Month: July 2017
Why Funny Faces Are Essential to the Success of an Anime
An art style can make or break an anime; For example, an art style with a superb use of color theory can enhance an anime, but one with a complete lack of understanding anatomy would absolutely ruin it. However, there’s one element of an anime’s art that stands above all the others, ready to wreck devastation onto the animes that don’t use it: We’re, of course, talking about the funny faces.
Anime fans everywhere know that funny faces are a staple and a signifier of a good show; These expressions are an indicator that you’re in for a good time, whether you’re watching the anime itself or just simply posting about it online. It’s basically telling its viewers “Are you ready for fun? Because it’s time to have fun!” After all, who doesn’t like to have fun?
To start our analysis of why funny faces are pivotal to successful anime, we’ll have to go back to anime’s humble beginnings: Anime originally started in the 1910s, much like many other cartoon industries from around the world. Not unlike the rest of the world, Japan was following in the same footsteps as everyone else: They took up sound when it was invented, they took up making animated feature films when they realized they could do that, they then— Well, you get the idea already.
Predictably, this would lead Japan to follow in the footsteps of western animation companies such as Disney and Fleischer Studios, and become inspired by their expressive characters. In fact, Japan liked them enough, Fleischer Studios even sent Betty Boop over there to perform once!
…That, and the fact that Donald Duck basically invented modern anime/manga. How could we ever forget about his influence on anime?
While anime characters have always been expressive due to their traditionally-cartoony roots, another element would later come into play of the effectiveness of funny faces: Reaction images.
You see, all of these animation companies made sure to consider the classical principle of “emoticons” in their work. Dating back to a simple drawing of a smiley face in 1653, emoticons were instantly incorporated into animation to help make their characters easier to draw (especially repeatedly) than having to draw realistic human faces for nearly every frame.
However, it wouldn’t be until 1982 that the idea of emoticons being used digitally was taken into consideration. As the internet and other digital mediums grew, people began to develop new kinds of emoticons to use in their communication, such as smilies, sideways emoticons, kaomoji, emojis like the ones in The Emoji Movie, -and of course- using gifs/pictures of shows to express one’s feelings. Naturally, anime funny faces ended up being a common occurrence among all of the gifs and pictures people used.
Meanwhile, back in the anime industry, all of the companies were starting to notice that images of their show’s funny faces were starting to be posted nearly everywhere online. Originally, the anime industry was considering suing everyone who used reaction images into oblivion, but as soon as they noticed all of the “what anime is this?” comments near many of the anime funny faces, it turns out they found free advertising for the shows themselves.
As soon as many studios released again how much impact funny faces could have on their anime (getting people attached to their characters, free advertising in the form of reaction gifs, its fun to draw and animate, etc.) they made sure to provide plenty for their audiences to enjoy. However, what happens to an anime that doesn’t use funny faces?
Maybe it’s a deep, serious drama that can’t see itself using wacky expressions? Perhaps they spent too much of the animation budget on special effects? Or maybe they’re just complete brutes who don’t like people having fun while watching their shows?
However, what if an anime is nothing but funny faces? One example would be the soon-to-become-an-actual-anime, Pop Team Epic; It plays with this idea, having it’s main characters faces always look adorable and funny, while engaging in all sorts weird, oddball scenarios, mainly since it’s a comedy series.
In conclusion, anime funny faces is a time-honored tradition dating back to the 1930s that also still holds up to this very day, and very likely into the future. Everybody loves and relates to them, they’re fun, and they’re an indicator of whether a series is truly good and worth watching, especially as we go further into the digital age; Wherever there’s pictures, there will be anime funny faces!
Happy Birthday to Stefan Karl Stefansson
THIS IS AN OFFICIAL BUTTBUDDZ BIRTHDAY CONGRATULATION TO STEFAN KARL STEFANSSON, ALSO KNOWN AS ROBBIE ROTTEN. HAPPY BIRTHDAY.’
Don’t forget fellow buttbuddz subscribers, that you can help out Stefan and his family by donating to his crowdfunding campaign https://www.gofundme.com/2tm9tqk
If you do this you will be remembered as a straight up alright guy and you will be blessed by fish and pepsi.
We will continue to wish Stefan the best of luck in his battle against cancer, despite the overwhelming odds he is facing.
Buttbuddz Video Game Recommendation Station #2 – Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors.
Good afternoon, live from the buttbuddz tower with 7 helicopter pads in beautiful Vienna, Austria it is the buttbuddz here with a new fresh review for you to read, today we are going to look at a great video game with an excellent storyline named Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors, popularly called 999.
Yeah, thats right. In 999 you play as a dude named Junpei who has to escape a sinking boat with 9 other people. They have 9 hours, and there are 9 doors that can help them seek a way out. In order to escape, this ensemble cast has to do various escape the room puzzles, which are linked by long visual novel portions. This might sound like a shitty mix of WORDSWORDSWORDSWORDS visual novel parts and shitty flash game puzzles, but you are actually wrong.
999 does in fact have the most thrilling storyline in a video game ever. Yeah that’s right, this game eats your favorite video game story for breakfast. A detailed storyline with excellent characters, exciting twists, philosophy and a mystery which will keep you hooked for hours are all here, and there are multiple endings which allow you to see different sides of the story and characters, and a true ending which wraps up the game perfectly. But wait kids, there is more to this.
Not only is there an excellent story, but there are also said escape-the-room puzzles. The puzzles are great not only because they are fun and require a decent amount of thinking, but the puzzles themselves are a part of the world and story. That’s right, the puzzle rooms reveal lore and have ties to the main storyline. These puzzles are not a thoughtless addon to a visual novel, they are a major part of the story themselves and that’s very excellent. The story never feels like it’s going to halt when you get to a puzzle room, the story keeps going and thats very good since the story in this game is excellent.
All in all, Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors is an excellent game and I really recommend you to check it out since I love it, and I think it’s a 10/10.
The game also has two sequels which might not be as solid and excellent as this game, but are worth checking out if you like 999. They are 7-8/10 games.
Buttbuddz Video Game Recommendation Station #1 – Earth Defense Force 4.1 The Shadow of New Despair
Hello boys and girls I’m going to tell you lads about a real good game you can all play on steam or Playstation™4, yeah that’s right it’s Earth Defense Force 4.1 The Shadow of New Despair.
Yeah, that’s right. The giant insects have invaded earth together with a bunch of robots of varying size. You play as EDF Soldier with gun. You must destroy these alien invaders.
In Earth Defense Force you get to play as 4 (four) different classes, all with their own exciting playstyle. There’s the Ranger who uses conventional weapons such as rocket launchers and can dodge roll for a very vanilla funtime, there is the Wing Diver who can fly real high with her jetpack on and shoots with disco inferno lasers and cool stuff like that, there’s the Air Raider who can shoot at giant insects with death rays from outer space (In other games, death rays from outer space would be a setpiece or a cutscene, but in EDF you can have giant death rays whenever you want) and he can also spawn vehicles such as giant robots, helicopters, motorcycles and giant tanks, which is fun for the whole family. And of course, there’s the Fencer who is the tank who can dual wield miniguns or have a cool shield which lets you go fast and also defends. There is fun for everyone in EDF thanks to these classes, and not only that there are 800 weapons to use too, so theres lots of fun playstyles you can try even within the different classes!
Wow, and there’s so many enemies varying from ants to robots to kaiju which create for a fun and varied experience. Roam a huge, realistic city with destroyable buildings, fight giant spaceships and play online with pals, or raise the difficulty to insane levels. There are over a 100 different missions, and like 40 more with DLC, giving you many hours of fun destruction. There are so many giant insects, giant robots, dragons, bees and aliens to destroy in so many ways, that the fun can not be halted. EDF is amazing and it is in fact the greatest game of all time. Only a MASSIVE, NASTY, CARD COUNTING BRUTUS BULLY DRAFT DODGER PIECE OF CRAB SHE IT HEAD FRICK would not enjoy Earth Defense Force. I therfore declare EDF as GOTY 2015, GOTY 2016 and I give it 10/10 and make it a Buttbuddz Game of Choice.
Butt with a Blog 