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REVIEW: Disgaea DVD 1&2


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Raven Shinobi





PostPosted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 10:47 am Reply with quote
From the uninteresting preview shown on Disgaea 2, I was expecting the animated version of the first game to be generic and this review solidified my decision not to bother with the anime at all unless the boxset came out later at a dirt-cheap price.

One of the notable diffrences from the game is that Etna's voice was actually done by Amanda Win Lee instead of Michelle Ruff and I personally liked Ruff's performance as Etna in Disgaea 2 better ,since she sounded more dead-on in Etna's sarcastic and egotistical moments.
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Iritscen
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Joined: 25 Apr 2006
Posts: 799
PostPosted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 11:25 am Reply with quote
Watching ep. 1 of Disgaea, I felt that it was one of the poorer anime series I'd seen in my seven years as an anime fan. Maybe it picks up a little later on.

I would say, judging from that one episode, that the reviewer gives the production values too much credit. I thought they were terrible. I actually felt bad for the staff that worked on the show. Seriously.
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GoodLuckSaturday



Joined: 30 Oct 2003
Posts: 567
Location: Indiana
PostPosted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 11:37 am Reply with quote
Raven Shinobi wrote:
From the uninteresting preview shown on Disgaea 2, I was expecting the animated version of the first game to be generic and this review solidified my decision not to bother with the anime at all unless the boxset came out later at a dirt-cheap price.


The weird thing is that nothing from the preview on Disgaea 2 is actually in the anime. It doesn't really do much else though and is actually on a much lower plane of quality than the preview on the game was if that's even possible.
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fighterholic



Joined: 28 Sep 2005
Posts: 9193
PostPosted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 12:37 pm Reply with quote
So could we be referring to this as a comedy anime for little kids or what? I had been hoping to pick this up, but I'll probably do it when it's on sale.
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bonbonsrus



Joined: 15 Oct 2003
Posts: 1537
Location: Michigan, USA
PostPosted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 1:06 pm Reply with quote
Ya know, I never played the game or saw it before the anime, so I have nothing to base or compare it to, however, I saw a disk of this, and while I can't say it's great, I find Etna and Laharl adorable.
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omnistry



Joined: 03 Mar 2005
Posts: 1019
PostPosted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 5:50 pm Reply with quote
I actually liked this series. Granted it's not Grade-A; but it's a lot better than most game-based anime.
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EngrishFan



Joined: 15 Jul 2006
Posts: 75
Location: Somewhere in chilly Canada
PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2007 12:13 pm Reply with quote
As a fan of Nippon Ichi games I was extremely disappointed with the series (especially after watching the much higher quality trailers, the one that came with Disgaea 2 in the US and the other which was present in D2 for Japan). It almost seemed like they had two seperate studios working on the trailers and the anime, with the majority of the budget going towards the former.

Obviously, the show tries to cater more to fans of the original, but the presentation somehow died during the conversion. Most, if not all, of the jokes were much more amusing in the game and there's no sense of any imminent danger present from the first two thirds of the series that I've seen. Laharl's weaknesses, which I thought was one of the funniest moments in the game, felt almost tacked on here and barely had any comedic elements to it. At least Etna's personality seems to have been kept intact, though her backstory felt fairly bastardized.

While I like the game's soundtrack I felt most of the time the music didn't flow very well with what was happening onscreen (or maybe it was what was onscreen that didn't flow to the music). The show almost made me hate the Rosenqueen shop theme (thought the La Pucelle rendition of the piece was better anyways).

Really, I wanted to like the series, but it just let me down in almost every possible way. It might have been more successful if it took an Excel Saga-ish, random crazy string of events angle rather than whatever they were trying for here.
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Jedi General



Joined: 27 Nov 2006
Posts: 2485
Location: Tucson, AZ
PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2007 12:21 pm Reply with quote
bonbonsrus wrote:
Ya know, I never played the game or saw it before the anime, so I have nothing to base or compare it to, however, I saw a disk of this, and while I can't say it's great, I find Etna and Laharl adorable.


I haven't played the game either. I like the anime, although it's nowhere near the level of great comedies like Ninja Nonsense or Ghost Stories. I hate the dub though.

omnistry wrote:
Granted it's not Grade-A; but it's a lot better than most game-based anime.


I wouldn't say that. There are a lot of better game-based animes out there (When They Cry, Fate/Stay Night, Kanon 2006, Air, Tales of Phantasia etc.)

It's definitely better than, say something like Xenosaga the Animation. *shudders* I wish I had never watched that one.
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GoodLuckSaturday



Joined: 30 Oct 2003
Posts: 567
Location: Indiana
PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2007 3:29 pm Reply with quote
Jedi General wrote:

I wouldn't say that. There are a lot of better game-based animes out there (When They Cry, Fate/Stay Night, Kanon 2006, Air, Tales of Phantasia etc.)


I do think there's a clear difference between a visual novel adaptation and a video game adaptation. Personally, I don't think that because someone was able to adapt Air or Rumbling Hearts into something great that the same can be done for Devil May Cry.
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Veoryn87



Joined: 14 Nov 2006
Posts: 808
PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2007 3:40 pm Reply with quote
Jedi General wrote:
bonbonsrus wrote:
Ya know, I never played the game or saw it before the anime, so I have nothing to base or compare it to, however, I saw a disk of this, and while I can't say it's great, I find Etna and Laharl adorable.


I haven't played the game either. I like the anime, although it's nowhere near the level of great comedies like Ninja Nonsense or Ghost Stories. I hate the dub though.

omnistry wrote:
Granted it's not Grade-A; but it's a lot better than most game-based anime.


I wouldn't say that. There are a lot of better game-based animes out there (When They Cry, Fate/Stay Night, Kanon 2006, Air, Tales of Phantasia etc.)

It's definitely better than, say something like Xenosaga the Animation. *shudders* I wish I had never watched that one.


Let's not forget Gungrave. That was the best video game based anime I'd ever seen.
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Jedi General



Joined: 27 Nov 2006
Posts: 2485
Location: Tucson, AZ
PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2007 3:45 pm Reply with quote
GoodLuckSaturday wrote:
Jedi General wrote:

I wouldn't say that. There are a lot of better game-based animes out there (When They Cry, Fate/Stay Night, Kanon 2006, Air, Tales of Phantasia etc.)


I do think there's a clear difference between a visual novel adaptation and a video game adaptation. Personally, I don't think that because someone was able to adapt Air or Rumbling Hearts into something great that the same can be done for Devil May Cry.


I don't like to think that either. To me video games and visual novels are pretty much the same thing.

Veoryn87 wrote:
Jedi General wrote:
bonbonsrus wrote:
Ya know, I never played the game or saw it before the anime, so I have nothing to base or compare it to, however, I saw a disk of this, and while I can't say it's great, I find Etna and Laharl adorable.


I haven't played the game either. I like the anime, although it's nowhere near the level of great comedies like Ninja Nonsense or Ghost Stories. I hate the dub though.

omnistry wrote:
Granted it's not Grade-A; but it's a lot better than most game-based anime.


I wouldn't say that. There are a lot of better game-based animes out there (When They Cry, Fate/Stay Night, Kanon 2006, Air, Tales of Phantasia etc.)

It's definitely better than, say something like Xenosaga the Animation. *shudders* I wish I had never watched that one.


Let's not forget Gungrave. That was the best video game based anime I'd ever seen.


I haven't seen that one, but perhaps I should. Wink
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akeleven



Joined: 28 Sep 2004
Posts: 3
Location: Anchorage, Ak
PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2007 4:22 pm Reply with quote
I haven't played the game, knew nothing about Disgaea before this anime. And I loved it! It's just for fun and mostly meets the target. Some parts are head scratching and some are hysterical. I have two young nephews and Laharl reminds me of them - and makes me more tolerant of them.

Sit back and enjoy. It's not great literaure. Laughing
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Nagisa
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Joined: 19 Aug 2003
Posts: 6128
Location: Atlanta-ish, Jawjuh
PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2007 4:42 pm Reply with quote
Veoryn87 wrote:
Let's not forget Gungrave. That was the best video game based anime I'd ever seen.


Meh, personally I despise Gungrave. Starts off as a bland, generic mafia story (though, being a sucker for mafia stories, I at least found some enjoyment of it at that time), which then introduces some ridiculous zombie monster plague nonsense in the most moronic way possible. From that point on, it just cannibalizes the cast and turns once-fascinating characters into mindless baddies, revolves itself around an utterly boring lead character who plays out like Frankenstein's monster went irritatingly emo, and the ending is such a copout that it effectively makes the entire series before it seem like a complete waste of time in retrospect. I dunno, everyone drools over it, but I just saw it as nothing more than insipid, vomitous garbage.

Of course, I've never played the game, but given that I hear it was trying to match up characters to game bosses and syncing up anime plot to game plot that made the anime the way it was, I don't think I'm missing much. Just some lame attempt at adding a crappy excuse for a "story" to an otherwise brainless shooter.
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Dardre



Joined: 16 Mar 2006
Posts: 166
PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2007 6:49 pm Reply with quote
Nagisa wrote:
Veoryn87 wrote:
Let's not forget Gungrave. That was the best video game based anime I'd ever seen.


Meh, personally I despise Gungrave. Starts off as a bland, generic mafia story (though, being a sucker for mafia stories, I at least found some enjoyment of it at that time), which then introduces some ridiculous zombie monster plague nonsense in the most moronic way possible. From that point on, it just cannibalizes the cast and turns once-fascinating characters into mindless baddies, revolves itself around an utterly boring lead character who plays out like Frankenstein's monster went irritatingly emo, and the ending is such a copout that it effectively makes the entire series before it seem like a complete waste of time in retrospect. I dunno, everyone drools over it, but I just saw it as nothing more than insipid, vomitous garbage.

Of course, I've never played the game, but given that I hear it was trying to match up characters to game bosses and syncing up anime plot to game plot that made the anime the way it was, I don't think I'm missing much. Just some lame attempt at adding a crappy excuse for a "story" to an otherwise brainless shooter.


I have to agree with you on this. I've only been able to bring myself to watch the first Gungrave volume, and that only twice. I actually thought it might be interesting in a sort of Crow like way. But what did I get? The first episode was interesting, and was the kind of action packed episode I was looking for. But after that? Episode after episode telling the back story. The first time I watched it, I fell asleep around the third episode. But thinking I was just over-tired, I watched it again the following weekend. It was a true effort for me to stay awake, much less interested in what was going on.

Backstory is all well and good, but I think that first volume would have been much better if it didn't shove a large chunk of backstory down my throat. I almost cried when I saw the next episode preview on the last episode on the volume and saw it was yet another backstory episode. Crying or Very sad

In my experience, most of the video-game based anime has been both boring and rather badly executed.
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DragonsRevenge



Joined: 15 Nov 2004
Posts: 1150
PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2007 9:06 pm Reply with quote
And it's a shame because the plot of the game really allows it to be awesome comedy anime fodder. There were some moments of great dialogue, and some of the attacks were wildly over the top. *sigh* Such a wasted opportunity.
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