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Raneth
Posts: 271 |
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Random question for anyone who downloads the show off Itunes--Has anyone else noticed that downloading these podcast episodes is suddenly taking an absurdly long time? It's only these downloads that I've noticed taking a while. Has anyone else noticed this?
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Via_01
 Posts: 551 |
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Man, I really don't want to argue about this... but let me just say that unless you tell me you actually played the VN, this reeks of generalization. The VN isn't divided on routes, and character arcs are focused mostly on Okabe helping that particular girl. Alternate endings where romance happens can be achieved, but the player needs to send enough e-mails to make the girl actually consider Okabe. I believe Rukako (guy) and Mayuri are the only ones that feel something for him from the very beginning, and romance is a thing only in the maid's ending. |
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gloverrandal
Posts: 406 Location: Oita |
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You can't blame people who subscribe to equal rights not wanting to identify with the label, though. There's a popular quote of "I can't be a feminist, I don't hate men" because of how groups have twisted the word over the years. It's very similar to how people use a person I disagree with politically as a bad word. On paper equal rights are great, but generally you only see a person I disagree with politically being used to describe bad people so being associated with the word isn't what some people want. I rememberseeing a documentary about women's rights in other cultures and one of the speakers, a French woman, complained about American feminism starting to pop up in their country because it was led by women who hate men. Saying feminism has a set definition is great, but words change their meaning over time, especially to other people. If people want to say their equalists or any other label they can think of instead of feminists, I don't see the harm. |
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Videogamep
 Posts: 564 Location: CA |
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Huh. For me, the characters were the best part. Steins;Gate is one of those anime where I really wish there were more episodes so I could spend more time with these characters. The harem/borderline harem didn't really bother me, and, with one or two exceptions, I avoid harem type shows like the plague and I've never seen a full on harem show. Even on rewatch (I've seen the anime twice and played the VN once) that stuff didn't really get in the way of me enjoying it. |
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PragmaticPoet
 Posts: 6 Location: Colorado Springs, CO |
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I absolutely understand what you're saying, and there are definitely some bad apples going around that make things look bad/weird/threatening/what have you, just as there are in any group of people. My only real problem with that line of thinking is that the inherent meaning of the word is what gives it its power in discourse, politics, and ethics as an ideological movement. The notion of the meaning of a word changing might do well for something that is more complex, abstract, or fluid; say, for example, the word "gamer", or "otaku". Those are words that have different values in different cultures and contexts, and the changing of their meaning reflects that. Feminism is different. It isn't a label or identity that should be able to be changed based on whatever the speaker believes (note that I'm not saying that that _doesn't_ happen, only that it _shouldn't_ happen). It's an ideology, a cultural and ethical goal to strive for. Take the word "democracy", for example. There are absolutely different ways people want to see democracy performed and enacted, yeah. People's values are as diverse and numerous as people themselves, even if they align themselves within a belief system like democracy. Yet no matter how many people may go about enacting or promoting democracy, the core definition of the word is unchanged across all languages, all cultures, all belief systems: A system of government enacted by it's entire population. It would be the same as saying that a country like North Korea calls itself democratic, and therefore it is; as we all know, based on the nature of that country's government, that is objectively untrue. To say otherwise would be to pervert the power of the ideal that countries that genuinely strive for democracy fight for. The same goes for feminism. It is a word that means equal rights and representation regardless of gender. People of either gender may interpret and enact feminism as something militant, something misandrist, something inherently unequal; this is unfortunate for every party involved. But the word itself shouldn't be changed, it's meaning shouldn't be twisted to reflect the failures of those who have claimed it. Instead of the word failing to live up to it's people, we should hold people accountable for failing to live up to the word. *end speech* 
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Megiddo
 Posts: 8360 Location: IL |
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Just finished watching Steins;Gate after off-and-on stints for the past month and a half. Like others, I don't like the characters. Okabe has his charm, but the rest of the cast simply weren't very likable for me. Especially those characters whose entire existence was just because that was the bizarre way that the writers deemed prudent for Okabe to procure that IBN 5100 (namely Ruka and Faris who are huge drags to the show)
However by far my biggest complaint is the story itself. spoiler[Somebody please explain to me very clearly why FB/SERN targets Mayuri of all people to die and not Okabe. It makes no sense at all.] |
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PragmaticPoet
Posts: 6 Location: Colorado Springs, CO |
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Well, to answer your question:
spoiler[Mayuri isn't targeted to die by SERN specifically; she's the expendable member of the group. All of the other members of the lab will be integral to developing the tech SERN needs, Mayuri's just dead weight, which is why she's exposed of.] |
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Megiddo
Posts: 8360 Location: IL |
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Sadly I don't think that's quite right.
Regarding that exact world line, spoiler[We know from John Titor's warning that SERN already has many time agents that have been deployed to various times. The only responsible thing to do for SERN would be to eliminate everyone else that was working on a time machine. They already had the ability themselves. It makes no sense to employ Okabe, Daru, Kurisu, etc. considering SERN's status in that world line by the year 2036.] |
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Videogamep
Posts: 564 Location: CA |
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Actually, spoiler[the people sent to the lab weren't sent by SERN from the future, they were sent by SERN from the current time. Also, it wasn't SERN that killed Mayuri every time. There was one episode where Mr. Braun's daughter (can't remember her name) accidently pushed Mayuri into the railroad tracks and even more situations like that in the VN where her death had nothing to do with SERN. SERN also wouldn't want to kill Okabe, Daru and Kurisu since the SERN from the future only got the time machine by stealing it from Okabe.] |
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Angel M Cazares
 Posts: 5484 Location: Iscandar |
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My take on the show,
Like I already said, I love Steins;Gate, and it is one of my favorite anime series. I found the first half enjoyable because the characters were likable, especially Okabe with all his chuunibyou. The rapport/banter among the characters was also enjoyable. I never got bored in the first half because I also noticed things that indicated that the easy going atmosphere was going to eventually diminish. The second half is very intense but still enjoyable. I came to respect the character of Okabe a lot when his personality started changing. In terms of narrative, things stared getting predictable once spoiler[the D-mails started to get undone], but the conclusion was very satisfying. The spoiler[romance between Okabe and Kurisu] was a big payoff, and I also enjoyed the resolution to Moeka's arc. One final comment on the dub. I actually tried watching Steins;Gate subtitled, but the initial moments of the first episode seemed very dull. I credit the dub for taking away my apathy. I am aware that Funimation's dub has a bad reputation, but I enjoyed it immensely. Last edited by Angel M Cazares on Sat Mar 21, 2015 1:08 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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PragmaticPoet
Posts: 6 Location: Colorado Springs, CO |
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Hm...
I think that spoiler[this is where the time travel gets tricky, because according to the anime (at least how I remember) the whole reason SERN is able to develop all of that technology in the first place is because they steal it from FGL. The existence of their time agents and whatnot are predicated on the events that lead to Okabe and the rest getting captured and Mayuri dying; after all, in that version of the future Okabe dies fighting some kind of resistance but Kurisu is somehow coerced into working for SERN. So I think it's the matter of SERN wanting to avoid a predestination paradox; despite having time agents they know that the only thing that will lead to them winning is doing everything exactly as it has already been done. Hence keeping everyone alive except Mayuri.] Granted, I could absolutely be missing/misremebering a key fac or something! |
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grooven
Posts: 1426 Location: Canada |
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I did enjoy this show very much. I liked the cast of characters and found them endearing. Though i understand most personalities aren't realistic. I agree that this has done one of the best job of making a connective story from it's visual novel counterpart.
I have to disagree with what Hope said about Steins; Gate being a Key story. It's just a visual novel. Many visual novels have sad plots in them and have another on going story arc. I also disagree that Key protagonists don't have personality, they have plenty of personality but I understand they don't react in the same as Okabe, but it doesn't mean they doesn't have a personality. I also hate Big Bang Theory 
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Via_01
Posts: 551 |
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It's been a while since I watched the anime, but from what I understood in the VN, Mayuri isn't being targeted spoiler[because Mayuri's death is something that simply happens. During that timeline, Mayuri is destinied to die at that same moment, with a variation of some hours depending on the changes Okabe makes. SERN hasn't sent anyone traveling back in time (as Daru is the only one who properly produced a time machine), and they kill Mayuri a bunch of times because she's expendable, but not because they were ordered to. Even if SERN doesn't attack, the fact remains that Mayuri is going to die one way or another.] |
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jl07045
 Posts: 1527 Location: Riga, Latvia |
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Democracy is not enacted by all population, but by people who the state considers adequate to have a say. The difference from other regimes is that the criteria are universal in nature. Let's take voting rights as the best example. In Athens it meant male citizens, probably around 10% of the population. It is still widely accepted as democracy. Later it was male citizens with a certain level of wealth, nowadays it is mostly based just on your age, usually 18 years. The "core definition" might be the same, but the real meaning of the concepts used in that definition vary. As a result your use of the word "democracy" is removed from reality of that word, labeling actually being the only thing such a definition can do outside of a classroom. It's somewhat similar with feminism. You describe it as an ideology, I would describe it as a socio-political movement and a philosophical paradigm - a way of thinking about some cultural processes in relation with that movement, that may encompass different ideologies or be a part of different ideologies. Since I don't take part in that movement (apart from one brief moment as a volunteer) I do not identify with it despite the fact that my views are mostly identical with a lot feminists at least as far as legal rights and fighting against violence targeted at women is concerned. My way of thinking is also somewhat different from a lot of what I've read from feminist philosophers, so I can't identify with the paradigm either. So again, you can call me a feminist, since it corresponds to your definition and serves to increase political and intellectual legitimacy of feminist thought, but I would reject that label, because it does not directly correspond to the way I think or act. /blog Now about Steins;Gate. I had trouble getting through the first half as well. Not because of the character interactions (which I simply didn't find very interesting for the most part), but because there was not that much else going on. I don't see the interactions as a problem in characterization as much as simply a style of characterization that people, who prefer a more "realistic" approach to characters, won't like much. The problem for me was that the tiny bits of plot that were given to us episode after episode gave an impression that not much is actually going on. I mean, when was the episode when they broke Akihabara? Somewhere around eighth iirc. That was the first "big thing" that happened in the show after they discovered the time machine. So I kinda struggled with that show until that episode. It picked up for me after that and the rest of the show was a good ride although I wouldn't praise it as a masterpiece either. |
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Zhou-BR
Posts: 1456 |
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Back when Steins;Gate was still airing, I didn't check it out due to my dumb prejudice against visual novel adaptations, but the show was so universally praised that I ended up buying the US BD release, which is something I rarely do with shows I never watched through legal streams or fansubs. Also, I was enjoying the Robotics;Notes anime at that time, and there were so many people bashing it and comparing it unfavorably to Steins;Gate that I thought "man, this show really must be something special".
And I was disappointed. Not only I thought the characters were paper-thin and annoying, but as engaging as the second half of the series is (I ended up marathoning the last 13 episodes in a day, even though I didn't originally intend to), the way the show approaches the consequences of time travel is too filled with contradictions and at times just plain forced and esotheric, no matter how much they tried to disguise it with scientific jargon. |
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