crumas2 said:
For me it isn't necessarily that I dislike Anime for its art style... its just that a lot of Anime is culturally influenced. The first time I starting digging into Manga I would see a normal looking teen character suddenly go on a rampage and alter in appearance so that the character looked like a characature of a screaming little kid, all head and mouth, etc. That sort of thing completely distracts from the story and suspension of disbelief for me, but Japanese consumers have typically appreciated it. I remember asking a friend who's really into Manga/Anime about that particular approach, and he said "isn't it great? You really see the character's emotions." As someone who writes western fiction on the side, that flies completely in the face of the concept of allowing a viewer/reader to draw his/her own conclusions from hints and clues presented in body language and dialog. It seemed like a very immature and simplistic way of communicating something that should be done more subtly, but then I began to realize that it was more of a situation where there were Japanese cultural factors that made this specific technique appealing to that audience... as well as the fact that people in Japan had grown accustomed to it. So... I don't care much for most Anime (or Manga for that matter), but I fully accept that someone in Japan likes Anime but might not enjoy reading an issue of Batman because it has a lot of American cultural aspects built in. I really believe the answer is for Japanese companies to shift to techniques and stories that appeal to broader audiences... and I believe the Japanese are beginning to tire of Anime due to the simple fact that they have been saturated with it. Nothing lasts forever. Perhaps it's time for them to move on to other art forms, and the Japanese game producers might need to move along with them. |
Well first of all, you can't really compare Anime to Comics. I know its done all the time, but the two mediums developed completely apart from each other following the 1950s. And yes, there's reasons for various Anime style being overly expressive, but not all character designs and styles are the same. Akira Toriyama's works (Dr Slump/Dragon Ball/Dragon Quest/Chrono Trigger) are not the same as say Shirou Masamune's works (Ghost in the Shell/Appleseed/Real Drive). Anime has just as many distinct styles as western comics, which don't even hint at overly expressing emotions. Some are even overly downplayed and seemingly trying to contrast the Anime norm. And harking back to your example with Batman, there's been a myriad of different styles for Batman over the years, ranging from completely simplistic to 'gritty' to overly expressive and with big huge eyes and mouths in a western style (take the art style of Bruce Timm for the Harley and Ivy series as an example).
Still, there's bound to be people who just don't like one style or the other. I still say that in reference to this topic however, that is not the reason why games aren't selling. If that was the case, then games wouldn't have sold well over the last 15 years. Or heck, games like Final Fantasy, Soul Calibur or MGS would be unpopular. They have EXTREME anime influences, not just from their character designs but their storylines and character interaction. The underlining problem is not 'people dislike Anime', its something else. And as I said before, I tihnk its because Japanese companies have taken advantage of their previous high sales and skimped out on marketing and spending the time/money to make good localizations.
Six upcoming games you should look into:
