Find the Anime Challenge

[The Merciful]

Hussar for the win!

 

[ptolemy18]

If, however, after one month, no one can find three examples, then all who take the challenge shall SHUT THE **** UP about anime in 3e art forevermore.

I wish there was *more* anime/JRPG-influenced art in D&D products. Not the perky kiddy dopey Yugioh/Dragon Quest/Slayers type, or the too-derivative-of-D&D Record of Lodoss War type, but the painterly illustrator-ly Yoshitaka Amano/Secret of Mana/Final Fantasy/Tales of Phantasia style.

You can all throw rotten fruits and vegetables at me now, since D&D fandom seems to have almost no overlap with anime/manga fandom, as evinced by this thread. But actually, I think that core D&D has managed to remain remarkably free of manga and anime influence, for better or worse. Is this partially because tabletop RPGers resent the success of Japanese console RPGs? I dunno. Personally, if I was at Wizards and I thought I could turn more of those people into tabletop RPGers by copping a more anime/manga/JRPG style, I'd jump all over that. (But realistically, there is certainly more to it than art style.)

Actually, the guy who's doing the 4E core rulebooks, what'shisname, looks very modern-American-comics-influenced to me. All those yelling faces and dramatic poses and sharp angles and a general "YAAAARGGGHH!!" attitude. Whereas in the more high-end Japanese console RPG products, you often get this very baroque, classical, stately "and now the saga begins" artwork (at least on the boxes). Hmm.

 

[ptolemy18]

But no one ever claims that D&D became to 'Star Warsy', 'Star Treky' or too 'Peter Jacksony', despite many people not liking those particular things

I will now fulfill the prophecy by saying that D&D4E is, IMHO, possibly going to be "too Star Warsy" (influenced by Star Wars Saga edition, emphasis on heroic fantasy over other, less heroic types of fantasy...)

 

[Arcturion]

Last time I checked, anime was simply a medium with a whole slew of sub-genres (ranging from the ultra slick realism to the cutesy super deformed, with everything in between from serious drama to silly comedy). You might as well call D&D as television, or D&D as motion picture. And as a medium, anime is just Japanese made (a relative term since most in-betweening animation is done overseas in Korea anyway, both Japanese and American) or Japanese-inspired animation, and as animation, is just used to tell a story as any other medium like CGI or live action.

If anything, the examples used are either inspired more by video games (most of which are made in Japan coincidentally) and/or comic books; I'd say those two have more an influence on the more recent D&D art than anime or manga.

The first picture is of a fire and water gensai, as I recall, not tieflings. The fire gensai looks a bit like Akuma/Gouki from the Street Fighter games, if anything, but how much different can one draw a creature based on fiery elemental and/or fiendish progenitor? There's also a bit of Joe Madueira thrown in there (the Western artist of Battlechasers, Spawn, Spiderman, etc.), particularly with the oversized and exaggerated hands, and again, this is more comic book than anime.

I don't see anything too distinctive anime-wise in the second picture with the tieflings, except maybe the dynamic poses, but this isn't an anime-only theme. The third is definitely has more in common with Western style comic book art than anime/manga art. The subject simply has Asian-themed clothing and a martial artist type stance to it, which do not automatically make it anime/manga, as someone already pointed out.

The fourth picture seems more comic bookish to me, while the last one appears to be generic interior D&D art and nothing more.

So unless WotC starts hiring well known (published) manga artists to start doing D&D art, I don't think anime is an issue at all in the artwork. As far as the rules are concerned, that's a whole other ball game (and having nothing to do with anime but rather D&D's strategic war game roots). The new direction with the new 4e classes (predefined niches and party roles and such) seems more video game-ish to me (ex. World of Warcraft), and again, is not necessarily tied with anime.

I think people simply just see what they want to see.

 

[Hussar]

I've learned a couple of things from this thread. One is that people, and I include myself in here sometimes, conflate subject with style. There were a few pics posted, a ninja illithid and a ravid, which people pointed to as being anime styled. The problem is, simply creating a picture that is based on Asian ideas doesn't make a picture anime any more than creating a picture of a Roman legionnaire precludes anime styling. Just because something has ninja boots on doesn't mean that it's anime. Heck, I WORE ninja boots last week in a local festival.

Another thing I learned is that some people really have a tough time articulating why they feel a given example is anime styled or not. I think the idea of anime has invaded gamer culture to the point where people simply reactionarily term something they don't like as "anime". It doesn't really matter to them if they are using the term correctly or not, it's just a word that means, "something I don't like." As such, it's mostly meaningless, like "dungeonpunk" and "video gamey".

The third thing I learned is that when running a game online, people are REALLY REALLY bitchy about the rules.

 

[Geron Raveneye]

And just to contrast with some artwork that can be found on japanese rolelplaying books, in order to round out the thread...
The cover of the japanese Call of Cthulhu book.

Got to say, this one reminds me a lot of Silent Hill...Harry Mason and his daughter fighting the Great Old Ones? Sounds like a great story.

The cover of the Arianrhod RPG

And for some more, simply go here

I think we can definitely say that THAT kind of anime hasn't touched D&D yet...although the CoC cover would look plenty cool, and not like anime at all.

 

[hazel monday]

I've learned a couple of things from this thread. One is that people, and I include myself in here sometimes, conflate subject with style. There were a few pics posted, a ninja illithid and a ravid, which people pointed to as being anime styled. The problem is, simply creating a picture that is based on Asian ideas doesn't make a picture anime any more than creating a picture of a Roman legionnaire precludes anime styling. Just because something has ninja boots on doesn't mean that it's anime. Heck, I WORE ninja boots last week in a local festival.

Another thing I learned is that some people really have a tough time articulating why they feel a given example is anime styled or not. I think the idea of anime has invaded gamer culture to the point where people simply reactionarily term something they don't like as "anime". It doesn't really matter to them if they are using the term correctly or not, it's just a word that means, "something I don't like." As such, it's mostly meaningless, like "dungeonpunk" and "video gamey".

What I've learned from this thread, is that on the internet,even when presented with evidence to the contrary, people will declare their argument to be unassailably correct. I've learned that people will discount the opinions and positions of others without a second thought, and then blithely go on to belittle those who don't agree with them.

Oh wait, I already knew that. Nope, I didn't actually learn anything from this thread.

 

[Zogmo]

Phew. Sorry about the delay folks. I've been busier than all get out the last little while. Honestly, this is the first chance I've had to sit down and finish this off. Again, apologies for the delay.

Let us recap shall we? To start things off, this was the original challenge:

So, we had to find three images that were not just sort of anime looking, but, really anime looking (or manga looking if you prefer). There were many entries and some close shaves. In the end, it was the following images that seemed to have generated the most consensus:

In no particular order:

1. An image of a tiefling from Races of Faerun. Definitely on board with this one. Dark Seraphim scores one. There were two other posted with this image, but, the first was straight up comic book and the third lacked any real anime styling.


2. We have another by the same artist from Races of Faerun. While it's a bit wonky, it's a fair cop. Props to Zamkaizer for spotting this one.


3. This one got kind of buried way back, but, I think it deserves to be considered a positive. Its from the Player's Guide to Eberron. Props to Deekin for this find.


We had a couple of close calls that were later disqualified.


1. A reprint from Paizo, which WOTC had never done before and I suspect was done because of the ending of 3e. The fact that this image was released after I started this is also something of a strike against it. Obviously, I could not comment on anything released in the future, only in the past. So, sorry, this one, while definitely showing anime influence, is disqualified.



2. A gnome alchemist from Races of Stone - was later shown to be pretty much standard short arse proportions as seen in artists like Hildebrant.


There are probably other images, but, I've spent enough time looking around.

Ok, so, the challenge was answered. There were definitely three examples found. However, I can't really declare any single winner since the challenge was to find 3 examples, not find one at a time. And, I know that people are going to scream bloody murder about this, but, no one poster actually answered the challenge. So, I will amend my sig, but, not quite in the way that the challenge specified.

I did learn a fair bit from this thread though. For one, people tend to see anime where it really isn't. Also, I think it's pretty safe to say that D&D art is about as anime influenced as any other pop art form. At the end of the day, I think it's safe to say:

Myth Busted

With the exception of the reprint I don't see the others at all as Anime/Manga. There are influences all over WotC books but if this is the closest then it's still pretty far off.

Hussar is right.

 

[Wolfspider]

What I've learned from this thread, is that on the internet,even when presented with evidence to the contrary, people will declare their argument to be unassailably correct. I've learned that people will discount the opinions and positions of others without a second thought, and then blithely go on to belittle those who don't agree with them.

Oh wait, I already knew that. Nope, I didn't actually learn anything from this thread.

Oh, the delicious irony. Yum!

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Heck, I WORE ninja boots last week in a local festival.

You're so anime. [/hong]