Well Chihaya is best idol after all and Kurisu is a damn fine tsundere so why not have the best of both worlds?
I'll admit, I cracked up almost instantly after listening to Okabe's laugh. Speaking of Steins;Gate, it's finally getting an official English release shortly! I'm more curious to see how they pull off certain scenes in the dub such as the "I am mad scientist" or 2chan lingo. I'm generally not a fan of dubs but the voices seemed pretty good in the trailer.
Yeah, I found it added a bit of depth to his character that the whole "mad scientist" thing was more an act to help Mayuri overcome her grief. I kind of want to resume the VN now since I'm in a particularly good mood for reading.
Oh don't worry, I've already spent the last week or so browsing youtube for all of Chihaya's songs. The full version of Yakusoku is quite powerful, but it lacks the sudden impact that the anime version did when Chihaya finally broke out (coupled with dat lighting).
I'm betting on Natsume dropping in price over time since most series eventually go down to the $20-$30 range within a few months. Though $52 isn't bad either considering the cost you'd probably have to pay normally.
Anyway, here are my thoughts on some of the summer titles.
Jinrui: Pretty good social commentary (a bit too obvious what they are trying to critique at times) along with colourful visuals and a likeable narrator. Still probably my top pick for this season if it maintains its quality.
SAO: It's pretty much the F/Z of this season, but that's a good thing more or less. Great set-up, established a conflict right off the bat and has a bit of commentary regarding MMO's and online communities. It's a shounen series at its core but is so far being executed nicely.
Natsuyuki: It's just nice seeing adult characters in a realistic drama. The supernatural aspect works well with how they decided to integrate it. The only thing I'm iffy about was that Hazuki didn't really receive much in terms of an introduction so it makes it difficult for me to want to root for him.
Horizon II: Great action in the first episode, tons of light hearted fun. I wouldn't be surprised if Aoi stays naked for the entire season. Now why is it taking forever for subs to come out for this?
Dog Days: I agree that the first season had some really forced melodrama in the second half. So I'm hoping they either go full force on the plot here or stay light hearted throughout. First two episodes have been tons of fun and LOL at Rebecca's transformation scene.
Rinne: inb4 Evangelion end. Tons of yuri drama (not that I really mind) but I'm hoping the show finally gets into the darker stuff rather than trying to go half and half.
Tari Tari: Join the choir club! It seems like a fairly standard slice of life show. Nothing seems that special to me so far but I'll have to wait and see. At least there's no overblown melodrama like a certain other P.A Works show *coughAngelBeatscough*
Muv-Luv: Apparently this is actually a huge VN series so a lot of fans are having mixed feelings about this. Since I haven't played the games I can only share my thoughts on this adaptation. The first two episodes were really poorly executed in my view since they just threw a bunch of hormonal girls into a bloodbath. Turns out this was just a flashback for one of the main characters. Third episode was better, but still fairly sub-par in my view. CG stands out like a sore thumb though.
Kokoro Connect: Not exactly fond of the whole body switching shenanigans but at least it's better than lolNatsuiro.
Overall there's nothing outright bad I'm watching, but very little that stands out to me (mainly just Jinrui at the moment). I might pick up Joshiraku if it doesn't bore me to death and that awful chocolate show just because it has Imai Asami voicing one of the characters.
Yeah, I would assume White Fox had to have changed a number of things to fit the material into 24 episodes. One thing I found from playing a bit of the VN was that the voice acting seemed a bit more subdued (or at least Okabe didn't sound quite as over the top). Not really an issue so much as each choice probably fit the different mediums better. A lot of people that have played the VN say that the adaptation holds up really well though.
Yup, that was one of the things that drew me to Chihaya immediately. She's even more lovely in the games. Maybe not as outright tsundere as Kurisu but damn is her character just love...
Importing anime series sure would be quite expensive. Have you ever heard of Right Stuf? They generally have a lot of items on sale so you can usually get complete series for about $20-$30. You should also be able to take advantage of their free shipping easily as you live in the states (whereas us Canadians have to purchase $150 worth of stuff first). I bought about 10 different complete series for about $150 so it was a pretty good deal. You should check it out if you don't already know.
As for the summer season it's actually pretty good overall. Jinrui and SAO are probably the two shows I feel will turn out the best and to a lesser extent Natsuyuki. Then there are some which are nothing special but just a ton of fun (Horizon, Rinne, Dog Days). Everything else looks like it will be pretty average but other than Dakara Boku wa H, nothing is outright bad. How about you, anything catch your eye?
Oh wow, I actually never noticed that the time loop took place on Friday the 13th in Steins;Gate. I still need to finish up the visual novel myself as it expanded quite a bit on the scientific theories. I'm planning on importing Idolm@ster 2 when the new edition comes out in August in an attempt to actually learn some moonspeak (this is really just an excuse).
Ah, I know what you mean. Lately, I haven’t really had much of a drive to blog about anything (but I’m itching to write more full series reviews). Especially with this season’s line-up and my full-time summer job, I almost want to just kick back and relax these days. Hopefully you’ll get back into blogging for the fall season since Robotics;Notes is airing then (along with many other promising titles).
Haha, well I wouldn’t say my scoring system is flawless (it’s probably un-needlessly complex) but hopefully it gives you something to go off of when revising some of your scores. I’d say it probably accounted for the big differences between some of our scores because otherwise the titles we’ve both rated highly are similar (ie. Natsume, Baccano).
I agree that SAO's first episode effectively accomplished more than AW could in 10 episodes. It actually took the time to show us the mechanics of its world rather than tell us via long drawn out info dumps (which were conveniently hidden from us until they became relevant). If all goes well, I can see this being one of the better titles this season.
Horizon's female cast's "assets" are rather distracting but oddly enough I didn't find it to be that big of a deterrence. The show did a good job at world building and was all around fun without getting too depressing or convoluted. Now if only subs for the second season could come out a bit quicker.
I actually wouldn't mind another Idolmaster season since it did a good job at being what it was supposed to be. So which idol was your favourite overall?
Oh I see. Admittedly, I did almost tear up during that one scene in the sunflower field with Tomoya and Ushio, but that was about it. One scene doesn't make an entire title automatically good though. Tomoya's development was handled pretty decently in AS (other than it being an extremely optimistic and rosy view of adulthood), but yes, then ending absolutely killed it. So we're supposed to just sit there and believe that everything was just a dream because lights of people's hearts are returning the favour? Haha, that's just a sugarcoated way of throwing a random deux ex machina in at the end.
It's a bit of a shame when a great voice isn't really being put to good use (though some people might argue that Aya Endo's is in this case). After watching the first ep of Boku wa H, I think the main is definitely way too over the top. He's a super pervert, but it's overdone so much it already makes him unlikeable. Aoi Tori (the character from Horizon, not the Idolmaster song) was a pretty likeable character despite this though.
It does start off really slow, unfortunately, but you will eventually come to see why Gintama is the top rated anime on this site. Granted, I have seen better plots in other animes, but the comedy and overall enjoyability of this series is 2nd to none. Also, if you're any kind of fan of Sunrise's animation, you will love their work on this series as well on their heavy budget episodes.
When I first started watching Gintama, it took me about 6 months to finish the 1st season, but after that I marathoned about 180 episodes in 2 months.
Well, now that the secrets out, I can officially say I had to hold back bitch tears during episode 20. Idolmaster was a great show overall, and it knew how to handle dramatic moments really well during its later episodes.
Speaking of which, I saw you actually completed the king of forced melodrama, Clannad. I thought you would never touch that show with a ten foot pole. AS's ending was complete BS though...
I have no idea how I ended up on your profile but I couldn't resist to stop and say that Natsume is so adorable in your profile picture, its quite nice by the way. You must watch/read Mushishi! The series, as you may already know, is similar to Natsume Yuujinchou however it holds a darker aspect to the series. It's one of my favourite series of all time!!! Also this,
I did see the 20th episode. Though I'll have to hold off commenting on anything about Idolm@ster until I've finished it due to a certain bet I have with someone else (who seems to feel he knew my favourite idol right off the bat).
Hopefully Natsuyuki turns out well, I'm pretty interested in it. Actually just noticed you're watching a lot of sequels to a ton of extremely entertaining stuff (Dog Days, Horizon). I'm actually incredibly pumped for Horizon II since the first season was a ton of fun. And lol, Dakara Boku wa H ga Dekinai is probably going to be this season's Guilty Crown masterpiece.
Yup, and it’s actually turning out to be better than I thought so far. It’s fun watching the characters bounce off one another and form friendships/rivalries. The more dramatic moments in the show are actually handled quite nicely and there’s a surprising amount of insight into the whole Idol industry. If the second half continues to maintain the same quality, I can see myself liking this show quite a bit by the end.
Hey, just dropping by to say that I've saved my Sakamichi post. Screenshots are not yet available. Will do that a little later (as usual, it's early morning here. lol. 12:30am) and Tari Tari - ep01 ost will come a few hours after that (since I don't have much things going on this Wednesday).
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I'll admit, I cracked up almost instantly after listening to Okabe's laugh. Speaking of Steins;Gate, it's finally getting an official English release shortly! I'm more curious to see how they pull off certain scenes in the dub such as the "I am mad scientist" or 2chan lingo. I'm generally not a fan of dubs but the voices seemed pretty good in the trailer.
Oh don't worry, I've already spent the last week or so browsing youtube for all of Chihaya's songs. The full version of Yakusoku is quite powerful, but it lacks the sudden impact that the anime version did when Chihaya finally broke out (coupled with dat lighting).
I'm betting on Natsume dropping in price over time since most series eventually go down to the $20-$30 range within a few months. Though $52 isn't bad either considering the cost you'd probably have to pay normally.
Anyway, here are my thoughts on some of the summer titles.
Yup, that was one of the things that drew me to Chihaya immediately. She's even more lovely in the games. Maybe not as outright tsundere as Kurisu but damn is her character just love...
Importing anime series sure would be quite expensive. Have you ever heard of Right Stuf? They generally have a lot of items on sale so you can usually get complete series for about $20-$30. You should also be able to take advantage of their free shipping easily as you live in the states (whereas us Canadians have to purchase $150 worth of stuff first). I bought about 10 different complete series for about $150 so it was a pretty good deal. You should check it out if you don't already know.
As for the summer season it's actually pretty good overall. Jinrui and SAO are probably the two shows I feel will turn out the best and to a lesser extent Natsuyuki. Then there are some which are nothing special but just a ton of fun (Horizon, Rinne, Dog Days). Everything else looks like it will be pretty average but other than Dakara Boku wa H, nothing is outright bad. How about you, anything catch your eye?
Haha, well I wouldn’t say my scoring system is flawless (it’s probably un-needlessly complex) but hopefully it gives you something to go off of when revising some of your scores. I’d say it probably accounted for the big differences between some of our scores because otherwise the titles we’ve both rated highly are similar (ie. Natsume, Baccano).
Horizon's female cast's "assets" are rather distracting but oddly enough I didn't find it to be that big of a deterrence. The show did a good job at world building and was all around fun without getting too depressing or convoluted. Now if only subs for the second season could come out a bit quicker.
Oh I see. Admittedly, I did almost tear up during that one scene in the sunflower field with Tomoya and Ushio, but that was about it. One scene doesn't make an entire title automatically good though. Tomoya's development was handled pretty decently in AS (other than it being an extremely optimistic and rosy view of adulthood), but yes, then ending absolutely killed it. So we're supposed to just sit there and believe that everything was just a dream because lights of people's hearts are returning the favour? Haha, that's just a sugarcoated way of throwing a random deux ex machina in at the end.
It's a bit of a shame when a great voice isn't really being put to good use (though some people might argue that Aya Endo's is in this case). After watching the first ep of Boku wa H, I think the main is definitely way too over the top. He's a super pervert, but it's overdone so much it already makes him unlikeable. Aoi Tori (the character from Horizon, not the Idolmaster song) was a pretty likeable character despite this though.
Also, how did you find SAO's first episode?
When I first started watching Gintama, it took me about 6 months to finish the 1st season, but after that I marathoned about 180 episodes in 2 months.
Speaking of which, I saw you actually completed the king of forced melodrama, Clannad. I thought you would never touch that show with a ten foot pole. AS's ending was complete BS though...
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Hopefully Natsuyuki turns out well, I'm pretty interested in it. Actually just noticed you're watching a lot of sequels to a ton of extremely entertaining stuff (Dog Days, Horizon). I'm actually incredibly pumped for Horizon II since the first season was a ton of fun. And lol, Dakara Boku wa H ga Dekinai is probably going to be this season's Guilty Crown masterpiece.