Vote for your favorite 2006 bishoujo game based anime series!

[bluemist]

Well, maybe it's that time once again to vote for your favorite bishoujo game based anime series of the year!

I would say that 2006 has a very solid lineup, but some of us may have been quite disappointed with the anime versions. Maybe because it's been the 4th year since the bishoujo boom and we have gone accustomed to the cliches of the bishoujo genre, or it just didn't live up to the originals.

As promised, Canvas 2 is included this year, and sorry Kanonites and Tokimemo fans, you'll have to wait until next year since the two series haven't ended yet. Also, the poll has a limit of 10, so I can't include some titles (like Otoboku), but please do voice our opinion. (I swear I'm missing some other popular anime of this genre, I can't remember, maybe from the spring season...)

Results from the past years:
2003
2004
2005

You can vote for as many as you want but please limit to 1-3 so that we can see a trend.

[Skyfall]

Voted for Canvas 2 and Gift. Would have voted for Higurashi, but i am not sure it belongs in this poll

[Kamui4356]

I voted for Utawarerumono alone. Haven't seen all of a few of them, since I've been playing yet another mmorpg, and some, like canvas 2 and fate/stay night have some serious flaws that ruined some of the enjoyability. Still a pretty good year for bishoujo game conversions.

[AvatarST]

I voted for Fate/Stay Night. I've actually been generally disappointed with the anime conversions of these games, but Fate/Stay Night is one of the exceptions.

[Deathkillz]

hmmm ~ well F/SN is one of my pick ~ great action and loveable characters...too bad that the whole series seemed kinda rushed ~ would have loved to see more fight scenes

second pick is utawarerumono ~ nice gerne and a captivating story ^_^

[capture]

Voted for F/SN either.... though I think the anime is kinda lacks of story.. .......still I'm a solid F/SN fan......

Saber is also one of the reasons

[Last_Hope]

I voted for Higurashi and Utawarerumono.

Utawarerumono gets some + for the ending and for it making you feel the horror of war in a better way than Gundam. The storyline overall is enjoyable and the characters are well made.

Higurashi is just senselessly amazing. I´ve never seen anything even remotely similar and this new experience was highly appreciated.

[Skane]

Canvas2 and Utawarerumono get my votes. Gift~ and Happiness get mine too because they managed to elicit feelings in me.

The rest are pretty much ho-hum to me.

Cheers.

[Scribble]

Canvas 2 and Higurashi, HANDS DOWN.

Utawarerumono was good, too.

Canvas 2: Wasn't as cliche ridden as other b-game based series. Gave us a likeable, non-generic (for the most part) male lead, more complex relationships than "all the girls revolve their entire lives around male lead", characters with actual ambitions, and the girls were some of the best versions of their respective archetypes.

Higurashi: I liked figuring out the mystery, and ALL the characters were likeable. Very unique anime and RENA. I didn't really care about the bad animation quality, kind of added to the atmosphere.

[bluemist]

Up, we need more voters.

I haven't watched Utawarerumono yet but since many voted for it it seems to be a good watch. I was too disappointed with Aquaplus since the whole To Heart 2 semi-flop.

[Sheba]

I voted for Utawarerumono and Higurashi, I expected nothing from them yet they entertained me. F/SN was too slow in its pacing then felt underwhelming after Archer's battle.

[DeZheKun]

Where is ZegaPain?

[Pellissier]

Voted for Canvas 2 and Higurashi. I've watched five of the ten shows on the list (the two I voted plus F/Sn, Gift and Tsuyokiss).

Canvas 2 because it was marvellously done for being an "harem" game conversion, and things such a smooth pacing and caring of details were cured as normally I don't see on these shows. There were also some of the most shining side characters ever seen (Tomoko, Sumire, Yagino).

Higurashi no Naku Koro ni because it really brought a lot of fresh air in the anime world. It was just so different from the mass. So intriguing, so horrorifying yet delightful, so unique. And as far as I'm concerned, I was ok also with animations, because the thing that was carrying me more, was the atmosphere and nothing else. I'm incredibly glad that a season 2 is scheduled.

[Quajafrie]

I think that Higurashi isn't really a bishoujo game... The girls are not very pretty at all, and it's also too story-based to be considered one of them.

[Radiosity]

Canvas 2, Utararerumono both get my vote for being good overall. Canvas 2, as mentioned, avoided a lot of the usual cliche rubbish and had interesting and fun characters (it also has Tomoko, who is worth the vote all by herself ) Uta was just awesome all round, probably the best war saga since Twelve Kingdoms, with additional moe.

Since I limit myself to three votes maximum in multichoice polls, my third went to Happiness! simply because it is amusing and I happen to really like the characters designs (Haruhi in particular, but Jun also gets points for a number of reasons )

An honourable mention goes to F/SN as well (no vote though), since it was an enjoyable series overall but Shiro really got on my nerves after a while.

A dishonourable mention also goes to Soul Link as one of the most awesomely horrible conversions of all time. I haven't seen an anime that bad in a long while

[kj1980]

Utawarerumono - more so because of the hilarious radio show between Koyama Rikiya and Yuzu-nee. www

[Vexx]

Voted for Canvas 2 and Gift (though each had minor stumbles at the end). Canvas 2 made the hero's thoughts overly opaque to try to increase the surprise but the series needed more clues that Hiroko felt *some* sexual attraction for his choice. As it was, the end credit screenshot was totally out of the blue for many viewers, even some of the supporters of that choice. Gift missed points with some viewers over the foreshadowing of the revelations at the end ( a bit too "rabbit now pulled from hat").
However, Canvas 2 gave me the "Hagino and Tomoko comedy hour" and Gift was an interesting little ride with some novel situations.

Ones I did not vote for:
Crescent Love just failed for me ... the core story seemed to be quite good but the clutter, poor animation, lame humor, and deux ex machina ending -- well, the people who knew the game liked it but for me - as a standalone product at least it failed.

F/SN -- I tried many many times to get interested in this but in the end many of its fans were even disappointed by some lost opportunities to make it great. It just boiled down to me not getting hooked by the story premise, my bad.

Higurashi --- quite excellent series, don't know if it belongs in this grouping, but its more like "required college reading" for me than enjoyable.

Happiness --- wah... one of several series that should have been better but you got the feeling the studio just pumped and dumped - I'm getting the feeling some studios aren't respecting their customers this season.

Lovely Idol, Tsuyokiss, Soul Link --- see Happiness remarks. Each seemed to have been produced by executives that really hated their audience and the material ... or that they just hired the drained end of the skill pool. The Lovely Idol *should* have been a great send up of the industry, but I guess self-lampooning is still edgy.

Utawarerumono --- this is an SRPG game-based show... I guess it makes sense here, but the series turned out to be epic war drama focused (where most personal relationships just get crushed under the epic). I enjoyed the series but only after I got over that issue.

All my opinions are simply mine and provide some lame context for why I voted as I did

[LionsMane]

Fate/Stay Night wins my vote. I was pretty pleased with out it turned out.

[Lichtkrieg]

That was difficult! I choose Higurashi, its been a long time since an anime disturbed me like this one. But I must say that Fight/Stay Night was quite good too.

[Scribble]

Now I remember why Utawarerumono missed out: because I didn't get attatched to the characters....I didn't feel the whole "team dynamic". Everyone just seemed kind of "bleh" to me.

If you read the Chinese novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the characters' personalities aren't really that delved into, but for some reason you end up rooting for them because of their exploits and abilities and how they deal with some situations.

I also felt there should have been more fleshed out "opposing generals" as opposed to "battle of the week". Now that I think about it, this is how my Uta viewing went.

1st episode: I don't like this, but I'll stick with it
2nd episode: This has huge potential, seems kind of epic, but in a sort of "grand adventure" kind of way

Then soon the whole war thing kicked in, and it just seemed "meh". And the last arc was lost on me.