get that maybe the demographic for anime is different than the one who reads those manga. Its just a bit sad to see that the Tatami Galaxies, Uchouten Kazokus, Monsters, Kaijis etc. are not that present.

Is it so bad? I watched some good AMV about this anime a year or so ago.

Imo the drama felt forced. It wasnt a bad show, but after a while it got tiring hearing the same thing over and over again. It really felt the whole drama was made for a "younger audience".

It may be that simply anime doesn't appeal to you as it once did when you were younger. Happens to everyone.

To me it wouldnt be that anime dont appeal to me. Its the choice of adaptions that wouldnt appeal to me. I have more than 1000 volumes of manga now and I would love to see some of those adapted. Its a bit sad to see that we get an adaption of a manga series thats on hiatus since years (Saiyuki...) or a Free clone.

 

[andythinkpad]

"Old man yells at cloud, claims anime was better in the 90s."

Actually this is not an anime thing. Almost every county not counting Hollywood has a movie gold age that last 1 decade or 2.

For example, HK in the 80s and 90s, S. Korean 00s, Japan 70s and 80s. Germany is in the 20s etc.

It's not so obvious for a larger countries like China but its very noticeable for the smaller countries. And alot of countries never got a renaissance age of cinema.

 

[nkarafo]

OVAs are not your average anime tv show to be fair

That's the main problem for me. In the 80's/90's you had lots of OVAs and more movies, now it's mostly cheap TV stuff because they want to produce more of it i suppose.

The only reason i ever liked anime in the first place was the animation/detail. That's all i care about when i watch something that is animated.

 

[Chairmanchuck]

90s era had literally tons of fanservice anime too. It is more that u guys are not that deep into anime during that era lol.

Love Hina, Maison Ikkoku, Lum, Ranma all is literally fanservice anime bruh. And that is not counting anime like DNA2 which is also harem anime which is quite bad.(but i likey.^_^)

90s fanservice where we see some boobs and pantyshots (besides those OVAs like Aika) was still much more tame than what we have now I would argue.

Nowadays its sexual innuendos, eating "ice cream", getting wet etc.
To Love Ru loves those.

One of my friends who know me and is really into anime recommended me to watch The Flowers of Evil and From The New World. I haven't finished From The New World yet, but I can't believe these two animes! They're very very very very different from what I expected from animes and just plain awesome. Both are from 2010s too. Can't wait to watch more of these awesome shows.

To be fair Flowers of Evil was first supposed to be a drama series, then used rotoscoping on the scenes and made it an anime. If you like that, maybe watch Ping Pong. I have some more recommendations, but some might think they are strange. Kaiba e.g.


Edit: Also next season looks great.

New Kino no Tabi.
Inuyashiki.
Second 3gatsu season.
Houseki no Kuni.

 

[Magicgamer101]

Personally for me anime has become worse overall. I hate all that ecchi/harem/loli crap now. I've always watched anime for the stories/action but maybe it's because I'm growing up but I don't want to see massive boobs every minute when I could just go watch porn or every girl in the anime being in love with the main character but him not noticing. I can't disconnect like that anymore and it's just not fun for me to watch.

I've been watching less Shounen stuff overall and looking for more Seinin anime but I don't think there's another form of media that's as iterative (not sure if right word) as anime. They're all based on the same tropes and don't differ much from them at all. So once you've watched a few animes it feels like you watched most of them.

I watch a few animes per season now, a massive drop from before and just read manga mainly. I've started to accept the core audience they're catering to in Japan isn't me.

 

[BudokaiMR2]

Everyone does realize why OVAs existed and why they have diminished over the years, right? They were a direct result of Japan's bubble economy and decreased in number at basically the same pace that the economy weakened.

They were a direct result of execs having a surplus of cash who were willing to basically greenlight OVA projects in the hopes that they take off so they could then serialize them.

I can understand being nostalgic for those days (Bubblegum Crisis for Life!) but it's a fairly impractical thing to cling to IMO.

And yes, I feel like this has been reiterated a dozen times over but there are still plenty of great series out there if you actually look.

 

[nkarafo]

Everyone does realize why OVAs existed and why they have diminished over the years, right? They were a direct result of Japan's bubble economy and decreased in number at basically the same pace that the economy weakened.

They were a direct result of execs having a surplus of cash who were willing to basically greenlight OVA projects in the hopes that they take off so they could then serialize them.

I can understand being nostalgic for those days (Bubblegum Crisis for Life!) but it's a fairly impractical thing to cling to IMO.

To tell you the truth, i don't care about the economics. That's for others to worry about. I only care about the product i consume. And when it comes to animation, i expect certain standards to be met or else i have no incentive to spend my time and money with it.

Something similar happened with Arcades. The only reason i would go and spend money there was because i was offered the state of the art in technology and graphics. After they cheapen out and now there is a parity with home consoles (or even lower) why should i continue to spend time and money there? I see the incentive for them to cheapen out but not for me to continue supporting them.

Basically, you just explained why the value of the product is lower. But you don't give any reason for me to continue support such product.

 

[BudokaiMR2]

To tell you the truth, i don't care about the economics. That's for others to worry about. I only care about the product i consume. And when it comes to animation, i expect certain standards to be met or else i have no incentive to spend my time and money with it.

Something similar happened with Arcades. The only reason i would go and spend money there was because i was offered the state of the art in technology and graphics. After they cheapen out and now there is a parity with home consoles (or even lower) why should i continue to spend time and money there? I see the incentive for them to cheapen out but not for me to continue supporting them.

Basically, you just explained why the value of the product is lower. But you don't give any reason for me to continue support such product.

You can't accuse creators of cheaping out and then in the same breath say you don't wanna discuss the economics. These things are intrinsically linked, especially since ease of access means less revenue in this type of industry.

The real reason OVAs don't exist is because VCRs don't either!

There are still plenty of shorter series and/or feature length films out there that showcase high production values if you take the time to look.

I still think everyone needs to step back and think about how their consumption habits have changed. These discussions honestly tend to gravitate around a couple of dozen of shows over two decades. And in the same breath there are people in here lamenting the fact that only a couple of series per season/year are any good. It's not that hard to do the math and realize that you are still getting the same ratio of good content, it's just your consumption in the past was more condensed and curated in those days.

 

[espher]

Have to reach through this thread a little more, but OP, having also been someone who recently (about six months ago) started watching anime again after quite literally a near 15-year hiatus, I've definitely felt a change in the nature/quality/target demographic for shows.

My Planetside outfit basically has an anime night (Tuesday nights) where we watch seven shows a week. The first three shows are series that we vote on and then watch beginning to end, and I have them split into three blocks (Pre-2000, 2000-2009, 2010-Present). After this, we have four 'weekly vote blocks', where three shows go up for vote each week, with a 'winner stays' system (e.g. if Show A wins Block 1, then Show A + two new shows are up for vote in Block 1 the next week). We've got a pretty curated list of about 250 shows that I 'randomly' pick week to week.

This format has allowed us to get through a few shows, especially newer shows (we've finished two 2010-Present shows end to end - Death Parade and Kids on the Slope, both of which I really liked, and I've picked up a large smattering of the first 3-4 episodes of some other shows).

The demographic that shows up is decidedly younger than I am - I think the oldest person other than me that is a 'regular' is about 22 - with tastes that tend to be a little different than mine (though they do appreciate the 'classics'), and we've had discussions on topics very similar to the one you discuss in your OP. My feeling so far has been the same as yours - which, based on the shows we watch, seems to have started slightly around 2008 or 2009 - and it's one the folks I watch with have started to echo as we watch a wide variety of shows. I've still found a fair number of shows I like in the past few years... but then we throw something like Trigun (1998), Berserk (1997) or Sayonara, Zetsubou Sensei (2007) into the rotation and they seem far more likely to be repeat winners.

One thing I do actually like about more recent shows is that they seem to be shorter more often (12, 13 episodes) and all killer, no filler. We're currently 24 episodes into Nadia (the first winner in the pre-2000s block) and every time an episode shows up that just seems to be eating up a week I die a little inside since I know we still have another four months to go. The shorter runs, however, make it a lot easier to ride a show out if it's supposed to be good and you waste less time overall if it's just OK.

Edit: For reference, here's a list of the shows that won votes during our run and how the folks watching felt about them: https://pastebin.com/tfnfrwrL

 

[bishopcruz]

90s era had literally tons of fanservice anime too. It is more that u guys are not that deep into anime during that era lol.

Love Hina, Maison Ikkoku, Lum, Ranma all is literally fanservice anime bruh. And that is not counting anime like DNA2 which is also harem anime which is quite bad.(but i likey.^_^)

Maison Ikkoku, Urusei Yatsura, and Ranma are fanservice shows? What?

 

[Head of Vengarl]

Literally every episode is the same song and dance. Dealing with trauma, but oh there's this girl I really like so I'm going to do this for her. The repeating internal monologue is terrible the third time around. I can't believe I withstood even 12 episodes of this.

At least I was able to hate watch SAO.

Haha. It's funny how some people seemed to find absolutely no charm in it, while others like me got super invested in the story and characters.

 

[hosannainexcelsis]

Anime has changed. It became cheaper and more mainstream. There are more cheap TV shows and less higher quality movies/OVAs. The drawings are less detailed on average, the animation is simplified and they rarely do hard to animate scenes by hand anymore, they use CGI.

Traditional good quality animation and detail in OVAs and movies is why i loved anime in the 80's/90's. Even stuff like Neon Genesis Evangelion was nice to look at despite being a TV series. Now 90% of it looks like crap, moves like crap and the designs seem to pander to the mainstream anime, fan service demographic.

Technically (animation/detail) it was. You had more OVAs and movies. They used to draw difficult and complicated scenes with strange camera angles and rotation by hand. It was a common sight in the 80's/90's but now it's rare. You mostly get crappy animation or CGI now.

.

Since the thread has gone in this direction, it's worth posting Sakuga Blog's article entitled I Can't Believe It's 2017 and I Have to Write that Anime is Hand Drawn, which goes into some of the misconceptions that can arise with the "anime was better made back in the day" mindset.

 

[rothgar]

Maison Ikkoku, Urusei Yatsura, and Ranma are fanservice shows? What?

Other than Ranma's Movie 2 and OVA's, I wouldn't call it a fan service show either. Haven't watch much of UY, but MI is not a fan service show at all.

 

[RangerBAD]

.

Link doesn't work, but anyone that thinks shows are done full 3D are lying to themselves. Everything is still mostly hand drawn. It's just not done on cels, it's digital. Certainly it doesn't retain the look of a cel.

 

[Rei_Toei]

I was so happy when I stumbled upon stuff like Kaiji and Detroit Metal City. But finds like these are becoming rare for me :|

 

[vctor182]

Thanks for those mecha recommendations, I need to fill this void after Gurren Lagann

 

[hosannainexcelsis]

Link doesn't work, but anyone that thinks shows are done full 3D are lying to themselves. Everything is still mostly hand drawn. It's just not done on cels, it's digital. Certainly it doesn't retain the look of a cel.

Whoops, sorry about that. Fixed it.

 

[RuinerPrime]

I decided to start curating and become very picky with what anime I watch. I only watch 2-3 series at a time and if it's not a least interesting by episode 3-4 I drop it. Currently watching cowboy bebop & hero academia.