Adaptation Relationship Overhauls in Anime and Manga.
- The anime version of Angelic Layer switches around the main couples. In the manga's epilogue, Misaki ends up with Kotaro, while Tamayo starts dating Ojiro. In the anime, however, Misaki ends up with Ojiro, while Tamayo gets together with Kotaro. The anime also adds a lot of Ship Tease between Icchan and Shuuko, which didn't exist in the Manga.
- Dragon Ball Super:
- In the anime, both Goku Black and Future Zamasu genuinely consider each other as "kindred sprits" who work together to achieve their goal of a Zero Mortals plan including fighting together and even speaking in unison with one another. In the manga, however neither of them are fond of one another due to differing ideals in what they considered power and their partnership is more based on pragmatism than anything else and when overwhelmed, are willing to turn on each other briefly. Case in point is how Future Zamasu react to Black turning down immortality, in the anime, Zamasu accepted his proposal even though he disagreed with it while the manga, Zamasu looks down on Black for it and even calling him out on it when both Goku and Vegeta overwhelmed them.
- Unlike the anime where Caulifla shows a special attachment to Kale and treats her like a protégée, Caulifla in the manga doesn't appear to treat her beyond as another member of her gang who she thinks is in need of more training, to the point that she even questions Cabba when he recruits her for the tournament. This is in contrast to the anime where it is Caulifla the one who suggested to bring her in for the tournament.
- In The Legendary Super Saiyan, Broly Second Coming, and Bio Broly, Broly obsessively hated Goku, and just the sight of him (or anyone with a Strong Family Resemblance) could send him into a murderous rage. In Dragon Ball Super: Broly, Broly has never met Goku and treats him like any other enemy. He even befriends Goku by the end of the movie.
- F-Zero: GP Legend:
- In the games, Zoda is the Arch-Enemy of the Arrows. In the anime, He is Ryu's Arch-Enemy instead. Also, Zoda is one of Black Shadow's Co-Dragons in the anime, while in the game they're individual villains.
- Captain Falcon and Samurai Goroh are rivals, even it's one-sided on Goroh's part. The rivalry is omitted in the anime.
- While Antonio Guster is still Goroh’s former partner turned vengeful rival like in the games, the anime adds his sister Lisa Brilliant, who is also Goroh’s wife. This makes things just as, if not more personal.
- Hanebad! has a strange example: in the anime, Riko and Nozomi are friends from middle school who meet again after several years during a tournament. In the manga they have no connection, but Nozomi has a connection to Nagisa, Riko's best friend, that doesn't seem to exist in the anime.
- Kaguya-sama: Love Is War
- Karen is mostly shown to either be wary of Fujiwara or view her as a troublemaker that is tolerated solely because she happens to be best friends with Karen's idol Kaguya depending on the circumstances. The OVA on the other hand shows her fawning over Fujiwara as she gets out of the pool with almost the same intensity that she shows Kaguya.
- Maki mentions in her first focus chapter that she and Shirogane are already acquainted with one another due to being in the same homeroom. The anime makes no mention of this and instead treats her coming to the student council room as the first time they've ever talked.
- Kei has a somewhat strained relationship with her older brother in canon, as while she does love and admire him, the fact that he has filled in the void of their absent mother makes him the primary target of her teenage rebellious phase. The gender-bent AU in the Official Doujin on the other hand shows them having a much closer relationship.
- The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (2016):
- Before Midna found Link, Midna was served by the Golden Wolf, as the Hero of Time had traveled to the Twilight Realm after death to keep an eye on Ganondorf.
- Midna and Zelda had an intense childhood friendship cut short by a misguided Auru.
- Lyrical Nanoha:
- In the main continuity, Precia and Lindy have no relationship with each other (barring the fact that Lindy adopted Precia's daughter Fate) and they only spoke with each other twice while Lindy was trying to place Precia under arrest. In Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha INNOCENT, they're Heterosexual Life-Partners (probably so Fate can be with both of her families).
- INNOCENTS also turned Momoko into Quint's high school senpai. This also applies to Signum and Tre (or rather, Mituki).
- In Gears of Destiny, the Materials were originally Yuri's guardians, essentially the precursor for the Wolkenritter's relationship with Hayate. When the story was adapted into movie form for Reflection and Detonation, it's instead revealed that they were her pet cats turned into familiars by Iris. However, both stories end with them having a familial relationship.
- My-HiME has a few character relationships that differ from the anime and manga.
- In the anime, Yukino becomes friends with Mai and Mikoto. In the manga, they start out on as members of rival Hime groups.
- In the anime, Shiho has a budding friendship with Mai, whom she meets in the first episode, until she learns Mai is a rival for Yuuichi's affections. In the manga, Shiho transfers in midway through and is antagonistic to Mai from the very start. Accordingly, Mai calls Shiho the informal and affectionate "Shiho-chan" in the anime and the more formal "Munakata-san" in the manga.
- In the anime, Natsuki is largely indifferent to Yuuichi, but in the manga, she is in love with him.
- My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! contains several In-Universe examples. Catarina remembering her past life causes some character relationships to be different from the original Fortune Lover game, mostly involving how other characters see her, but also relationships she's no part of:
- In Fortune Lover it's implied that Catarina likes Geordo, but Geordo doesn't like her back, and only keeps their betrothal as a convenient shield to keep other girls at bay. Here, Geordo doesn't want to break their engagement because he is genuinely in love with her.
- Catarina originally bullied and tormented her adoptive brother Keith for most of his childhood. Due to her radically different treatment of him, Keith ends up falling in love with Catarina while maintaining close ties with her as siblings.
- Catarina's parents in the game had an extremely tense relationship, in large part due to Catarina's mother believing Keith is her husband's bastard (he's actually the bastard of a distant cousin). Now she knows the truth and they are deeply in love.
- Similarly, Catarina's mother was supposed to be cold and abusive to Keith (due to, as noted above, believing that he is her husband's bastard). Now, they have bonded over mutual exasperation at Katarina's antics and she openly considers him in many ways a better child than her actual daughter.
- Catarina in the game also bullied Maria at any opportunity. Now, she defends Maria from bullies and is on very good terms with her. Maria appears to be in love with Catarina as well.
- Similarly, Maria could fall in love with either Geordo, Keith, Alan, or Nicol. Now she doesn't show any hints of being attracted to any of them, and none of them display any romantic interest towards her in return, since all of them are in love with Catarina.
- Due to barely appearing in Alan and Nicol's routes, Catarina had no relationship with Alan, Nicol, Mary, or Sophia. Now she's friends with all of them, and all four of them are in love with her, especially Mary.
- Alan and Mary are betrothed in the game and are initially in love with each other. Due to Catarina's unwitting interference, while they're still betrothed, they don't show any romantic feelings for each other, mostly due to being in love with Catarina as seen above.
- Originally, Geordo and Alan had a pretty tense relationship, due to the latter feeling overshadowed by the former's talent at seemingly anything. Due to Catarina finding that Geordo is terrified of snakes and sharing said knowledge with Alan, and encouraging Alan to develop his talent for music enough for him to snap out of his self-esteem issues and his reckless need to prove himself, their relationship is much smoother. Due to Alan seeing his own worth, he doesn't develop a rivalry against Maria, who is second on the academy's ranking to enter the Student Council while he's below her, simply content that he's one of the best.
- In One-Punch Man, the manga version has focused on and added several events showing the more pure and caring side Tatsumaki has for her little sister Fubuki, that was quite underplayed in the webcomic which culminated in the Psychic Sisters arc showing that Tatsumaki and Fubuki’s relationship was actually unhealthy, with Tatsumaki wanting Fubuki to be as much of a loner as she is, believing that to be true strength, going as far as considering she should just start thinking for Fubuki altogether.
- Pokémon Adventures:
- Red and Blue are shown to have met at age ten. Their game counterparts are long-term friends turned rivals. They still become friends but the tension of "friend turned rival" is gone, with instead them just being rivals before becoming friends.
- Shauna, X, Y, Trevor, and Tierno are all childhood friends while their game versions only met recently.
- Sabrina, Koga, and Lt. Surge are originally all close enough Team Rocket members. In the games they are unaffiliated with Team Rocket and don't know each other more than they know any other Gym Leader.
- Pokémon: The Series
- In Pokémon Diamond and Pearl your rival is your childhood friend and next-door neighbor; your fathers are even childhood friends. In the anime, the game's rival's role of Dawn's childhood friend was instead given to Kenny. Barry would be introduced into the anime later, but Barry and Dawn wouldn't know each other personally (but they have a mutual friend in Kenny).
- Similarly, in Pokémon Black and White, Cheren and Bianca are close friends of yours who receive their starters at the same time as the player character. In the anime, Bianca was introduced early on and is a friend of Ash and his traveling companions. Cheren meanwhile appears much later in his Pokémon Black 2 and White 2 incarnation, where he's a new Gym Leader. The anime's version of Cheren and Bianca never meet and don't know each other at all.
- Sun & Moon anime:
- In the original Pokémon Sun and Moon, Island Trials were overseen by trial captains. In the anime, they're run by the Island Kahunas themselves. The jobs of trial captains effectively don't exist. Instead, four out of the seven trial captains are now Ash's classmates and are close friends. The other three are effectively Demoted to Extra but get an appearance here and there.
- The relationship between Lusamine, Lillie and Gladion. In Sun and Moon, Lusamine is insanely devoted to obtaining the Ultra Beasts so far as to dress Lillie as close as to one of them as possible. Gladion ended up running off in defiance and it would take Lillie her encounters with the player character to openly defy her mother. In the anime, Lusamine is an Amazingly Embarrassing Parent who is overly affectionate towards her kids and whose only real crime in the series is not being too attentive to them. This is more on par with her characterization in the Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon games, though the anime shows them being much closer than even that.
- Downplayed with Professor Kukui and Professor Burnet. In the games, the two are already Happily Married. In the anime they're in a relationship but unmarried, until Kukui proposes to her near the end of the series and they get a dedicated Wedding Episode. It's also implied in the games that Burnet is fully aware that Kukui is secretly the Masked Royal and simply feigns ignorance for the purpose of Kayfabe, while in the anime she's genuinely clueless.
- In Ranma ½ Ukyo and Shampoo had almost no interaction with each other in the manga. Whereas the anime portrayed them as being rivals, for Ranma's affections and as chefs.
- Due to Adaptation Personality Change, Rei's closest friend is Usagi in the '90s Sailor Moon anime. In the manga and Sailor Moon Crystal she bonds more with Minako.
- School-Live!:
- In the anime Taromaru doesn't like Miki much, despite her wishes. In the manga Taroumaru was a Oneshot Character who never even met Miki. Back when Megu-nee was alive, before the girls met Miki, they found a puppy who was later found out to have been bit by a zombie and had to be thrown out. It's implied Kurumi killed him when he returned to the school after already becoming a zombie.
- In the anime, one of the reasons Miki joined the School Live Club was because she thought Yuki made living in a Zombie Apocalypse more bareable. This contrasts the original manga, where Miki was annoyed by Yuki's delusions and it took several chapters for them to become mutual friends. In general, Miki in the manga was initially very distant and distrusting of everyone. The anime removed these elements.
- In the original Vampire Hunter D, the titular vampire hunter has nothing positive to say about the Sacred Ancestor. In the 1985 OVA, D rebukes Larmica for claiming that the Sacred Ancestor taught all the vampires to prey on the weak, pointing out that the Sacred Ancestor actually taught otherwise and is not the Social Darwinist that other vampires mistakenly believe. Though the details are still unclear, it suggests that D has some level of respect for the Sacred Ancestor.
- X/1999: After being hit with Adaptational Villainy in the movie, Kusanagi becomes mortal enemies with Yuzuriha and even kills her without a second thought which is in contrast with the manga and anime where Yuzuriha has a crush on Kusanagi despite being on the opposing side.
