Primal Conundrum

The Unpopular Opinions Thread.

Pokemon Go utterly misses the point of Pokemon in several glaring ways that nobody is willing to address because hey, it's Pokemon, we all love that, right?

Let's address the fact that, unlike with any other pokemon game, you have ZERO incentive to bond with your pokemon at all. You'll likely just be crushing them down into a candy anyway. You move through them. They aren't your partners or friends, they are just what you're using for now until you can trade it out for something stronger.

I also don't like how they gutted the combat system simply to make it quicker to play while people are on the go. It doesn't feel like a pokemon battle, imo.

I'm glad people are enjoying the game, but I have no desire to play it. To me, it kinda looks like what you'd get if you licensed Pokemon out to a mobile company who didn't really understand the game or the fantasy of being a pokemon trainer. It has official pokemon in it, but none of what made pokemon a fun game for me is left in there anymore. More than ever, it's just a game about fantasy cockfighting, but now it feels like the heart, the thing that made it more than a game about enslaving animals and forcing them to fight to the death, is gone.

The Unpopular Opinions Thread.

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Well what kind of genres do you like? Personally I go in for the josei style of show. Josei is aimed at women but it's really just a way of saying 'this kind of show has actual characters talking about feelings and shit rather than boring punching and nakama bullshit'. Something like Chihayafuru is a good drama as well as being a good series about a game many probably haven't heard of outside of Japan. Nana is about two girls that become room mates and spend a lot of time dealing with young adult problems of love and stuff and it's really good but remains forever unfinished because the author got seriously ill.

Paradise Kiss is also one I suggest. It's probably the most out and out 'aimed at girls' but don't let that stop you. It's about a high school girl who is bored of her high school life and gets swept up with a group of college fashion designers as their new model as she discovers her own identity and such. Kimi ni Todoke is a charming little series about a girl that looks like the girl from The Ring and her quest to make friends with people that hate her and to find love in the process. It's sweet and nice and just adorable.

The Tatami Galaxy is like anime subbing's end boss because of how whip fast the dialog and pacing of the show is. The Tatami Galaxy is pretty much the anime for people that are like "anime is all the same shit". It's a show about life and how choices affect it which sounds lame or whatever but it's actually really well done and unlike most anime out there in terms of presentation and animation. The difference in animation also extends to:

Aku no Hana Aku no Hana is a strange anime that uses the rotoscoping technique and got a lot of ire for it. I thought it added to the vibe of the show, which is rather unsettling. It's a psychological thriller that is, oddly, darkly romantic. It's about a literature loving student who gets blackmailed by a strange, lonely girl into doing bad things. Seriously, it's real good

Sakamichi no Apollon/Kids on the Slope is a great series about how jazz music brings people together. Set in the 1960s Japan, two people with wildly different personalities come together to play jazz and experience romance (not with each other though it's very bromantic anyway). Great music, solid animation (from the guy what directed Cowboy Bebop) and just a real genuine show with nice characters.

Your Lie in April is really, really, really great. It's about a former music prodigy who, because of reasons, can no longer hear the piano and sees the world in a very bleak manner. Enter the free spirited violinist and watch as love happens.

Cross Game is a time investment but what a great time investment it is. It's about a guy named Kou Kitamura who loves two things: baseball and his neighbor Wakaba Tsukishima. Kou and his family are close with the Tsukishima family and their four daughters. The show revolves around baseball but also at the relationship and character growth of its three leads. Baseball is the backdrop. Come for the baseball. Stay for the relationships. Mitsuru Adachi loves his baseball romance.

Major is one of the few sports anime I really enjoy. It might be because I really like baseball but still. Major is the story of Goro Honda, the son of a professional baseball player. It is six seasons long with each one detailing a different period in Goro's life. From his childhood little league days, his middle school and high school days, to his quest to become a major league player (hence the title) it's ultimately a show about how one guy's love for baseball influences and changes the people around him. It's pretty shounen-esque but there's definitely more attention to the supporting cast and Goro actually learns shit instead of just getting dumb power up pitches.

Gakkou Gurashi!/School Live is a cute and adorable show about girls having adventures in their high school and I highly suggest it.

Space Brothers is about two brothers who, as children, made a promise. "I'll go to the moon!" says younger brother; "I'll go to MARS!" says older brother, since he has to be ahead of his younger brother like any good older brother should. Years later, older brother is working as an engineer while younger brother has become an astronaut. Living a dead-end life after losing his job and failing his promise, Space Brothers is about one man's journey to space. It's character driven light sci-fi with more realistic space jargon than normal science fiction.

Shokugeki no Soma is far and away the most blantant 'this is shounen trash' series I am suggesting. But I don't care because I fuckin' dig it. Instead of ninjas or robots or monkeys with blonde hair, this is a series where the fights are done in the kitchen. Soma attends a really, really prestigious culinary academy while his dad goes away to do cool dad things. This academy is kind of corrupt and there are ten elite chefs that Soma wants to take down because he's a shounen hero. But after catching the anger of the tsundere, he's constantly fighting to stay enrolled as failure means expulsion and expulsion from this school means you'll never cook anywhere decent again. It's like if Iron Chef was serious and anime. At some point during the writing process the author decided to be a bit more realistic and the cooking starts using actual techniques and styles. Once you get past the 'this food is so good it gives people orgasms' of the early episodes it's fairly enjoyable throughout. Second season hype as fuck.

Infinite Ryvius is...kind of rough. The animation doesn't look good even by 1999 standards and it takes its sweet time getting to its own point, but sticking with it past the first four or so episodes gives you a series that is a psychological sci fi drama that's actually social commentary. It's been dumbed down as "Lord of the Flies in space" but that's not giving it full credit. Sure, there are certainly elements of that but it's a bunch of teenagers trying to have their own ideas for a perfect society come to fruition. As the show goes on it does a great job exploring the mental state of these characters as they deal with their harrowing situation. It's real good, but also kinda ruff.

Okay that's some stuff I'd do more but then I might as well just make a thread instead of shitting up this one like I do.

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I'm sorry you feel that way, fam.

@Fabricant451

I don't know the terms for what I watch, but I don't think it would be defined as josei—I typically don't enjoy romance (sub)plots, and I'm not much of a fan of slice of life or highschool stuff. For reference, if I were to try to name my top 3 animes, it would be One Punch Man, Ranma 1/2, and Space Dandy. Of those, One Punch Man is probably the only one that I can actively say I like. I'll give a crack at some of those, but I'm pretty sure you and I have quite different tastes in shows. From the descriptions you've given, I'm going to be honest, I don't think one of those actually sounds appealing to me.

Also thank you for reminding me of why I hate anime intros.

The Unpopular Opinions Thread.

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Well yeah if all you watch is this shonen trash then it's no wonder

@Fabricant451

Shonen trash is usually what people recommend and talk about, at least that I hear, so it's generally what I give for examples. I've tried lots of anime, if someone recommends a series I usually will try it, I have just found almost no anime that I think is actually worth watching. With only a few exceptions (i.e. One Punch Man) I find the animation of anime to be simply unpleasant to watch. I also don't happen to like the same handful of fucking cardboard cutout characters that seem to get recycled over and over and over from one series to the next. Frankly, any time I've seen a Western show tackle the same material as an anime, the Western one, imo, frequently does a better, more entertaining job. People can sit there and tell me about how great Evangelion is, Megas XLR is a more enjoyable giant robot cartoon. Highschool romance? The relationship between Kim Possible and Ron Stoppable was, silliness of the show aside, developed in a far more believable, realistic way than in any anime I've ever heard about.

I mean go ahead, suggest an anime and I'll make an attempt at watching it, but I think I could count on one hand the number of animes that I enjoy.

The Unpopular Opinions Thread.

Most anime is complete and utter trash. There are a few good shows, but about 99% of what is out there is just garbage. This includes SAO, Kill la Kill, Naruto, and even Dragonball Z (I know people love it and maybe the manga was better, but the show was a fucking joke.)

The fundamental concept behind eugenics is good, even if it hasn't been applied correctly. We used the same method to control the development of many types of animal, and if we had the guts to turn that discipline on ourselves, we could potentially eliminate many persistent problems that plague the Human race.

Feminism is a good thing. Third wave feminism is pure toxicity, but at its core feminism is a good, positive thing that has been generally beneficial. That, however, is being overshadowed by third-wave feminists and SJW-types who are making the entire thing look shitty.

If Hitler had won, he would probably be dead by now anyway and the rest of the world would be running with German efficiency. Yes, there would be horrors to clean up after, but I don't believe that Humanity is fundamentally shitty enough for the Nazis to have continued their campaign of slaughter and hate without Hitler at the helm. There was a LOT of internal dissent towards the end. Don't get me wrong, it's a good thing that Hitler lost, but it wouldn't have been 100% shitty if he had won, especially in this day and age.

Cats are inferior to dogs in every meaningful way.

Hey Canadians

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I originally wasn't bothered by the change, but when you put it like that it disturbs me. We shouldn't be swapping out O Canada's lyrics every six years because political sensibilities change.

@The Nexerus

Fair, but it's not every 6 years, it's closer to every 50, and this change has been under consideration for more than half the time that we've had an official version of Oh Canada. It's not a sudden thing, and that's why I'm okay with it.

Hey Canadians

This change has been in the works since 1990, so it's not a reaction to shitty, modern 3rd wave feminism pressure. We actually didn't even have one official version of Oh Canada as our anthem until 1970 (there were some regional variations), so it's not like our anthem is some centuries-old piece.

Frankly, I don't mind the change in the slightest. It doesn't change the meaning of the song, and I personally think that the only reason it was written with non-gender neutral lyrics in the first place is because when it was written, the default gender tense was usually male. It was the language of the time.

The Canada of 2016 is not the Canada of 1966. The Oh Canada of 2021 will not be the Oh Canada of 2015, and that's fine. No country remains static as time goes on, and as a living country I feel that it's appropriate that our anthem is a living piece as well, that will change over time to reflect the current state of our nation.

Most people I know that are angry about this are Albertans. I'm not sure if I've talked to more than five Canadians from outside of Alberta that are even slightly annoyed.

Any dungeoneers around?

Worldy buildy fantasy things are my JAM

For real though, I'm vastly better at building settings and worlds than I am at running RPs, and fantasy stuff is like, 95% of what I do. Good to meet someone else with a tabletop background!

Sum up your week in roleplaying in just 3 words

Waste of effort.

Kill the heroes and take their stuff!

Just found out work is gonna be ramping up for me soon here, so I likely won't actually have the free time needed to run this thing that I thought I was going to. @KRIEEEG, as we've talked about plot direction and you seem quite interested in the setting, I'd be happy to let you pick it up and run the thing if you want. At present, I don't think I'm going to be able to.

Weird Roleplay Ideas You're Afraid To Pitch?

A multiverse fandom AU crossover.

The idea is that everyone takes a canon character from somewhere, puts their own AU-twist on the world that they come from and the character, and everyone's characters get thrown together into a team working for an interdimensional, world-hopping pseudo-police-force that deals with threats to the multiverse, world-hopping criminals, and threats to the structural integrity of different dimensions.

Tried to get it going once, got through one scene before people seemed to basically forget the setting and start doing shit / declaring 'facts' that made no contextual sense with what was going on. Also, didn't help that a lot of people seemed to lack the creativity to put any kind of AU spin on their characters. One person brought a cyborg Susie Derkins to the table though, and that was kinda cool.