Dragon's Dogma
Sep. 18th, 2020 08:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
satalasers So. Yeah. I played this game last year, or maybe earlier this year, and I loved it. It's a good, if bare-boned game, with interesting mechanics and interesting characters, but the story isn't that fleshed out, and I wish we could have seen more of the world, but what we had was super neat.
And the Netflix said 'hey, we're going to do an anime about it'. I was skeptical.
I was right.
To be fair, it's not the worst anime I've ever seen, but it's not the best either. It's just average.
Positives:
- I enjoyed it for the nostalgia, I liked that I got see the monsters from the game, though I'm incredibly sad that the Chimera did not appear, because I fought Chimeras a lot, and they were difficult to beat!
- I liked that they kept the same voice actor for the dragon. I think they changed it slightly, but hey, it made me happy that the voice actor was reused.
- I'm hesitant to say the seven deadly sins fit the show, because I don't think it did. But I saw what they were trying to do, and I guess I did like that direction. However, the anime was massively limited by the fact they had to rush a story into seven episodes, and the conclusion was not as satisfying as it should have been?
- NGL, I liked that the protag did not go near water. I too have made that mistake so many times when playing the game.
- I know the geography wasn't quite right, but it was nice to look at the scenery and go 'oh, this DOES look like a road I travelled'.
- I do like that it was it's own story, and not quite a rehash of the game. It just goes to show that the story is stuck in a cycle, and it's not going to change that much. So I enjoyed the cyclical nature of it.
- Seeing the protag turn into a dragon? Actually pretty cool.
- They didn't quite say 'it's a dragon', but, they got close.
- Simon, Balthazar and Hannah were probably the only three good characters in the show. Balthazar looked so much like Julian, TBH. Simon was a snarky ray of sunshine. and hey, Hannah was a cool pawn.
Middle:
- Kind of wish they used more quotes from the game. I loved it when pawns said the most redundant of things. Maybe that would have been too fanservicy, but god, those quotes were great. Master works all, you can't go wrong!
- Sad the protags did not go to the capital, Grand Soren, the beating heart of all Granys. Or the witchwood NGL.
- They rushed Hannah's development so much, but I'd still say she was probably the best down in terms of her gradually becoming more human-like TBH.
- I wish there were more pawns. Hannah was good, but I liked there having two or three, I think?
Negatives
- There were too many boobs in this anime. Like. Guys. You don't have to say 'we're so edgy now because we're showing boobs'. It's really just a disappointment. You did not have to make the Goblins almost rape a woman.
- Character development was dire. If you wanted Ethan to become more vengeful and driven to kill the dragon, and lose faith in humanity, it's not easy to convince the audience that it happens in the span of seven episodes. So, that was botched. I got what they were trying to do, and I have to say: did not work out well.
- The killing of characters was, uh, not great? Simon and Balthazar basically died because of a possessed coin, and it was so easy to have saved them, and instead you killed them off? Just like that?
- I have less sympathy for the married couples. Elizabeth weirdly reminded me of Madeleine, the husband was just. Uh, Okay. Kill your wife I guess? And the other couple with the hydra, I think?, where the man constantly cheated on his wife, and the wife ends up blind? It was hard to care about either of them.
- Little bit sad that Ethan was mainly incompetent as a fighter, and Hannah was great at it. It just would have been nice if they'd been on more equal level TBH, instead of having Hannah bail Ethan out every episode.
- All the characters were bland. As much as I liked three of them (plus dragon), they were very threadbare.
- I do not like 3D anime. All of them have been disappointments, this one was no different.
So, on the whole: it was fine. I wasn't expecting much, and there wasn't much to it. But from time to time, I enjoyed the callbacks to the game. At least I didn't get angry watching it, but still, I wish it could have been better.
And the Netflix said 'hey, we're going to do an anime about it'. I was skeptical.
I was right.
To be fair, it's not the worst anime I've ever seen, but it's not the best either. It's just average.
Positives:
- I enjoyed it for the nostalgia, I liked that I got see the monsters from the game, though I'm incredibly sad that the Chimera did not appear, because I fought Chimeras a lot, and they were difficult to beat!
- I liked that they kept the same voice actor for the dragon. I think they changed it slightly, but hey, it made me happy that the voice actor was reused.
- I'm hesitant to say the seven deadly sins fit the show, because I don't think it did. But I saw what they were trying to do, and I guess I did like that direction. However, the anime was massively limited by the fact they had to rush a story into seven episodes, and the conclusion was not as satisfying as it should have been?
- NGL, I liked that the protag did not go near water. I too have made that mistake so many times when playing the game.
- I know the geography wasn't quite right, but it was nice to look at the scenery and go 'oh, this DOES look like a road I travelled'.
- I do like that it was it's own story, and not quite a rehash of the game. It just goes to show that the story is stuck in a cycle, and it's not going to change that much. So I enjoyed the cyclical nature of it.
- Seeing the protag turn into a dragon? Actually pretty cool.
- They didn't quite say 'it's a dragon', but, they got close.
- Simon, Balthazar and Hannah were probably the only three good characters in the show. Balthazar looked so much like Julian, TBH. Simon was a snarky ray of sunshine. and hey, Hannah was a cool pawn.
Middle:
- Kind of wish they used more quotes from the game. I loved it when pawns said the most redundant of things. Maybe that would have been too fanservicy, but god, those quotes were great. Master works all, you can't go wrong!
- Sad the protags did not go to the capital, Grand Soren, the beating heart of all Granys. Or the witchwood NGL.
- They rushed Hannah's development so much, but I'd still say she was probably the best down in terms of her gradually becoming more human-like TBH.
- I wish there were more pawns. Hannah was good, but I liked there having two or three, I think?
Negatives
- There were too many boobs in this anime. Like. Guys. You don't have to say 'we're so edgy now because we're showing boobs'. It's really just a disappointment. You did not have to make the Goblins almost rape a woman.
- Character development was dire. If you wanted Ethan to become more vengeful and driven to kill the dragon, and lose faith in humanity, it's not easy to convince the audience that it happens in the span of seven episodes. So, that was botched. I got what they were trying to do, and I have to say: did not work out well.
- The killing of characters was, uh, not great? Simon and Balthazar basically died because of a possessed coin, and it was so easy to have saved them, and instead you killed them off? Just like that?
- I have less sympathy for the married couples. Elizabeth weirdly reminded me of Madeleine, the husband was just. Uh, Okay. Kill your wife I guess? And the other couple with the hydra, I think?, where the man constantly cheated on his wife, and the wife ends up blind? It was hard to care about either of them.
- Little bit sad that Ethan was mainly incompetent as a fighter, and Hannah was great at it. It just would have been nice if they'd been on more equal level TBH, instead of having Hannah bail Ethan out every episode.
- All the characters were bland. As much as I liked three of them (plus dragon), they were very threadbare.
- I do not like 3D anime. All of them have been disappointments, this one was no different.
So, on the whole: it was fine. I wasn't expecting much, and there wasn't much to it. But from time to time, I enjoyed the callbacks to the game. At least I didn't get angry watching it, but still, I wish it could have been better.
