Anime culture and D&D

[Kid Socrates]

I love how this thread gets stranger and stranger the further you get in. It starts talking about tea and rice, and the last post I read dropped "bukkake."

I have influence from anime in my gaming, first and foremost in the fact that I'm running a Final Fantasy d20 game. Other than that, though, I draw inspiration from Cowboy Bebop, Final Fantasy (especially Advent Children), Fullmetal Alchemist, Trigun, Outlaw Star, and Dragon Ball Z. I also draw inspiration from Lord of the Rings, Spider-Man, any number of novels I've read, and anything else that interests me when I work on my gaming notes.

I'm less inclined to say "I'm influenced by anime" because our Suncoast video store in the mall recently added a Hentai section and boy are those DVDs disturbing at times. It also has spawned hats with cat-ears and seven hundred series of girls in school girl uniforms in peril, and too many people think of that when someone says "anime" for me to latch onto it.

The entire question is hard; it's like saying "Has American culture influenced your gaming?" Sure, but which part? Tailgating? Corporate scandals? Amusement parks? Wearing socks with sandals? New York taxi drivers?

 

[Desdichado]

I love how this thread gets stranger and stranger the further you get in. It starts talking about tea and rice, and the last post I read dropped "bukkake."

Life imitates art. And a thread about anime imitates anime.

 

[D.Shaffer]

Fair enough, and I think that (in general) Japanese society is slightly more forgiving to it's "geek crowd" than American culture. Slightly.

But that's not based on the POV of an insider. That's based on the reports of slightly geeky Americans living in Japan.

Not speaking first hand here, but I tend to hang out on a lot of anime based boards. (Yeah, big geek here, and you can take this with a grain of salt if you want). In any case, from comments from actual Japanese anime fans, anime viewing past the age of 20 or so is considered 'wierd'. Some of them are actually worried they'd be fired if they're discovered as 'otaku' as there are some seriously bad stereotypes involved in the word, mostly thanks to this guy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsutomu_Miyazaki It's apparently gotten a little bit better over there, but it's still not a good word to call someone.

Manga, on the other hand, everyone reads.

 

[Darth Shoju]

Oh, definitely! Wuxia is a great genre of film, and I'm a gigantic fan. You may want to look up Dragonfist, Ranger; it's a PDF that was recently updated from AD&D to d20, aimed at recreating wuxia.

So the worst aspects of anime make you avoid it for the most part, but you are willing to overlook some of the bizarre and often ridiculous elements of wuxia? Or do you avoid the crap in wuxia as well? (for my money there is a big difference between Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Duel to the Death, for example)

(I'm a fan of both anime and wuxia for the record).

 

[Desdichado]

That said, American society has become a lot more forgiving of "geek" hobbies over the last few years too. Comic books, video games, mainstream sci-fi and fantasy movies and TV shows, etc. are increasingly created and marketed for adults and it's a big (and growing) market.

 

[Darth Shoju]

As for live action anime; there's actually a live action Fist of the North Star. I've never been brave enough to attempt to watch it, though.

I have. It...isn't good. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0113074/

As to the OP's question; I'd say anime has influenced my D&D to a small degree. Record of Lodoss War shaped a few of my NPCs (well one for sure). Hayao Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away have had a large effect on a campaign I am developing (albeit in a larger sense as to theme and style rather than anything specific). If Avatar: The Last Airbender is anime you can count that as a big influence as well.

As far as anime is concerned, I'd have to say I was a bigger fan of it 10 years ago than I am now. I still enjoy it but I am much more picky about what I watch now. I suppose some of the stereotypical aspects of it started to annoy me a little (the face faults, exaggerated emotional reactions, etc), but I would say the thing that hindered my enjoyment the most was the plots to much of it. I don't know if it is a cultural difference or what, but the plots of many animes seem to be just confusing or really poorly executed (IMO). In western animation they seem to be either good or bad, but tend to lack the strange and/or muddled plot presentation. In my experience this extends to Japanese video games as much as anime; while I am a fan of series like Final Fantasy, the plots to many of these games exhibit the same problems as many animes (and often to an even greater degree, due to the nature of video games vs movies/tv shows/ova).

However, I still find it strange to dismiss a whole genre of entertainment due to some of its weaker examples. Miyazaki's films feature little to none of the anime cliches. Same goes for one of my other favourites, Patlabor 2. There are plenty of examples of good anime to choose from.

I guess I just find dismissing a large body of entertainment due to generalizations to be odd. Chalk it up to personal preference and people only having so many hours in the day I guess. *shrug*

 

[Kid Socrates]

That said, American society has become a lot more forgiving of "geek" hobbies over the last few years too. Comic books, video games, mainstream sci-fi and fantasy movies and TV shows, etc. are increasingly created and marketed for adults and it's a big (and growing) market.

And thank heavens for that. I remember when Final Fantasy: Advent Children was coming out in the U.S. finally, and on that day there was a line twenty people long at the Suncoast in the mall. I'd wager that the Spider-Man and Lord of the Rings movies had more to do with that than probably anything else, but most everything is taking a profit from that and taking more risks, like that two-rack-long Hentai section in Suncoast.

I still don't know how anyone can walk up and purchase "Tentacle Nurses Vol. 2," though.

 

[Kid Socrates]

As far as anime is concerned, I'd have to say I was a bigger fan of it 10 years ago than I am now. I still enjoy it but I am much more picky about what I watch now. I suppose some of the stereotypical aspects of it started to annoy me a little (the face faults, exaggerated emotional reactions, etc), but I would say the thing that hindered my enjoyment the most was the plots to much of it. I don't know if it is a cultural difference or what, but the plots of many animes seem to be just confusing or really poorly executed (IMO). In western animation they seem to be either good or bad, but tend to lack the strange and/or muddled plot presentation. In my experience this extends to Japanese video games as much as anime; while I am a fan of series like Final Fantasy, the plots to many of these games exhibit the same problems as many animes (and often to an even greater degree, due to the nature of video games vs movies/tv shows/ova).

I'd pin some of that on translation and localization. Final Fantasy Tactics is the best example of a deep plot being undone by a poor translation that I can think of ("Life is short! Bury!"), and fine details can be missed by a translator. Translations lately, actually, are getting far better as the validity of anime and related products as entertainment in America increases.

 

[Ghendar]

So how has the anime culture effected your life and gaming habits?

Not at all. Don't watch Anime and it doesn't influence me in any way.

 

[Desdichado]

I'd wager that the Spider-Man and Lord of the Rings movies had more to do with that than probably anything else, but most everything is taking a profit from that and taking more risks, like that two-rack-long Hentai section in Suncoast.

I personally believe that it's the other way around. The Spiderman and LotR movies were made because the climate had changed sufficiently so that it seemed they would make money.

The changes in comic book and video game target markets certainly, I noticed years before the Spiderman or LotR movies were made.

You could perhaps put some of the credit for that change on the original Star Wars trilogy, though. Maybe.