Forum - View topicShelf Life - The RideBack Diaries
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Princess_Irene
ANN Reviewer
 Posts: 2619 Location: The castle beyond the Goblin City |
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I agree with you there. Heavy Rain had a terrific (albeit tragic and horrifying) story and played on your emotions masterfully, but most of my sister's gaming students and friends just dismissed it out of hand. The now nearly extinct graphic adventure game was another that did some great storytelling, particularly Loom and the Monkey Island games. (Though not the fourth. That one kinda sucked.) It is bizarre that people would say that story doesn't matter in anime or manga - I had one comment to that effect on one of my reviews. Maybe it's my bias as an English prof or as a writer, but I feel that there needs to be a story to carry things through. Otherwise how are we able to care about the characters? A well told story in any medium is a valuable commodity, whether it's a video game, an anime, or a strange little essay published a century ago. (I have the original Harper's Bazaar this was published in - it purports to be nonfiction.) |
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ljaesch
Posts: 299 Location: Enumclaw, WA |
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I agree with you 100% on this, Rebecca. To me, the story/plot of a piece is one of the most important elements of any fictional work. Without the story/plot as a framework, those poor characters end up wandering around aimlessly. As you said, without that clear purpose, it's hard to feel very much for the characters that are in the story.
The other important element of a fictional work to me is well-developed characters, because they make up the "heart" and the "soul" of the story.
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Yttrbio
 Posts: 3653 |
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Of course story does matter, but that doesn't mean that every anime or manga needs it. It's an asset, and not every show has to do everything. It seems perfectly reasonable for someone to say they don't care about story in some forms of entertainment. If I go see a summer action flick, I don't think "you, know, this story has a lot of holes in it. It doesn't really paint a compelling picture of the struggles faced by that guy," I think "Wooo, that explosion was totally awesome!!!" And I certainly didn't want a deep story that made me care about the characters when I was sending Lemmings to their horrible deaths back in the day. |
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Anime_Otaku35
 Posts: 74 Location: USA |
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Thank you! I love Please Save My Earth and I was lucky to pick volume 13 on Amazon cheaply a few years back. I've since picked up the Maison Ikkoku on Ebay. I wound winning all 8 box sets for $532.00. However, compared to some auctions I've seen, that was a bargain. (I saw one auction go for $998.00!!) Banana Fish and Princess Tutu have been on my list for awhile and after your recommendation I'll be sure to look into them. |
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One-Eye
 Posts: 2261 |
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When I first saw the promo art and summary of Rideback I was like eh, sounds corny not impressed. But then I caught the first few episodes and I was like hey that's not bad! However, around half way through the show it took a steep nose dive and I went nooo!! This was definitely a show that needed to be 2 seasons long from the get go. It tried to cram too much into too little time and somethings were not working at all for me.
spoiler[There's people who want revenge for some reason, but we don't really get the whole picture. There's the hint of cut throat politics going on! But it only remains a hint, nothing is really explored. Rin is a gifted athlete and this allows her to handle a Rideback really well! Cool, I've done sports and known many gifted athletes able to change to a new sport. But then in this show it morphs into being The One (cue Matrix music). Rin is a fairly strong character with good instincts until she gets a personality change and starts blaming herself and everyone for what's going on except for the obvious choice being the bad guys. Plus, the world is taken over basically by guys on motorcycles (uh, yea right). Finally, they pushed the ballet thing a little too much at the end, for my tastes.] I think if the show had been 2 seasons and started her off becoming a better rider in competitions for a few more episodes and developed some of the politics it would have been a much stronger show. Hey what was up with the design of her friend, you know the one with the viking sausage horns growing out of her skull? Yuck. |
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leafy sea dragon
 Posts: 7163 Location: Another Kingdom |
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It is definitely possible that Yu Yu Hakusho sagged in popularity, then Togashi was forced to writing an action series. I know this happened real early on with Medaka Box.
Not everything in these media needs a story (Tetris is fine without one, for instance), but that sort of reaction would mean that they shouldn't ever have one. It'd be way more acceptable to say, "I like A Dark Rabbit Has Seven Lives" or even, "This series doesn't need a good story," but saying that if you want a good story to go read a book would indicate that a good story is inherently detrimental to anime or would tarnish its image somehow.
About that need to have a story no matter what: In Robert McKee's legendary book Story, he points out that comedy is the one genre that doesn't need to put story as its highest priority. Well, a strong story, at least. Looney Tunes, for the most part, were a series of jokes wth some certain theme to each short. The Marx Brothers relied almost entirely on wordplay and slapstick to sustain audience attention. And as far as anime and manga goes, I can think of Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo as a successful series without a need for a narrative at the forefront (though it's not so successful outside of Japan). John Kricfalusi (Ren and Stimpy) even considers story as a hindrance to animated works, though I personally feel that it's more of that pigeonholing. I'd presume Dark Rabbit is NOT a comedy though, so it has no excuse. Well, I suppose pornography doesn't need plot either, and even though it's not pornography, it is apparently quite titillating to some people. |
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Megiddo
 Posts: 8360 Location: IL |
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I'd agree with that at least for console games. However, PC games have an extremely lengthy history and love for story-based games. But even that has dissipated slightly over the years. I'm playing Grim Fandango again (last played it 5 years ago) and it really makes me miss the heavy story-based adventure games. Good ol' nostalgia As far as this Shelf-Life goes, I'm really interested in Guin Saga. But I'll probably wait for the combined set. Rideback had a very interesting premise, but I also was pretty disappointed at all the loose threads that were left hanging. YYH is always good but I'm happy with my DVD sets. That streaming show looked like generic otaku fodder garbage from the get-go so I never bothered with it. |
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Princess_Irene
ANN Reviewer
Posts: 2619 Location: The castle beyond the Goblin City |
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An excellent point. (Although my sisters and I named the Lemmings after people didn't like and hit F12...  ) In the case of the action flick, I think some story is an asset if only to give you your bearings, but yeah, I'm not in something like "Cutthroat Island" for the fine storytelling and character development. (Just rewatched that awesomely awful thing, so it's on my brain.)
Gotta run; I have more people I want to respond to, so I'll be back later! (Is that a threat...?) |
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Cecilthedarkknight_234
 Posts: 3820 Location: Louisville, KY |
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funny that no one mentioned that the male lead also has tomua's imagine breaker from to aru no index or the fact that dark rabbit is just a plain rip off of every show in the past six years despite the otaku pandering... so.. yeah. Hmm also Dubs to me are not a warrant reason for purchase I mainly watch sub only unless it's an older series like eva, dbz, tenchi muyo etc.
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erinfinnegan
ANN Columnist
 Posts: 598 |
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I don't expect all entertainment forms to deliver a narrative. I mean, I enjoy experimental books and sometimes I like experimental film, too. But database shows tend towards a non-narrative in a way that isn't experimental at all. On the contrary, they use tried-and-true story-like elements to construct a pseudo-narrative. I have seen very little in the way of experimental television (maybe Snuff Box?), since broadcast/cable television is usually a ratings game. American television is usually designed for a broad appeal to a mass audience, using narrative. Anime of this variety, late night DVD commercials, is heading in the opposite direction. It's aim is to appeal to a very specific and small market. As for video games, the medium is so broad and still somewhat new... there is certainly room for narrative and non-narrative games. Earlier posters are correct, Tetris doesn't need a plot. On the other end of the scale, collective narrative through gaming is very interesting to me (like in Dungeons and Dragons). Maybe otaku database shows fall into a creepy uncanny valley of narrative.
It was kind of off hand, as they mentioned magic systems and other dimensions. |
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Melanchthon
 Posts: 550 Location: Northwest from Here |
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I saw Dark Rabbit listed in the promo blurb, and I'm like 'Come on, Flushable, Flushable" <click> "Yes! Flushable!". Kuro Usagi is a bad show. But you know what? I love it. Oh I love it. Shows like this exist for a very narrow reason -- they are emotional porn for ronery male otaku, and I will not deny that I fall into that circle on the Great Venn Diagram of Life. For some people it's soap operas, for others it's professional wrestling, but for me it's ecchi magical girlfriend anime. And that's okay. But I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. Well, I would, but only if I knew they owned a body pillow featuring an underage girl. It's that kind of show.
/You didn't know who Crowley was? He gets namedropped in every cheap dime store occult novel out there. Crowley references aren't that impressive. Wake me when they namedrop John Dee. //A plot is not needed for a show to be enjoyable, but it is needed for it to be good, two very different outcomes. Let me compare it to classic science fiction authors. Verne is enjoyable, but not good. Heinlein is good, but not enjoyable. And Asimov is both good and enjoyable. Dark Rabbit is a like a Verne story. You don't say 'the Center of the Earth is really just lots of hot rocks', you say 'giant dinosaurs, awesome'! Or this case, 'DAT HAIR'. |
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CareyGrant
Posts: 453 |
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I can forgive a show if it has so-so animation (or even terrible--hello, Boys Over Flowers) or sound, but story? No. Outside of porn (and some forms of physical comedy), where a plot, art & character development -hell, even characters- truly don't matter, it's all about plot, narrative and character development.
I simply can't understand the mindset that gives a well-plotted or strongly written story such a backseat, or to overlook such a glaring fault. Without the writing you're just staring at some moving pictures with some nonsense dialogue (OK for porn, not for fiction) and random action. I'm not saying it's got to be Citizen Cain -hell, I love dumb comedies and action flicks- but good writing & plotting is at the top of my list. |
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larinon
 Posts: 992 Location: Midland, TX |
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Do you mean Aleister Crowley? Wikipedia says that he actually used both names, but I felt that he gained more recognition while using Aleister rather than his birth name. I think there's a reference to him in season one of Toaru Majutsu no Index. I haven't seen season two so I don't know if he becomes a more significant character. Of course, they seem to be co-opting his name for their own purposes so it's not the best reference. I enjoyed Rideback, but I agree there could have been a few more episodes to answer all the questions. One of the things that I got a kick out of in the show was the hats of the GGP. They have this symbol on their hats that basically makes them look pissed off all the time, which is fairly close to the truth. (For those that haven't seen it, it looks like this, but with three curves instead of four) |
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tsunayakuin
Posts: 91 |
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I watch Guin Saga because it has a interesting plot and currently searching for dub mp4 links. Kuro Usagi is crap, it has overused everything. Only have the 1st ep for fanservice and will only view fanservice heavy episodes.
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Joe Mello
 Posts: 2272 Location: Online Terminal |
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Oh, he's a character, all right. He's the one spoiler[upside-down naked in a jar] |
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