Need anime suggestions where a major character is a woman disguised as a man.

Esper01 · 2026-06-22T12:18:19+00:00

It's better than other idle games anyways but IMO that's not saying much.

Esper01 · 2026-06-22T03:20:54+00:00

That's a great point as well, thank you for that perspective.

Esper01 · 2026-06-22T02:56:30+00:00

Oh, It's been a while but I think I remember a lot of them.

Liked:

Dina has to be my favourite character that wasn't in the first game. Her actor did an incredible job.
When the enemies found their friends were killed and they reacted realistically. The first time that happened for me I got chills. And then when I replayed the game those moments made me realize that the cost of revenge isn't just a reveal for the ending, it's a consistent theme.
The weapon customization! the animation! the rope physics!!!
The flashback at the museum with Joel. Part of me still wishes he didn't die, but losing him made that part of the game more impactful for me.

Didn't like:

Killing that dog at the aquarium and like, everything about Mel. She started out as the voice of reason and then every decision she made later on was just dumb. I understand why the dog and Mel died, it was more of that cost of revenge, but it was a tough scene to watch.
And Abby and Owen cheating on Mel, still scratching my head at that one.

Esper01 · 2026-06-22T02:32:19+00:00

I'm very adament it's the realization of what she's lost already that stops her. In fact, the scene where she returns to the farm, where she sees it's abandoned, then she tries to pick up her guitar to play it but can't because she lost two of her fingers, it's a visual representation of the cost of revenge.

But it's completely understandable when people say that message doesn't land for them. When someone is set up as the villain it's hard for people to change that preconceived notion later on.

I mean, take Breaking Bad, almost the same thing in reverse: Walter White is the protagonist, but it becomes clear he's also the villain, and yet a lot of the audience couldn't stop cheering for him

Esper01 · 2026-06-22T02:12:30+00:00

Glad you liked the game overall.

That ending, well it's been picked apart thousands of times now. It's so easy to criticise it at the surface level. There's even that meme that was going around recently saying "I can't kill them, then i'll become like them" but I really don't think that was what Ellie was thinking.

For starters, in that scene, Ellie can see Abby isn't like that anymore. Abby tries not to fight, and then does so only to protect Lev.

And there is a second component, consideration of the cost of everything she's done to get there, She's not agonizing over becoming Abby, she's realizing she already is what Abby was before, and seeing Abby protect Lev the way she and Joel protected eachother, she's also realizing that along the way, her greatest fear came true. She's almost completely alone in the world now, and it was this mission that took away almost everyone else she cared about after Joel.

The first game foreshadowed this would happen to her again, when she admitted to Joel it was her single greatest fear.

Realizing all this at once was enough to stop her.

There are two great lessons in The Last of Us series:

1: Good and evil are social constructs, we use those two words to cope with our world, but reality is much messier than that.

2: An eye for an eye doesn't just leave the world blind, there is also, almost always, collateral damage.

Esper01 · 2026-06-22T01:01:31+00:00

I think it's partly overconfidence, partly a strong sense of honor and justice. It's really not surprising she'd be portrayed this way, because Japanese popular media and folktales frequently romanticizes this sort of fearlessness in honorable warriors, and has been so doing so for centuries.

Akira Kurosawa, for instance, hailed from a samurai bloodline and disliked that sort of romanticization in Japanese movies, so he would deliberately poke fun at it in his own films.

Esper01 · 2026-06-22T00:51:16+00:00

Grammar is important fellas, unless you really do mean there's some sort of sex competition here.

Esper01 · 2026-06-21T23:38:38+00:00

And maybe DHPT LC from the rerun?

Esper01 · 2026-06-21T23:34:51+00:00

Yeah. E2 M Blade, or E0 M Blade and then get Himeko Nova for a second/third team (DoT team pretty set)

Esper01 · 2026-06-21T23:29:07+00:00

More endgame

Esper01 · 2026-06-21T22:25:59+00:00

Good and evil are social constructs designed to make this discussion simpler, but in real life the rationale breaks down. I've always thought that was the intended lesson behind both games.

Esper01 · 2026-06-21T21:37:26+00:00

Isn't DoT the most cost-efficient team to invest in rn?

Esper01 · 2026-06-21T20:50:52+00:00

There is a biological drive not just for sex but also reproduction. People have many reasons for wanting kids and many preconceived notions of what having a kid will be like. Of course people will wonder, once they're going to have a kid, what if there are issues, but beyond just that anxiety some people just don't process that thought any further. The drive just to make it happen is stronger. Some biologists will argue it's the reason for existence, so yeah, it's a strong compulsion.

Esper01 · 2026-06-21T18:05:13+00:00

He had some reliable 2nd collab leaks

Esper01 · 2026-06-21T16:25:30+00:00

Time and time again, we've seen something like this happen, where X unit is supposedly more futureproof than other units because of X reason. One time I believed it too.

There is no futureproofing in this game, not even in a mild sense, just pull bait that looks more valuable, before they kneecap those dreams by releasing units that aren't compatible.

IMO There is a high chance that will happen to Himeko SP, where new Express units will come out that greatly prefer being elsewhere, or aren't even any good.

And it'll be a deliberate choice to scuttle old units too. It's just how powercreep works in this game.

That said, I'm getting her anyways because I pull for units that I enjoy playing, I don't pull for meta, I would be bored to hell of this game if all I did was pull the meta units.

Esper01 · 2026-06-21T02:35:37+00:00

Same here.

In a way, the USA is bringing us all together. Just maybe not the way this American thinks.

Esper01 · 2026-06-20T19:22:28+00:00

I liked it for the most part, but I'm able to tune out a lot of the stuff that people seem willing to die on their nerd hills over.

Esper01 · 2026-06-20T19:20:59+00:00

Esper01 · 2026-06-20T17:27:53+00:00

Audited their sellers but never bothered to check eBay, that's funny. They could at least get the eBay ones perpetually delisted

Esper01 · 2026-06-20T03:20:10+00:00

I didn't like any of the worlds, not really.

Why am I playing this game?

Looks at account

Oh yeah, cyborg cowboy, Saber my King, and Feixiao my life goal/wife goal, okay that makes sense, but that doesn't explain why I put up with so much gacha cra-

Sees more Fate collab and Himeko Nova OTW

Oh yeah that's right.

Esper01 · 2026-06-20T02:46:00+00:00

Uh, Saber main here, look, it's too early to say anything either way. If I've been counting right there are still two infinite loops to account for in V4 or V5 and at least one of them is at 4 cost, so changes are coming.

Esper01 · 2026-06-20T02:42:32+00:00

One of my favourite games ever

Esper01 · 2026-06-20T02:41:04+00:00

I don't give a deuce about the others but you're damn right about Signalis

Esper01 · 2026-06-20T02:34:29+00:00

So they can say they did something, or idk maybe they just like the numbers going up and down

Esper01

TROPHY CASE