EPTthis is up Numy's alley lol
Anime Discussion Thread - Page 6014
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BigFan
TLADT24920 Posts
this is up Numy's alley lol | ||
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Slaughter
United States20255 Posts
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Numy
South Africa35471 Posts
Fantasy and sci-fi is a bit tricky. I'm sure we've had this discussion before or maybe that was with another group. LOGH definitely has more to sci-fi than fantasy in it but I'd argue that FMP kind of goes towards the "fantasy with future tech" that stuff like Star Wars does. The descriptors for shows/stories at the end of the day are pretty shit. Fantasy encompasses all non-fiction basically if you want to stretch it. Shows like Star Wars uses futuristic tech but yet has more in-common with fantasy stories than it does sci-fi stories or at the time. So how you classify it really depends on your view imo. | ||
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eviltomahawk
United States11135 Posts
On May 09 2017 13:46 Slaughter wrote: Lol Little Witch Academia went full TTGL. Looooved it! Especially since I just finished the TTGL movies a couple days ago. Plus, that random LoL esports reference at the beginning. It's one of my favorite episodes so far. | ||
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Sentenal
United States12398 Posts
On May 09 2017 16:04 Numy wrote: Fantasy and sci-fi is a bit tricky. I'm sure we've had this discussion before or maybe that was with another group. LOGH definitely has more to sci-fi than fantasy in it but I'd argue that FMP kind of goes towards the "fantasy with future tech" that stuff like Star Wars does. The descriptors for shows/stories at the end of the day are pretty shit. Fantasy encompasses all non-fiction basically if you want to stretch it. Shows like Star Wars uses futuristic tech but yet has more in-common with fantasy stories than it does sci-fi stories or at the time. So how you classify it really depends on your view imo. FMP is pretty solidly in the "scifi" camp IMO. Unless you think giant robots makes for Fantasy. It goes a long way to try and make pretty much all the tech, even the Lambda Driver (probably the only thing that could possibly be considered 'magic'), seem scifiy. Something like Star Wars or WH40K could be considered "science fantasy", but FMP is definitely no where near their level of magic, swords, and dragons. | ||
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Slaughter
United States20255 Posts
https://my.mixtape.moe/iebhhv.webm | ||
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Numy
South Africa35471 Posts
On May 09 2017 22:47 Sentenal wrote: FMP is pretty solidly in the "scifi" camp IMO. Unless you think giant robots makes for Fantasy. It goes a long way to try and make pretty much all the tech, even the Lambda Driver (probably the only thing that could possibly be considered 'magic'), seem scifiy. Something like Star Wars or WH40K could be considered "science fantasy", but FMP is definitely no where near their level of magic, swords, and dragons. I could be just not giving FMP enough credit in the genre. I do think a lot of the giant robot anime are more fantasy than sci-fi though or at least "science fantasy" | ||
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Sentenal
United States12398 Posts
Most of the time when people say "Hey, thats a TTGL reference!" I don't believe them, but that is indeed full TTGL lol On May 10 2017 02:57 Numy wrote: I could be just not giving FMP enough credit in the genre. I do think a lot of the giant robot anime are more fantasy than sci-fi though or at least "science fantasy" Nah, there is no way most mecha anime is closer to the fantasy end. Fantasy almost exclusively refers to medieval adventures with wizards, knights, and monsters. Scifi is alway deals with the future and technology. There is always a blending of the two, because "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic", but its always easy enough to peg which is which just in terms of how its flavored. "This magic-like thing exists because of technology!" = Scifi vs "This futuristic stuff exists because of magic!" = Fantasy | ||
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Toadesstern
Germany16350 Posts
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Sentenal
United States12398 Posts
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Numy
South Africa35471 Posts
On May 10 2017 03:28 Sentenal wrote: Most of the time when people say "Hey, thats a TTGL reference!" I don't believe them, but that is indeed full TTGL lol Nah, there is no way most mecha anime is closer to the fantasy end. Fantasy almost exclusively refers to medieval adventures with wizards, knights, and monsters. Scifi is alway deals with the future and technology. There is always a blending of the two, because "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic", but its always easy enough to peg which is which just in terms of how its flavored. "This magic-like thing exists because of technology!" = Scifi vs "This futuristic stuff exists because of magic!" = Fantasy You thinking more of the high fantasy definition. There never used to be a sci-fi and it was all just fantasy but over time the genres got more separated. So "fantasy" as a overarching type will encompass everything from sci-fi to wizards flinging magic spells. Sci-fi is generally more "speculative" and linked with commentary either social or just exploratory. These stories try have grounding in reality even if they sometimes go off the deep end. "Fantasy with future tech" on the other hand normally ignores all of that and merely uses the future tech in the same way magic/wizards etc are used. That's why you Star Wars is essentially fantasy. It follows a typical "prophecy" fantasy story. Takes no effort to ground itself in anything and even has magic. A lot of mecha/giant robot stuff I've seen follows similar themes. The mecha could easily be replaced with magic dragons without really changing the story. There are obviously plenty of mecha that don't do this. Gundam has a whole swath of stories that don't fall into these patterns. I think in a post Star Wars world what sci-fi is has just really drifted into fantasy so much so that we kind of need a new term. edit: I see wiki suggests the classic definition of Sci-fi is now more "hard science fiction" instead, with the current usage more just fantasy with tech. Whelp there goes another term. So everything I said is pointless. Lovely end to the day. On May 10 2017 03:41 Toadesstern wrote: what if it's something like Mahouka where it's clearly portrayed as something scientific (or like Railgun by itself, also known as the proper way to watch it) but within the universe itself it's called "magic"? Mahouka is clearly a fantasy story man. It's even called a magical girl show!!@ | ||
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IceHism
United States1903 Posts
On May 10 2017 03:41 Toadesstern wrote: what if it's something like Mahouka where it's clearly portrayed as something scientific (or like Railgun by itself, also known as the proper way to watch it) but within the universe itself it's called "magic"? I call them magitech. index as well. | ||
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Miragee
8716 Posts
On May 10 2017 03:28 Sentenal wrote: Most of the time when people say "Hey, thats a TTGL reference!" I don't believe them, but that is indeed full TTGL lol Nah, there is no way most mecha anime is closer to the fantasy end. Fantasy almost exclusively refers to medieval adventures with wizards, knights, and monsters. Scifi is alway deals with the future and technology. There is always a blending of the two, because "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic", but its always easy enough to peg which is which just in terms of how its flavored. "This magic-like thing exists because of technology!" = Scifi vs "This futuristic stuff exists because of magic!" = Fantasy If anyone didn't play the new Torment: Tides of Numenera (or the Pen & Paper Numenera): They approached this topic with a similar attitude you mentioned. "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." It's not quite that, they say clearly that magic doesn't exist in the universe but because some technology is so advanced and the knowledge how they work has been lost between the rise and fall of civilisations it's basically magic to the people who use it in the present. Your last statement is obviously true. However, I think in most cases you can make clear cuts between Fantasy and Sci-Fi because of the explanations the author gives the consumer. There are just some cases where your statement clearly matter. For example psychic abilities. It's basically magic, labeled as sci-fi. I personally don't like the idea of it being sci-fi but I can at least understand when they try to make scientific explanations for it. Also, if a magic-system is well defined and explained, like in The Elves Saga by Bernhard Hennen, it borders on being sci-fi because the explanation is very "scientific" (for the universe it's set in). When I watched Gundam, the way Plavsky Particles are implemented in the universe kind of reminded me of that - but one is labeled magic the other is labeled sci-fi. | ||
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Lackbleeder
741 Posts
But yeah it depends where on the mohs scale of sci-fi it falls into, if it's soft sci-fi the advanced stuff with little to no explaination is basically magic. This is especially true for mecha, even most real robot shows are only Medium SF at best. Heard Votoms was hard SF-ish but other than that I can't really think of anything else. | ||
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ZerOCoolSC2
9071 Posts
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Sentenal
United States12398 Posts
On May 10 2017 05:41 Lackbleeder wrote: Was gonna bring up the third law of Clarke but looks like Miragee beat me to it. But yeah it depends where on the mohs scale of sci-fi it falls into, if it's soft sci-fi the advanced stuff with little to no explaination is basically magic. This is especially true for mecha, even most real robot shows are only Medium SF at best. Heard Votoms was hard SF-ish but other than that I can't really think of anything else. Gunbuster is hard scifi | ||
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Lackbleeder
741 Posts
Gunbuster had some hard scifi concepts like time dilation but it also had stuff like + Show Spoiler + The battle against the aliens in episode 5, the gunbuster was capable of doing some really insane stuff. | ||
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Toadesstern
Germany16350 Posts
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Zergneedsfood
United States10671 Posts
On May 10 2017 05:41 Lackbleeder wrote: I mean, I don't necessarily agree with that assessment. By this scale you're linking, HG Well's Time Machine, one of many commonly cited science fictions works by him, is basically a work of fantasy/magic because there's no explanation to the inner workings of the contraption. Was gonna bring up the third law of Clarke but looks like Miragee beat me to it. But yeah it depends where on the mohs scale of sci-fi it falls into, if it's soft sci-fi the advanced stuff with little to no explaination is basically magic. This is especially true for mecha, even most real robot shows are only Medium SF at best. Heard Votoms was hard SF-ish but other than that I can't really think of anything else. In addition, by this scale, we have to consider Steins;Gate hard science fiction because their description of their time traveling machine iirc is pretty extensive even in the anime when it should be clear to everyone that S;G's science is bogus. Fun and greatly entertaining, but bogus nonetheless. With stuff like Hyperion, Dune, and The Book of the New Sun, stuff like science fiction and fantasy can be blurred for many reasons. I can agree that it's an inebriating idea to want to be able to more easily classify these things, but I feel like these old rules and scales, as nice as they sound or look, don't even remotely come close to adequately explaining much. From my experience, fantasy and science fiction are most commonly distinguished by tone and atmosphere and it is only when an atmosphere of mysticism and scientific tone collide that we get things like a Dune or a Hyperion. | ||
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felisconcolori
United States6169 Posts
Anyways, as a long time Sci-Fi/Fantasy reader - the difference is that Sci-Fi has to at least have a reasonable connection to science as it is or as it could be without too much handwaving and particle of the week nonsense. Whether or not the science makes sense, it is actually viewed scientifically. (Which is why, say, Star Trek would be more Sci Fi with Star Wars being more Sci-Fantasy. WTF is a motivator? Why does everything have one? How does it work? Never a part of the story - and the science was dreamed up by secondary authors, fans, etc, after the original story was told. Where as the science, though often tenuous, was central to Star Trek. Even if it was BS like Berthold Rays.) Straight Fantasy is of course swords/sorcery/low tech/what science. But you could argue for Urban Fantasy for a lot of the modern/near future anime stories that have tech but also magic. Like Index (but not Railgun). Science can pop up in Urban Fantasy, but isn't a driving factor in the story usually. I think, for Sci-Fi, science needs to be central to how the story plays out. It's all a big muddle, though, as you point out - there never was any solid demarcation, and things slide from extreme hard sci-fi through to sci-fantasy into urban fantasy and landing in fantasy. Sometimes in the same book! (Dammit, Heinlein.) | ||
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