Poll: .hack roots is a terrible show

[Roadface]

When I was in high school I got drawn into anime by great shows like .hack sign. Then the next serious sequel (not including legend of the twilight) to the show is roots, boy what a disappointment! I've seen the series about 2 times now re-watching a third time. The only way this show is even manageable is if you watch it on 2 to 4x speed. There are parts where songs will play for 4 solid minutes to slow pans of people thinking....

I know I've so far given vague examples so I'll give specifics.

-The premise is bad

I don't feel I need to expand on this

-Forgettable characters

All of them, even Haseo. This cast is nothing compared to the original sign cast.

- Too slow

The plot moves at a snails pace. I've watched 10 episodes in about 90 minutes through major fast forwarding. The dialog is given so slowly that ironically it sounds better on 2x speed. I don't know why the voice actors were directed to talk at such a monotonous pace but it gets old fast.

-Terrible story

I feel like if I had to I could summarize the story by saying its just a 2 part sequence. Reaching up to the climax (episode 10) its all just EXTREMELY SLOW pacing of two rival guilds speculating about each other.

-The fight scenes are bad

I know sign wasn't known for its fight scenes either. The enjoyment from that show came from the cast of interesting characters and the process of them investing and solving the mystery of the world and how it relates to Tsukasa. But come on.. The 3 times that people fought in sign was much more interesting than anything you'll see in roots. For instance there is a scene where 3 of the twilight brigade members are being attacked by Ender. At the end of the episode they begin one final charge... except it lasts a minute then the episode ends with the sound of them being defeated...

-The attempts to stretch out to plot are obvious and painful to watch.

Everything in this show happens as if its in slow motion. You could easily compress the events of the whole 26 episode series to a movie length OVA. If you want a quick guide for what episodes to watch and which to skip: First, Tenth, *SPOILERS* (which ever one Shino gets pk'd in), Then final episode.

-The story ends on a sad note; nothing gets resolved.

Sign did end a little abruptly but its considered well done compared to roots.Its been awhile since I've seen the end but I recall that it just ends with Haseo failing.All this time you invested in this boring, awful anime is rendered useless due to it ending with failure. It's just a cliff hanger to the G.U. Games. I felt abused after watching the show to know it's just there to promote the games like the Devil May Cry anime.



This is already getting long so I'll end it here. It's a terrible disappointment that sullies the name of the original show. I really hope no one who was involved in sign's development was involved in the making of this farce. If you really need to know what happened read the wiki then play the games. Then again I'm only on the first G.U. game so I'm not even sure if I can even recommend it.


I know people will hate me for posting this but keep in mind these statements were made from someone who is only freshly acquainted with the first 10 episodes.


TL;DR

First ten episodes is the buildup. Then eleven through twenty three ( If I recall correctly) are the worthless episodes where nothing happens. Leaving the final three to be the conclusion to the waste of time that is .Hack Roots.

 

[Roadface]

Played the first G.U game and it was "alright". The combat was way better than the original games but the story clearly isn't. Oh well probably going to play the rest to see if the story gets any better!

 

[Ultress]

To me .Hack has never had a great anime,Signs was incredibly boring(of what I saw),I won't acknowledge the stupidity of Legend of the Twilight,and Root's was mediocre at best(again of what I saw). I'd rather play the games they spawned than watch the boring animes.

 

[komodomantis]

I agree entirely. On your point about the ending though: The actual "ending" is in the games. I can't say whether or not that ending is good as I have only played volumes 1 and 2 of the G.U. series.

 

[Kae]

I really wouldn't know, I'm not really a big fan of Anime but I watched the one where a girl gets trapped inside the game, which I think is Sign but I'm not sure because that was quite some time ago, but anyway I liked that, then I watched another one, I'm not sure which one it was Legends of twilight [small](Google exists, I'd forgot that)[/small] but I didn't really like it, it was somewhat silly and I don't really remember all that much, the only thing I remember liking about that one was the main character's design, not sure why but I liked his orange costume, I don't know why I normally don't care for that sort of stuff but I liked that costume.

Spoiler: Apparently it was this one

Now I'm not sure why I liked it so much back then, it's not really that good, but it does like the kind of character I would use in a game I guess, the fact that he uses knives must have had something to do with it, I always go for the knives even if they suck.

The other one I didn't watch because I didn't catch it on TV and I didn't really feel like buying it, so I just let it slide, to be fair I only watched that because I was curious about the MMO thing, and the premise of the first one was pretty appealing due to the being trapped inside the game thing, even if it was just one character, though I found it strange that no one ever seemed to lag, seriously does everyone really have that good of a connection?
Or maybe they do lag and I don't remember, it's possible.

 

[Roadface]

I was curious about the MMO thing, and the premise of the first one was pretty appealing due to the being trapped inside the game thing, even if it was just one character, though I found it strange that no one ever seemed to lag, seriously does everyone really have that good of a connection?
Or maybe they do lag and I don't remember, it's possible.

The premise for .hack//sign is leagues and leagues ahead of roots. Roots takes off way to slow for there to really be a premise. I mean what are we supposed to take from that show? A guy has to tolerate annoying people who are stalking him because he is "special"? If he seriously believed that he needs his head checked. He wasn't enjoying the game yet kept playing it because of the vague praise of his peers? None of his reactions are believable and that's where I felt the show REALLY suffered.


Oh and a lag-less game is possible assuming 3 things (correct me if I'm wrong):

One, the game needs to be well optimized with a good network code so that it runs packets efficiently.

Two, the company needs to have servers that can handle the load at all times. These also need to be well optimized to handle the request of the tens of millions of players they had.

Three, the average internet speed among it's users needs to be excellent. Japan is known for it's great internet so this is believable.

Oh and INB4 NECRO BUMP!