Anime Rebirth

Review - .hack//SIGN

Review by Roriconfan

Prologue
This series already has around 20 reviews, so in order to make mine matter, I made it to contain a thing all others don’t seem to mention. SPOILERS! Lots of them! This is a review for those who HAVE SEEN .hack but understood squat about the story or the plot. You have been warned!

Enjoyment: 4
The plot is all talking and no fighting, a thing that DID make me watch most of it at X8 speed. And, no, I didn’t miss any important voice acting or music themes this way, as the pace remains the same in all episodes.

Most otaku prefer a balanced pace of a good story, along with cool battles in between to keep them on their toes. Discussions alone aren’t enough. A fine example is Full Metal Alchemist, which had a bit of everything and is worthfully one of the best anime ever. But if I would have to choose between talking or fighting, I would definitely pick the first. Series that are only about fighting and shallow talking/storytelling are AWFUL. Just try to watch Devil May Cry and you’ll understand what I mean.

So, .hack is limited to the best of the two main things most otaku notice: Talking with a deep meaning behind it. That made it slightly bearable.

Story: 10
Yes, the plot IS boring. But that doesn’t change the fact that the story AROUND the plot of .hack is AWESOME! What I describe here is the story BEFORE the beginning of the events in the series, as the series itself hardly evolved the story any further.

In the near future, a super virus destroys all but one web networks, plunging the world into chaos.

A few years later, the same events are slowly repeating through the most famous on-line game of the time, simply called THE WORLD. As gameplay goes, the game is not better than Lineage, but it features a revolutionary originality: Virtual Reality! VR helmets and gloves make the sensation of the game a lot more realistic, although feeling pain when hit is not possible.

But even that is beginning to get dangerous, as many are struck by a virus in the game that throws them into coma. The producers of the game keep this a secret because it sells like crazy and simply order several programmers and moderators to secretly “fix” any problems the game may have.

The reason of the virus is The Key of the Twilight, a forbidden artifact in the game that can alter the very programming of the game and effectively make anything possible. Even making NPCs act like players and throw players into coma!

The Key was made by the now deceased original programmer of the game, who was in love with a woman poet/phantasy novelist. When she died in a traffic accident, his grief led him to secretly create a simulation of her personality with the name of Aura and sent her dormant and hidden in the game. A program called Morgana was responsible for gathering information on players that would help Aura become artificially intelligent. She would move freely in the game, without any game programming restrictions, thanks to the Key’s power to alter anything.

And here is where the problem arose. Morgana became self-aware and like all living/sentient beings, it wanted to stay alive. If Aura would awake, its reason-for-being would end and effectively, it would be erased/killed. So, in order to prevent Aura’s awakening indefinitely, it gave the Key to someone who didn’t want to change or face reality (not awake from the illusion of the game, so to speak). That person was Tsukasa, someone who wished to stay in the game forever (the reason is described in the Character section). So, Tsukasa almost willfully chooses to forget who “he” is and stay in the game forever, in order to escape the harsh reality.

And then the series begin. Tsukasa’s Key is slowly corroding the programming and creates viruses with a thematic motif of those of the woman’s End Of The World novels. These viruses start to expand beyond the game, causing troubles and beginning a new world crisis. But the story is about Tsukasa learning to trust people again, search for his lost memories and face reality. You hardly hear anything about the story I describe so far. The series focuses on him and leaves aside the whole world threat.

The ending is open, as you are supposed to watch .hack//LIMINALITY and play the .hack Playstation game trilogy to get the full picture. But those are just marketing tricks to rob you of your money, as the plot is also boring and slow and not even interesting characters are present.

There! If that is not a good story, I don’t know what it is. It sure beats all those “I want to become No.1 in the world” and “I will beat the crap out of everyone” series.

Animation: 8
You will love them if you’re into MMORPG and phantasy worlds. They lack stylized CG and flashy visual effects, but I didn’t care about that. The atmosphere rocked!

Sound: 10
I hardly rate a perfect score. That implies a lot! Simply the best music themes and amongst the best voice acting I have ever heard. They talk all the time and most music themes repeat too often, but I didn’t care about that, either. The songs have become an Obsession of mine!

Characters: 6
Tsukasa is the protagonist. We originally know nothing of him, he knows nothing of himself. The whole “amnesia” theme is so commonly used in movies and series, that I almost stopped watching .hack because of it. I mean, the main character is a wimp who doesn’t trust anyone or fights anything. He was just talking about how harsh life is and the like. But, as the story goes on (in a very slow pace), I loved the guy! Why? Well, for starters, he is not a guy! He is a girl playing a male character! She was being beaten by her father in the real world and when Morgana gave her the chance to escape reality, she willfully trapped her consciousness in the game permanently and erased her memories to forget the cruel past (all these, thanks to the Key of Twilight). As Tsukasa, he/she was avoiding others until other players (mostly Bear, Mimiru and Subaru) help him/her face reality, just to be together for real. His/her character development can’t get any better, as he/she is 180 degrees different when the series end. Go Tsukasa!

Besides Tsukasa, all others are there for flavor. Sure, it was interesting when they described what they do or how they look like in the real world. But besides that, they didn’t really do anything else other than talking and giving advices to Tsukasa. Not that they were shallow, it’s just that they had weak presence in the series or before Tsukasa’s character. Only the few points in the story, were some try to deceive others or criticize their actions in the game were noteworthy.

Subaru is the only other character that truly develops, as she dismantles an entire organization and even falls in love with Tsukasa (a possible yuri relationship is blooming here!).

Value: 10
There is nothing else like .hack//SIGN. Even its sequels are very different and inferior to it. Its originality in setting, scenario, way of storytelling, make it memorable even if you hated it. A perfect mark for a controversial series that alters the way you look at “childish cartoons”.

Verdict
The accused is found … NOT GUILTY! … He blabbers a lot but he has some serious things to say.