Little Busters Promo Thoughts

You know, lots of people have been bitching and moaning about JC Staff doing this but JC Staff has made some of the best classics in the industry; things like Azumanga Daioh, Nodame Cantabile, Honey & Clover, Excel Saga, and many more. They are probably my personal favorite studio and get most of the hate they do because of their more recent works – however they’ve done good stuff recently too (Nodame Finale was only like 2 years ago, Joshiraku right now) and a lot of other “alright” stuff too. Every single studio has it’s flops – and a damn lot of them – or has ruined adaptations or ruined possibly great shows or big moments within good shows.

In all honesty, I was and still am actually HAPPY this didn’t end up with what everyone wanted – KyoAni animating it.

KyoAni removed an ENTIRE MAIN STORY ARC from the Clannad anime. Not only that, but an ENTIRE MAIN CHARACTER who was also deeply tied into two other main character’s stories and routes. Why? Just because! They don’t even mention him or give him a cameo. And yes, the arc and character were both important to the story and a main story part just as much as any of the other characters aside from Nagisa and Tomoya. Hell, aside the cat arc this one was the best in the story, and it’s just gone because it didn’t have enough “moe” for KyoAni to sell because it wasn’t another uguu girl and was a guy instead. It’s not like it was some boys-love route or something, he ends up with one of the other girls actually in the end – which also ties into the girl’s route, plus Sunohara’s. It’s shit and I can’t get over it.

Actually, another thing KyoAni decided was just not moe enough for them was in a more serious series – Full Metal Panic : The Second Raid. Remember the incestuous lesbian twins who were naked half the time or all up on each other’s pussies? Thye never existed in any form in the novels. Originally there was just an assassin – male – who was sort of unimportant who was in their role. But, just like with Clannad, they decided to shit all over the source material in favor of adding more fanservice and moe.

KyoAni is by far one of the WORST studios for adaptations.

Point being, no matter how much people like to bitch about JC Staff messing up source material – KyoAni has done the same shit.

As for if they are doing a good job or not on this…so far it looks like it’ll be great if you ask me. The character designs were ported over to the animation medium by JC Staff pretty damn well. You have to keep in mind the fact this is an anime and not a click n read picture book like the VN, so the overall quality is a little less detailed because it’s not 6 different still sprite-images and one or two still CG shots, but a fully animated show. However, even keeping that in mind, it looks really nice and just like the game, even in comparisons they look pretty much exactly alike. They also confirmed awhile back the same voice cast as the VN, so that’s not an issue either, and given this trailer and the general good idea of doing it – chances are the OST will be straight from the game too (probably redone, but the same songs, much like Clannad for example).

The only bad part, which wouldn’t be avoided no matter who was animating it, is that we miss out on the practicing. I don’t know about anyone else, but I somehow had a lot of fun in the batting practice mini-game. They can animate the other stuff like the fighting ranking side stuff because even in the VN it was all automated and scripted – but for the baseball you actually got to do it and it was oddly addicting for such a simple move a little and push one button deal.

As a side note, this is basically the only Key work that had an entire cast I really loved. There’s nobody in Little Busters that I dislike – I obviously like some more than others, but unlike almost everything else they’ve written, there’s nobody here I don’t like. I think the only other thing from Key that fits that is Planetarian – and that’s probably thanks to them adapting a novel and not writing it in the first place. My personal favorite characters in LB are actually mostly the dudes, who luckily are really main characters this time around – especially Kyosuke. My favs are Kyosuke, then Muscles, and then the Rei clone who whispers so much that you literally can’t hear her in the game unless you turn the BGM almost entirely off. After that, probably Rin, and then the rest. But I like them all really.