Quote Originally Posted by Vyk
In the world of wuxia lore, martial artists train to be able to attain that feat. In the world of Final Fantasy (or just plain video game) lore, it's all about fighting battles. You don't have to necissarily think of it in terms of levels. But either way, the more battles you fight, the more powerful you get and more abilities you attain. I'm going to cite DBZ as an example of this, for anime reference. Rarely do the characters actually train to highten their martial arts abilities. What they do is put a lot of physical stress on their body. Doing bogus kicks and punches in 10x Gravity isn't going to make your reflexes any better in a fight. But that's how they get "more powerful". Its the way reality works in DBZ. In FF, the same thing is done, but the physical stress is attained through countless battles that we aren't privy to in the movie (it's all in the game). In either case, there is no mental discipline, yet they attain super human abilities. So they can do moves that wuxia does, but they don't get there the way wuxia does
I had issues with just about everything you wrote, but for the sake of brevity, I'll just sum it up with this quote.


Quote Originally Posted by Vyk
Doing bogus kicks and punches in 10x Gravity isn't going to make your reflexes any better in a fight. But that's how they get "more powerful". Its the way reality works in DBZ.
Do me a favor, go to any store that sells exercise gear, and check out equipment like heavy hands, leg weights, arm weights, weighted clothing, ect. What the heck do you think this stuff is for? by strapping extra weights to your body your causing regular acts such as common movements to suddenly put strain on your muscles, and a propor workout with weighted clothing/equipment will actually result in yes, quicker reflexes, because your body will now be doing even mundaine acts such as keeping balance with greater difficulty, and your muscles will have to focus beyond that which they are used too. When practice my roundhouse kicks I do so with leg weights, I started with five extra pounds and have worked my way up to strapping 30 lbs to my legs now, and let me tell you in ten minutes Im dripping sweat from the exertions.

as for your comparing martial arts training to video games, ummm, you do realize I do practice martial arts. and there is a reason its considered an "ART". There are some practices that focus solely on combat, which is why they are referred to as combat arts. Martial arts refer to training the spirit, as well as the body. And if one is not trained in a particular area then one is typicaly unfit for using the techniques of that art. I wouldnt expect a Muay Thai fighter to be using grappling techniques, nor would I expect a Jiu jitsu practitioner to perform aerial roundhouse kicks. In the same way I wouldnt expect a mechannic and cyborg street thug to know anything about chi use.

Quote Originally Posted by SoulTaker*
Ishin I dont care what you say about wuxai, wutai or wu tang or whatever it is you watch pull off the things they did in this movie, their usually set in some ancient period, this movie was set in the modern time frame, and wuxia movies are more artistic, this movie was just straight in your face kickass action, I didnt see Le bie or whatever in crouching tiger chuck a motorcycle at somebody using his legs while smashing his fist into the ground, if your a fan of non-stop ORIGINAL action you'll like this movie, If you like sappy chinese martial art movies you'll probably STILL like this movie, I dont know what ishins problem is, tell the Chinese to look out for the Mongols, all that wuxia training and its still know help against a horse and a bow.
actually, wuxia films have been known to take place in the modern era, like The Myth for example. and in anime, throwing motorcycles is somewhat cliche. Tetsuo in Akira rarely threw anything smaller then an automobile, In X whole building shatter during one on one combat, Macross Plus and Zero all have giant transforming mecha tearing [img]/xxx.gif[/img][img]/xxx.gif[/img][img]/xxx.gif[/img][img]/xxx.gif[/img] up left, right, and centre in particularly badass fashion. And John Woo has been doing those sort of chase/combat scenes since time immemorial. Hard Boiled anyone?