Poll: Difference of Cultures: America and Western Styles Vs. Japan and Eastern sytles

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

This question is something that has been on my mind for a whole now and after talking to many friend: what elements that are different between Western and Eastern entertainment that can create such a divide between fans and what are the cultural sources of these differences.

Now, before I explain my point, I want to reflect on my bias. I'm someone who has been immersed in Japanese and Chinese culture since childhood: Taiwanese parents, first few years of life in Singapore, Early exposure to Anime through Toonami and 4Kids.

For me, as evident by the aforementioned bias, I love Japan to the point that I will admit to being a moderate weeabo/ major otaku. I am much more likely to pick a Japanese style fight scene than a Western style fight. Protagonists from Western Media such as Marcus Felix and Rambo seem weak in character compared to people like Kira Yamato or Heero Yuy. I can list more Japanese games that I like than American. As for why, in order: Japanese fights seem more dynamic with a greater display of skill and power compared to the plain war time gunfights, Kira and Heero seem to have more struggle and internal conflict than people like Marcus, and I'm a bigger fan of Story and Characters than Gameplay (capitalized to illustrate strict division).

I will admit several counter points: Yes, anime is becoming more cliche and moe filled, Japanese fights can be too insane with power escalation and many Japanese games have struggled to balance gameplay and story. But I still would prefer Japanese media and it's tropes to the tropes of American media

Please comment on what styles you like and why.

 

[thesilentman]

I come from Asia, so I really can identify with all of the in jokes and bonuses that they put in the games and anime, so it's definitely the East for me.

There's also the fact that the Japanese actually still make games, and not interactive movies and do it well. The most played games on my PC are Dark Souls and Cave Story. They're both there as I really feel the game part, and they're damned good at the experience that's conveyed.

I can't really comment on anime, as I haven't watched any recent anime. To give perspective, the last one I watched was Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei, which I found darkly funny. But I have been reading more manga and holy shit, it's reaallllyyy good.

Of course, the West still has media worth it, but I'm leaning to the East as of late.

 

[Soviet Heavy]

You seem to be stacking your deck a bit with your fight scene comparisons. You are pitting two heavily stereotyped western characters against your preferred anime of choice.

 

[Eddie the head]

There's also the fact that the Japanese actually still make games, and not interactive movies and do it well. The most played games on my PC are Dark Souls and Cave Story. They're both there as I really feel the game part, and they're damned good at the experience that's conveyed.

That's not much of a fact. It's more of an interruption. I mean Metal Gear Solid 4 vs lets say Bastion. Witch one is the interactive movie there?

OT. I don't want to limit myself both can do things well, I guess, but don't like anime. So I guess Western.

 

[Hoplon]

There can be merit in both, and flaws in both, Like what you enjoy but don't think you will enjoy/hate anything by default because of origin.

 

[Hero in a half shell]

Personally I prefer the Western more realistic style, partially because I really like the blocky military architecture shapes that it creates, and partially because I'm from the West and therefore more biased than an Italian in a Spagetti tasting competition.

(Of course we are going by the broad stereotype that Western = Rambo, Tom Clancy and Mechwarrior style, Eastern = Final Fantasy 7, and Gurren Lagann style)
There's just something in the way Western stuff truly looks like it can perform the feats it does, it always seems to reign in the designs with what would be feasible and workable, whereas the Japanese style seems to be taking those ideas and deliberately breaking them and pushing the style further and further. But it's 100% subjective personal taste, and neither is better than the other just from the merit of style. (not to mention many cross-overs of style, subversions, parodies etc. that exist in both cultures blurring the definition somewhat.)

 

[The Madman]

Neither, Eastern European history and Slavic Mythology are my personal fascination. The art style and culture is just so distinct and unique, the history so rich. Even today countries like Ukraine and Poland continue to create distinct products, this being a gaming forum the obvious examples being games like STALKER and The Witcher.

Also I'm guessing you haven't actually seen First Blood if you're using Rambo as an example of an overblown US caricature. You realize in the first movie he's a PTSD suffering Vietnam veteran right? It's an anti-war movie. Rambo was introduced to counteract characters like Marcus Fenix and his ilk, at least that was the original intention.

Love Japan and its history, not so big on it's media these days.

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

You seem to be stacking your deck a bit with your fight scene comparisons. You are pitting two heavily stereotyped western characters against your preferred anime of choice.

apologies then, as I said, I'm extremely biased so that would influence me. The issue with me is that anytime I see a cool action scene in a western movie, the influence of Chinese and Japanese fight choreography is heavy such as in the Matrix and Kill Bill. I haven't seen a purely western style fight that i liked.

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Neither, Eastern European history and Slavic Mythology are my personal fascination. The art style and culture is just so distinct and unique, the history so rich. Even today countries like Ukraine and Poland continue to create distinct products, this being a gaming forum the obvious examples being games like STALKER and The Witcher.

Also I'm guessing you haven't actually seen First Blood if you're using Rambo as an example of an overblown US caricature. You realize in the first movie he's a PTSD suffering Vietnam veteran right? It's an anti-war movie. Rambo was introduced to counteract characters like Marcus Fenix and his ilk, at least that was the original intention.

Love Japan and its history, not so big on it's media these days.

Thank you for the suggestion, and Nordic styles are interesting yes, perhaps my bias is speaking ahead of me.

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

So now apparently Western = American? I'm from the Western side of the world, and I can't stand a lot of stuff going on on the other side of the atlantic. If you look closely enough there's a very large difference in culture between Western europe and the States, and between the naitons of Western europe as well. I'd reckon about as large a difference as there is between Asian countries like Japan, South Korea or China.

That said, I can't stand most anime that is popular enough to get shipped over, except from Studio Ghible I find it extremely hard to name good anime at all. There's a bunch of good movies though, Oldboy and Battle Royale are among my probably top 30 favorite movies of all time, and I do really like Hero.

That said, it feels ridiculous to compare cultures to each other, all of them have their differences, and it's really quite ridiculous to value one over the other.

That is a logical fallacy that I have, I admit, but the issue is that a fair majority of Games are influenced by American and Japanese styles so they come to mind the most often. As it stands, you can correct me as much as you want; I won't learn if people just keep telling me i'm right

What exactly about anime that gets shipped over that you don't like? I will admit that a lot of the moe and harem stuff is crap to the nth degree but as Sturgeon's law says, 90% of everything is crap; you just have to find the part of the 10% that appeals to you. I love Suisei no Gartantia, Toaru Majutsu no Index is a fun as hell anime/light novel, and I generally find the Gundam series to be refreshing and interesting (they have dropped the ball with AGE but their older stuff is good)

As for valuing one culture over another, lets just say that the past few years has made me cynical about both Japan and America. America is full of political problems and religion still plays too much of a role for my taste while Japan has a massive generational divide and issues with both women and the youth. If I had to pick between broken politics and a red state/blue state divide vs. Generational women issues, I will take the generational issues (barely, and I still would act on my own principles to fight them)

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Personally I prefer the Western more realistic style, partially because I really like the blocky military architecture shapes that it creates, and partially because I'm from the West and therefore more biased than an Italian in a Spagetti tasting competition.

(Of course we are going by the broad stereotype that Western = Rambo, Tom Clancy and Mechwarrior style, Eastern = Final Fantasy 7, and Gurren Lagann style)
There's just something in the way Western stuff truly looks like it can perform the feats it does, it always seems to reign in the designs with what would be feasible and workable, whereas the Japanese style seems to be taking those ideas and deliberately breaking them and pushing the style further and further. But it's 100% subjective personal taste, and neither is better than the other just from the merit of style. (not to mention many cross-overs of style, subversions, parodies etc. that exist in both cultures blurring the definition somewhat.)

I will agree that the West and East have different styles of worlds. I talked to a few people about this: American games typically make a real world and add the fantastic and unreal stuff into it with some integration while Japanese games create an entire world so amazing you want it to be real.

If I had to take a stab at a show with both cultures in play, it would be Avatar: the Last Airbender. Most episodes of the show display classic Anime tropes of continuous story and the story itself is heavy with asian symbolism such as spirits, elements, and reincarnation. A few episodes though are more independent episodes, using the character tropes from Japan and placing them in isolated sequences with no influence on the overarching story (Tales of Ba Sing Se comes to mind) It would be nice to have shows that combined traits but as it stands, both sides are vastly different.

 

[loc978]

Having grown up with D20-inspired games written awesome storytellers the likes of J.E. Sawyer, Brian Fargo, Jordan Weisman, et cetera on one hand and mythologically inspired games written by the likes of Hiroyuki Ito, Yasumi Matsuno, Yūji Horii et cetera on the other... I'm just gonna go ahead and say the quality of a game really depends more on the vision, talent and resources of its creator than the culture which raised said creator. Sturgeon's Law and all that. It's not that 90% of any specific genre is crap (lookin' at you, Marcus Fenix... and you, Snow Villiers) it's that 90% of all media is crap.

You seem to be stacking your deck a bit with your fight scene comparisons. You are pitting two heavily stereotyped western characters against your preferred anime of choice.

apologies then, as I said, I'm extremely biased so that would influence me. The issue with me is that anytime I see a cool action scene in a western movie, the influence of Chinese and Japanese fight choreography is heavy such as in the Matrix and Kill Bill. I haven't seen a purely western style fight that i liked.

Ever watched Firefly [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0303461/]? There's some Eastern influence in the setting, but the fights are almost entirely Western. The characterization in them is top-notch, though. Ol' Mr. Whedon knows when to crack a joke and when to be deadly serious. Damn good storyteller.

 

[The Madman]

Thank you for the suggestion, and Nordic styles are interesting yes, perhaps my bias is speaking ahead of me.

Slavic isn't the same as Nordic. You're thinking Northern European, aka Finland, Denmark, Sweden, etc. The old Nordic countries from which things such as Beowulf, Thor and the like come from plus, obviously, Vikings. Slavic Europe is countries like Russia, Ukraine, Poland and the like which have a whole different history and belief system. If you want examples of Slavic style mythology look up Baba Yaga, she's an interesting place to start. And if you want history look up the Teutonic Knights and their crusades into Eastern Europe, that makes for a fascinating read.

Nordic/Slavic intertwine a fair bit, for example popular myth has Vikings originally founding the kingdom of Kievan Rus, but even so mythology that arose and the belief systems are quite different and both extremely fascinating. Here's a neat illustrated history of Poland for a neat little glimpse, that totem you see being pulled down would be Slavic while the terrifying knights in black and white are the Teutonic Order.


Personally my family is Ukrainian but sadly there's no neat little video online about their history, at least not that I've found.

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Having grown up with D20-inspired games written awesome storytellers the likes of J.E. Sawyer, Brian Fargo, Jordan Weisman, et cetera on one hand and mythologically inspired games written by the likes of Hiroyuki Ito, Yasumi Matsuno, Yūji Horii et cetera on the other... I'm just gonna go ahead and say the quality of a game really depends more on the vision, talent and resources of its creator than the culture which raised said creator. Sturgeon's Law and all that. It's not that 90% of any specific genre is crap (lookin' at you, Marcus Fenix... and you, Snow Villiers) it's that 90% of all media is crap.

You seem to be stacking your deck a bit with your fight scene comparisons. You are pitting two heavily stereotyped western characters against your preferred anime of choice.

apologies then, as I said, I'm extremely biased so that would influence me. The issue with me is that anytime I see a cool action scene in a western movie, the influence of Chinese and Japanese fight choreography is heavy such as in the Matrix and Kill Bill. I haven't seen a purely western style fight that i liked.

Ever watched Firefly [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0303461/]? There's some Eastern influence in the setting, but the fights are almost entirely Western. The characterization in them is top-notch, though. Ol' Mr. Whedon knows when to crack a joke and when to be deadly serious. Damn good storyteller.

Yeah, The issue with me is that the Vision of stuff like Gundam and Toaru Majutsu no index or Blazblue seems better to me than mechwarrior, DnD, or Killer instinct. Again, it is completely subjective.

I will be perfectly honest and throw my nerd card into the ring but I haven't watched Firefly but I heard it's a good show. But if the Characterization is as insane as people say, I would probably like it.

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

Thank you for the suggestion, and Nordic styles are interesting yes, perhaps my bias is speaking ahead of me.

Slavic isn't the same as Nordic. You're thinking Northern European, aka Finland, Denmark, Sweden, etc. The old Nordic countries from which things such as Beowulf, Thor and the like come from plus, obviously, Vikings. Slavic Europe is countries like Russia, Ukraine, Poland and the like which have a whole different history and belief system. If you want examples of Slavic style mythology look up Baba Yaga, she's an interesting place to start. And if you want history look up the Teutonic Knights and their crusades into Eastern Europe, that makes for a fascinating read.

Nordic/Slavic intertwine a fair bit, for example popular myth has Vikings originally founding the kingdom of Kievan Rus, but even so mythology that arose and the belief systems are quite different and both extremely fascinating. Here's a neat illustrated history of Poland for a neat little glimpse, that totem you see being pulled down would be Slavic while the terrifying knights in black and white are the Teutonic Order.


Personally my family is Ukrainian but sadly there's no neat little video online about their history, at least not that I've found.

So you are referring to stuff like Vasillsa the Beautiful, the Water of Life, and the like? (Toaru Majutsu no Index literally pulls stuff from other myths so it gets me interested in doing skims of other mythologies). Baba Yaga seems to be a sort of challenge for people to overcome or a resource that aids but correct me if i'm wrong

By the way, who was the person being crowned in the year 1000? I think he was a major leader of Poland and a conquerer if my limited history serves me right. Also, I think i've seen those knights with angel wings before but the name slips me.

Other than that, I have to give props to Poland. It was a much larger contributor to the Renaissance and the Crusades than I realize and the country has survived attempts at conquest so many times, that they are pretty tough

 

[Abomination]

So now apparently Western = American?

This rustled my jimmies too. A lot of "Western" combat - especially medieval - existed before the United States was even a speck in Mother England's eye.

That being said I prefer Western depictions of combat far more than Eastern. Western don't always have the most realism but they frequently have far more. Some of the stuff from Game of Thrones, for example, has been great. The West is starting to show more and more the effect of armour in a battle, something the East seem to be happy to completely ignore.

 

[The Madman]

So you are referring to stuff like Vasillsa the Beautiful, the Water of Life, and the like? (Toaru Majutsu no Index literally pulls stuff from other myths so it gets me interested in doing skims of other mythologies). Baba Yaga seems to be a sort of challenge for people to overcome or a resource that aids but correct me if i'm wrong

By the way, who was the person being crowned in the year 1000? I think he was a major leader of Poland and a conquerer if my limited history serves me right. Also, I think i've seen those knights with angel wings before but the name slips me.

Other than that, I have to give props to Poland. It was a much larger contributor to the Renaissance and the Crusades than I realize and the country has survived attempts at conquest so many times, that they are pretty tough

Yep, you're right on with Vasilisa the Beautiful which is part of the Baba Yaga mythology and you're not wrong with her either, a lot of Slavic Mythlogical creatures and stories tend to be personifications of things people feared: Plague, pestilence, hunger, the unknown. It tends to be very dark, like something from the original Brother's Grimm, although that was Germanic.

The horsemen you're thinking of are the winged Hussars, they were an elite Polish fighting order.

 

[Izanagi009_v1legacy]

So you are referring to stuff like Vasillsa the Beautiful, the Water of Life, and the like? (Toaru Majutsu no Index literally pulls stuff from other myths so it gets me interested in doing skims of other mythologies). Baba Yaga seems to be a sort of challenge for people to overcome or a resource that aids but correct me if i'm wrong

By the way, who was the person being crowned in the year 1000? I think he was a major leader of Poland and a conquerer if my limited history serves me right. Also, I think i've seen those knights with angel wings before but the name slips me.

Other than that, I have to give props to Poland. It was a much larger contributor to the Renaissance and the Crusades than I realize and the country has survived attempts at conquest so many times, that they are pretty tough

Yep, you're right on with Vasilisa the Beautiful which is part of the Baba Yaga mythology and you're not wrong with her either, a lot of Slavic Mythlogical creatures and stories tend to be personifications of things people feared: Plague, pestilence, hunger, the unknown. It tends to be very dark, like something from the original Brother's Grimm, although that was Germanic.

The horsemen you're thinking of are the winged Hussars, they were an elite Polish fighting order.

I'm starting to think a lot of cultures have similar aspects to each other, the monomyth comes to mind

And the Hussars are pretty awesome, Poland's history is something that more people such as myself need to learn