Quote:
Originally Posted by Pinwheel10
The cheaper animation style ruined most episodes (especially the first 2 episodes of the season) :|
Jellal vs. Jura and Chariot was good though and I enjoyed them a lot. As for Lucy vs. Flare... 
I wonder what's the reason behind the budget cut? |
Most anime series, with their first and sometimes second season, generally only have a smaller budget. You don't notice it with most series, because they lack action, so there are a lot of trick shots they can do to hide the fact that they saved on animating. Such as showing you an almost still shot of people talking, but you only see the backside of the person talking (thus saving them from animating lips moving or facial expressions. Having watched tons of anime for many years now, I can pretty much pick out every scene that used a trick to save on animation.
Action scenes, by contrast, require MANY more scenes to be animated, especially if they want combat to look fluid. That's expensive. So they use stock footage and speed lines, or save their animation budget for one or two fights. The good news is, if a series lasts beyond this, then it's because it is popular, and the budget increases. That's when you start to get nicer looking fights.
But a studio will generally keep the budget small for the first season (unless they are really pushing the series hard), just in case it isn't popular or fails.