Response to Animes Like This One: How to Find Similar Anime

In my Hubpages browsing of Anime hubs I stumbleupon a very interesting Hub from Falsor Wing concerning How to Find Similar Anime (FULL TEXT HERE).

In this Hub Falsor describes 9 points that he thinks relevant and will help the common anime lover to find better what's the next anime he should watch! Now this was a great topic and I must congratulate Falsor for bringing it up. However reading his hub made me think a bit and altough I agree with him on some bits there are a few things I want to add to this subject.

So many, in fact, that I started to write a comment on his hub but when I was at half of it I saw it was already so long that I Ctrl-C it and just created a brand new hub to share my views on this interesting subject!

So, what I'll do next is just argue with what Falsor says in his hub about how to find anime, point by point. I hope he doesn't get mad at me if I'll sound a bit harsh on some subjects. I'm just expressing my opinion (which is as good as his) and expect an interesting discussion about this topic, mostly for the gain of everyone that loves anime.

It is my firm conviction that a little controversy not only raises the interest of the topic, it also helps to deepen it's analysis and more enlightement can be obtained that way.

So Falsor (and everyone else for that matter) feel free to agree, disagree or even dice me for what I will write on the following lines.

I'll take you on anytime (wearing sunglasses and looking coool ^.O)!

1) Forums and Chatrooms

Asking is indeed irrelevant because if it's a good anime forum like animesuki chances are it was already asked a gazillion times. There should be a mega thread about it. Just use your head (and the search tool ^_^') to find it out. It's not useless per se, just not time effective. I mean if you read people saying good , over and over, about an anime it must be good enough for you to give it a glance, even if then later you find out it's not your genre.

What I really must enphasize prior to watching any anime, no matter where you got the recommendation for it is to first check out some pro reviews about it. Check out Anime Planet or Anime News NetWork - those are good sites to look for great animes. Anime reviews are nice and ratings tend to be fairly accurate.

2) Look at the art

When you speak of art I think you're talking about drawing style. Alas, art is more than that... things like animation techniques used are way important to be neglected and you can find that the good or bad use of those (even if the drawing is similar) can make or break an anime.

Also, you're going to 'investigate' an anime based on art? That can get quite hard to do based on a few pics that you randomly encounter on the Internet, unless a) you're an expert mangaka or b) the art you like is quite unique and obvious like chibi style or something.
Overall it's very hard to find an anime this way.

And don't get me talking of the way a bad soundtrack can kill an anime as well...

3) Genera is a poor way to search

Genre is a good way to look for an anime! Just don't be so restrictive on your classifications. Genera isn't only Sci-Fi or Action! What about the plot and storytelling? To me that's way important and a very good way to further enhance how to find an anime we will like! So it's a drama anime or comedy? Teen oriented or adult theme? What, it's a action packed anime, mature oriented and in a sci-fi setting? Sweet, that's just how i like it!

4) Creators

Totaly agree with you on this point. Normally if you liked the work of some artist like Otomo's Akira, you'll also love some other works by him. Just let me warn: you won't love them all though, because even anime genious can do a flop anime.

5) Number of Episodes

Ohoh, common number of episodes is not a good way to find an anime, It's just something that you have to think and choose before even going after the next cool anime. You want a +100 episodes full of twists - and fillers (Naruto a huge offender here but sadly not alone) or prefer a more compact story, that's quick but normally goes straight to the point?

This choice you have to make can be influenced by many factors, not the least one the very important detail: what is the lenght of the anime you just saw (or you're currently watching). If you're still struggling in your 259 episode of Dragon Ball Z, do you really want to start another long series?... Urghh!!!

6) Length of Episodes

I Lolled a lot with this point. First it doesn't add nothing to your hub, because it's a generic statement, arguably true and no one in their right minds will think;: 'yeah, you know what, my next anime is gonna be one with 5 min episodes, because i like commedy' O.o

7) Don’t read too much into the name of the series

You are correct in this statement :D

8) Sequels/Alternate Universes

Want to find the sequels to your favorite series? Wikipedia it. That is all for this topic.

9) Don’t Discount Series with low scores on websites

You should never discount any series. However if everyone (and I mean everyone, including critics of some sites I aforementioned) are saying it's really bad and giving it bad notes (and most important, explaining it why they're claiming what they claim) feel free to believe them. Or not, and go waste some hours of your life watching a bad anime in favour of a good one.

There, I arrest my case!