Damien Valentine 00:44
Hello and welcome to another episode of now for something completely machinima this week, Phil is playing left Red Dead Redemption again, and so he's kind of, we've kind of lost him in that world. So yeah,

Ricky Grove 00:57
he's the most powerful person in the world in that game. Oh yeah,

Damien Valentine 01:04
but I'm sure he'll be back soon. So I'm joined by Ricky and Hi, Tracy. Hello. This week, we'll be discussing Tracy's picks, and you've got two of them for us. Very unusual. I haven't seen anything in this style as far as machinima goes before, so please let us know what you've chosen for

Tracy Harwood 01:24
us. Absolutely okay. So yeah, I thought this week I would have a look at some anime type machinima, mainly because we've not discussed this as much on our show as I would have expected. And I guess, certainly from my perspective, perspective, I don't think we know too much about anime tropes. Or maybe, actually, I'll rephrase that, I'm sure Ricky knows quite a lot about anime tropes, so I'm looking forward to seeing what his comments are. Anyway, I've picked two shorts. These have been made in a game called Final Fantasy 14. Before I get to the films, I just wanted to talk a little bit about anime and my digging around on it, for those like me that don't actually know so much about it, clearly, it often explores similar genres as most other machinima, such as sci fi and fantasy and slice of life and what have you. And evidently, what we have here is a game that's been made with a stylistic approach that reflects anime traditions such as cell shaded graphics, stylized characters, big, expressive eyes, and Japanese storytelling tropes, which include things like character archetypes, dramatic monologs and emotional arcs with editing techniques such as flashy transitions and exaggerated expressions, these kind of text overlays music reminiscent of intro, you know, anime intros and endings, plus this kind of voice acting, which is often done in a style that mimics Japanese or even English dubs. I'm reminded actually that Rooster Teeth of red versus blue infamy were, in fact, one of the first machinima creators to branch out into anime explicitly and successfully in around 2013 this was with their RWYB Show, which, as I recall, was the first anime created outside of Asia to be exported successfully to a Japanese market, being dubbed into Japanese and actually airing on local TV in 2015 of course, That wasn't machinima, but it was cell shaded animation. And I suppose it's also worth highlighting that one of the key studios that makes anime, Studio Ghibli, is also, well, they are, I'd say, anti machinima and also anti AI at the moment, and that's because the process lacks traditional animation craft and AI is what they consider to be just a soulless machine. Miyazaki comments, for example, have been along the lines of, this is just a machine churning out art, which is an insult to life itself. And I'll come back to that point a little bit later on. Now. This game was launched originally in 2010 but was shut down and then re launched in 2013 by its developer called Square Enix. It's a massive multiplayer online role playing game, and according to steam, currently has about 13 million players globally. Probably a large proportion of those, I would say, are Asian. It is set in the world of yawzi, I think, which is a detailed fantasy world filled with magic and advanced technology and these kind of powerful deities featuring. Have multiple contents, diverse cultures and kind of this ongoing political drama. And you play the game as a, what they call a warrior of light, rising from a humble adventurer to a world saving legend across multiple expansion packs. It works, I think, a little bit like World of Warcraft and Second Life with guilds, or, you know, groups of players, they have housing, there are player hubs and communities, and there's various in game activities, including groups of players that engage with crafting, fashion, music performances, also fishing, treasure hunting and what have you. I think importantly from a machinima perspective, it has within the game, emotes, cut scene tools and in game camera features that are especially useful. And folks have created everything from music videos, short dramas and even full cinematic series. They use something called the G shade and G pose tools to enhance visuals, and there are apparently tons of mods and creative tools outside of the official game support, which are used in making machinima and other forms of content. Now I looked up how the games developer sees itself in the context of an anime offer more generally, and it would appear that there is some suggestions that they, they there is, well, they're potentially considering how to license the game for a film, I guess, a little bit, Witcher-like. However, primarily, their attempt to create film content is generally, I think, viewed as maybe a glorified promotional, you know, commercial through which they'll advertise the game. So I think from what I can read about it, it's a little bit unclear whether there's any real demand for an actual series out of this game. But, you know, whatever, that was true for pretty much every machinima that was ever made, it's it's kind of irrespective who makes it, but I do think it's fans that make the best machinima. And actually, that brings me, you know, right onto these particular picks. I'm going to start with Frieren: Beyond Journey's End, which this particular pick that I've made is by wheat tea, and it was released in February this year. It's a video in which its creator is aimed to recap what he describes, he or she describes as the whole anime trope in one song as a kind of fantasy parody. But it's actually drawing on fire and beyond Journey's End, well, I think there's two things it could be drawing on. One, one is actually a manga series, and another is a Netflix series that's a couple of years old, but I suspect it's drawing on the manga primarily, which is comic. Obviously, it's a slightly different form to anime, and in its original form, manga is obviously silent rather than voiced. And I also understand that it's kind of fairly quick to consume rather than any kind of real story, which is what you might get out of an anime work, which is more story-led. I didn't actually get a chance to look at the Netflix show, though. I just sort of had a quick glance at it, so I don't know how close it might be to the Netflix series. Now, with that bit of introduction, I think what you can see from this particular example is that it's trying to do a lot. There's an adventure for some central characters that have these kind of magical powers. They're clearly overcoming some challenges, and some pretty flashy transitions have been included between the shots. And really, I think what comes over to me is that it's, it's a kind of graphic novel rather than a kind of anime story, per se. So it's so for me, it's crossed a bit of a boundary between manga, comic and anime animation through this game, and it's interesting therefore, that it's neither one of those things, but it is machinima. The music is also an interesting kind of crossover between this kind of chiptune style and something else I don't know, digital music or whatever. It's not what you kind of expect it potentially to be. I think anyway, I found when I was looking at it, I was I was interested because of how it transcends some of the genres and some of the traditional creative boundaries, which is, which is probably more interesting than the quality of the content, per se. But that's not to decry the content itself, because it's definitely an interesting approach to a story. If I'm critical of it, I'm going to say it's a little bit too long for me in terms of what it shows. Going, it's, yeah, there's a story there. But it becomes a little bit repetitive after a couple of minutes. It's not massively clear how the different characters relate to each other, beyond the foes and friends and of the the continuing journey. So it's an interesting one, but my second pick is a little bit different. Now this, this film is based on a new expansion pack in Final Fantasy which was relatively recently released, called Dawn trail pack. And hence you see the comment at the beginning of the film which says, Beware of it being a spoiler for Final Fantasy fans who are clearly, I would say, the folks that this is intended for. Now, this is quite a different story. It, you know, you definitely get a sense of a bit more of a an animation running through this. It's a contest in an arena. There's lots of characters. It's, I'd say it's clearly created by a clan of sorts in the game, which kind of reminded me a little bit of what you might see with, you know, groups of folks working together in something like Star Citizen or whatever.

Tracy Harwood 11:13
But of course, the anime themes are very evident in it, and that's to do with rivalry, with this undertone of friendship and camaraderie. I think there's some excellent editing in this, that kind of echoey, empty hall at the beginning really kind of interesting, the footsteps, the the clashing of the weapons and so on. I'd say the voices are harder to pick out because, you know, clearly, it's, it's, it's spoken in Japanese with, you know, if you, if you put the the translator on, you know, you don't, you don't always get a sense of what's necessarily being said. But lip sync isn't quite there for the Japanese, and I'm not too sure why or how, they managed to not address that one specifically. I'm just

Damien Valentine 12:01
going to cut in there, yeah, there's this message that pops up. If you press the CC button on YouTube, it will bring up the English subtitles. They're perfect. So they are, yeah, but the

Tracy Harwood 12:10
lip sync isn't, and it's because it's, it's being spoken on the animation in Japanese. Oh, okay, yeah. So it's yeah, it's Yeah, exactly. But I would suggest it's because you can hear the Japanese being spoken, but it doesn't even sink to that. Okay, so I don't know. It's doing something else. Um, I in terms of the the content of it, I'd say the battle seems a little under positioned for a non game player in Final Fantasy to appreciate, pre appreciate, appreciate, actually, what's going on and what the objective here is for the people that are viewing this. I think there's also this kind of interesting new year Christmas theme, sort of, you know, start an end to it. And the and the music is a little bit Christmasy. Seems a little obviously it's out of place for us talking about it in the spring, but it's also a little bit strange, because I think another element that comes through this particular film are the cultural crossovers that are portrayed within it. It's East Meets meets West. It's spectatorship and fantasy. It's competition and collaboration, and it's, you know, it's kind of everything in between. It's just, you know, two ends of each spectrum, if you like, on any one thing that you might want to talk about. It's a really interesting mix of things. And looking up the creator, the studio, I'm not really surprised. It's that, because it seems that they themselves are a bit of a cultural mix, at least from what I can see. It's made in the US, which I think is an interesting one. And then finally, wrapping up my comments on this, in terms of Final Fantasy official machinima, there are actually some promotions for the promotions for the for the game, which, it turns out, were directed by a guy called Sakuragi, who is a Japanese anime director, screenwriter and also a CG animator who is quite well known for blending traditional anime storytelling with 3d computer generated imagery. Now he's one of the prominent figures pushing the boundaries of anime using modern digital techniques on which this kind of these, these kinds of films, are actually being inspired, I suspect. And another is a guy called Kosaka who has contributed, believe it or not, to Studio Ghibli, and is also trying to push boundaries of the anime art form by integrating digital technologies. And I actually found a really good video about him, which I'll put on the show notes too. So for forum, you know, for Studio Ghibli to come out and say that they're not advocates of machinima, I don't think they really. Get what this is all about,

Ricky Grove 15:01
in some respects, sort of missing the point, just

Tracy Harwood 15:04
a little bit missing the point. But anyway, that's my overview. I know it's a bit of a mishmash, two picks slightly different anime, machinima. What did you

Ricky Grove 15:14
think? Well, you know, anime is one of my favorite art forms in most entertainment. I've watched hundreds and hundreds of hours of anime, and I'm constantly looking for new ones. Netflix is a great source for good anime. I'm so glad that they decided to include that in their film collection. I also, although to a slightly lesser degree, I'm a big fan of manga too, although manga is a bit harder for me to follow, because you don't go left to right, you go right to left. And sometimes, even after dozens of manga, I still get confused and have to go back. Oh yes, because, because, you know, I read so much left to right. It's a habit. But I have to say, The Untold Story in Machinima is anime influence on machinima filmmakers. I think I'm so glad that you picked these because it made me reflect on the fact that gamers are invariably anime lovers. And I think you'll find that the connections between anime storytelling and especially fighting scenes, because one of the great tropes of of anime is the fighting contest, where you get groups of people who are either masters of their whatever form of fighting they have come together and have to fight an arena, or their students who end up having to fight each other to advance in their careers. That's a trope everywhere. So fighting techniques and the ways that anime cover, how cover a fight just visually, cinematography, have been borrowed by anime filmmakers. I'm recalling a author named machi my filmmaker, Baron Soosden, who used a lot of anime. I could see that, and you only catch it if you know about anime, you know. So I think it's a hidden influence, influencer on machinima filmmakers, but also that cultural, that car for blend, you mentioned a little trope that you saw in anime of the humble beginnings building to a supreme warrior. Well, that's that is an anime trope that has been in Good lord, three quarters of the animes that I've seen, and I think they borrowed that from Tolkien, because Tolkien was the first person in fantasy literature, and Fantasy has a close connection to anime. To start with the humble hero who builds up to take the action that determines the entire fate of the world. And I think his his Lord of the Rings trilogy was so influential. I think Japanese filmmakers saw that, and they borrowed some of that from it, although I think it was already in the culture the notion of a humble person becoming a fierce warrior. So I watched your films with glee. I enjoyed them very much. I have to say that the production values for both were outstanding. The editing in particular was just really intelligent and smart. It kept everything rolling, the combination of scene choices and cinematography and music to accompanying it was terrific. I found myself enjoying the second pick, Arcadian, a little bit more mostly because the content of free run was a little bit too cute for me, and that's just a personal choice. You know, it's my personal Ben. It didn't diminish my enjoyment of watching the film, but I found I couldn't engage in the same way I could with Arcadian, which is a little bit little bit more serious in tone. There was a sort of likeness in tone of fear and that I enjoyed, but I found myself engaged more with Arcadian. And I really like these choices. I wish people would use anime more often in their film making, machinima filmmaking, there are so many great anime films to watch. The most recent one that I watched that I thought was just brilliant was blue eyed Samurai, which has some of the most astonishing scenes in design, now that that's traditional anime filmmaking, cell shaded film making, but just just the way they depict landscape in it as the background to the foreground characters is just astonishing. Mission, you felt it was much like reading a novel watching that. And I urge you to watch more machinima and be influenced by it. And finally, today, later on in the afternoon, I'm going to see a restored 4k version of Princess Mononoke by from Studio Ghibli, which is my favorite film of theirs at the IMAX theater here. Oh, wow, we're going to be seeing Yes. Now my only fear is that they're going to show the dubbed version, which Disney did, and Billy Bob Thornton has a voice in it, and it's just terrible. So I'm hoping they're going to do the subtitled version. But whatever version it is. I can't wait to experience it.

Damien Valentine 20:43
What you have to do is take some noise canceling headphones. But the Japanese version, oh, they just play that on your phone so you can listen to it, but watch the high grades on this big screen. That's a good point. That's a good point. It sounds like you're into a really good afternoon watching that absolutely oh my goodness,

Ricky Grove 20:59
yeah. And they're very few animes that actually make me cry, and that's one of them. Oh, wow, that

Damien Valentine 21:06
was a really good one. Mikey, Ricky, I think I enjoyed Arcadian more. I think Varian, it felt like one of those videos that captures various moments of playing the MMO. But we've seen the similar videos made with Warcraft and star citizen and Elite Dangerous and many others, whereas Arcadian felt like it was actually trying to show us a particular moment, which was the story they built around this video. I did enjoy both of them, but yeah, I think I enjoyed Acadian just a little bit more. I've got a friend of mine who really enjoys playing Final Fantasy 14. He's been trying to get the rest of the group into grip, but he just plays a lot. So this is my first actual proper look at the game, because I definitely want to get into an MMO. So it's interesting to get that. I might have to show him these videos and get his perspective on them as well. It'd be interesting to see what he has to say. Yeah, so my understanding that I've only played a couple of Final Fantasy games, but the single player ones, and each game in the series is completely separate from the rest of them. So they've got their own world, their own set of characters and their own story, but the next one is complete, doesn't interact with it like at all. So like in western entertainment, if you like, let's say Mass Effect. There's three mass there's four Mass Effect games, and they're all in the same world. The first three follow the same group of characters, and then the the fourth one is in the same world, and it references the other three games, whereas the Final Fantasy games that will never happen, each one is its own. It could be its own complete game with a complete title, but separate title, but they all have the Final Fantasy title and then the number of whatever it is in the series, but it's not anything part of it. So there have been sort of spin off animation films, but there was a animated movie called Final Fantasy, which was released about 20 years ago now, and it's kind of like a sci fi adventure kind of film. It wasn't that great, but it was entertaining enough, but it is very different from the Final Fantasy games I had played at the time because it's so different. So some of them are sci fi, some of them are fantasy, some are kind of mix of the two, and they kind of have modern elements in it as well, like, like, you might have a sci fi adventure, but they'll be driving sort of modern, ish kind of cars through this very elaborate sci fi streets, or maybe a car through some very medieval, fantasy looking streets. That's what you kind of expect from the Final Fantasy games. I can't say I'm a huge expert on the World of Final Fantasy game. So because I've only played two of them, I've seen lots of clips from friends, though, so, but it's always been an interesting thing that each one is just a complete reset. Yeah, so be interesting to see what happens there. Yeah, I enjoy both these films, and it's interesting to see a machinima, an anime style used in machinima, because it's not something we see very often. By me wonders. That is because, even though there are lots of anime fans in the Machinima community, the games we use do not have the anime art style, like the big eyes and the stylized characters, whereas they tend to be more and I'll go say photo realistic, because obviously there's games like The Sims, but the Sims has its own style, and so does Warcraft, but they're not anime style either. So obviously these two filmmakers are using a game that has that anime style. Able to produce anime style machinima. So maybe if there are more anime style games that would suit form the cinema, we would see more.

Ricky Grove 25:09
Perhaps the anime's influence is less on the actual style of filmmaking than in some of the content and action of fighting and character arcs. Because I see, knowing as much about anime as I do, I see those arcs all the time, even in commercial, realistic television production, I can see that when they do a fantasy film in particular, yeah,

Tracy Harwood 25:37
yeah. I'm sure you're I knew you'd have a lot to say about it, Ricky, I knew you would be into this, and I don't know why we've not picked this up before, because there are, believe it or not, lots of machinima made with these games, and it's been around. This particular game's been around for quite a long time, and there's tons of machinima in it, but my guess is it's probably all in Japanese or, yeah, or Korean, maybe, which makes it very hard for us to to access it easily. I would have said,

Ricky Grove 26:09
well, with the AI translation tools, whether they're too bad, they can do it much easier, as they post it on YouTube, and then that's an automatic translation of it, timing of the animation and the actual translation, they're questionable sometimes, but you can, you can generally do that, yeah,

Tracy Harwood 26:29
I don't think anime, you know, not notwithstanding Ruby, for example, I don't, I don't think anime landed quite so strongly here In the UK as it ever did in the US. So I suspect that you'd probably have a much more natural tendency to want to see this than ever we would hear in UK, maybe on maybe that's not correct, though, Damien, because I know I think

Ricky Grove 26:58
you're right, because the big film that knocked everybody out in America, including all the professional animators, was Akira, right? Which just blew everybody's mind, because it had a theatrical release here. And seeing Akira on the big screen is like going to see the Nibelung and opera cycle in way roof. It's just, you can't believe the scale, the epic scale of what's going on. It's just overwhelming. Yeah,

Tracy Harwood 27:28
yeah. Well, the best we get is Disney.

Damien Valentine 27:34
There is a pretty it's not much in the as it's in America. There is a sizable anime fan community here, because I see a lot of anime cosplayers at conventions, and I have no idea what the characters are, but I recognize them as anime because I've seen pictures of them, and I kind of recognize, yeah, yeah, but they tend to be much younger, like they're they're teenagers and things like that. So maybe it's only just starting to catch on in a bigger way here, so maybe we'll see more of it in the future. Yeah, well, may well,

Tracy Harwood 28:05
yeah, absolutely. So

Ricky Grove 28:06
before we close, I'd just like to mention that everybody knows that I'm an Elden ring fan. Oh, by the way, I think those were excellent choices. Tracy, thank you for making myself. But everybody knows I'm an Elden ring fan. Well, there's a big mod that was made a couple years ago called The convergence mod, and they updated it to 2.2 and they completely redesigned certain areas in Elden ring. And it's just fantastic. You can check the convergence mod just type in the convergence mod in Google. It'll take you right to it. They have a discord channel that tells you all about it, how to do it. If you're an Elden ring fan and you want a different experience, I'd highly recommend it. Brilliant.

Damien Valentine 28:53
All right, so that wraps things up for this week, and I good. That's some interesting mod for fans of Elden ring. Tracy excellent picks and so yeah, we'll be back next week with another film pick. So thank you to my co hosts, Ricky Grove and Tracy Harwood, glad to be here. If you've got any feedback about anime or these films or Elden ring, please send us an email at talk at complete the mission, and you can check out our website at complete the mission.com, so for now, see you next time Bye, see

29:31
ya bye. Bye.