Wulff

I just attempted to watch "Zankyou no Terror" or "Terror in Resonance". I write attempted, because after two whole episodes, I was fed up with ZnT. It's a shame as well, because the director is none other than Shinichiro Watanabe, who's done stuff such as Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Champloo in the past. Regardless of what you might personally think of shows such as Bebop and Champloo, there really can't be much arguing in the aspect of them being unique. They're all about bringing different genres together in a melting pot of an anime, Bebop being mainly Blues and Sci-fi and Champloo being mainly Rap/Hip Hop and Samurai.

Zankyou no Terror on the other hand, was the most bland and generic attempt at a "serious" "modern" action/mystery anime I've seen in a long time. It wades through the same tired charade of tropes, plotlines and characters, that have riddled your typical Hollywood action movie since the early 2000s. The fact that it is basically "Die Hard" from the villains perspective, sprinkled lightly with some "V for Vendetta" character backgrounds, with a bunch of troubled HIGH SCHOOL KIDS really didn't help it.

Even if you just wanted some mindless action, you won't find it in Zankyou no Terror, because the show seems to think it is so clever and adds long and mostly boring conversations in between the action. The only redeeming character in the entire anime is Lisa, who unfortunately is very quickly written into a melodramatic troubled girl and that gets really old, really fast.

The animation is good. That is all the positive I can say about Zankyou no Terror

I don't know if anyone remembers, but a couple of weeks ago I made a post in this thread, stating that I had been watching a ton of shoujo anime recently and that I was really enjoying Revolutionary Girl Utena. Well, I've finished it now. I actually finished it a while ago, but I didn't really post about it. I was a having a hard time collecting my thoughts on that anime.

As per usual though, whenever I watch something which I thoroughly enjoy, I like to impose my opinions onto others by posting an essay on the anime in question in this thread (See: Legend of the Galactic Heroes or Hajime no Ippo, among others), because this is the only real outlet I have for these kind of things. I guess I could go join an anime forum somewhere, but I don't actually like people and you guys have acceptable taste. So I'll post my stuff here in hopes that someone might just pick up Utena, because it is 100% worth watching.

**********************************************************************************************************************************

I guess I'll start by explaining why I ended up watching Utena in the first place, because if you judge this anime by looks and by whatever short synopsis you can find on various anime sites, it probably won't look or sound appealing at all.

Revolutionary Girl Utena is a "Shoujo" (The opposite of "Shounen", it is aimed at younger girls) anime, which originally aired in 1997. It is an anime that has caused a lot of discussion between anime fans, because there is no clear-cut way of interpreting this anime. It released around the same time as giants such as Neon Genesis Evangelion and just like NGE, it is riddled with symbolism and it is a lot more layered than you might think at a first glance... Though it doesn't quite reach the same level of insanity which is the end of the Neon Genesis Evangelion TV series, so don't worry about that. It is one of those anime that is regarded by many older anime fans as a cult classic. This was the biggest reason I ended up watching Revolutionary Girl Utena, because my previous experience with older "cult classics" in anime, has shown me that I tend to genuinely enjoy those shows. A lot. Gunbuster, Legend of the Galactic Heroes, Future Boy Conan, Neon Genesis Evangelion etc. That and also because Shoujo is one of the anime genres I am the least experienced with... Which I suppose is understandable, considering I am a dude. The only Shoujo I can remember watching prior to Utena, was "Kuragehime" or "Princess Jellyfish", which was alright.

Enter Revolutionary Girl Utena, an anime that is presented initially a little bit like a fairy tale. In very picture book-esque manner, we are told the story of a young princess who lost her parents. As she was crying over their graves, she was approached by a prince on his white horse. The prince wipes away the young princess' tears and says to her: "Little one, who bears alone such a deep sorrow. Never lose that strength and nobility, even when you grow up. I give you this to remember this day. We will meet again. This ring will lead you to me." He proceeds to put a rose-signet ring on the girls finger and rides off into the distance. Perhaps that ring was an engagement ring? We don't know, but whatever the case, the princess was so greatly inspired by the prince, that she vowed to become a prince herself.

But was that really such a good idea?

Fast forward to the present time, we are introduced to the high school student "Utena Tenjou", who quite clearly is the princess from the fairy tale introduction. She is in an argument with a teacher at her high school, because she is wearing a boys uniform, she wanted to become a prince, remember? Utena is a tomboy by all respects. Dresses in boys clothing, is captain of the basketball team and in general is a very strong-willed (and not very feminine) person. She goes about her high school life as any regular student would, except she is waiting. She has been waiting for a long time. Waiting to finally be reunited with the prince who gave her the rose-signet ring all those years ago. One day, she notices a girl tending to flowers in the school's garden. This girl is being abused both verbally and physically by the captain of the Kendo team and a member of the student council, Kyouichi Saionji. As Saionji backhands the girl, Utena rushes to her aid, scolding Saionji for his behaviour and daring him to go any further. Saionji calls Utena out on her audacity, claiming that "The Rose Bride" was his to do with as he pleased and that she shouldn't get between them. It is at this point Utena notices, that Saionji is also wearing a rose-signet ring. She asks him about it and he seems equally surprised that she is wearing one and leaves in a hurry. Utena is left to introduce herself to the other girl, named Anthy Himemiya (Note: "Hime" means "Princess" in Japanese) or "The Rose Bride" as Saionji had called her. She is a very quiet, introverted and kind-hearted girl. Utena cannot for the love of her figure out why Saionji was acting the way he was towards Himemiya, especially considering that Saionji is a person admired by many girls on campus, both because of his dashing looks and swordsmanship.

Later that same day, a private love-letter is posted on the school bulletin board for all to see. The love-letter was anonymous and directed towards Saionji, who obviously deemed it silly and meaningless and decided to humiliate whoever sent it by making it public. As many students gather around the letter to read and laugh at the wish-washy love drivel written in it, Utena notices her only true friend at the school, Shinohara Wakaba, standing near the crowd, at the verge of tears. Utena puts two and two together and decides that Saionji has gone too far. She marches towards the Kendo dojo and brazenly sparks a confrontation. Saionji tells her to meet him in the arena behind the school after classes and tells her that "her ring will grant her entry".

Unfazed at the idea of having to duel the Kendo captain, Utena marches towards the arena after her classes and using her signet to unlock a vast door, she enters an arena which seems otherworldly. Spiralling endlessly into the sky, she climbs a staircase. At the top, she finds a circular arena, balancing at what can only be described as the top of the world. Even further above this arena, an upside-down castle floats in the sky, casting bright lights down onto the area. She is greeted by Saionji and none other than Anthy Himemiya, though she is dressed differently. Instead of the usual school uniform, she is wearing a regal looking red dress. Utena questions Himemiya's presence, but the girl seems different from before. As the duel commences, Saionji utters the words which will be echoed countless times throughout this anime: "Give me the power to revolutionize the world!" and with that, he draws a sword from Himemiya's chest... Yes, her chest. Utena herself had brought a Kendo practice sword and with that, the duel begins. As you can imagine, a wooden practice sword doesn't hold up very well against cold steel and the Kendo sword is quickly shattered, leaving Utena to dodge and weave the strikes from Saionji. I should probably mention at this point, that they were never actually aiming to kill each other, but rather to strike a rose which the Rose Bride had placed on their chests before the duel. Whoever lost their rose first, lost the duel.

Just as things seemed at their worst, Utena is infused by a power emanating from the castle in the sky above. "The Power of Dios" (Dios = God in Spanish, if I am not mistaken) courses through her and with this miracle she is able to defeat Saionji, knocking the rose from his chest. Off in the distance, other members of the student council observe the duel, intrigued by this new addition to the equation. Utena learns that upon defeating Saionji, she now holds the engagement to the Rose Bride and that Anthy Himemiya is now effectively hers to command. Not that she really wanted it. This is the beginning of an insane tale of love, betrayal, growing up and shattering the image the world might have of you.

What I just described to you, are the first couple of episodes of Revolutionary Girl Utena. As the series continues, it gets weirder and weirder, as more and more dots are connected in the plot. New players enter the stage, terrible secrets are unveiled and subtle symbolism hints at the truth throughout the entire anime, but you most likely won't be able to put it together until you have seen the ending and my god, what an ending. Probably one of the most brutal, yet satisfying endings I have ever seen in an anime. I cried, I'll admit it. Revolutionary Girl Utena is indeed a Shoujo, with a gratuitous amount of "bishounen" characters, not to mention very girly subplots, but the series finale is definitely not for kids, I can tell you that much right now and I don't feel any less of a man for having watched this show.

Revolutionary Girl Utena is not a total dance on roses (hehe). I cannot give it full points, as it unfortunately falls flat with a few filler-esque episodes. They're not mindless fanservice or contrived sideplots, but the episodes serve no real purpose to further the main story, and because these episodes sidetrack the excellent main story, they become extremely tiring to watch. Not to mention the fact that there are quite a few recap episodes. Out of the series 39 episodes, I'd say roughly 8 of them could be completely cut, which is not exactly great. I suppose to some people, the art might be off-putting as well, I know I was having a hard time with it initially.

I will also go ahead right now and say that Revolutionary Girl Utena is corny. Really corny. You know, "90s corny". It gets better as the story progresses and gets more serious, but man, the first episode especially really got to me. I know I described it in detail above, but I only really talked about the serious things. I didn't mention the corny song that plays as Utena ascends the staircase in the arena (I've come to love that song now) and I didn't mention the great one-liners uttered by some of the characters such as "Oh baby, light my fire!" in broken English. It was actually so bad, that I initially dropped Utena after the first episode. I just couldn't take it seriously. After reading other people's thoughts on it though, I decided to give it a real chance and controlled myself as I watched the beginning part... and lo and behold, it turned out to be fucking amazing, especially the last 10 episodes.

9/10, would recommend if you want to watch something that isn't braindead moe.

Thank you for reading through my essay, I can't wait to receive my grade.

Silencer still dead after they removed his passive ;_;

good yoke m8 ty for laff

Io

• No longer requires turning to perform any actions

Riki

• Blink Strike max charges increased from 3/4/5 to 4/5/6
• Blink Strike bonus damage from 50/70/90 to 40/70/100

Sniper

• Shrapnel no longer does damage to buildings
• Shrapnel now has 3 charges with a 40 second replenish time [?]
• Shrapnel mana cost reduced from 120 to 50
• Shrapnel duration increased from 9 to 10

Techies

• Added to Captain's Mode [?]

Are we YRYR Boys tonight, boys?

Most people agree that the first half of TTGL is better than the second, at least the people I know. The ending is still hype as fuck regardless. Good on you for finishing it though. And as you can imagine, I totally understand that you couldn't finish KLK. I just barely did it myself.

pls understand who the cutest pie is

YRYR BOYS WW@?

A lot of people complained about Arms from what I heard, when I tried it out I thought it was pretty fun...

Insectan was telling me the other day how Arms "felt gutted" in Warlords of Draenor, compared to prior incarnations of the spec. I didn't really pay him much mind, but then I actually played Arms at max level... It's bad, it's really bad. Not only does it pull average numbers at best, but the rotation is so mind-numbingly boring, that I am inclined to actually believe people when they claim to have fallen asleep while DPS'ing as Arms. Not to mention that the spec is EXTREMELY rage-starved, because basically the only rage generation the spec has comes from white damage, which means that in the execute phase, you will find yourself auto-attacking for up to ~20 seconds, so you can pool enough rage to spam execute together with the Colossus Smash debuff.

It's not so much that Arms doesn't pull DPS, because it does. In fact Arms is incredible in AoE situation and on cleaving 2 targets, but the way their spells flow together is so bad, so so bad. It's to the point where you have to wonder if the Blizzard developers even played the spec themselves.

Warrior forums literally exploding regarding the current state of Fury/Arms, meanwhile I'm just sitting here pressing Shield Block.

Gonna watch an episode or two of Yuru Yuri in about 5 minutes, anyone's welcome to watch if they want

steam://broadcast/watch/76561198057457581

 

EDIT: And it's over, hope whoever watched had fun, I'll probably do some more over the coming week

Timezones preventing me from enjoying cute middleschool girls doing cute implied lesbian things, thanks God.

I'm getting a lot of gibber about how it's amazing or shite, but no reasons for those accusations. Guide me, senpais. Guide me.

Alright look. Obviously I can't sit here and say whether you will like Kill la Kill or not, who knows until you've seen it.

With that being said, there are a few key notes that you should be aware of when watching KLK.

• It is created by Studio Trigger, an off-spring of staff from Gainax, more specifically, it's the people who spearheaded Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. Same director, same writer, same animators. It is VERY similar to TTGL in many ways. If you did not enjoy TTGL, chances are you won't enjoy this.
• Kill la Kill is a parody anime, exactly like TTGL. It takes the tropes of Shounen battle-anime and blow them completely and utterly out of proportion. It ends up becoming extremely ridiculous. Included in this list of tropes is fanservice, which is why the general amount of fanservice in this anime is completely insane.
• Kill la Kill was created on a shoe-string budget. It is the first TV production of Studio Trigger (Prior works being Inferno Cop and Little Witch Academia, both of which were straight to video). At times, the fact that they were a bit starved for money becomes extremely apparent.

Those are the facts. What comes next is my subjective opinion, which will include bias.

I heavily disliked Kill la Kill. I loved TTGL, but KLK was not my cup of tea. It's obvious within the first three episodes that the anime is taking the piss, to put it bluntly. Initially, I found that to be quite amusing, as the extreme exaggerations of shounen tropes are very apparent and honestly? It's pretty funny. Unfortunately, it never ends. At some point I realized that I was having a really hard time discerning what was supposed to be a parody and what was supposed to be actually serious and relevant to the plot. The anime ends up wading around in uninteresting plot points, half of which are never really resolved or are really pointless. The fanservice was also very uncomfortable for me to watch. I've been watching anime for a couple of years now. I know what anime is like, I understand that fanservice is a thing. Normally I can see past it, but the level of fanservice in Kill la Kill went from being slightly amusing to being genuinely disturbing within the first half of the show.

I found the "humour" to become really stale within the first 8 episodes, I found the plotline to be extremely contrived, which I guess it was supposed to be (What with the whole "It's a parody!" thing), but actually doing something and then calling it a parody doesn't change the fact that it is still as bad as it would normally be, even if it IS a parody. Overall, the anime just ended up annoying me. Near the end, I was having an extremely hard time getting myself to watch it... Truthfully, the only reason I finished it, was because I had already invested so much time in it, plus I was watching it as it aired. I don't think I could ever marathon that series... Ever.

It's not all bad though, I personally really enjoyed the artstyle and some of the character designs, not to mention that music is fucking AMAZING (It's Hiroyuki Sawano, who did music for Attack on Titan, Blue Exorcist, Guilty Crown and Aldnoah Zero as well). Seriously, even if you end up ditching the show. Listen to the soundtrack. It's a bit alternative at times, but I really appreciate it, even though I dislike the actual anime.

 

I'm actually quite excited to see what they mean by "a major improvement to Dota 2’s engine". Is that graphical or optimization or additional features? Might be nice. Might be superfluous and boring. Who knows.

It's going to be Dota 2 ported to the Source 2 Engine, no doubt. Alternatively, it will be the ability to create custom game modes that they're referencing.

EDIT: Also I am really not upset at all about Frostivus not coming out. I've found in the past, that for me these seasonal game modes/events usually last for about 1-3 games where I find them enjoyable and then I get bored. No doubt the Dota community is exploding about redundant shit because of this announcement though (Reddit).

Don't get your hopes up boys. The Steam Stream Anime Dream will only be real for a little while. There is no way Steam will be able to let people stream copyrighted content like this.

Pretty certain the only reason this shit is flying right now is because of how new the service is.

Truly a golden age of Steam is beginning

I just had the most vivid dream(nightmare?) experience I've had in a long time.

All I remember is I was locked in combat with some guy. I don't even remember what he looked like, all I know is that me and him were fighting. He was wielding a spear and at some point, I was knocked down and then impaled by that spear, right in the gut. It hurt so fucking bad, I can't even describe it. I guess this is what my subconsciousness believes that being impaled by a spear feels like, but it was not fun. I was screaming in agony, coughing up blood in a desperate attempt to not drown in it. I can still taste the iron in my mouth and as that incredible pain went on, I felt myself grow faint and cold, the stabbing pain turned into dull thuds of pain and then the world grew dark.

That's when I woke up, bathed in sweat and breathing heavily. I know it's my mind playing tricks on me, but my stomach is hurting right now. Don't think I'll be going back to sleep.

The amount of Shoujo anime I've been watching over the weekend is worrying, but I'm really enjoying myself. The funny part is that I had actually written off Revolutionary Girl Utena. I was unable to take the first episode of that anime seriously. At all. It was to the point where basically every scene was making me laugh because of the sheer amount of corniness in it. Picked it back up because many people were encouraging me and damn... That anime got really good, like 9-10/10 good. Only a bit more than 1/3 way through it, so it still has time to become awful, but from episode 5 this anime has been consistently great.

Then of course there is Princess Tutu, which is exactly as girly as it sounds. It's really cute though, not to mention it draws heavy inspiration from western fairy tales. It's like watching a fairy tale written by H.C. Andersen come to life on screen and it's genuinely interesting to watch.

This will be across Steam right? Because otherwise shipping fees could become an issue for me, not to mention adresses etc. If Steam is the case, I will join.

Today on: The greatest magical girl anime of all time, we are proud to present the following additions

Don't really know what I getting at here, mostly rambling because of the amount of PAs I've had to deal with. But I agree she takes a lot more to counter than other pubstompers, thus can get away with a lot in most pubs compared to something like Riki or SB.

I mean, I know how to "deal" with PA and it's not like I always lose against her. But she feels like such a ticking timebomb compared to many other carries because her damage potential spikes by (literally) 250% once she reaches level 6. I understand that the easiest way of dealing with PA is to pick carries that can't care less about her evasion and/or has the ability to rush MKB without too many repercussions. This list includes Faceless Void and Juggernaut off the top of my head. (Juggernaut is my personal go-to Anti-PA carry. Omnislash doesn't give a fuck about evasion and in the early game spin is also incredibly handy for killing her). I actually think that my winrate as Juggernaut vs. PA is 100% this month.

Alternatively you pick supports who are potent roamers and/or laners and just sit on her lane. This can be risky though, because if you don't succesfully shut her down, the supports will be underlevelled.

I can't tell if I am harboring all this ire towards PA simply because she is the most picked carry of this patch and because of this I see her in a ton of games. I used to think that she was overtuned and needed a bit of rebalancing, but after seeing that her winrate is just barely above 50%, I am not so sure anymore.

I've been reading up on Phantom Assassin and I am surprised that her winrate isn't higher than it is. I see her in almost every game and she is the most played hero of the month, not to mention that she is quickly gaining speed in the most played hero of all time list. I understand that a lot of the playtime she is getting is because of the Arcana and the Nemesis event, but I just don't understand how she is winning at such a poor rate.

The hero is incredibly frustrating to play against and can really only be harassed out of lane by early magical nuke spam. She is hard to gank without chainstuns due to her insane mobility with Phantom Strike, especially if the PA player is smart and uses Helm of the Dominator to position creeps as convenient blink escape routes. Even if you pressure her lane, she can retreat into the jungle with a Morbid Mask and still be a presence later in the game with very few items. And if you don't pressure her lane and let her farm, she will get that presence much earlier.

Coup de Grace causes her to innately scale ridiculously well with straight up damage, which is a stat found on several strong items, namely Black King Bar, which also happens to cover her greatest weakness, magical nukes. Not to mention that her great mobility, long-range farming ability and 1-point-wonder passive on top of her excellent damage scaling allows her to lane pretty much anywhere without massive issue. PA can go into the solo offlane role, the mid lane role and the safelane farmer role with relative ease if the player behind the wheel is knowledgeable of what such roles entail. Not to mention that she is able to have relative flexibility with her items. You can aim for the late game by allowing her to farm key items such as Midas or Battlefury, both of which she gains decent benefits from (AS from Midas is good for PA, the straight damage on BF is good for PA, in comparison to a hero like Morphling, who doesn't benefit in the same degree from the Midas AS, as that hero would rather have stats to shift around, making these "aim for the lategame" items more desirable on PA in comparison to a lot of other carries).

Alternatively, you could go for early stat items such as Drum of Endurance and Helm of the Dominator. With t2 boots, be it Phase or Treads, alongside a set of Drums, HotD and level 6, PA becomes a fighting force to be reckoned with and it allows her to actively participate in early/midgame teamfights. This alone makes her more desirable than a lot of other carries.

Obviously the hero is not without flaws, as she suffers heavily against BKB herself (Makes it impossible for her to stick on a target, as neither Stifling Dagger or Phantom Strike functions against a magic immune target) and she is at the end of the day, based on pseudo-random crit and evasion chance. Not to mention that her evasion passive can be completely negated by a 5400 gold item. I would like to point out though, that most carries will find themselves in an extremely poor situation if they rush MKB to deal with PA and when the enemy carries have to get another big item or two before being able to focus on the MKB, it allows PA to easily run away with the game.

The super high tier players/professionals also seem to deal with PA decently, which is what matters at the end of the day. Dota 2 is mainly balanced around the highest level of play. I do concede a fair amount of points regarding PA, but I still believe that her flexibility and excellent scaling is what currently allows her to stomp lower skilled pubs with ease. It is a hero you can pick and run away with the game with on your own, if you know what you're doing. I have a degree of an understanding that pubstomping heroes will always exist, but I think PA is on a different level than most of them and needs to be tuned, just a slight bit.

Just watched Gunbuster and it was kickin!

If you have not seen it yet, I highly suggest you drop whatever you're doing and watch it

Mah boi

Gunbuster is fucking great.

Regarding GuP and whether or not to watch, I'll just quickly say this: Girls und Panzer is a clowny little show, consisting mainly of cute girls doing cute things. That being said, as contrived and clichéed as the story of the anime is, it manages to do more with its cast of characters, than most Slice of Life. It is actually more of a sports anime than anything, regardless of how silly the concept is (Sensha-do). It also has a couple of stand-out characters that are genuinely fun to watch on screen, for reasons other than them being cute. Funnily enough, the main character is probably the most boring character. I really enjoyed Girls und Panzer, because I have an unhealthy interest in Tanks in general and it was fun seeing them come to life in such detail, even if they pulled some pretty impossible moves here and there. However, if you are not a person who appreciates tanks being fucking cool, you'll probably not enjoy Girls und Panzer all that much... Unless you're a moe-eater to the extreme or you like really clichéed "Underdog rises" sports film.

I'm playing my first character, a level 18 worgen warlock. Anything I should know while in my early stages of WoW?

You should enjoy yourself, honestly. First time levelling is something I look back on with extreme fondness, at the age of 13 when I was levelling my Human Male Warrior "Hellangel". Cringeworthy in all respects, but I still think of it as a good time. I even had the Tabard of Flame on him because I got lucky, but I've unfortunately lost that account since then.

The thing that is so nice about levelling, is that you can do what you want. I'm going to let you in on a little secret here: World of Warcraft is balanced around max level, which means in lower levels, things are weird and scale weirdly, meaning you can get away with whatever you want. Honestly, the best thing you can do with your first character is to take it slow and not worry about things. Hitting max level does not mean you can't go back and explore/experience zones and dungeons you missed, not to mention professions, that are if anything, even more simple to skill up when you're max level.

Seeing as you're playing a Warlock, a class that I have "mained" in most of my time in World of Warcraft, I'm going to ahead and tell you now to switch between the various specializations (Affliction, Demonology, Destruction) and have some fun with all of them, see what they're like. The sad truth of the matter is that in the current patch, Destruction is the only real viable PvE (Player vs. Environment, AKA Dungeons and Raids) spec and in PvP (Player vs. Player), it is a mix between Destruction and Demonology. Affliction is so atrocious at max level, that it is not worth speccing into. This might change with an upcoming balance patch however, so keep an eye on that.

What do I level next.

 

Ele Shaman

Unholy DK

Prot/Gladiator/Arms Warrior

I'm currently levelling a Protection Warrior and it is a lot of fun. I'm curious to try Gladiator Stance at max level, but I was intending to tank on him, so it will probably be an off-spec, unless I enjoy it too much.

In regards to the other classes, I guess it depends on whether or not you want to be viable for endgame or you genuinely enjoy the playstyle of a class enough to stick with them for better and for worse. The reason I say this, is because Shamans currently rank as one of the lowest tier classes in the game. Of course that has the possibility of changing with a new patch, but Enhancement especially is atrocious and Elemental is not that great either. Historically, Shamans have been kinda gimped as well. Enhancement was strong in Vanilla because of ridiculous Windfury mechanics but have been hovering between mediocre and bad since then, excluding the ICC patch. Elemental didn't really become viable until Wrath of the Lich King, where burst was king and they were the gods of it, but they've never really been chart-toppers in any patch than I can recall, excluding WotLK content. Restoration Shamans have historically always been viable and in quite a few patches, both in Cata and WotLK to my knowledge, been rather broken actually (CHAIN HEAL STRONK). I'm not sure what they're like here in WoD.

DK's are braindead broken tier. They cast one spell and top DPS charts. That doesn't mean they aren't fun though, unfortunately I am not too experienced with DK's outside of Blood. Ask Facade or Insectan about that, I suppose.

Hi, it's me again.

I just wanted to chime in because I finished Hajime no Ippo a few days ago and recently watched the movie that accompanies it. I should mention before I continue, that there are quite a number of sequel seasons to the original Hajime no Ippo, but I've only watched the "original" series and the movie as mentioned.

Now, even though it may seem like it, I usually don't write these long essays on all anime I've watched. I tend to do it on the ones I watched and really enjoyed, which luckily for me have been the case for my two most recent series: Legend of the Galactic Heroes, followed by Hajime no Ippo. Now LOTGH was a whopping 110 episodes long, which is a lot for me. Hajime no Ippo the original series was also relatively long, clocking in at 75 episodes total. It took me two weeks to finish Hajime no Ippo and considering the pace I usually watch anime at, that is breakneck speed.

I absolutely adored Hajime no Ippo. I was honestly concerned when I started watching it, because Hajime no Ippo is a sports anime... I've never really been all that into sports in my life and especially not boxing, which is the main theme of this series. Sure I could name you Mike Tyson and Muhammed Ali, but beyond that I know little of boxing. The thing about Ippo is, that it eases the viewer into boxing as a sport.

We follow our protagonist, Makonouchi Ippo, a freshman in high school, who is a very shy and timid young man. When he is not in school, he helps his mother out with their local fishing business. His father died a long time ago. Ippo is a regular target for bullying, as he never really retaliates and just caves in with even the slightest amount of pressure. He is regularly shaken down for lunch money and/or slapped around by his bullies. This has been his life since middle school, a friendless and bullied outcast. His life takes a different turn however, as one day he is approached by a tall and bulky man named Takamura Mamoru. Takamura spots him as he is being beaten up badly by his bullies, after trying to stand up for himself for once. Takamura quickly chases the bullies off and helps Ippo to his feet. Ippo learns that Takamura is a professional licensed boxer and is in awe over his strenght and confidence. Ippo vows that he will change his own life and begs Takamura to teach him boxing, but Takamura is reluctant. He gives Ippo a challenge to complete: To catch ten leaves falling from a tree, before they hit the ground, without dropping even a single leaf. He gives Ippo one week to finish this task, after demonstrating it himself. The truth of the matter is that Takamura never expected Ippo to be able to do it and never really wanted to train him, but when the young boy works tirelessly day and night on mastering this ability and manages to actually do it in front of Takamura on the seventh day, he ends up reluctantly keeping his promise and introduces Ippo to the trainer of Kamagowa Boxing Gym.

That is the beginning of Ippo's journey as a boxer and it is an insane ride. You follow Ippo as he learns the basics such as Jabs and Straights and eventually you watch as Ippo develops his own personal style of boxing and his own techniques and special attacks he pulls off in the ring.

Where Hajime no Ippo really shines is in three places: Characters, Pacing and Action. There is not a single character in the anime that ever felt out of place. Of course some characters are highlighted and fleshed out more than others, but I did not ever experience a character that annoyed me because it was poorly written or totally unnecessary. The characters aren't just flat stereotypes, but feel like real people, with actual depth. That becomes more apparent as the series goes on. One thing I have to mention are the "antagonists" of Hajime no Ippo. For the most part they boil down to Ippo's opponents in the ring AKA other boxers. The series does a great job of establishing these other boxers as characters and as people too. They don't feel like Sunday morning cartoon villains, that are just there to increase Ippo's powerlevel. They feel like genuine obstacles for our hero, but at the same time they have noble and relatable reasons for being in the ring, to the point where it gets hard to know who to cheer for at times.

The show follows a very formulaic pace. Downtime which gradually increases in suspension and hype, culminating in a boxing match which releases all that tension and hype with some great action, followed immediately by more downtime and subsequently another rise in hype and suspension into the next boxing match. Don't misunderstand though, the downtime is not boring or unecessary by any means, I just call it downtime because the tension and excitement can't quite compare to the boxing matches.

Finally there is the action. The boxing fights in Hajime no Ippo are beautifully animated and with the thick outlines and rough looking animation, it makes the boxing matches feel that much more impactful and heated. You have to understand that the boxing matches are exaggerated a bit in Hajime no Ippo. They use various effects and animation tricks to make certain punches look almost supernatural, but it is more to highlight the nature of the punches and their dangers, than it is anything else, like this for example.

Obviously that is not what a barraging punch looks like in real life, but those effects are there just to indicate the power behind the punch.

Overall, Hajime no Ippo had me hooked from episode one. I got really invested in the characters and their struggles and the show didn't ever feel contrived or stupid. The pacing is excellent, the characters are excellent and the action is top-tier. If all sports anime are of this quality, I don't think I'll be watching much else. I won't say that Hajime no Ippo is without flaws, which should become apparent to anyone who watches the show, but they are not glaring flaws that detract from the overall enjoyment of the series, at least not for me.

I should probably mention at the end here, that Hajime no Ippo is a Shounen anime and thus has some Shounen tropes in it, which becomes especially apparent during the less serious and more comedic moments. So if you're an avid hater of anything Shounen, you might be turned off by this. That being said, this show is not very offending at all in terms of relying on and overdoing Shounen tropes.

/blog

I don't know what qualifies as "anime tier". Curved swords? Blue lines? More "dat hips"? I can only guess the third, and it's not even that pronounced.

Dual-wielding curved blades with blue flames/energy/whatever particles shooting up around the character is what makes it anime tier as fuck. Straight out of Bleach, boys.

Please bear in mind that I see nothing wrong with that, in fact I think it is miles better looking than the Shadow Fiend Arcana, I'm just saying, it's anime-tier as fuck.