What is your favorite RPG inspired anime?

[Agamon]

I haven't watched anime in 10 years, but I did like Lodoss War. I found Slayers pretty unwatchable. Does Ninja Scroll count? Not truly fantastic, but it ruled.

 

[JEL]

Vision of Escaflowne is probably one of the best TV series of all time, and I can't recommend it enough. The story is tight, the animation is very smooth and uniform, and the music is excellent (one of Yoko Kanno's earlier projects).

Other shows that fall into the western-ish fantasy category that I haven't seen mentioned here include Weathering Contitnent, which is a short film with a self-contained story that is very well done.

Legend of Basara is technically post-apocolyptic and light on the supernatural, but it has plenty of fantasy visuals (unfortunately, the TV series is incomplete).

Violinist Hamelin is a very dark fantasy series (though the visuals tend to be silly, which creates somewhat of a dysjunction) that I enjoyed quite a bit.

Aura Battler Dunbine adds quite a bit of semi-magical pseudo-technology, but definitely has the sword and sorcery vibe to it.

Magic Knight Rayearth is more console game inspired, but still is very much fantasy. It also has one of the best twist endings ever (I pretend Rayearth 2 doesn't exist).

Shamanic Princess, while not strictly set in a medieval setting, is definitely worth it for the spellcasting visuals (the story isn't bad either).

 

[jdrakeh]

Bastard! Clothes-eating ooze? Brilliant!

 

[jdrakeh]

Vision of Escaflowne is probably one of the best TV series of all time, and I can't recommend it enough. The story is tight, the animation is very smooth and uniform, and the music is excellent (one of Yoko Kanno's earlier projects).

The OAV is great (all 26 hours of it). The widely distributed Fox dub edited out many important plot elements deemed inappropriate and/or too confusing for children under the age of ten to follow (this is who the Fox dub was aimed at). It sucked hard and all but ruined the sense of wonder that Tenku no Escaflowne had instilled in me.

 

[Sejs]

A lot of them have been mentioned already (Slayers, original Lodoss).

Bastard.
Berserk.
Scrapped Princess.

 

[Stone Dog]

Nobody has seen Rune Soldier Louie? I love that one. I think it is in the same basic universe as Slayers, but I find it to be alot less wantonly silly and more funny. Not to say that silly doesn't happen...

 

[JEL]

The OAV is great (all 26 hours of it). The widely distributed Fox dub edited out many important plot elements deemed inappropriate and/or too confusing for children under the age of ten to follow (this is who the Fox dub was aimed at). It sucked hard and all but ruined the sense of wonder that Tenku no Escaflowne had instilled in me.

To nitpick, it wasn't an OVA and it was less than 13 hrs long (26 episodes, each about 25 minutes long). I agree about the Fox version, which thankfully is dead and burried.

 

[JEL]

Nobody has seen Rune Soldier Louie? I love that one. I think it is in the same basic universe as Slayers, but I find it to be alot less wantonly silly and more funny. Not to say that silly doesn't happen...

As someone mentioned above, it's set in the world as Lodoss.

 

[jdrakeh]

To nitpick, it wasn't an OVA

My bad. That's simply how I first encountered it (a friend had copies of the masters used for the first sub-titled video release).

and it was less than 13 hrs long

I guess it simply seems longer when you view it all in one sitting