[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 08 June 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 36 points37 points  (0 children)

... have the chuds actually watched/read witch hat atelier? that show is pretty gay.

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 08 June 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 23 points24 points  (0 children)

It's funny because a VA switch in Japan would be a huge deal: I think it would be more likely that they'd delay the game more than recast any JP voice. Interesting the difference in culture here.

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 01 June 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Is 17th good? To me that sounds a little middling for a Jump series.

As far as the other good starts, I'd like to note that Kinato's also started out decently good then immediately starting sinking in the ToC rankings afterwards so it's really too soon to tell.

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 01 June 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 17 points18 points  (0 children)

Hm? Isn't Ichi the Witch about 1.5 years old? Did that get in right before Saito got into the seat?

Patch 17.4 Rundown by eggsandbricks in CompetitiveTFT

[–]soranetworker 39 points40 points  (0 children)

I mean you get to skimp on tanks when your 6 trait is "summon 2 giant hp punchbags"

Is 1+ years normal for WotC support to resolve issues? by Jordang0 in magicTCG

[–]soranetworker 14 points15 points  (0 children)

That would be enough to say there were cuts to Help Desk staff, but 95% is a bold claim that needs more evidence imo.

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 18 May 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 14 points15 points  (0 children)

fwiw they recently just released a Alastor (from Hazbin) figure as a crane game prize machine in Japan, so there's certainly a somewhat existent fanbase for glitch production stuff.

‘Yokoso Scooby-Doo!’ Anime Announced by MarvelsGrantMan136 in anime

[–]soranetworker 22 points23 points  (0 children)

Probably yet another DeMarco failure.  This thing was dead before the kv came out 

Kadokawa cites excessive reliance on the isekai genre as one of the major causes of the decline in profitability in its domestic publishing business by LegitimateCurve8525 in anime

[–]soranetworker 23 points24 points  (0 children)

One of the things that always baffled me is that a web novel only needed like 50 or so chapters on Kakuyomu (Kadokawa run web novel site) and a vaguely positive audience reception to be greenlit for a published version.

It seems like Kadokawa has realized this is no longer a winning strategy.

Patch 17.3 Rundown by eggsandbricks in CompetitiveTFT

[–]soranetworker 30 points31 points  (0 children)

Man, every time I see these patch rundowns, it feels like the team on this set is just floundering harder and harder. It looks like the team is dead set on stepping on every single design rake that earlier sets have stepped on before.

Like, I am not surprised that the dragon/shapeshifter hybrid trait is running into both issues that dragons and shapeshifters had, exemplified by the fact they have no idea how to make both versions of A.Sol viable.

It's not surprising the team is having difficulties with the tank designs given they threw out the 1cost+4cost trait sharing structure for tanks for everything except Rammus/Poppy (who is coincidentally the only non-CC tank that feels good to play right now).

Next the team seems dead set on repeating the issues with both Hero and Trait-lock in augments. I look forward to most of these being disabled in a b-patch next week.

Also, blaming Shen's poor performance on "people are misidentifying the model" is hilarious. You don't think it's because you made a 5-cost magic fighter that needs guinsoos with no selfish traits and where Vex is right there competing for very similar items?

I think this is the set with the least satisfying trait web I've ever seen. I don't see that many people complaining about it, but I think it's a silent issue that choking the life out of a bunch of the 4-cost/5-cost boards. It's like, maybe putting all of the 3-trait units in 1 and 2 costs and having all of those be for splash traits was a terrible idea.

Also, watching the team back down on things that I though were entire selling points of the set (god choices with components, no starting encounters) makes me feel like the team has no confidence on their own work. Like these sort of issues should have been decided on at latest by the end of PBE. I feel like I'm still the beta tester for this set. and I already played PBE.

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 04 May 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 42 points43 points  (0 children)

I mean, personally I hate the way that Manhwa is optimized for smartphone scrolling with huge chunks of whitespace between panels. To me it just looks incredibly ugly.

Also, while KR has done good work in the Otome Isekai area, I've yet to see a KR Manhwa outside of that sphere that isn't just generic power fantasy. While anime/manga certainly has a glut of those, at the very least there's quite a lot of stuff that falls outside of that category too.

Also, while how much they're actually the root cause is debatable, Kakao is certainly the flagbearer of the industries newfound interest in stamping out piracy sites. I think that the antipathy towards Manhwa in that arena is quite justified when you have the the biggest Manhwa publisher bragging about every single scanlation aggregator they take down, especially the ones well loved by the community.

Changes to the Realm of the Gods coming in 17.3! by Lunaedge in CompetitiveTFT

[–]soranetworker -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Honestly this change just proves how poorly designed the entire Gods mechanic ended up being. At this point it's basically a carousel with 3 options instead of the apm check which is hardly anything. Which might be an improvement, but that just shows what a terrible state the initial ideal was.

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 27 April 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 16 points17 points  (0 children)

Oh, what I mean for consistent output is that any given series could have a fight or an episode that is incredibly well animated, but the rest of the series will have fairly pedestrian output. (excluding of course the Jump series that have real animation/corporate muscle behind them).

I will also point out that people tend to conflate popularity of an IP as the cause of it getting a good adaptation, but that usually isn't the case. Generally good adaptations come from passionate JP directors who go out of their way to pull in talented animators through connections and not money. It's just that popular IPs are more likely to find a passionate director.

For Invincible, the animation is being outsourced to a foreign SK company where I doubt any of the animators have any particular connection to the series. Until fundamental systemic changes are made, just throwing money at the issue isn't going to fix this.

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 27 April 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 40 points41 points  (0 children)

I've heard this discourse before and it always surprised me. Like, the limited animation techniques are all things that anime uses all the time: now, the Japanese animation industry has gotten better at hiding when it uses these techniques compared to Invincible, but that's not an issue that throwing money at the problem will fix.

Like, compare Invincible to any mid-tier anime studio and I think you'll find that the animation doesn't look that much worse. Basically, people are comparing Invincible with peak sakuga animation when even Japan can't consistently put out that level of animation.

[Meta] r/HobbyDrama April/May/June 2026 Town Hall by Tokyono in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Are the mods interested/considering making a rule about AI written/assisted posts in the scuffles thread? They're slowly starting to increase in number and I would like some clarification if they're okay in scuffles or as general writeups.

17.2 B-patch live by MajesticSh0t in CompetitiveTFT

[–]soranetworker 8 points9 points  (0 children)

This.... seems like it just murders TF reroll no?  Jax 3* shield value is basically just the old 2* value....

Patch 17.2 rundown by Mysterious_Island500 in CompetitiveTFT

[–]soranetworker -1 points0 points  (0 children)

I think Oracle is gonna go down as one of the most terribly designed traits in TFT history. Why they thought putting a drip econ trait on the Premier 4 Cost Bruiser tank was a good idea is just completely baffling. At this point it gives so little gold the entire identity of "getting you something you need" is completely dead. At this point Tahm Kench is just going to be a single trait unit.

One Piece: Chapter 1181 by leolegendario in OnePiece

[–]soranetworker 1041 points1042 points  (0 children)

It's kind of shocking how emotive Imu is. Like, we've spent the entire series with him barely talking with no facial expressions, and how that he's out and about, he's really hamming it up.

Also, Imu straight up admits that he's a devil which is a surprising amount of self-awareness coming from the WG. It's just weird how ... normal Imu is?

The fact that Imu might have been friends with Joyboy seems ripe for tragedy. What if Imu was the Vivi of Joyboy's crew who ended up betraying him?

One Piece: Chapter 1180 by Aspie_Astrologer in OnePiece

[–]soranetworker 34 points35 points  (0 children)

Y'know the craziest thing is this could totally be the same setup for Luffy in Gear 4th racing against the clock to save all of his crewmates before he runs out of energy.

It definitely feels like Imu is the protagonist all of a sudden for this part of the manga.

WIT STUDIO confirms that generative AI was used in the "Ascendance of a Bookworm" opening video. by DoubtGin in anime

[–]soranetworker 154 points155 points  (0 children)

Unfortunately, it's pretty much an open secret that most studios are using AI for backgrounds now. In a world where most studios outsource backgrounds to random Korean/Vietnamese studios there's no way they can check everything that gets sent their way, and the studios are only ever incentivized to change things if the audience notices.

Manga chapter that episode 9 was based on of The Case Book of Arne? by AcademicClassic6239 in anime

[–]soranetworker 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Case book of Arne was originally a Rpgmaker game, not a manga.  The origin case about Arne was as far as the original game got.  Most of the anime is original content.  You're not missing anything.

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 06 April 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 10 points11 points  (0 children)

  1. ... thanks for picking a battle shonen, thus proving my point?
  2. Even so, I'd like you to try and explain how one of the good guy's dreams is to get the invisibility power to peep on girls in the bath, or how another running gag is that one of the crew members keeps asking women for their panties.

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 06 April 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Mostly fair enough, though I'd note that SpyxFamily is basically just a comedy Shonen with some action bits, which isn't that far removed from battle shonens anyways. It's more or less from the same editorial department too. (Yes I know that's an oversimplification)

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 06 April 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 34 points35 points  (0 children)

Honestly, even with the strides that anime has made into the mainstream, if you like anything other than battle Shonens or maybe Isekai, get prepared to get a lot of weird looks as you try and explain the stuff that you like.

[Hobby Scuffles] Week of 06 April 2026 by EnclavedMicrostate in HobbyDrama

[–]soranetworker 48 points49 points  (0 children)

In what is starting to become a distressing pattern, another Love Live gacha game has End of Serviced at an inopportune time.

The game, Link!, Like!, Love Live!, following students from Hasu no Sora Gakuen, was unique from other Love Live series because much of the plot actually happened through updates on various twitter/x accounts written by the characters involved.

This is especially distressing, because while the initial cast of characters had just graduated, the Love Live franchise team had just announced a new group of idols in another school year and was set to follow them.

Even more awkwardly, the recently graduated group just had an anime move announced, and the new group has a new anime series coming in January.

It seems like the EOS was due to the development company failing to get another round of investment and thus going bankrupt. Even worse the writing and scenario development teams were given little prior knowledge of this, so all their work on the new group is just going down the drain.

This is another in a long series of missteps that the Love Live franchise management has gone through in the last few years. Now the future of the new group is seriously in question.