SPOILERS! General Pokémon Anime Discussion

[Cresselia~~]

Wait... I never knew Pokemon and Yokai Watch are animated by the same studio.
No wonder Yokai Watch gave me Gen 1 Pokemon vibes.

But why did they stop doing that to the Pokemon anime?
Indigo League and Orange Islands are still my 2 fav seasons.

XY is definitely better than BW, but I kinda rage quit after Ash lost to Alain.
Actually, I started watching every episode of XY, but stopped doing it when Ash releases Goodra. Then I watched the Pokemon Performance episodes by Serena.

Oh... please don't stop doing Pokemon battles.
Pokemon would never be the same without battles.

I hope Rotom dex would behave somewhat like Professor Oak's Rotom in the BW lectures.

 

[ThreeT]

Going to be honest, but I think everyone is completely overreacting with the whole no Pokemon battles and copying yo-kai thing. Yeah the anime is going to have a lot more comedy, but saying that battles will stop or be changed is complete nonsense. It's still pokemon! Ash is still going to evolve them and there WILL still be battles. I don't even believe they are going to stay in one spot either. The Alola Region is way too diverse and unique for the anime's setting to just take place only on Melemele island. About the whole Yo-kai watch thing, I can't really explain but I really don't think they're copying off it. Here's a video that I found, it doesn't relate too much to what I said but I still enjoyed it.

 

[Norne]

I really refuse to give viewing traffic to Poketubers, is this an actual animation spotlight, you know animation techniques, sakuga, framerate, color pallette comparison and technical stuff or just some guy screaming his fancanons?

At least put a small synopsis of the video dude.

 

[Codraroll]

I really refuse to give viewing traffic to Poketubers, is this an actual animation spotlight, you know animation techniques, sakuga, framerate, color pallette comparison and technical stuff or just dome guy screaming his fancanons?

At least put a small synopsis of the video dude.

The video starts off with a fairly long (but consise) rant on guys screaming their headcanons, which is a pretty good sign in itself, then he goes into the technical details. Really insightful, if you ask me.

Basically, he pinpoints the reason why Ash was redesigned: The animation studio is developing an entirely new workflow for animation, using new software and new techniques to change (and improve) the animation of characters and backgrounds. This allows them to make much more dynamic character animations, for both people and Pokémon. To take full advantage of the improvements, Ash was given a slight redesign to allow for more complex facial expressions and movements. The video explains this a lot more eloquently, so I really recommend seeing it.

I can totally see where he is coming from: Ash used to have large eyes, a large mouth, and precious little else. His face was as flexible with regards to animation as an emoticon. His hat hid his eyebrows, he had no nose, no cheeks or chin, his mouth was basically a changing shape drawn inside the borders of a flat surface. Check out Ash's artwork section on Bulbagarden. Note how, in the early series (and notably averted in the XY series artwork), Ash's face was always shown directly from the front or in perfect silhouette, no matter how awkward it looks with the position of his head. It is flat as a pancake, the design was never meant to work in 3D. For all intents and purposes, Ash's face was a flat screen on which flat eyes and a flat mouth could create expressions. Ash's large eyes limited the amount of perspective drawing the animators could do, so perspectives were mostly averted. Where it was really necessary, Ash's eyes were visibly shrunk and separated, like the new SuMo artwork.

TL;DR - Ash might look "goofy" in his new look, but there's a perfectly valid reason for that. His original design was too unflexible, and the new one can take advantage of a lot more angles and motions. Knowing the reason why he was redesigned makes me appreciate it a lot more.

 

[Norne]

The video starts off with a fairly long (but consise) rant on guys screaming their headcanons, which is a pretty good sign in itself, then he goes into the technical details. Really insightful, if you ask me.

Basically, he pinpoints the reason why Ash was redesigned: The animation studio is developing an entirely new workflow for animation, using new software and new techniques to change (and improve) the animation of characters and backgrounds. This allows them to make much more dynamic character animations, for both people and Pokémon. To take full advantage of the improvements, Ash was given a slight redesign to allow for more complex facial expressions and movements. The video explains this a lot more eloquently, so I really recommend seeing it.

I can totally see where he is coming from: Ash used to have large eyes, a large mouth, and precious little else. His face was as flexible with regards to animation as an emoticon. His hat hid his eyebrows, he had no nose, no cheeks or chin, his mouth was basically a changing shape drawn inside the borders of a flat surface. Check out Ash's artwork section on Bulbagarden. Note how, in the early series (and notably averted in the XY series artwork), Ash's face was always shown directly from the front or in perfect silhouette, no matter how awkward it looks with the position of his head. It is flat as a pancake, the design was never meant to work in 3D. For all intents and purposes, Ash's face was a flat screen on which flat eyes and a flat mouth could create expressions. Ash's large eyes limited the amount of perspective drawing the animators could do, so perspectives were mostly averted. Where it was really necessary, Ash's eyes were visibly shrunk and separated, like the new SuMo artwork.

TL;DR - Ash might look "goofy" in his new look, but there's a perfectly valid reason for that. His original design was too unflexible, and the new one can take advantage of a lot more angles and motions. Knowing the reason why he was redesigned makes me appreciate it a lot more.

So basically confirming a "Ponyo" with computer assistance as it was predicted by the Sakuga crew?

You can disregard my exepticism but OLM is known for its Gonzo approach to new technologies, jarring insertions of CGI that really don't age well. Also PowerPoint slideshows before A1 perfectioned the technique.

I can understand trying to update a show visuals, but I just can't shake the feeling that they are inept with the new stuff, the trailer showed us BIG issues with depth and animation flow even on key frames, this isn't just a baseless concern regarding the designs, then there is also issues with the gag festival approach some are hinting, especially given how the staff at OLM treats this kind of running gag things, cue they often delay the punchline for comedic effect on a tsukiome boke gag wich while working as a 5th panel of sorts just really kills a joke in the English concept.

It's really hard to trust this studio, especially as a non Japanese member of the audience.

But seriously, he didn't say anything new from the Ponyo crew, I'm surprised how much he ignored the millenial bathers in saying the depth and pallette was reminiscent of the infamously negative animation if SU and its depth inconsistencies or on the "stretch" mechanics of the fluid animation.

Im not saying there aren't saving throws to be had, but what we where shown and what was supposed to hype us only least us with Duragon desu~ and 4 other calm takes to praise on a technical level.

 

[Pikachu315111]

It has been confirmed that the episode of Gathering at the Pokémon House, otherwise known as Pokénchi, due to air on October 16th, there will be a huge presentation of new Pokémon Sun & Moon game footage and what is labelled interesting information about the Pokémon Sun & Moon anime, which is set to air on TV Tokyo in Japan next month. As this follows on from CoroCoro's release on October 15th and the previously announced October 14th information release, it is unlikely that there will be anything new within the episode. However, if there is, we shall post it so be sure to check back

So we'll probably get our first real clip of the Sun & Moon anime, possible a scene specifically selected to show viewers what to expect from this saga.

 

[ToadBrigade]

Considering there are dozens of Pokemon shown in each episode and with almost 1000 episodes that seems like a reasonable number overall. I'm not sure if XY and XYZ have a higher rate of shinies per Pokemon shown than other seasons (as opposed to per episode) but with the quality of animation getting better it wouldn't surprise me if there are just more Pokemon being shown overall. It also wouldn't surprise me if the producers of the anime introduce a shiny Pokemon at similar rates to the games but just have them as that episodes featured Pokemon rather than in the background making them more prominent.

I'd be really interested in seeing someone crunch the numbers to see if that's the case.

 

[Vinc2612]

The events for shiny Suicune/Entei/Raikou were in gen 4. I don't remember seeing them in any movie though, but my memory may be just bad.

I am not surprised that there are more shiny Pokémon, for two reasons:
- You can see wild Pokémon before encountering them in the anime. If there is a green Tauros on a route, you'll see it in the anime, but you'll probably miss it in the game.
- Trainers in the anime are "allowed" to have shinies. In game, I remember Seaking Meowth and another one from gen 3 in the Trainer Tower, but I think this is the only exception. But in the anime, this is not prevented, and it's actually pretty easy to imagine that Steven Stone or Lysandre are special/hardcore enough to take the time to catch a shiny. Since Ash meets a lot of those special/hardcore trainers, it increases the odds of facing shiny Pokémon.

 

[ToadBrigade]

The shiny beasts themselves weren't in any movie from what I remember but Zoroark did disguise himself as them in the Zoroark movie.

Many of the in game trainers could be hard core enough to seek shiny Pokemon but then it wouldn't be as special for the player to find them if other regular trainers had shinies like in the anime. As for the XY anime I think shiny hunting has become much easier and more accessible in the games recently and has become more popular so they might be trying to appeal to those people to watch the anime too.

 

[DHR-107]

adamjohnson I merged this with the General anime discussion thread as I do not think it is a good enough topic on its own for its own thread.

I left a redirect in place for one day :) Have fun on Smogon!

 

[Norne]

Well at least they got the decency of using proper shadowing for close ups and reactions.

Scared Lillie.

I might not like how the key frames look or how little frames there are, but if they keep this detail on slapstick it might not be terrible, the shadowing in the following trailer is way better than on the first one, at least I can say it won't be SU tier garbage animation wise.

I still need to watch more stuff on action to judge the sakuga and depth tricks if the characters are just going to slide across them like in some scenes we watched previously.

At least I got Flip Flappers to please my eye and put me in a good mood before Pokémon.

 

[LightningLord2]

Do you think there'll be another outrage about the Anime soon? I know that the league loss is pretty much common knowledge by now, but we're getting close to the US release of that episode.

 

[Norne]

Do you think there'll be another outrage about the Anime soon? I know that the league loss is pretty much common knowledge by now, but we're getting close to the US release of that episode.

Yes it will. This is where things go memetic.

 

[LightningLord2]

Another thing: The episode where Ash (presumably) gives away Greninja airs on the 20th, while the demo will be out on the 18th. So basically, we're getting his Greninja before he even ditches it.

 

[Pikachu315111]

*Sees a discussion that seemed to have started in the middle going on*

What in the world are you guys talking about...

adamjohnson I merged this with the General anime discussion thread as I do not think it is a good enough topic on its own for its own thread.

Oh.

The shiny beasts themselves weren't in any movie from what I remember but Zoroark did disguise himself as them in the Zoroark movie.

Um, the Shiny Beasts were in the movie. Zoroark disguised herself as the normal looking versions to create illusions of them destroying the city. The real Legendary Beasts showed up to stop Zoroark later on and they were all shiny.

I'm guessing you guys are talking about Shiny Pokemon in the anime? Bulbapedia has a list right here.

Also all set trainers in the game don't have shiny Pokemon, however some trainers in the Battle Facilities can have Shiny Pokemon (though I don't know whether they were set to do so or if its because they generate mostly random Pokemon). FUN FACT: In Gen III, Wally can actually encounter a Shiny Ralts, however after he catches it it'll become a normal Ralts.

Sun & Moon Anime Stuff:

New Trailer

Not sure if it was confirmed but looks like Jessie's Wobbuffet is staying, there's that at least. Nothing really else to get from that trailer (BTW what is flying with the Fearow at 0:10? They look like Pigdeotto but their darker... Alolan Pidgeotto?)

Official Art

Oh god, Ash, Jessie, James, what have they done to you?

They look alright, obviously not as sharp as they would had they kept the XY art style, though I don't see anything wrong with them (besides looking flat, seriously where's the shadows on the clothes?).

Meh, guess Lillie looks okay, the flatness REALLY messes with Kukui, and Samson looks like a badly drawn Professor Oak.

Character Bios

Ash: Ash has traveled to the Alola Region with Pikachu.
Rotom Pokedex: Rotom Pokedex will speak to Ash and aid him in his journey.
Lillie: She likes Pokémon, but for some reason cannot touch them (hmm...).
Kiawe: He likes Fire-type Pokemon. He helps out on his family's farm while attending the school
Mallow: She likes Grass-type Pokemon. She has an active personality, but can be goofy. She helps out the family business of the Aina Cafeteria (possible game location?).
Lana: She likes Water-type Pokemon. She's docile but active. She's the eldest of three daughters of a fisherman.
Sophacles: He likes Electric-type Pokemon. He is a programming geek and loves to analyze things.
Professor Kukui: The Pokémon Professor of the region who studies Pokémon moves and teaches at the school. Ash is staying at his house (what, there's no dorms at the camp their going to?).
Samson Oak: Professor Samuel Oak's cousin. He's the headmaster of the school and studies Alola Pokemon evolution (then why isn't Ash staying as his place?).
Team Rocket: They have traveled to the Alola Region to capture Pikachu.

Also its confirmed that Kiawe, Mallow, Lana, and Sophacles would be Ash's crew this season (yet oddly not Lillie).
Also apparently Sophacles' Togedemaru is going to be Pikachu's "rival".

 

[Johta]

HOLD ON JUST A SECOND

Are you telling me that the blue haired kid is actually a girl?
w o w, I don't even know what to say, I was sure as all hell that was a boy.

Also, I've been trying to stay positive but damn, Jessie and James look terrible, I can't even try and defend that one...

 

[LightningLord2]

The new anime info makes me feel that the writers are so bad at trying to stay true to the source material, they might as well not even bother trying to.

Also, the change of the art style might not just be a thing where they try and improve on the animation (I have to be honest, I haven't had any issues with the animation quality since Advance really), but it could be that the producers have new animators who simply draw the characters differently than the old ones. Though the latter one might fall flat because Team Rocket's Meowth still looks the same as it did from the beginning.

 

[Karxrida]

Something interesting to note is that there's apparently a new head writer.

 

[Pikachu315111]

Another trailer, but nothing really to take from it:

Hide

 

[Every1XplodeNOW]

The new anime info makes me feel that the writers are so bad at trying to stay true to the source material, they might as well not even bother trying to.

Have they ever "stayed true to the source material"? They use the games as a base yeah, but the anime has always done its own thing.

 

[LightningLord2]

Have they ever "stayed true to the source material"? They use the games as a base yeah, but the anime has always done its own thing.

Well, most adaptations of monster-catching games tend to do far worse than that - Digimon and Monster Rancher, for instance, have content that isn't even remotely similar to that of the games.

What I'm referring to the is the characters brought to the anime being nothing like their game counterparts and many wierd happenings in the battle performance from time to time. At the very least, they managed to retain the core gameplay elements and the plot segments revolving around the Pokémon League (mostly).

 

[ScraftyIsTheBest]

Stepping away from the new Sun and Moon anime discussion for a bit, I just wanted to say that I managed to find some time today to watch the Team Flare arc go on today.

To put it simply, I loved it. It was very intense and it was great to see every major character in the XY series step up to the plate against the crisis and give it their all for the cause. There was a lot of action going on towards the end, with all the Gym Leaders, Diantha, Steven, and everyone just putting everything on the line to fight off the Zygarde abomination. There were also some heart-wrenching moments such as the one with Clemont needing to release Zygarde from the machine's control, but at the expense of Clembot's life...and a showcasing of the bond they shared, or Bonnie trying to snap Squishy (or, as I should say, Red Zygarde) out of Team Flare's control by singing to it, showcasing what bond they had. There was so much action and a lot of suspense at every moment and it was amazing to see. The animation was well done, and the characters were really showcasing how far they've come in the series. I like that they made the Team Flare arc more action filled and edgy, and even had some up and intense moments like Lysandre walking off the tower, and the way Lysandre was killed was pretty awesome: watching him and the Zygarde abomination get completely annihilated by Complete Zygarde's Core Enforcer, which by the way looked totally badass.

Speaking of Complete Zygarde, it just looked completely awesome. The art style, the appearance, and its movements were awesome and Core Enforcer's animation was also awesome. Its appearance and design are just so kick-ass it's amazing (it looks like a giant mecha ready to kick ass), and the animation just showed off how awesome it was. In short, I like the throwback to the DP series' edginess and intensity, and how dark a turn the events took.

That said, I'm a little sad Xerneas and Yveltal had no involvement in this arc at all, since I really did want to see them ever since this arc was conceived. Too bad we never saw them in the main anime at all (except for a brief cameo from Xerneas back in the summer camp arc). Oh well, the Team Flare arc was still awesome, with all the intensity and at times emotional scenes. And Zygarde looked completely awesome too.

I'm not gonna comment on Sun and Moon for now, but from what I'm seeing I'm pretty afraid for the SM anime, this looks like it'll drop Ash down to BW level stupidity (oh boy), especially after how the XY series actually had a pretty decent, even if not amazing, anime series.

 

[Every1XplodeNOW]

Well, most adaptations of monster-catching games tend to do far worse than that - Digimon and Monster Rancher, for instance, have content that isn't even remotely similar to that of the games.

What I'm referring to the is the characters brought to the anime being nothing like their game counterparts and many wierd happenings in the battle performance from time to time. At the very least, they managed to retain the core gameplay elements and the plot segments revolving around the Pokémon League (mostly).

Okay, but that's been occurring since the beginning. The anime has always been changing characters, adding new ones, or not even putting them in. Also, the only similarity between the in-game Pokemon League and the anime Pokemon League is you collect 8 badges to challenge/enter it. So, my point is, "not staying true to the source material" isn't a legitimate criticism when the show has mostly strayed away from it.

Though to be fair, the S/M anime is the first time they have gone so far from the video games, that we know of. But I'll say this, just because an anime (or any form of media for the matter) doesn't stay true to the source material mean it's inherently bad (ex. Fullmetal Alchemist).

 

[Frozocrone]

Looking forward to the SM Anime personally. So much potential available. I've come around to Ash's new design and sort of prefer it to the XY design.

 

[LightningLord2]

How about I make a small top 5 list? I'll post what I think are the best and worst of the battles in the anime so far (excluding ones I haven't actually seen), alternating between the two:

Flop 5: Ash&Paul vs. Dawn&Conway, DP Saga
The reason this is on the list is because it basically proves plot armor exists by having a tag battle be won by a team of trainers who hate each other and actively work against each other. I like Conway because he attempted to synergize his moves with Dawn and actually worked out a strategy with her (sort of), so seeing this completely shattered by brute force is highly disappointing.

Top 5: Charizard vs. Magmar, Original Saga
Kanto had many disappointments, skipped large parts of the in-game story, but this battle is grand. It shows what the writers are actually able to pull off if they don't discard the cool things about Pokémon in favor of slapstick humor and the author's fetishes.

Flop 4: Ash vs. Erika, Original Saga
It was either this or vs. Sabrina, but the bad writing involving her mainly extends outside of the one battle they had, Haunter wasn't even fighting at all. But in this one, Erika is being made fun of, her Pokémon are de-evolved and the only gimmick her main Pokémon has was smelling funny. Not to mention Team Rocket of all people being the ones that win him the badge. Who needs skill in Pokémon if your criminal stalkers can coerce the gym leaders?

Top 4: Ash&Cilan vs. Rocko&Soren, BW Saga
This battle was about decent in choreography, what really shined was how awesome the double battle brothers were with their combo attacks and their extremely hammy announcements. Not to mention that Drilbur and Braviary are two really cool Unova Pokémon.

Flop 3: Kingler vs. Psyduck, Johto Saga
Ash's Kingler was a top-notch Pokémon, he knows how to deal with Psyduck and knows exactly how its abilities work. So of course he goes to attack the head with a pinching attack to trigger its psychic powers (one of the main things I hate in the Anime, anything Psychic is basically god mode). That's not even being stupid anymore, that's losing on purpose.

Top 3: Ash vs. Roark, DP Saga
One of the few times in the anime where a battle was won by strategy and not some nakama crap. Ash knew that his Pokémon didn't have a snowball's chance in hell to match Rampardos in raw power, so he devised techniques to outmanuever the slow rock types and him not having much type advantage. In the end, he even conditioned Roark into a certain counterplay to avoid Rampardos' attacks.

Flop 2: Combusken vs. Grumpig, Advance Saga
Oh boy, Psychic-Types and contests. Not a nice mix. The entire strategy of that Grumpig was basically that Psychic makes it untouchable, pretty much neutralizing anything May would try. At the end, May would end up using Fire Spin on the ceiling to spread the attack such that Grumpig couldn't focus on it, making just stand there dumbfounded as it literally has nothing going for it other than this one gimmick.

Top 2: Ash vs. Champion Drake, Orange Saga
It's nice to see a full 6v6 battle, especially since Drake and Ash use some really cool Pokémon. It had quite a bit of back and forth where Ditto would already pressure Ash from the start, then he would mostly cruise through the matchups, only slowing a bit against Electabuzz, before facing that monstrously powerful Dragonite that took Ash four Pokémon before Pikachu finally beat it. Even Team Rocket was amazed at how awesome that battle was.

Flop 1: Buizel vs. Lanturn, DP Saga
Basically the epitome of everything bad about contests. The judges and announcer were already biased towards Lanturn, who wouldn't shut up about type advantage. Lanturn never landed a hit on Buizel, who hit much harder and faster and the closest Lanturn came to a comeback was using Ice Beam, which only served to power up Aqua Jet into a combo with devastating power. Lanturn was announced the winner for no reason.

Top 1: Ash vs. Winona, Advance Saga
Hey writers, why can't you make more trainers as skilled as her? Winona has a lot of coordination for aerial battles by being able to accurately issue precise orders and gauging very well how fast the two Swellows were. She even has means to deal with Electric attack, having forced Ash to bring his A-game. He ultimately wins by pulling a manuever so daring that Winona never saw it coming.