Fire Emblem's new anime direction (RANT)

[ToraTiger]

sundin13 said:

ToraTiger said:

I might be spelling it wrong, but Chiki is similar to a word in Japanese that means friendly and cutesy.  That is what I mean when I said that.

And I stand by my initials statements, they didnt have to mordernize/animize the art like that, and make it lose the originality that the NES and GB game had, the story and writing is very different from the japanese version, so of course that is partially why it doesn't come off that way, Nintendo  likely knew that the original japanese-y plot would scare away westerners who aren't interested/repelled by that culture, so they gave them free reign on the writing.  I can speak Japanese midly well (Was dating a japanese chick for 3 years) and looking  through KI U japanese videos I can confirm that anyone with a little bit of Japanese experience would know how easternized the plot was originially.

The story and characters did come off as a bit bland for me in some spots, I loved the writing for the villans but Pit's typical small young hero bravado and Palutena's excessive smarts was a bit bland in my opinion, and what makes it worst is that they were literally the main characters and 70 percent of the dialog.  Viridi was kinda okay I guess.  I played the first 2, and I like the style and tone of them, as well as the concept art. 

Not being Xenophobic here, but excessively eastern (japanese) stories tend to suck, and suck just as much as excessively western stories (G.I Joe, Gears of War, ect) The story and characterization in other m was typical corny japanese narrative.  Not saying all japanese narrative is bad and cheesy, but Other M was literally the equalient of a cliche Michael Bay film with Megan Fox showing her boobs, explosions, and car chases.  I don't think they were akin to mainstream popular anime, but Samus' weak strong girl persona is so typical of a Japanese story.  Also Samus in Fusion is nothing at all like she is in Other M.  Hell Samus barely had any deep characterization up until other M, which to me is better than turning her into a weakling of a woman.  How doesn't it make sense how she loses her powers?  Her weapons/armors get damaged and they go offline, that is usually the reason 80 percent of the time.  Way better than an old wrinkley white guy telling her when she can and cant use the grapple beam.  That system was so much fail, and why would a badass like Samus need a man's authorization to use her tools? lol

I refer to them as anime because they adhere to many of the tropes of anime, just like you can call kid Icarus cartoonish.  They use anime cliches and plotpoints for their stories, as well as anime styled art for the presentation.

And no, I'm not saying it's moe, my point is they are taking their core franchise which were developed mostly in a western style (See Zelda, Mario, thank god they haven't gone down the same route) and turning them easterize, which not only kills the tone of the originals in comparison but they also have the nerve to use cliches and predicable tropes that you would find in an anime.

-Ah, the word is chibi, which is a style neither Fire Emblem, Metroid nor Kid Icarus conform to.

-...Why would you go digging into the Japanese version to find faults in the non-Japanese version? That doesn't make any sense. Who cares if the Japanese version is too Japanese? If the localization is good enough that shouldn't be a problem and IT WASNT.

-Your criticisms of KI: U are so light that they might just float away. And once again, they have nothing to do with anime.

-Did....did you even read anything I said about Other M? You didn't did you....Well, not much point arguing then. I will just restate my thesis. In bold and underlined this time. Your criticisms of both Other M and Kid Icarus Uprising have absolutely nothing to do with any sort of Japanification or Animification of the games. They are simply increadibly banal remarks about writing in video games. If you have problems with story or characterizations, fine, but don't act like they are somehow tied to anime in any way whatsoever.

-Theres only so many ways that I can say that you are fundamentally wrong. You like western media. Congrats. We have tons of other western media. No need to complain that every single piece of media that exists doesn't fit your specific tastes. That is what this boils down to. You don't personally like it. That is all the substance your argument has and the more you say, the clearer it is that you are letting your personal biases seep into this discussion. The fact that there are so few similarities in tone, characterization and style between Other M, Uprising and Awakening, despite you trying to make them out to all be identical, make this clear.

-Also worth noting, that I wouldn't say that any of these three franchises are excessively Western at their core. Both Kid Icarus and Fire Emblem were much more Eastern in their early days, although more reminiscent of 90's anime/manga. Metroid had a slightly more Western tone, however there were still many ways in which it felt like a product of Japan excluding the Metroid Prime series. An argument could certainly be made that the Prime series was much more of a departure than Other M was (regardless of quality). At the end of the day, they are a cultural product of Japan, just like western media is a culture product of the west. You will see tropes to some degree in cultural products, especially ones where story and characters are not the primary focus like (most) video games.

Get over it or move on.

ToraTiger said:

I got a challenge for you.  

1. Charge your 3DS.

2. Put in Awakening.

3.  Start game and load up a save with all the characters still alive

4. Go to a shop.

5. Look at everyone's buying comment when you're buying weapons/items for them.   

I promise you I can, and anyone remotely familar with anime can see what cliche trope the characters have, and name 5+ characters in other popular animes with even similar appearance and design just by reading their comment.  Lissa is the typical girly girl, Maribelle is typical rich girl, Vaike is typical tough guy, Lon'qu is typical tough hard guy with a small soft spot ect.ect.

You can literally tell everything about them and how they will react to eachother just by reading 7-10 words of their dialog, and some case much less.  If that isn't one dimesional weak characterization than I dont know what is. 

a) My statement wasn't about character depth, it was about tone.
b) Pretty much any character can be simplified.
c) Despite the simplicity of the characters, the writers of Awakening do a lot with them, through building relationships that are endearing and using dialogue that is simply well written and fun to read.
d) Most of those tropes aren't anime specific. "Rich girl" isn't an anime trope. Its just a trope. Theres not really anything "anime" about it. That trope exists in virtually all media featuring fictional characters.

EDIT: If your topic was essentially "I don't like the focus of Fire Emblem's story moving away from the main path with a few well developed characters and towards a larger cast with characters with less apparent depth", I would have stopped this discussion after the conversation I had with Rol. That is a fair point of view. It is different and the character (for lack of a better word) of each character is injected in support roles and in their interactions with other characters. This makes the game different, and I am curious to see where FE: if goes with what seems like a smaller cast of characters and different mechanics. However, it is your insistence that this has anything whatsoever to do with anime that makes your point of view ridiculous, seemingly xenophobic and self centered.

No it's not chibi, it is a style of anime like Sword art online and Blue Exorcist.

That's the point, if they didn't change the dialog in KI it would have been just as bad as Fire Emblem in how the script would have played out.  Kudos to them for changing them though.  

How do my points have nothing to do with Anime or Japanification? The games are prime examples of cliche anime stories.  I can name 20 anime with a story/characters that played out like other M, and that is why it was bad, beside the fact that the japanese feel didn't work well for the game at all.

And stop putting words in my mouth, I don't like western or japanese media to any great degree.  I'm just saying them easternizating their originally western styled games is a cockslap to the fans who have been there since day one.  Underlined and bolded.  That is my entire point, the fact that the easternized versions usually are way worse than their originals is just another aggrovating part of it.

 Now let me outline one more thing, and add cliffs so you can hear completely what I'm trying to express.

1.) Fire Emblem's tone and art were intially classical based stories, and the characters were not typical cliches you can find in mass.  Some characters were stereotypes but not all. 

a.) Awakening is now in the setting of an anime or manga, as an artstyle similar to a chiki one (Sword art online, Blue exorcist) and the plot and characters suffer because all the characters are basic anime cliches/tropes which are common in the genre, as it tries to appeal to both men and women. 

 

2.) Kid Icarus was initially the same as what I wrote for FE.

b.) Now it's all weird and animified which wasn't at all like the original game.  Call it adding personality all you want, but the game had plenty of that on NES. This game actually made the transaction quite well, but that doesn't change the fact that it would have been just as bad as FE:A if they stuck to the Japan script so again, props for changing.

 

3.) Metroid was tradtionally a series based off of comic art and an old movie called Alien.  It centers on isolation and exploration.

b.) Fast foward to Other M, the story is almost exactly akin to something like the original ghost in the shell or evangelion.  They overuse tropes common to modern eastern stories, such as Samus' portrayal as a weakling, who at her core is just a sensitive weak woman.  Which is a complete cockslap to everyone who's been following samus up to this point who saw her as a badass.  To make things worse the game does a horrible job of feeling like a metroid game.   Prime on the other hand nailed the story and tone to a T, but I agree the gameplay was a huge departure, but that's for another rant...

 

There is a simple reason why they're doing this and you're making it sound far more complex than it is

Back when Kid Icarus, Fire Emblem, and Metroid were made Nintendo's primary audience and source of income was the west. 

Fast foward to 2015 were everyone has Xboxs and Playstations in the west, Nintendo's market here has diminished, and they will likely have a very hard time winning it back from ms and sony.  So what do they do....They take their games that were meant to appeal to westerners orginally (back in the 80s-90s) and make them appeal more to easterners, and in doing so kill the original feel and tone to the games, and they do a poor job also, but riddling the stories with cliches and predicable tropes. 

Okay, look at FE POR radiance.  

Summarize Lethe, Naesala, Ike, Soren, or Ranulf.  Summarize Hector and Lyn for that matter.  The older characters did not suffer from being overly simple and cliche like they did in awakening.