as someone who's basically never here anymore, I can confirm that it's not in any way Raven's fault. (it's mostly because I wrote most of my Ossia capstone and then ran out of juice so every time I think about the M:EM I get stressed out about finishing it.) I do think taking breaks from things is good when they're stressing you out so I say go for it, take the break, and see how it feels, but activity's trending downward all over NGA. it's not anyone's fault, we just don't have any new blood so you notice every absence.

As one of the long time contributors who isn't around here much anymore, I can also confirm that Raven is a huge positive force for the community. I left because I was too busy to make Magic cards, not because I was being "driven off" by anyone. In fact this is one of the most accepting communities I've been in in a long while.

Well, thanks, everyone. Like I said, I think it's mostly just that I'm not doing well at the moment. I'm usually pretty good at handling stress, but this semester has been just a little more than I've been able to handle.

Anyway, I appreciate all of you. I do think it's best for me to head off for a while, but don't worry. I'll be back before you know it.

If any of our wayward friends happen back during my absence, do please tell them I said "hi" and that I miss them.

It's good to chill in the same room with my mother, her at the TV and me at my laptop. Less good when she wants to see programs about covid and relative political matters when I just want to relax before going to bed and no matter what I put on my headphones I keep hearing people talking over each other with either shameless populism or annoying lack of charisma about themes that set me on edge on their own.

I just (finally) finished Yu Yu Hakusho, and... well, it was a show.

I stand by my previous assessment that it's an entertaining and fascinating watch both because of it being from a different era and because it even stands out just a bit from its contemporaries, but there are a LOT of long stretches where I asked myself "why the hell am I watching?" A lot of the arcs feel disconnected from each other, somewhat disjointed. The penultimate arc with the psychics feels like it was a filler arc (though AFAIK it wasn't), and the final arc was extremely rushed, but it was a fun romp and almost-nostalgia trip.

For all its flaws, there are a couple of really good moments, like how the final tournament gets started off: the main character, who by now has inherited 1/3 of the Demon World's territory, goes up to one of the remaining 2 lords and proposes that they choose a winner by having an open tournament for ALL the demons, and I think that's a BRILLIANT piece of writing, Of course every demon is going to enter for a chance to win absolute rulership, even if they don't have a chance against the current demon lords, because they're DEMONS. Probably the only way to get them to not sign up would be under threat of violence (or, more likely, death).

Taken as a whole, though, I think there's not all that much to offer after the Dark Tournament arc finishes, which takes 2 1/2 seasons and 66 episodes on its own (67 if you count the "and they went back to their lives" after-episode). Everything up to then is great, but they pull some fake-outs that take some of the emotional weight away and the stories that follow the Dark Tournament don't feel like they have the same heart.

So in the last 3+ years I haven’t really been watching anime. I think i watched One Punch Man twice and rewatched a couple favorites very spread out; but essentially I wasn’t watching anime for 3 years. In October I started watching anime a little. Right now I’m only on my 3rd series; but it’s been nice.

One of the shows was do good I essentially went out and binge read my first LN ever; and that was also really good. Significantly better in fact. I’m about to start reading another series that is supposed to be similar, so wish me luck all.

I know that feeling. I've mentioned before that I avoided anime for nearly that long after a run of back luck in which I watched SAO, AoT, and Elfen Lied in a row.

I've been trying to get myself back in the mood for anime lately, too, but I still don't feel fully up to it the way I'd like to be. I'm just not in the right headspace right now. I need something along the same lines as Yuuyuu Hakusho because I don't have the heart to invest in a really good show right now.

I know you had some interest in Magical Girls -- have you watched Cardcaptor Sakura? I very much enjoyed it but it's not an enervating-great the way some shows can be.

I am not that into magical girl anime on average. Too much fan service; not enough genuinely interesting plot. I think the only one I would genuinely recommend is maybe Madoka; and that is more for the artistic part presented by the witch’s labyrinths then the actual show going on.

Same with “high school anime”. I have low tolerance for blatant fan service with no deeper point to it.

——————-

Keep in mind my opinions definitely changed over time. If i had to list my favorite animes atm, in no particular order they’d be:

Overlord
Hellsing Ultimate
FMA: Brotherhood
Trigun
Cowboy Bebop
Black Lagoon
Stein’s Gate
Magic Kaito

Definitely some fan service in some of those; but it’s not the point of the show.

The list of animes Id recommend is significantly longer and includes almost every category; but those are my favorites after watching a few hundred anime.

I feel like Overlord needs to come with a degree of forewarning considering where it ends up.

My personal anime list is several hundred shows, but narrowing down my recommendations would be more arduous than outlining ones I'd avoid at all costs.

For Luna, if you're looking for something similar to Yu Yu Hakusho, the author's other popular work would be a place to start. Hunter x Hunter.
Though that one is an absolute grab bag of quality and tone.
In general, I wouldn't mind just listing out a chunk of shows that might work for you might be an enjoyable task.

Hunter x Hunter is a pretty slow starter. On the other hand I've heard the Palace Invasion arc described as one of the best in the history of anime. Trouble is you'd need some background to get what's going on there. Anybody have an idea how far back you'd have to start? Starting right after after Greed Island? A little Googling says that would put you at episode 76. Is there anything from you need to know that you couldn't pick up on if you started watching there?

The chimera ant arc in general is a polarizing run. There's no in between people that praise it and those that hate it.

Thinking on it, and springing off this suggestion, you might want to try Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicles, which stars alternate reality versions of the Cardcaptor protagonists reality hopping through various Clamp inspired worlds.

On the topic of anime I just watched the first episode of The Great Pretender and I'm really excited about the rest.

I haven't watched it so I don't really know how to interpret that. Solid, but formulaic/predictable, kind of like a core set? What about a sports anime, like Haikyuu? (Although that is currently ongoing, but there are probably other solid ones that have ended which I haven't watched. Baby Steps?)

On the topic of the chimera arc, it's a good arc, but it has /a lot/ of setup before the payoff, probably too much. I'd watch all of HxH though, skipping it doesn't make sense, and it's not like the beginning is egregiously bad or anything, it's just kind of unexciting at worst.

Have you seen Princess Tutu? It competes for my top spot with Madoka for magical girl anime, in large part because of the lack of fanservice, but it's also a good twist on the normal magical girl formula. As the saying goes, "real men watch Princess Tutu."


Yeah that might be a good way to describe it. I need something that I don't have to think about too hard right now, preferably a show with a dub because I'm feeling too scatter-brained right now. I think older shows would be better because of the different trends that don't get on my nerves so much (like how there's no female character in Yu*Yu*Hakusho that I could point to as being busty or pointlessly sexualized), but that's obviously a case-by-case basis. I've never watched a sports anime before, because the only sport I've ever found myself enjoying are marble sports, and I only started on that this year. Hijeme No Ippo seems to rate highly, and I once tried to watch Slam Dunk with Japanese subtitles as part of an immersion technique (I've heard sports anime in general are better for this because there's a lot more "normal" speech), but... I don't know if I'd stick with it.

--------

For the moment, I've dipped my toes into Highschool of the Dead, because that's been on my list for years, and it's been a lot of laughs so far. Don't know how long my patience will hold out with it, but at least I'm at the point where I can forgive it for being what it is, even if I don't particularly care for that.

On a side-note, I was linked to the NSFW webcomic Alfie through a worldbuilding thread and didn't expect so many feels. Since it's set in a high-fantasy setting with lots of different races (halflings, elves, goat-people, naga, etc.), I thought it would give me ideas about racial relations, but instead I got hooked on the tear-jerking drama. The sex scenes are kind of integral to the story since pretty much all of the plot is about sexual repression and freedom, but I found myself largely skipping them because they were not the interesting bits of the comic.

EDIT: WHAT THE **** WHY IS HOTD ALREADY A HAREM I DID NOT SIGN UP FOR THIS ISN'T ALL THE SKIN AND LINGERIE ENOUGH
*sigh*
It's only 12 episodes, so I might just power through it, but damn.

Congratulations, ya degenerate, welcome to the club.
No but really, Alfie is sort of absurdly well written. And now you have to put up with me talking about it.
... I'll own up to it. I've liked the artist for years before he even started Alfie.

pppfffttt-hahahahaha!
You really didn't know what you were getting into, huh?
I can safely put that series on the bottom of the list of 'quality' anime. It's shameless exploitative schlock. It's down there hanging with Queen's Blade and High School DxD.

I mean, as long as we're being candid, I've known the same - I was surprised when I looked down and saw the "username," so to speak of the artist. To think they're both a talented artist AND writer...

And IMO Vera is best girl. Her entire arc has had me torn up.


I thought I knew what I was getting into, considering the first I had ever seen of it was the famous clip of the guy with the super-sniper rifle using one girls bouncing breasts as, like, airbags while shooting in-between another girl's impossible serafuku as her breasts bounced independently at apparently supersonic speeds.

For a time, I was under the impression that there was some good characterization going on because of some talk I'd heard about the show, but that illusion was promptly dispelled before the first episode was over. And, hell, even the opening is full of near-pinup scenes with the various girls barely clad in anything, so it was supposed to be CLEAR what the show was.

But then suddenly everyone -- INCLUDING ESPECIALLY THE DUCKING SCHOOL NURSE -- started showing feelings for the "normal" male character. I expected a setup like the pink haired bitch girl to eventually fall for the fat gun geek, since he already had a thing for her, and MAYBE a love triangle between the remaining high-schoolers, but then suddenly the bitch girl loves normal dude and the soft-spoken nurse is some sort of cougar and alkahpjethpoi

========

Changing topics slightly, I remembered that something I've been meaning to do for a while is go and really watch the original Dragon Ball, back when it was just a re-telling of Journey to the East. That's a solid nearly-200-episode older series that's mostly a bunch of silly hijinks and martial arts. I might go watch that on weekdays.

High School Of The Dead was by the same guy as Death Note of “I will eat this chip” fame. I think that’s the main reason it is/was relatively popular. I personally don’t even like Death Note so.....

——————-

Someone said something about Overlord; so a disclaimer:

1. The light novels are way better. I know people say that all the time, but in this case there’s a good reason. The anime gives some people a bit of whiplash, especially in the 3rd season. The light novel actually does a much better job of handling his slide from anti-hero to evil deity.

2. Full Disclaimer: The main protagonist/antagonist is an evil overlord who does not and will not ever get punished. The drama comes from how the heros and supporting bad guys will struggle. Thus it is not a lot of people’s cup of tea.

Hello there, fellow appreciators of the finer things in life! I'm personally a fan of the goat people in general, included the one recently added to the main cast. The author DOES seem to have a thing for goats, now that I think of it...

Vera... she's growing on me. Pretty much the opposite of the titular character, tho she's gonna get better, I'm sure.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised, given our makeup, but it makes me laugh that I apparently opened a bit of a floodgate, since I never expected something like this to come up in our circle.


See, this is something I just plain don't get, and it was obvious after the author ran that poll and the overwhelming majority labeled the titular character as Worst Girl.

I'm actually kind of reminded of a little discussion/argument I had with a redditor about the effectiveness of the drama in Land of the Lustrous; IIRC, I came to the conclusion that I must just not have the same level of empathy as others who engage in these media.

Now, personally, I think a lot of people seem to have issues separating reality from their fiction -- i.e. they see Alfie herself being a bad person and react to it in the same way as if a real person had done the same -- and they don't understand a good character flaw or recognize how a character making such obvious bad choices is actually good writing. I would put Alfie, as a character, as second-best girl just under Vera, because I relate more to the sacrificial nature of Vera's journey than to Alfie's attempts to break out of her old life.

Unfortunately, I don't think that statement counts for much, given that it seems every character's motivation is to break out of a life that they felt was suffocating, up to and including Vera, but given the unique flavor of each character's backstory, I can forgive them for their main themes all being roughly the same.