Forum - View topicTales of Zestira the X (TV).
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Stark700
 Posts: 11762 Location: Earth |
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This week...we got...
Velvet...making her debut in Tales of Zestiria the X? Nice. I like how tough she is especially with her goal to defeat Arturious. It's really interesting to see her also team up with that other prison breaker and Seres. The animation and soundtrack were really great thanks to ufotable. This episode honestly felt like watching a mini movie tbh. Last edited by Stark700 on Sun Aug 07, 2016 1:42 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Vaisaga
 Posts: 13230 |
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"And now for something completely different."
People were worried about being able to adapt all of Zestiria before, but now that they're throwing Berseria in there too I imagine it'll be worse for them. Still, people unaware that Berseria is a distant prequel to Zestiria (which would be most general anime fans) might be lost with the sudden change. Especially since terminology used is different for the same concepts (ex daemons = hellions, malak = seraphim). It's quite curious why they'd throw Zestiria's game opening in at the end too. |
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Cam0
 Posts: 4890 |
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Yup I was lost. Totally lost. Like just jumping straight into the middle of a story, not having any clue about who any of the characters are and why they are fighting. Honestly, this episode sucked some major ass in my opinion. I was basically like "Who is that? Why are we here? Who is this? Who are they? Why? Where? Who? WTF?" If this stuff continues next week, I'm not looking forward to it. I wanna go back to Sorey n' friends now. |
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Dessa
 Posts: 4438 |
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I'm not quite sure that there's an equal 1:1 correlation between the Daemon and Hellions, and the Malak and Seraphim. But I do feel that they're obviously related, but how is yet to be seen.
Just from the feel of it, this is probably the opening section of the game. It seemed very reminiscent to the castle at the start of Vesperia, the facility at the beginning of Xillia, the test at the beginning of Xillia 2, and the ruins at the start of Zestiria itself. Plus, given that the game isn't even out yet in Japan, it's unlikely that they'd be spoiling further into the game, and this is likely the equivalent of the Dawn of the Shepherd special for Zesty, just replaying the beginning of the game. The rest of this will have spoilers both for Zesty, and from the trailers/early info for Berseria. Because there's no way to spell out my thoughts for this episode without going into how it connects to Zesty directly, and we're talking very endgame/final dungeon spoilers. 1) Regarding the timeline spoiler[We know that Berseria takes place centuries before Zestiria. Given what we see in this episode, and what we know from Zestiria, this seems to be about 3000 years prior to Zesty. The official Zesty timeline states that this time period (listed as the "Destiny Dawn", which would fit with the episode's title) included the appearance of the first dragon (which seemed to be shown in the episode, in Velvet's flashbacks), as well as an exile from the Seraphim and the first Shepherd's paradise. We know that Artorius was the first Shepherd, so it makes sense that this is the time period of Berseria.] 2) Regarding Artorius' betrayal, and how it relates to Zestiria (MAJOR END-GAME SPOILERS FOR ZESTY!) spoiler[We saw in Velvet's flashbacks, that Artorius murdered a child, who (seemingly) became a dragon (presumably the aforementioned first dragon). Given that, according to Zestiria, dragons are Seraphim who are taken over by malevolence, the child was probably a Malak. What strikes me, however, is that, though we don't know his motives, Artorius' actions, as the first Shepherd, are later mirrored in the actions of last Shepherd (prior to Sorey), when Michael sacrificed his nephew. Since Michael's actions created the most recent Lord of Calamity, could Artorius' actions have created the first Lord of Calamity, and could this be Velvet? Heldalf wasn't a Hellion before Michael's actions, and Velvet wasn't a Daemon-Eater before Artorius' actions. It seems like there's a correlation here] I had more thoughts, but I can't remember them at the moment, and I wanna rewatch the episode (plus, I still need to get my thoughts in order for the past 2). One last thing, though... White Light! I was so stoked to see the Zesty opening! Although, 2 points on this: 1) Gee, thanks for spoiling spoiler[Rose's Armitization]! That was a complaint in the game, too, and something I felt the animation for ZestyX's opening did better; 2) You know, as awesome as the Japanese version of White Light is, I actually prefer the instrumental from the US version ^^; For reference, the US version. |
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DuskyPredator
 Posts: 15503 Location: Brisbane, Australia |
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Where did you get the feeling of jumping in the middle of a story, clearly this was jumping in at the start of a different story. Main heroine locked up for unknown reasons but probably for the same dark power she wields in the darkness. Saved by a mysterious light person who she does not know, but seems to have an agenda of starting a quest by breaking the heroine out of the prison. Insights into the heroine seeking revenge against some guy that did something wrong and talks about how the world has changed in the three years the heroine has been locked up for, at that point hearing names for our heroine who is not interested in making friends, and soon afterwards coming across another person who was locked up that she did not know before but will probably become an ally. No, it is not like jumping straight into the middle of a story, it is more like just as one story was starting up we were thrown right into the start of a different story, of which I guess we have been given promise that they will both cross paths in some way. Just a question, but was that the same ED footage as normal, but with a new kickass song? It did not sound liked it matched Sorey and the gang (most of which are not really part of "the gang" yet, but it felt like it matched Velvet. |
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Dessa
Posts: 4438 |
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That was White Light, the OP from the game. Different footage from the anime. I linked the US OP (full instrumental) in my post, I actually prefer that version to the lyrics version. |
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Cam0
Posts: 4890 |
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That's just how I'd describe my feelings about the episode. Why was Velvet captured? Why was the red haired girl helping her? Who are these exorcists? What is this prison? Who is Artorius and why is Velvet after him? Who was that other prisoner? Who are Legate exorcists and why are they more dangerous than Praetor ones? Everyone was talking about things like I was supposed to know what they know. How can I possibly enjoy watching these characters escape a prison when I don't who they are or why they are captured or what this place is. Starting off a story with this many questions isn't good in my opinion. Stories usually start off slow, to introduce us the characters, the setting and gradually explain things as the story goes. Just throwing all this stuff at me all at once isn't really gonna work, nothing is gonna stick. This was a lot of like episode 0, but worse. |
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Dessa
Posts: 4438 |
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I think a lot of this is the difference between Japanese and US approaches to adaptations.
In the US, when you're making an adaptation of something, the goal is to reach a new audience. You have to assume that your audience knows nothing (or, at least, nothing past the absolute basics) of the characters or story, and build it up from there. You can try to stick closely to the source material, which will likely lose you people unfamiliar with it, or you can stray from it, in which you'll lose the pre-established fanbase. Generally, the new audience will be more significant than pre-existing fans, and so the latter is gone for. The ultimate goal, however, is to make something pleasing to fans, without alienating the general masses. You can see that a lot with the recent Marvel and DC Cinematic Universe ovies. Marvel, while not sticking super-close to the comics, still has capture the essence of the characters, and, for the most part, both comic fans and non-comic fans are pleased. DC, on the other hand, has had movies that are very close to "in name only" for the characters (who often have decades of history in media, so there's more familiarity with them to the general public), and haven't been doing as well. In Japan, on the other hand, with many adaptations (and, given the Tales of Phantasia and Symphonia adaptations, as well as the Eternia and Vesperia side-story releases, I'd assume this to be as well), the audience is expected to have that pre-knowledge. You're expected to know the basics, and the cool thing is to watch it in a new fashion (especially for manga adaptations, where it's in motion for the first time). Additionally, it was specifically advertised in Japan (at least via twitter and event announcements) that this (and the next) episode were a tie-in to Berseria, which comes out very soon. So everyone (in Japan) was expected to know that we'd be seeing the Berseria characters. And they'd be expected to have watched the trailers and read the news articles, so they'd know that Velvet and Artorius had worked together until he betrayed her (shown in the episode as killing the child who became the dragon), and that her arm had been infected by the demons possessing people/animals. Part of this goes back to my belief that these two episodes are the Berseria equivalent of Dawn of the Shepherd, which was an adaptation of the start of Zesty's game. Why should they explain everything, when the point of it is to get you to buy Berseria to learn what's going on and where it goes from there? It's pure marketing. You just have to remember that we're not the target audience. Sure, they like getting the kickbacks from the licensing fees, but if we don't get what's going on, that's not their problem. Their problem is Japan, who understands what they're doing and why they're doing it, and will then buy the game. Also, knowing that Berseria and Zesty are connected, knowing the info they've released for Berseria, and having played Zesty, the episode does make a lot more sense (as evidenced by my spoiler-filled post that I don't suggest you read above). Unfortunately, it's end-game Zesty stuff, so it'll be a while. |
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Cam0
Posts: 4890 |
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I understand that in Japan there's often some level of expectation that the viewer is already familiar with the source material. That's why openings and endings can sometimes contain spoilers. I don't care about any of that. I, personally, don't like it when shit don't make sense to me. I, personally, think that adaptions should be able to stand on their own feet. This might be some marketing ploy and just fan service to the people looking forward to the new Tales game, but I didn't like it as I have no interest in the Tales video games and have not followed any news regarding them.
My perspective is that suddenly we jumped into a completely different story for some reason, but I do not know any of the characters or why any of this stuff is happening. I may not be in the target audience, but this show was good last week and this week it sucked. |
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Vaisaga
Posts: 13230 |
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You have that backwards. Fans will show up no matter what so more effort is put into attracting the general audiences. Japan is really no different in that regard. Most stuff get anime adaptations for the sole purpose of bringing in new fans. And it works too: with any given light novel adaptation there always follows a boost in book sales. A work might have very little fan art initially, but once an anime adaptation starts up you'll see a lot more pop up. With a TV adaptation like Zestiria (and Abyss), pre-knowledge is not required and not expected. That's why in these threads you really should at least try to act like you don't know what's coming up. If pre-knowledge was expected then they wouldn't bother explaining anything. And if something is omitted it's a case of "we need to save time so we'll remove this not so important detail", not "the viewers know all this stuff already so we don't have to explain." This episode isn't vague because it assumes everyone has beaten Zestiria already. It gives enough hints to let you know some basics such as the flashbacks of some kid getting killed who we can easily deduce was some one important to Velvet, thus her quest for revenge. This is a case of "Want the whole picture? Play the game!" A game which isn't even out yet. The only place the country differences factor in is the kind of news we have available. If ANN doesn't report on it you can safely assume very few English speakers will know about it. But knowing this episode and the next are Berseria episodes does nothing to address the fundamental problem of leaving on a cliffhanger then jumping to a seemingly unrelated story. |
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Morry
Posts: 756 |
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^ This is where the last episode leaves me salty. While the idea of a crossover tying two games' narrative to the overarching world is neat, just dropping it on us after quite a few episodes of investing me into a different cast and premise does little to endear me to what's going on.
If this was so important, why couldn't it have been spread out over the last few episodes from the beginning? At least then I'd be intrigued to figure out how it all ties to Sorey and Alisha's story. As is, it's too abrupt and just wastes time that could be spent adapting the actual source material in the title. I'm here to watch Sorey's story and maybe buy the game because of it, after all. On a side note, enjoying the dub and might stick with that from here on. Last edited by Morry on Thu Aug 11, 2016 11:37 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Vaisaga
Posts: 13230 |
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Some one point out elsewhere, but Velvet tosses aside some rope thinking it useless only for her to later have to jump off the tower where that rope might have been useful. That's actually pretty funny.
Also, her outfit has drawn quite a bit of criticism, but as impractical as it is I do like her design. |
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Stark700
Posts: 11762 Location: Earth |
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Episode 6:
RIP Seres. Even though her role in this series wasn't long, I kind liked her. The fight was great and well animated imo. Soundtrack is nice too especially when they fought against that dragon. I really hope we learn more about Velvet besides a glance of her past though. Meanwhile, that new Magilou girl is funny, hope we see more of her in the future. Good episode. The OP song (after the credit song about Tales of Berseria) is awesome. |
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Vaisaga
Posts: 13230 |
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A stand alone Berseria work would have been great, but just throwing it into a Zestiria adaptation kind of detracts from both of them. Well, maybe less so for Japanese viewers, I guess, because if they want more Berseria they can go play the game now.
Still another week until we get back to Sorey and co. At least Tales of Link is having an Alisha event right now to tide me over. |
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Cam0
Posts: 4890 |
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I'm glad we are done with that. I liked Magilou though.
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