Thursday 19 June 2003

Pic of the day: Your butt avoidance skill failed! You suffer nosebleed damage! (Screen photo from anime "Boys Be".)

3 dating anime

In the Far East, there have for a while existed computer games known as "dating sims". They are not inspired by Maxi's The Sims – Hot Date: The genre pre-dates that game by quite a bit. I do not know of any such games available in English, though possibly there may be some for console games (I don't have a TV and thus no console games). From what I have learned, there are dating sims for girls and for boys. Dating sims for boys are often available in an ecchi (sexual) version, where you are rewarded with pornography if you make a good enough impression with the girl. I have not heard such a feature being available in dating sims for girls.

At least 3 anime have been based on the dating sim concept, although I am not sure if all of them are based on actual dating sim games. Kanon was. The other two are To Heart and Boys Be. They are all based on the "boy dates girls" perspective, and none of them are pornographic (although there are broad hints of sexual attraction in Boys). The central concept in all of them is that one boy relates to a number of different girls. They have different personalities, strengths and weaknesses, and they value different types of behavior in a boy. Thus, as the story progresses, it will be increasingly harder to keep all of them attracted to you. You have to choose one, but you may still remain friends with the rest if you are not too greedy. In all three series, the main character is a high school boy.

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Kanon is about a boy whose parents move abroad for a year, and he has to go live with his aunt and her daughter. The cousin and he used to be close friends during their childhood, when he used to come visit every vacation. She has cherished these memories and nurtured them into a full-blown crush on him, whereas he has forgotten everything. In fact, he can remember nothing of his childhood visits to this town at all. There is a reason for this: A trauma that casts its shadow over the whole series, and is only resolved towards the end.

The girls in Kanon are quite diverse. The domestic and would-be sporty cousin, the mysterious classmate who might be either psychic or insane, her caring and nurturing friend, a younger and very innocent girl fighting a life-threatening illness, a mysterious girl with amnesia who only remembers one thing: That he has somehow betrayed her. And a girl who likes to steal food and constantly bumps into him. Gradually his dreams reveal which of them is his true love.

To Heart is about a young boy who is athletic, helpful, but lazy and seemingly very casual about everything. Once again, we start out with an obvious easy way out: The friendly neighborhood girl and classmate who has been his best friend since childhood. He generally treats her as part of the furniture, but she still likes him. But is it more than friendship? Then he meets more and more girls. One is rich and spoiled, one is obsessed with martial arts, one is shy and clumsy. All of these characters are realistic, there is nothing mysterious or supernatural about them. Each episode is largely self contained and shows how to make friends with that particular type of girl. Unless human relationships fascinates you, this may be a bit slow for most boys. Ironically, I think girls may like it. It is also very decent, and the music is beautiful. (One month ago, I wrote an entry about one of the songs. It is that good.)

Boys Be: I have only seen 1 episode of this. (Actually I am going to download that episode tomorrow, but since I am writing this the day after tomorrow, I have already seen it. Still confused? Simply put, tomorrow is yesterday because today is two days ago.) The title seems to be part of the Japanese original, and I suspect it is their way of writing "boys will be boys". (Japanese tend to drop pointless, redundant words.) It stands out from the two others as being just slightly ecchi, or sexual. Still, this anime is not a sex toy. It uses the various levels of sexual interest as a way to make characters realistic. There is this friend of the main character who is a perv, and is caught using a mirror to look up girls' skirts. That pretty much places him, personality-wise. The main character is not like that at all. He is rather innocent ... but he still almost gets a heart attack when his childhood sweetheart is crawling around on all fours looking for a CD. Help, the butt is going to kill me! I know that feeling.

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You can find facts about these anime, their actors and availability in your area, on Animenfo.com (note the missing i in nfo if you memorize the name).

For more info on dating sims, a good starting point might be http://dmoz.org/Games/Video_Games/Simulation/Dating/.