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Looking at your profile pic, I alos vastly prefer the art style of the manga to the anime. I used to have this big calendar with all the artwork from it and it was gorgeous

Yeah, I like him, so watching him reduced to "token arm candy" by S was a bit annoying (not that he did much in the manga adaption of S anyway) but I definitely missed the fact that his four bodyguards still make cameos in the manga, whereas this whole angle is gone in the anime.

Oh yeah, Mamoru is just so much more of a character in the manga

Both versions have their issues. The anime drags things out too long with filler and tended to make the villains goofier as the series went on, with Sailor Moon S being the first victim of this phenomena, Mamoru loses most of his character development and importance in the anime due to the director allegedly hating him and purposely sidelining him more and more with each season, and SuperS and Stars are barely recognizable to the darker and better written manga chapters of the same arcs.

The manga does have a breakneck pace at times, and largely focuses on Usagi, Mamoru, and Chibi-Usa to the detriment of the rest of the cast. While the main villains get better character sometimes (it largely depends on which arc) the subordinate characters are reduced to monster-of-the-week status and become flat and generically evil.

I love both versions for different reasons, and I think I like the anime adaption of the first two seasons the best because it strikes a nice chord between what makes both versions great.

I disagree. I think the manga is much better because of the fact that it's paced in a more original fashion. It disregards traditional chapters for a more flowing narrative, which I think worked great and added a lot of magic to the atmosphere of the whole. Plus, where the manga played up the deconstructive (or rather unbuilt? it is one of the first examples, after all) elements of the story, the show had more focus on the action with tons of filler that was just there for it to be more marketable.

Plus, what the anime adaptation did to Venus was downright criminal.

I'd argue with anyone who tried to say the manga is objectively better because the pacing is horrible and a lot of characters don't get fleshed out because of it. A serious flaw that shows in the anime adaptation of Sailor Moon Crystal. Maybe the overall arcs and everything are better, but I thought the anime did a better job of fleshing out the other Senshi and a lot of the villains.

I get this so much, Wolf! Granted, we didn't have the dub here in Poland, and I was in kindergarten, but still! Our version actually had the original music and all the original names (with Usagi called Bunny, for some reason, as in the actual English word, not the Polish translation) and none of the censorship, so we had gay Zoicite and lesbian cousin outer senshi. In 1990s, post-communist Poland. Let that sink in. People don't want to acknowledge gender is a thing now and yet it seems gays and lesbians in a kids' show back then were a-okay, but I digress.

I also liked Makoto a lot, though I wouldn't say she was a crush since I was much too young, but I did kind of relate to her a lot for some reason. For that reason, it wasn't really the need for romance that this show stirred in me, but rather drama and darkness. Like you mentioned, it was pretty similar in here in that it was the only kids' show that had actual stakes and danger and the characters often had to face absolute hopelessness to be victorious, and sometimes you can't get that happy ending even (Nephlite), so there being a continuity and so much serious stuff going on was a big thing, though the characters were still fun and incredibly relatable. The art direction was also incredibly haunting, sticking with me all the way until now, influencing all my creative thoughts.

I don't care if it was corny or if the manga is actually objectively better, my whole childhood was spent obsessing over Sailor Moon and it's the reason I got into drawing, writing, and anime in general, so I don't think there is a single work of fiction that has influenced me quite as much as this thing

Sailor Moon is my childhood. I relate to Usagi so much it's not even funny. I can still watch the dub even to this day, and honestly prefer it mainly because I hate reading subtitles. I still have the soundtrack, myself.

It's a discussion that's been going on in academia for centuries. I really don't think we'll be able to settle on a definition here

Still, it's nice to see what people subjectively think of it. I mean, I also subscribe to one approach that feels the most valid to me, but that doesn't make it undeniable truth

Originally Posted by Fynn

Really, these types of discussions are actually all doomed to go nowhere because it is impossibe to reach an agreement on what art is nowadays

Very true. It's one of the reasons I suggest we need to talk about defining the criteria of what art actually is. Course this is a bigger discussion than the one concerning gaming.

Really, these types of discussions are actually all doomed to go nowhere because it is impossibe to reach an agreement on what art is nowadays

Originally Posted by Karifean

Huh. To me having the interactive element be part of the artistic merit of a video game is something so obvious I never even thought about it being ignored.

It's something I've noticed when some people discuss it. Often people will say certain games are art because of story alone and others like Roger Ebert suggested that the interactive element of games disqualify it from being art because art is meant to be static.

I think gaming is an art, although I can't describe why. It's invoked feelings and emotions in to me stronger or on par with some movies and some literature and some paintings and whatever. So I would say it is

Huh. To me having the interactive element be part of the artistic merit of a video game is something so obvious I never even thought about it being ignored.

Well, in my opinion, all games are art. There really can be no denying it. How pleasing or how thought provoking it is is irrelevant - it was created through some manifestation of a person's (or a group of people's) vision. Everything has some sort of vision behind it, even if it's trout. Art can be trout too. Really, from a postmodernist perspective, everything is art.

There was this cool episode of Brows Held High where Kyle talked about this very topic. Granted, it had next to nothing to do with JRPGs specifically, but it was still really interesting. I am super mad that the blipocalypse happened as I can't find the video anywhere on Youtube

I don't know, part of me would prefer the original cabinets just because of nostalgia and to really give it that arcade feel. I may build my own if the game in question is too expensive or difficult to acquire but I would like to pretty much build an old school arcade.

Buying arcade cabinets can be pricey. But a more DIY solution (and maybe even more enjoyable if you're that sort of person) is to build your own cabinet(s) and have computers running MAME inside. You can even get into some crazy stuff like custom sticks, buttons, layouts. Decorate the outside with some classic arcade game artwork. Or even get a cab where the game no longer works on the cheap, gut it, and use it instead of making your own.

So many options. I may have thought about this a bit myself.

I had a room dedicated to video games when I was a little better off before everything went south and I was forced to sell my home. In it I didn't have an arcade but I had every system from the NES, to a Dreamcast, to the PS3 and an X-box 360. All had their own TV and I had a couple of Lazyboys un the muddle that swiveled to all of them. It was my games room which I loved and I can't wait to build it again too. I was looking at arcade as well but just didn't have the space yet.

Figure I should close this out. I finished the story somewhere about the fourth draft I figure it was as good as it was going to get. While it did not turn out to be the story I originally envisioned, I can say it definitely held the raw energy it had when I first came up with it.

Sadly it dragged up some old feelings and now I have to reconsider certain aspects of my current state of affairs. I've come to some hard truths and I guess it will take some time to figure out where to go from here. On the other hand, I feel more creative now than I have in a long time. I already finished a draft for another short story, working on a new short story which I might use for a bigger one and I'm revisiting two stories I've been wanting to do for awhile but never had the confidence to do before.

I guess to end this, I'll simply post an image of the creative process for people who don't know.