Muv-Luv Alternative: Total Eclipse

Transparent Orange? That's one more word than I'd use to describe them.

Eh. We'll see. It's been blatantly telegraphed if you've been watching the previews, and it's not like these characters have been around long enough to make an impression. I'm more interested in seeing the real main cast. Though that has more to do with wanting to know if the universe holds up to better world-building than it got in the original trilogy.

edited 6th Jul '12 4:31:49 PM by HighVelocityPointyThings

Episode 2 has aired and is available subbed on Crunchyroll now. This time, they had it up within half an hour of the Japanese broadcast instead of 12 hours, which I appreciate.

As was expected and told by the people who saw the episode at Anime Expo, all squad members apart from Yui died. Additionally, plenty of mooks got killed as well. Both the first broadcast and the Crunchyroll version are censored (using shadows), but your imagination plus the sound should be disturbing enough. Most BETA types got a moment to shine and we get some people being nommed by the smaller species. The episode shows why this is a serious war quite well. Partly-CGI BETA were weird at a few moments, but it can't really be helped with the low budget.

We also got some shiny TSF action. The instructor's Shiranui 1C is a nice machine, even with an arm missing. The Takemikazuchi prototype is pretty damn cool as well.

All in all, a solid episode, but visually not too impressive (which will probably be a theme for this show).

Well, next week it's time for Yukon and the real cast. I'm looking forward to it.

Not really surprised about what happened in the 2nd episode. You can see it miles away, simply because none of her squadmates were listed as "main characters", they're not even in the "supporting characters" bit. lol

edited 9th Jul '12 5:09:22 AM by entropy13

Wow, this is one thing I like about anime and manga. They're generally not afraid to pull an Anyone Can Die moment when establishing characters. I really liked Yui's Despair Event Horizon that she suffers after watching her last friend get killed, and you can tell she just doesn't care anymore at that point (not that she could've did anything anyway, since she's on foot and ran out of ammo for her peashooter vs. those Beta's).

You know, this kind of reminds me of Starship Troopers, especially the Battle of Klendathu, when ended in a similar manner in this anime.

Spot-on. The original creator of this series is a huge fan of mecha and sci-fi works, and foremost among them in influence on him is Starship Troopers, especially its power suits.

On the movie version side, you have this in the VN, among other things:

edited 9th Jul '12 9:53:33 PM by HithertoAnIPAddress

In fact, TSFs are also supposed to have powered exoskeletons as part of the escape mechanism. Basically, the pilot seat transforms into one. Infantry forces also use them, including types with jumpjets. A pity they decided not to use them in the episode. It's not as if the escape exoskeletons offer much additional protection.

Yui: COME'ON YOU APES! YOU WANNA LIVE FOREVER!?

Kouki on twitter said they had insufficient 3D budget in this episode to animate an exoskeleton.

He also said that the survival kit should have carried a carbine, not a handgun, but then again, budget. Minor spoiler for later in the LN: A later illustration has Yui, arm in improvised sling, outside her downed TSF shooting BETA with it.

edited 10th Jul '12 7:12:09 AM by HithertoAnIPAddress

I have a hard time imagining that it's that much more expensive (budget-wise) to animate a carbine than a handgun, but whatever.

Though replacing the carbine with the pistol makes Yui's missing that much less trauma-bait, imho. Hitting a small target like that at ~50 yards with a pistol is hard, especially when you throw in everything else. Most practical pistol training focus on a 7-yard distance, and shooting as fast as you possibly can while keeping all of your shots on a torso-sized target.

It's not like the original series did dick-all with the exoskeletons, so I find their absence here not terribly disappointing.

Well, Yui would've missed even if she had a sniper rifle. She panicked, guys! It's just plainly impossible to hit even a broad side of a barn in a panic. Anyway, that's pointless to discuss anyway, as first two eps are just an original material jammed in to add TEH DRAMA. Still, didn't discourage a lot of people to debate all the Hollywood Tactics displayed. I've seen several claims that were the claimants in command, they'd hold Kyoto all right.

The problem with Alterverse Muv Luv has always been that Humanity is fighting with both arms tied behind their back while wearing concrete shoes, and the BETA get nearly everything out of the Alien Swarm bag of tricks plus some friendly Super Science. This makes it very easy to write a certain kind of impactful story, but frustrates those more interested in the setting as a whole.

edited 13th Jul '12 10:59:19 PM by HighVelocityPointyThings

Something I've pondered, and this doesn't just go for Muv-Luv, but humanity built Humongous Mecha to fight off the aliens because conventional weaponry, by which I assume means firearms, artillery, missiles, etc. don't work very well. Except that the Humongous Mecha continue to use conventional weapons, only maybe a little bit scaled up.

And mankind wonders why it's getting its ass kicked.

I dunno, I'm a total Muv-Luv virgin, going only off of what I've seen in the first episode so far. Maybe things are better later on or in the source material.

The main reasons to use the mecha are:

The first one: Laser classes are able to shoot down planes and even missiles and artillery shells. Tactical Surface Fighters can move quickly and safely via boost jumping and extremely low-altitude flight to get to a combat zone and are agile enough to avoid lasers once they lock on. They basically fill the role of close air support while there are lasers around. If they manage to kill all lasers present, actual air support will be deployed.

The second one: The mecha were mostly designed to infiltrate BETA hives. These are underground tunnels swarming with enemies, too small for helis to move in and with too much height difference for tanks. This is where the TSF shines. It's their job to find a way down to the bottom of the hive, where they can destroy the Reactor which provides sustenance to the BETA of that hive. It's an extremely dangerous job, which is why they also carry suicide charges. If they reach the reactor, they set the charges to blow it up. Otherwise, they can use it to cause interior damage to the hive so it expands less quickly.

I expected that only Yui will survive, and I was not disappointed. She looks good with long hair, incidentally. I suppose we're at the actual meat of the story now?

God I love this show. Blood-splattered mecha make my day. Sucks that the censorship was rampant, though. :( I wanted to see the head roll.

Honestly? Mecha. Mecha never make sense, there's never really any practical reason for using them other than Rule of Cool. (Of course, this is assuming we're talking about fairly realistic works.)

edited 14th Jul '12 5:11:56 AM by fillerdude

Crunchyroll's Ep03 is out.

Time for some Muv Luv Plus.

edited 15th Jul '12 11:09:32 AM by HithertoAnIPAddress

And now we're back to where we're supposed to be: Top Gun with TS Fs.

Yuuya's surprisingly plausible as a protagonist, tbh. The whole squad, excluding Yui, has a nice dynamic to it. Guessing that integrating her plus the twins will make up most of the first cour, but I'm not that familiar with the novels.

The third episode starts the actual story, and does so pretty nicely. While the animation is still pretty low-quality and there were a few colouring errors, it looks decent enough, if a bit dated. We got some nice TSF vs TSF combat and an introduction for most of the cast. When it has its proper animation to accompany it, the opening theme is also surprisingly decent. The insert song for the battle was quite good. Judging by the preview, the next episode will mostly be dedicated to our Russian friends.

For those of you wondering how things went in Japan from the fall of Kyoto in 1998 to 2001:

The BETA keep pushing the defending forces back and establish Hives in Sadogashima and Yokohama. A combined Japanese, UN and US counteroffensive manages to reclaim some territory and launch an attack on the Yokohama Hive. After the Americans drop two of their brand-new G-bombs on the Hive, most of the BETA inside are killed. This allows infiltration units to capture the Hive, the first time a Hive infiltration operation has ever succeeded in doing so. With the Yokohama Hive gone, the BETA are chased of the Japanese isles, with the exception of Sadogashima, where the other Hive still stands. Because the long-term effects of G-bomb explosions are unknown the combined forces decide to establish a series of defensive lines around the Hive instead of dropping more of them. Japan begins to rebuild and recieves a large UN presence bolstering the defenses.

A friend from A Suki help started the page for the show, but I'm not even sure it's in the right category...

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Anime/MuvLuvAlternativeTotalEclipse

Now available for those more knowledgable about the franchise to chip in and expand on it.

edited 16th Jul '12 9:10:30 PM by MyssaRei

Added a few things and edited a few sentences. I'll probably add more when I've got the time.

Needs indexing, crosswicking and custom-titling.

Hey, I didn't make it. ;) Like I said, I'm leaving the content to those who actually know the franchise better,

As for indexing and stuff, I'll see if I can do those later on this evening, unless someone else beats me to it.

edited 17th Jul '12 2:45:50 AM by MyssaRei

I moved it to the Light Novel namespace.

Looks like the TE entries on the Muv Luv pages have to be moved there sometime too.

Edit: And the Muv-Luv page can use an expansion into a franchise page a la Nanoha sometime, with pages for the main trilogy and sidestories...

edited 17th Jul '12 4:13:24 AM by HithertoAnIPAddress

Thanks for that assist, guys - I'm the feller who made the page. Wasn't too sure on where it ought to go...

Regards carbines vs pistols as survival gear, I read Apache by Ed Macy, a memoir of his tour as a British Army Apache pilot in Afghanistan. His basic survival kit, stored under his seat, consisted of a rucksack with rifle and pistol ammo, MR Es, grenades (strictly non-regulation for safety reasons, but he kept them anyway), radio, flares, map, compass, water, and L 85 A 2 rifle (which, being a bullpup, is already carbine length). Then there's the survival duffel bag in the Apache's other storage, which is accessed from outside and has even more survival gear, including sleeping bag and enough things to last for a week on the run. So yeah, the TS Fs ought to have at least a carbine of some sort, along with at least a rucksack of survival gear.