A&M Review and Recommendation Thread

A couple of old-school anime recommendations:

Record of Lodoss War: Pretty much the best Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st Edition animation ever (although considering how much D&D The Animated Show kind of sucked, it's not like Lodoss had much competition). It began as a series of AD&D 1st Edition games that a bunch of Japanese guys played and created their own world called Lodoss and it mostly follows the exploits of a fighter, wizard, cleric, dwarf fighter, thief, and a gorgeous female elf shaman as they try to save the world of Lodoss. The creators tried to sell the world to TSR (who owned D&D at the time), but TSR was all "lolnothanks, pearl harbour, assholes!" and rejected it. No wonder they went out of business. You really can't go wrong with it if you're into traditional sword & sorcery stories/RPGs. The english dub is kind of lacking in several areas, with the best performance given by Lisa Ortiz as Deedlit (her very first voice acting role, no less!), but it's okay.

The Slayers: Arguably the best anime adaptation of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2ND Edtion. The main characters are almost all doing things for selfish reasons, but somehow end up saving the world anyway. Lina Inverse (for you English dub fans, ANOTHER one of Lisa Ortiz's roles) is one of my favorite anime characters. She's powerful, devious, and her response to minor irritations is blowing things up. It's a mix of swords & sorcery, drama, action/adventure, and plenty of comedy.

Basically, Lodoss War can be described as the campaign that goes exactly how the DM planned. Slayers can be described as the campaign that goes the way it does because the players decided to do whatever they want.

Alfieri said:

Anyone know of any good action adventure comedy anime? Preferably short, around 25 episodes or less (60 something is my absolute limit). I've watched series like Dragon Ball, Naruto, One Piece, Yu Yu Hakusho, Hunter x Hunter, Rurouni Kenshin, Fooly Cooly, Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood and more.
I'm not crazy about mecha anime and I really am not into slice of life high school girl anime or those fan service "ecchi" anime. Oh and absolutely no horror lol. It can have demons and ghosts and such but it needs to be less scary about it like Yu Yu Hakusho or Bleach.

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The students of class 3-E have a mission: kill their teacher before graduation. He has already destroyed the moon, and has promised to destroy the Earth if he can not be killed within a year. But how can this class of misfits kill a tentacled monster, capable of reaching Mach 20 speed, who may be the best teacher any of them have ever had?

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Ansatsu Kyoushitsu/ Assassination Classroom a really good manga but it's getting adapted incredibly well. This one is only just airing and it's second episode just came out today if you're willing to watch it week by week. If you aren't, it's definitely worth it to put it on your list to watch it when it finishes at the end of next season. It's quite a unique shounen/comedy/action, however doesn't really hit much in terms of adventure.
It isn't really similar to the serious-badass-Killua sort of assassination, but I guess it does carry that serious-yet-comedy sort of atmosphere that HxH has. Their assassinations start of mild, but as the story progresses, there will be some pretty cool action and assassination scenes. It's currently confirmed for 22 episodes.

Asakura Yoh is a shaman, one who can see and communicate with spirits. Yoh is training to become the Shaman King, strongest among all the Shamans. The ones helping him are Manta, a short boy who can see ghosts and Amidamaru, who is an old samurai spirit and Yoh's partner. However there are also others who are trying to get the title Shaman King.

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Shaman King is pretty old so I won't be surprised if you have seen it (2001-2002). It one of my childhood favourites and I've watched multiple times. It certainly does capture all three of the action-comedy-adventure type anime and carries that serious-yet-comedic feel that many shounen action animes have.
Since I watched it during my childhood, I watched it in English and it was dubbed by the infamous 4kids. Although a lot of people don't like the English dub (especially with the more serious and passionate Japanese dub), the english dub did me great on the character based humor and more for
nostalgia sake. Unfortunately it is 64 episodes, but it's definitely an anime worth it!

Also one of the most badass english OPs ever:

The main character, Endou Mamoru, is a very talented goalkeeper and the grandson of one of the strongest goalkeepers in Japan, who died before he was born. Even though his skills are incredible his school lacks a real soccer club as the 6 other members don't appear very interested even in training. But as soon as a mysterious forward called Gouenji moves to Endou's town, the young goalkeeper sets out to find and recruit members for his soccer team.

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Inazuma Eleven is something I recommend to a lot of people. I know a lot of people who don't necessarily like sports will tend to stay away from this genre, but this anime in particular, you don't really have to like soccer to love it - Most of the people I know who love this anime, REALLY love Inazuma Eleven, but don't even like anything to do with sports. IE isn't your typical sports anime because it is incredibly unrealistic - which all the more make it much more enjoyable.
If you enjoyed any character's special Nen abilities off HxH such as Kurapika's Conjured Chains, Gon's Jajanken (Saisho wa guu, jankenpon), Killua's Godspeed or even his Rhythm Echo, you will probably enjoy the special abilities each of the characters have in the anime. IE has loads of action with a bit of comedy here and there and also has a bit more adventure than more sports anime have.
The first season of IE is only 25 episodes, but the first series contains a total of 127 episodes over the course of 3 seasons. A sequel series follows with another 147 episodes with different main characters, but it still does really well. Right beside HxH this is tied as one of my favourite anime of all time!

Now and Then, Here and There

Basically a teenage boy named Shu sees this girl on a smoke stack, some people try to kidnap her, and both of them get transported into either a distant planet somewhere orbiting a star going supernova or they were transported many years into the future and Earth is the planet with the supernova star. Either way, the entire world is a desert wasteland. Even worse, they're both captured by a paranoid warlord and Shu is conscripted into his army of child soldiers. Other characters include Sara, an American teenage girl from where Shu came from, who is...well...pretty much treated as breeding stock.

And all of this is over a war for water.

It's grimdark as hell and somewhat soul-crushing. The writing and animation are fantastic and well-done, but this anime is not for the faint of heart. This is "playing-evil-in-Planescape:Torment" depressing we're talking here.