— — — —— — —
×
— —— —
— — — —— — —
×
— —— —
— — — —— — —
×
— —— —
← darkroom
Anime should be categorized by their primary category
I think that it's very misleading to include all tags when doing stats.
Imagine looking at someone who's anime list is full of Shonen and just because some Shonen have "comedy" and "romance" tags, it would show that 80% of their anime is "Romance". It's misleading and it completely nullifies the purpose of having stats by category.
It should only take into count the anime's main category.
Can you elaborate what you mean by as "main category"
I think genres? If I'm interpreting them correctly, they're suggesting that entries be given a single 'main' genre and that should be the genre counted towards the anime stats on one's profile.
For example, something like SAO is a 'Romance,' but the vast majority (I assume) of people watching it aren't watching because it's a Romance, and rather because it's an action-adventure video game show.
However, it was hard to even find an adventure show that had "Romance" so I really don't think that shows being multiple genres would affect stats that much. If someone has a lot of Romance on their stats, it's probably because they've watched a lot of Romance. Media doesn't stop being itself just because someone doesn't like what it is. ¯\(ツ)/¯
Yeah thats what I was figuring they meant its just sort of weird because there isn't really a "main category" currently tracked and idk what that would mean for many titles.
I feel like a much more realistic request of this nature would be splitting up genres further, instead of having romance and comedy as two genres, if something is a romcom then that is its genre and other such things.
All in all it would be a rather huge undertaking and I really don't know how big of a fan I am of it due to how overarching of a change this would be for what would likely be very minimal gains
(also every time I've ever brought up maybe trying to reconsider what genre's we should put on titles I get very minimal feedback from other mods so short of just doing it all myself I just don't see much happening in this regard)
Apologies, I meant "genre".
An example: Jujutsu Kaisen has "Drama" associated to it, but I think that when doing stats, Jujutsu should not be counted as "Drama", as it's inaccurate to portray it as such. It's clearly an "Action" anime primarily.
Dragonball Z and Naruto are labelled "Comedy" as well. That's not what I think about when I think about a "Comedy anime".
So imagine someone seeing a profile with only Shonen and thinking "oh yeah, this guy is all about comedy anime": Completely misleading.
I like to think theres 6 main types of anime:
Action (includes aventure, sports),
Comedy (romance-comedy/parody, slapstick),
Slice of Life-Comedy ("lite" comedy, cuties doing cute things),
Slice of Life-Drama (coming-of-age, iyashikei),
Romance-Drama (mature relationships, politics, tragedy)
and Thriller (psychological, horror, gory action)- continue this thread →
Sure, that looks fair.
Now imagine that Dragonball Z and Naruto count as "Comedy" on your profile.
This would be insanely hard to do. I know this because I tried to do it my self for legit just slice of life. I am going to use slice of life as the example. Some are more comedy focused, while some are more drama focused. However its not black and white, most have a mix. It's hard to label things like this specifically because that mix will be very objective depending on the person. That is why shows are given multiple genres, because if a show is about romance, while also having comedy and action, you can just slap those three genres on there and be good. The problem here, as you can see, is what makes an anime's genre the "Main category/genre" as you put it. This would also be a major overhaul on how this site categorized thousands of titles just so you can have your stats more correct? You know what shows you watch, and what types of shows you like, idk why you need the stats page to reaffirm that for you.
And I know its not just you, but its such a common trend for people to post ridiculous things that will never happen to the site feedback side of things. Things that would take massive overhauls or provide little to no benefit for a majority of the user base.
[Removed]
An example: Jujutsu Kaisen has "Drama" associated to it, but I think that when doing stats, Jujutsu should not be counted as "Drama", as it's inaccurate to portray it as such. It's clearly an "Action" anime primarily.
So when I look through someone's "Anime genre stats", I sure hope his "Drama" anime don't count Jujutsu.
Dragonball Z and Naruto are labelled "Comedy" as well. That's not what I think about when I think about a "Comedy anime".
So imagine someone seeing a profile with only Shonen and thinking "oh yeah, this guy is all about comedy anime":. Completely misleading.
[Removed]
Since you and Damselfies are saying the same thing, you can follow the discussion in my reply to her latest post, since I have the same thing to say to you.
As a reader and someone who watched jujutsu kaisen you're absolutely wrong, drama should definitely be counted for jujutsu kaisen. It is both heavy on action AND drama.
Also Dragonball Z and Naruto are comedic action shounens, labeling it any different would give people a severally different idea. Without the comedy tag it's very easy to assume it's a very serious action anime, which it is definitely not, there's a lot of humour because its also meant for a lower age group rather than a higher age group.
It is not misleading at all in my opinion, seeing someone with a lot of shounen but the comedy tag means they like comedic action rather than serious dramatic action anime.I obviously think you're wrong and making it quite a stretch. I wouldn't call Naruto a "Romance anime" because there's a bootleg love story somewhere inside.
Imagine someone tells you: "I LOVE ROMANCE ANIME". Do you think "Naruto"? Of course not. It's just misleading to visit a profile and see "30% Romance anime" when those 30% come from things like Naruto and Jujutsu or whatever.
If I tell you: "categorize me" and tell you my top 3 anime are: "Naruto, Jujutsu and Bleach". Do you say "Oh well, ROMANCE anime is what I'd categorize you as!". Of course not.
I rest my case.
[Removed]
- continue this thread →
I'm using it as an example to counter-argue the idea that we should label shows based on "elements/events" that happen to take place during the story, rather than for how the story actually intentionally present itself.
Any Shonen has comedic relief and scenes with humor, it's a generic recipe for practically any anime anyway. That shouldn't be enough for me to go around saying "Dragonball Z is a Comedy anime". Dragonball Z is an action anime.
Now look at a perfect example where it would be acceptable: One Punch Man, because the story presents itself as humoristic, it's the style of the show. Naruto and Dragonball Z are not at all trying to present themselves as "comedy anime", they just happen to have scenes with humor like any other anime on the planet. Gintama is another example.
To me, the issue is very clear because we can actually draw examples from real-life interactions. No one on earth goes around saying DBZ is a comedy anime and therefore shouldn't be labeled as such (at least for stats), it's just misleading.
If i hear those 3 animes, I'm sorry but yes i do think of comedy, action and drama.
Also to go even further using jujutsu kaisen as example:
If you don't think the moment between yuuji and his grandpa is a typical drama moment, yuuji "dying" and the other sorcerers mourning for him, yuuji being junpei first true friend and than him dying any of that isn't drama and which btw all happen within the first 13 episode, you clearly have no idea what you're talking about and clearly just skip watched jujutsu kaisen. If there's any action anime/manga that they stuffed with plenty of drama, it's jujutsu kaisen.Also I would advice you to go look again at the naruto entry, because it doesn't have romance as genre at all, same for jujutsu kaisen, so again, your point is completely invalid :)
- continue this thread →
There's a difference between a show that contains drama and a drama show.
I don't know why I have to explain the obvious difference between the two.
All Shonen contain drama, but they're not drama shows, they're action or adventure shows.
The same reason why Naruto contains romance but clearly isn't a romance show. There's a world of difference between the two.
If you read what I'm saying from the start, I'm saying that when it comes to STATS, anime should be qualified based on the PRIMARY genre, otherwise it skews the stats and ends up being misleading.
So when you look at DBZ's anilist page, sure, there can be the TAG "comedy", but don't use "comedy" as the genre in stats.
I think a lot of people read those statistics wrong, and that's because it's easy to just read it at face value: Bob has watched 150 comedies, 25 actions, and 70 slice of life shows? Bob must really like laughing.
No, it means Bob likes lighthearted stuff or stuff than can make him smile.
If Bob has a high genre count in drama, he'd prefer more serious tones or stuff with more tension and problematic scenes.As Damsel said, all of the main genres are a part of the show. The stats aren't supposed to be read at their base-level value of "Damn, 150 comedies? You must really like humor and laughing."
Think of Perfect Blue for a second. Perfect Blue is a great example of psychological, horror, action. It embraces all of those genres. It'd be a disservice to say it has a single, main genre.
Yeah, I'm not sure I really agree with the whole "main" category thing, but I do think that what genres go on shows should be more selective. Right now, I'd say genres are as flippantly added as tags are, and it really shouldn't be that way. Whether that's a matter of poor consistency across entries or no proper ruling against it is something I don't know and frankly don't care about.
Honestly if they just reworked the "Genre Overview" tab to allow us to customize it that would fix all of my issues. As is, the tab adds absolutely nothing to a user's profile, since the more they've watched, the more likely that 3/5 of those tags are going to be Action, Comedy, and Drama. That doesn't tell me anything.
If you think the person who submitted said data to be reviewed and added to the site has made a mistake regarding genre you can always request an edit to the data mods and explain why the genre's are incorrect.
Right now, I'd say genres are as flippantly added as tags are
Not true, since genres do go through an actual reviewing process, while tags I'm 99% sure don't.
But yes, they are certainly inconsistent. I'd say Demon Slayer is less dramatic than MHA, and yet guess which one has the drama genre?
Also manga genres seem more loosely applied. For example, MHA manga has drama, while the anime doesn't, and also fantasy is there, for some reason.Drama I think is the most inconsistent, probably 'cause of the extremely vague description it's been given in the submission manual and its general broadness. In fact, I'm not sure where else there are inconsistencies with genres, off the top of my head.
I'm not a big fan of how widely applied the Comedy tag is. An anime cracks a couple jokes and it's suddenly a comedy.
Not true, since genres do go through an actual reviewing process, while tags I'm 99% sure don't.
I know what I said. Tags go through a review process if the website is to be believed (when you add a new tag, it says it goes through moderator review). But genres/tags going through moderator review doesn't mean anything if it isn't enforced in a way that's satisfactory, thus why I said "flippantly."
Edit: Seems like some people have already made comments on the submission guide regarding some of these tags. I also agree that "Psychological" is far too vague; the definition is too flowery and does not present a clear vision for what the genre is supposed to be.
A big cause of confusion on this thread is using genre and tag interchangeably.
The genres are published by the piece - originally the author/editor, and then it may change when it airs as an anime. However, correct me if I'm wrong, this is still determined by the studio/publisher.
The tags are community voted on and validified by the moderators. One of the big discrepancies with this is the shounen/seinen/shoujo/josei debate, but it depends on the medium it's published in. It may present like a shoujo or josei story, but it was published in a shounen magazine, so it's shounen.Some tags you may disagree with, but if we're going based on stats, then the argument is about genres, right?
I have a hard time following this thread because I can't tell if we're talking about the stat page or this little guy:
If it's this little guy, then my point above is still my opinion.
If we're talking about the stats page itself, then I feel like it's easier not to look at those stats if you disagree or they make you uncomfortable.No such thing as a main category exists. Maybe a target audience?
Another analogy is to think about main characters in connection with main genres: Take SAO for example, a well-known anime. Kirito and Asuna are both considered main characters due to their character development and screen time. It wouldn't be fair to Asuna to say Kirito is the sole MC since the piece started out with him as the forerunner.I could make more analogies and connections, but I think Perfect Blue and SAO should do the trick.
Tl;dr
Figure out whether you're talking about genres or tags. Then read the last paragraph.That "little guy" is what I first saw when I thought about that.
I read your opinion on it and I think you're wrong because that "little guy" is not supposed to have overlapping informations.
When I look at Bob's categories, I want to know what category of anime he watches, not sub-category.
Imagine Bob's list is: Bleach, Naruto and Dragonball Z.
Do you honestly believe that I think these anime are well represented by saying: "Comedy - 3 entries"? Of course not. Bob would be accurately represented by having "Action - 3 entries".
When I look at those three I think: He likes fun-filled action shows that he can laugh at and enjoy that don't have an overarching theme of heavy drama. All three of those have whimsical moments and appeal to a younger-based audience (usually action shounen have comedy tagged, since it relieves some of the pressure from the fights).
So yes, I think it is well-represented. It all comes down to how you interpret the tags, and that's what my point was initially: having a high comedy genre tag does not mean that someone enjoys laughing a lot or actively seeks it out.The purpose of comedy in anime is usually to provide comedic relief and reduce tension. Sure, there are series where it's more prevalent or visible since it's the leading focus (Love is War, School Rumble), but you can't say neither of these shows are more romance than comedy: because they're not. They're both.
One genre may seem more prevalent, but the other genres are there to tell you what kind of story they are.Even for Spy x Family, people are arguing the "supernatural" tag which is simply given to titles that have something out of the normal realm of existence that's inexplicable by science. In this case, Anya. Some people want to put it as a tag, but it's a genre because her character plays such a large role in the story that it directly affects the events that are going to happen. It affects the storytelling and changes the plot. If she just read minds and didn't do anything about it, then it wouldn't be a part of the genre.
A lot of it comes down to identifying what each genre does to a piece. You may notice the action more because that's what you're looking for. You may notice the drama more because you want to focus on the story. There's no way to determine a singular main genre when they're a combination for the purpose of telling the story without telling it.
If we limit the genre overview on the front page to a single genre per show, we aren't accurately explaining what we enjoy watching. If we could put genre favorites, then that would be another story, but again: the genres are being read incorrectly. The overview should be read with each genre being a part of your favorite shows with the purpose of each genre in mind.
I don't understand why you'd think someone who enjoyed these 3 must mean that they like comedy. It's really misguided. I never once thought of comedy when watching Bleach/Naruto/DBZ. Yes, it contains comedy but that goes for pretty much 99.99% of action anime out there, there's always some comedic-relief scenes. That doesn't make it a "Comedy show", that's not the message it's trying to imprint on you.
My point stands and it's not like I'm speaking in hypothetical. I'm literally looking at profiles, including my own, and going "oh well, that was gravely misleading".
I will say, my whole take on this is quite biased as I watch for primarily storytelling reasons. Every genre to me is important in each piece I read/watch, so I don't really mark anything as a "main genre". They're all main to me if they directly affect the character development and plot progression.
I think we should probably agree to disagree at this point since we seem to be looking at it from different angles.
Agree to disagree.
Just for fun, look at my own case; I hate comedy, yet apparently 30% of my shows are "comedy" and they're rated 94.67 mean score:
Simply nonsense.
I also usually dislike shows where the sole purpose is to be comedic, but I don't read the genre group as "only shows that focus on comedy". I read it as "shows that have comedic elements." With that, my comedy genre is the one I have watched the most of (116 to 98 days for action in 2nd place, even).
I don't read comedy as 100% I'm supposed to laugh each chapter/episode, and I don't read action as 100% something action-y happens every chapter/episode. Stories are a mix of the genres that they portray, and the stats just suggest their plot function to me.
I personally don't think it's misguided, but I think it's misinterpreted and misread quite often.
We have the same perspective show-wise, but take-wise we're just not going to be on the same page.
