I still love how Patlabor is the polar opposite of Gundam in a lot of ways yet they both celebrate giant mecha. One grounded, lighthearted, and thoughtful; the other dramatic, epic, and philosophical Both have amazing designs and a loving attention to detail
You have to ask the small questions as well a the big ones to get the answers; and also, ironically, asking both will lead you to conclude you'll never get all of them.
Nice, some things worth mentioning about the show's development. 1. A large chunk of the cast were pretty much Fresh off of "Maison Ikkoku", Izumi, Asuna, Shinshi, and Shige were Secondary Love interest (Kozue), main character's best bud (Sakamoto), the Male lead (Godai), and the weirdest of the neighbors (Yotsuya). The seiyu who Played Kyoko, showed up as a guest character in the TV series. The one major MI actor who didn't show up in Patlabor was Akira Kamiya (Shun Mitaka and Mendo in UY before that). He was likely too busy doing "City Hunter". 2. You Inoue played Kanuka, her other role of note was as Sayla in Gundam (she had serious health issues and died quite young). 3. Noa is from Hokaido. So is Hiromu Arakawa (who was in her mid teens when the shows came out), the name re-use was probably not coincidental. 4. Central Park Media had themselves to blame for a lot of the failure to catch on. Watch the old trailers, they try SO hard to sell this as an Action Series. 5. Shige (mechanic second in command), was played be Shigeru Chiba (and is drawn to look like him, AND was played by him in the live-action adaption). Considering that Chiba's big break was playing Megane in UY, it's likely the part was written with him in mind. This show and Dominion share the beginnings of the female lead being in love with their vehicle. I'd call shenanigans, but I once met a lady who called her Jeep "Thor".
Yeah I remember those CPM trailers for Patlabor. The way the announcer said "Patlbor!" like it was some gritty noir flick has always caused me to cringe,
My introduction was actually KMFDM. That the mechas seemed to have heft to them blew me away (my only other point of reference was Robotech). Then became quite dismayed it wasn't the techno-futurist, guns ablazin' carnage I had envisioned in my mind. I'm more mature now (sort of).
I love Patlabor, especially the 2nd movie, because of it's mix of every day life, politics and some sci-fi action combined with amazing atmosphere, including tense waiting.
I am one of those rare people who has seen all of Legend of the Galactic Heroes and all of Patlabor. I believe the first Patlabor OVA is the perfect way to get any human being into mecha anime. Maybe even beyond that. My cat enjoyed watching it, too.
They had little money to animate, but they made the traffic jams and city scenes so detailed that you can recognise the cars, for examole the Honda Today police car thats the same as the "youre under arrest" one
I'm genuinely surprised you didn't mention Leona Ozaki from Dominion Tank Police at all, the short tomboy police girl who adores her giant metal instrument of destruction, tho the Fullmetal Alchemist reference was funnier. The intro was just brilliant and now i have to go listen to the Stand Alone Complex OST for half a day!
Patlabor is essentally Police Academy but with giant robots... and I love it. Looking forward to future videos on it. Also, I'm glad I wasn't the only one who thought of FMA at 14:49
Gotta love that tap-dancing on the 4th wall's grave there at 24:42. And I like that you pointed out how deconstruction doesn't always mean dark. I think a lot of people forget that (possibly because Dark And Edgy is Cooler).
HELL YES! While not my top favorite mecha series (that honor is a tie between Dai-Guard and Giant Robo), Patlabor was a huge childhood favorite and remains so to this very day! I'm writing this article before watching the video proper but I know its going to make my day regardless!
Everybody should watch dai-guard. It is a great exploration of the real robot genre in a more grounded setting. The fact that the robot looks like a super robot just makes it all the funnier. -- they really get the hot fuzz paperwork joke to the logical extreme.
Dai-Guard is a show that I really want to like, but never actually do. The whole premise of an overly real robot, the comedy of bureaucracy, and everything else is great. The problem is that it's such a tiny part of the show in the end. It just turns into a generic show where a group of underdogs use the power of ganbatte and friendship to save the day. Which is just kind of dull. I want to see more about how utterly impractical that drill arm is to use and how expensive it is to operate for even a few seconds. The massive amount of work that has to be done to repair the mech after every fight. Watching the kaiju wreck havoc while suits try to get authorization while being more concerned about being held responsible. Basically what Shin Godzilla did so well. Even though it still focused on a group of underdogs who save the day through sheer dogged enthusiasm.
Really love seeing all this Patlabor love over the past 6ish months from a lot of people. Really glad a ton of people in the west are finally now giving this show the watch it rightfully deserves. Definitely in my top 5 anime. OVA Series, Pat 1 and Pat 2 should be an absolute staple - and once upon a time it was for mecha heads on almost most forums. Good video!
Patlabor will always be one of my top five anime of all time. As for why it never caught on in the States, I'd say it's a number of factors. 1) It's mostly focused on the daily lives of working class Japanese citizens. 2) There's nothing "cool" or "sexy" about it. There's no high-octane violence or fan-service to be found. Another commentor mentioned that CPM tried to market Patlabor as an action series, and Patlabor... just isn't that. 3) It has mecha in it. For some reason, this is a kiss of death for a lot of U.S. anime fans.
TH-cam recommended me one of your videos on Looney Tunes, and while I was loving it, a few minutes in I realized it was part 5 in a longer series. I clicked on your channel to find part one... and you just put out a video on one of my favorite shows of all time! Not only that, the video is really excellent and informative without spoiling things for first-timers! I'm not sure how you have only 17k subs, your videos are seriously high quality. You've definitely earned a subscriber today, now I just have to go watch more of your videos! Also to anyone who hasn't watched Patlabor: what are you doing? Go watch it, the show is great!
Thanks for your explanation on the origins of Patlabor and a stimulating analysis on the OVA! When I was younger I was looking forward to the Labor fights, but I realised later when I was much older that Patlabor is really about the relationships and dynamics of the quirky characters of SV2. Keep up the good work and looking forward to more of your videos on Patlabor!
My favorite scenes are when nothing’s happening and the gang is sitting around interacting. The final episode, when you finally learn why Asuma hates his father, is fantastic. It’s a cop show, but in the vein of Homicide: Life on the Street or Hill Street Blues. It failed because it was marketed as Miami Vice.
On the LOTGH note I’m still hoping that Sentai will just release a reasonable standard edition Blu-ray instead of that insane limited edition set. Right after they get out that Ideon reprint. Still with Patlabor it’s pretty easy to just follow either the OVA/movie or tv series timelines, they’re even listed on the sentai box set.
I love Patlabor. Thanks for bringing more attention to it. Did you find any connection between Patlabor and Dominion Tank Police? They share more than a few similarities. Regardless, I really like your channel. Subscribed.
I'm surprised that Patlabor isn't more widely seen. Maybe it's just fallen through the cracks these days? It was certainly bigger or at least more well-known in the past. It (or one of the movies) was usually in many of the promo reels, and in one of the bigger crossovers clips from the first movie were used extensively in the music video for "Juke Joint Jezebel", which was probably KMFDM's biggest hit.
2:59 raises hand* brazilian patlabor fan here! desperately wishing this franchise would get more attention. ... also that the model kits were easier to obtain over here...
An unforgivable sin- you interrupted the OVA opening. How could you?! And now I'm back, 90 seconds later because nothing's impossible... nothing's impossible...
The second movie was rewarded at Cannes, in a period which the anime movies were less popular in Europe than the obscure and intellectual movies presented to Cannes, talking of Europe obviously.
@@JinxTheLooneyToon915 It's Tomino. I'm so used to him, I didn't even notice that death until I viewed the clip three times. First thing I noticed was Tomino's name, then the first body, then the second.
Complete series, ovas and movie Bluray set out at Sentai Film works. Look for mega sales on Sentai Film Works website as the set will go on sale for around $40 bucks for all of it. No need to spend $75 on the set. It is worth it, but since Sentai has sales so often getting it all for $40 is a steal.
i loved the show due to its references, there is an entire episode that parodies gerry anderson puppet shows like captain scarlet and thunderbirds, its clearly made by people who love the genre they are working in
The creators actually made the female characters human beings instead of just eye candy for horny otaku. I feel like it's been pretty rare nowadays to find a female character like that in most anime.
I think you're just too narrow-minded to know anything but horny anime. Watch the shows like A Place Further than the Universe or Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! It's not rare as you think.
@@tykep1009 dude I've been watching anime since grade school. I know what the hell im talking about and the shows u just listed are an exception, NOT THE RULE.
4:50 you forgot the most important place where one could start! the obscure cross-over disaster survival game City Shrouded in Shadows (technically part of the raw danger/disaster report/zettai zetsumei toshi series) which features patlabor in one of its first (if not the first, that I know of) video game appearances... as a background element, along with kaiju like godzilla, ultraman, evangelion and such other insanity. That is DEFINETELY the best playce to start with patlabor (obviously being sarcastic here)
Another excellent analysis as always. I consider myself a huge fan of Patlabor even though I haven't watched all the anime for it. I still need to watch the new files and 3rd Patlabor movie. To be perfectly honest, Patlabor has my favorite mecha designs of any mecha anime that I've actually watched and I've pretty much enjoyed all aspects of each and every Patlabor anime that I've watched. I just love the entire chemistry of the entire special vehicle unit and it is easily one of those types of anime is when it wants to do something it does it right regardless if its mecha action, character development, comedy, drama and it's actually nice to watch an anime that uses rational and sometimes the scatter irrational thought process to get the job done. It also helps that Noa Izumi is one of my favorite female characters in all of anime. I'm guessing I've always had a fondness for short haired anime police women that love their machines (Leona - Dominion Tank Police). I look forward to yout deep analysis into the other anime entries of Patlabor.
3:39 How does one mistake a Shinohara Type 95 Taisho as a Shinohara Type 98 Ingram? (Yes, MAHQ says it's a Type 96, but the Viz Comics edition says Type 95, and that's what I'm sticking with)
I know to be patient, but I am especially looking forward to your take on Patlabor 2 given its heavy emphasis on domestic Japanese and broad geopolitical themes during the "end of history" as well as its roots in Japan's radical politics of the 1960s...
*Dominion / Patlabor oddly similar* Spunky redhead in OVA with cool 1st name: Noah/ Leona ✔ Named vehicle/ mecha after a political/ militant figure: Alphonse/ Bonaparte ✔ Public mad at police force: ✔ ✔✔ ✔
Okay I could write a fifty line paragraph about how much I love this show, but... It's 2 am right now where I am so I just want to say something. Patlabor is beautiful
Can't wait for you to get to the TV series. I watched it on TV many years ago, and I was one of the weird kids who actually enjoyed it. Now I think I gotta watch the OVAs, too! Thanks for the review, and keep up the good work!
Having seen both Patlabor movies and the original OVA but not the TV series, I recall the OVA feeling so so much like a pilot (ha) for a TV series. The way it bounced around in tone from episode to episode really put me off at first. It felt as though it were just giving the widest range of episode concepts it could to appeal to a producer: "Look, we can be funny, we can be serious, we can have action, we can have episodes where the mechs take a back seat! Please pay for a whole season!" without accounting for how they'd fit together. But as I got further into the episodes, I realized that (whether or not it was a carefully crafted splash-reel) Patlabor really worked best telling these more mundane and self-contained stories. They don't need a really complex or heady over-arching plot, because just spending time with these characters who ooze charm (and their cool giant robots obv.) is more than enough. And watching something like Bubblegum Crisis (sorry folks, I don't like it) which also refuses to have a true over-arching plot across a comparable number of episodes but instead of feeling breezy and fun feels like a repetitive slog of the same plot over and over (except for Scoop Chase), I have learned to appreciate what Patlabor managed all the more.
Hmm... I don't know if this kind of thing would be covered in your channel but as a Lost Media researcher I was curious about the history of the Playstation "Patlabor The Game", which had two playable demos released, but ultimately was scrapped and rebooted into a very different "Patlabor Game Edition". You wouldn't happen to know any of that stuff in greater detail, would you?
Much to my surprise, this is my first time hearing about Patlabor in any capacity... So, domo arigato for this introduction to what seems to be a perfectly enjoyable franchise for me. Personally, I cannot STAND Evangelion. The angsty and unrelatable characters, the convoluted and infantile drama, and "edgy try-hard" nature of the anime just... I flat out couldn't find a single enjoyable aspect of the franchise. Much like you stated, Patlabor almost seems like an intentional "Anti-Mecha" MechAnime... No grand galaxy-spanning warfare against extraterrestrials for humanity's survival, no post-apocalyptical edgelord showcasing -just a handful of scrubs (that you could expect to find in any grocery store) employed to keep the peace, who have questionably been assigned bipedal tanks to accomplish this. [ Thumbs Up ] Sounds like watching this series is just a good time, and likely to entice newcomers and create fans of the genre far better than the ludicrous WtF-marathon Angstvangelion ever could.
No real specific watch order, but the OVA really does acclimate and introduce you to the concept the best. If there is a watch order, you can't go wrong with release order.
I'd like to see your take on Assemble: Insert, a 1989 two episode OVA based on a manga by Masami Yuki. In the same way that Patlabor is a light hearted deconstruction of mecha anime through a police procedural, Assemble: Insert unravels magic girl and idol anime tropes through a comedic police story.
Point of interest 1: While playing Resident Evil 2 and its Remake, I often thought about the RPD's officers lives before the city got infested by hordes of the dead. Something about the environment and care that went into those police stations are still forcing me to imagine the same game but where the zombie apocalypse never happened, and the game is about spending your time with the police force as a young rookie and also the player takes control of micro managing the development of the station, in a mix of 90s managing games from Bullfrog games and old XCOM games management. Point of interest 2: Captain Gotto, dimention hopped from Patlabor to another anime called After the Rain where he dates a high schooler that can resemble one or two girls of Patlabor.
I often wish we got an XCOM style game for something other than alien invasions be it managing a futuristic police force; Or even a GI joe sort of deal, against exaggerated terrorists and stuff. Its specially appealing after chimera squad showed that it can be done very well with pre-existing characters Something like you mentioned on point of interest 1 just sounds close to a perfect game really.
@@Maioly Man, do i have an elevator pitch sale for you, i don't believe how much this game fits your needs right now. and it's not just a game that i haplened to play, nothing like that ever, this game is what i played since childhood, tried many other turn based tactical/strategy games but even after 20 years this game is still on top, there's nothing that can even come close to it's briliance and depth variety, hell i still find some new mechanics or ally behaviours that hit me from no where, and i've playing it 1-3 times every year. I don't know if you heard about Jagged Alliance 2 but if you only looked at it, it doesn't look like something that spent point into its presentation vut under the hood of that game there's so much intuitive systems and so much power. for example, most of Turn Based Tactical game i.e XCOM Disgaea Valkyria Chronicles Fire Emblem all take place in a base and you select missions from there, you can't get out of there and walk around near your place. JA2 is open world, by 1999 standards which means it's a map devided by sectors, 200 to be exact, where you can go where ever, when ever, most annoying XCOM gimmick was is that you were on a timer, even when you were in stealth mode, which was so poorly and artificially made to create tension it only made the game look so cheap. In JA2 you don't have that pressure. In XCOM the chance to hit was nothing more that bullshit, I love the point blank miss in xcom 2, where your soldier sways away his gun almost like he is taking the piss out of you, after he misses he then tries to sound genuine about his miss, or even more stupid when you a 95% chance: your bullets bounce off the alien's head, he has a brain fart, and then he plays the "bullet near miss" animation, it's got to be the most farcical display of combat in a game, and the most hardest suspension of disbelief. You know what JA2 has ? they have pretty much the same system, but it doesn't show you anything, you have a gun power and distance, if it's out of range the aim cursor blinks and also gives a sound cue, also your aim and chance to hit not only dictated by Marksmanship, it's dictated by your Mercs Dexterity, Experience, stance, did he moved before he took the shot, or did he stood or crouched or proned and his previous turn Action Points Interrupted the enemy that he caught in his sight, did your merc slept week, what's his moral condition, what attachments does he have on his gun ? and even after that the game has a Ballistic system, you know what this is ? it's a system that renders any bullet abd explosion as an real object, you can have a merc that fails in everything, but if the enemy is at point blank distance the bullets have no other way but to hit him, thisis why anyone can spray and pray and still get results, even the enemy, because let's not forget you're on an equal footing here, there's no gimmicks here. JA2 isn't a game of replayability, it's a dirty word in my opinion made for games that don't have great gsmeplay so they make different ending so yoy can do another replay of 90% of the story only to see a different cutscene in the end. JA2 is a simulation of events made out of gameplay systems, it doesn't mean it's going full realistic, it's going more simulating the reality, but never goes full realistic. remember how many things i noted for a character to shoot a bullet ? Believe me that's the same ammount of work that went into every system the game has and those systems are connected. only thing that i can add to shooting is that some guns has burst mode, just press the B button and the cursor changes when you place the mouse on the enemy, also very important, right mouse click makes you spend more Action Points but it makes the shot more precise, but like i said stanxe is also important, some guns are easier to fire if you're prone, that's just logical but it's crazy that you can that way in a game. after all said and done i haven't really scratched the surface. and i'm talking about the vanilla version. in 2004 the devs released the source code for fans that really love the game, it's been so many years and the mods grown into massive titans that not only can change the maps add weapons and mercs, not very good coice acted or drawn well, but there's one mod, called 1.13, called like because the last official version was 1.12, this mods job was to take all those overwhelming mechanics of the vanilla and make them even more advanced and deeper. for one tiny example, you spent AP to aim right ? every gun has it's own max AP you can spent, a pistol would have much less than a Sniper rifle, much less. you can aim and also spend more point on that aimed gun to shoot in a burst, and you can choose how many bullets exactly you want to spend, and even if you miss all of them, if they fly near, it takes out of the morral of the enemy, or you too, and if enough is went close an enemy can get supressed and will lose AP in his next turn. I don't want to talk about the mercs, you can experience it by yourself, or just go the the site TV Tropes and read very interesting titbits, and info that enrich those characters for you, it's a fun read. Jagged Alliance 2 is loved by Germans and Russians, not only in the mod community but also in the game industry, as small as that fan base is, since 2012 JA had 4 tries of ressorections, all of them were failures bucause you can't recreate God. The fans praise this game a lot if you go to GOG you'll see only good stuff said about this game, if you go to steam you'll see many People disappointed how badly it launched. If you want to hear about JA2 just add the word Podcast to it's name in google, people usually talk how intuitive it is, it's a game about subjective plays, so don't take one playstyle to heart, this is why JA2 doesn't have much reviews, because it's easier to show it in a playthrough, which are filled to the brim on youtube. If you want to read about it, there's a book on Amazon from the book company Boss Fight Books. if you want to play something else there's a table top game called Jagged Alliance 2 The Board Game, which is a bit hard to come by, good game actually. So i don't want to spoil anything beyond that, i talked about many things but i feel like a told nothing, and that's good i don't really play the game setiously, i play on easy, i sometimes want to have fun i use exploits that i found many years ago by myself without the internet, my exploit is the copy paste items. so yeah play the game however you like. Sorry if i didn't checked for typos, i'm a bit busy, playing JA2 while recovering from the corona.
@@DrRESHES oh yeah I am fully familiar with jagged alliance 2 and the open source mods too Still have fond memories of it Like an absolute bullshit headshot my sniper somehow pulled off on the hospital area. Wish the sequels/remakes werent trash. I am also very familiar with the many spiritual sequels out there (many of which are russian?), even own a few on steam. Sadly it lacks the base bulding elements of xcom which i am also fond off (and i do wish it had a larger scale) Need toget back to playing more of it sometime, specially sonce its always installed XD
The OVA series probably my favorite in the series mostly it's a good length and it's a good showcase of Oshii's comedic side but still his usual direction that we know him today. That and I think the dub isn't bad either, sure it has faults and stumbles for a CPM dub but it's not bad compared to other dubs from the company.
So the creators themselves didn't understand what they had in Kanuka Clancy? That explains why the TV show turned out as the most inferior version of the franchise. Here's the secret of Clancy: Any association with SV2 automatically puts into question your entire history, everything you did and everyone you know. You could be the most distinguished officer in the world but once you're with SV2, you're there because you did something, doing something now or will do something in the future. Ragtag bunch of misfits- by association. Cowboy cop by proxy. End of the day, Clancy's the only one who could keep Ohta in check.
Just got back into this show. From browsing the web, seems like the fandom generally considers the OVA to be superior to the tv series, but I disagree. I think people might be conflating it with the OVA TIMELINE being superior to the TV TIMELINE, because I just don't really see why the ova itself is held in so much more regard than the series. I think the love for the movies might be giving them rose tinted glasses for the ova. I watched the og ova, and I'm only 8 or 9 eps into the tv series, but here are my thoughts so far: With the 47-ep tv series, the characters are given more time to actually BE CHARACTERS. The plots and scenarios so far are a little more down to earth and not as contrived. The characters seem to have way more personality, and the comedy just hits harder for me. The combat has also been better than in the ova. Also, the main thing that people seem to give the ova props for over the tv series, is its art and animation. However, I honestly don't see how it's any better than the tv series. The tv series looks nicer and a tad less dated to me. Overall, I'm enjoying the tv series much more than I enjoyed the ova.
4:00 now you’ve got me wondering if you’ll ever do Legend of the Galactic heroes review. If you did I’d really enjoy it, it’s my favorite anime and not enough people talk about it.
03:05 that's an overexaggeration, Patlabor was definitely a success, but it didn't change the anime industry the way Gundam and Evangelion (and Macross) did, that's not even close. Gunbuster and the Gundam ovas were also successful in those days, but they didn't end up changing the industry.
My patlabor's vhs need an update, the first 2 movie are a master piece of animation. Must have if you like animation. Personally I prefer the manga to the oav.
I wanna love this, I really do, but my PTSD surrounding police just keeps me from doing it. I'm really glad it kicked off the trend of well-realized female characters with depth. Instead of, you know, what we have today so much.
I somehow managed to find the first film on TH-cam. The franchise is on my to get list alongside the Bubblegum Crisis OVA and 2040 versions. Partly because I would classify both franchises in reference material to recommend for tabletop Cyberpunk games.
I still love how Patlabor is the polar opposite of Gundam in a lot of ways yet they both celebrate giant mecha.
One grounded, lighthearted, and thoughtful; the other dramatic, epic, and philosophical
Both have amazing designs and a loving attention to detail
You have to ask the small questions as well a the big ones to get the answers; and also, ironically, asking both will lead you to conclude you'll never get all of them.
Big, big, BIG thank you for teaching us all that ‘deconstructing’ an existing property doesn’t automatically going the “Dark and Edgy” route.
Too bad this isn't a case of deconstruction... Watch Mobile Battleship Nadesico for an actual deconstruction of the mecha genre
Captain Goto is my favorite calculating Ojisan!
Nice, some things worth mentioning about the show's development.
1. A large chunk of the cast were pretty much Fresh off of "Maison Ikkoku", Izumi, Asuna, Shinshi, and Shige were Secondary Love interest (Kozue), main character's best bud (Sakamoto), the Male lead (Godai), and the weirdest of the neighbors (Yotsuya). The seiyu who Played Kyoko, showed up as a guest character in the TV series. The one major MI actor who didn't show up in Patlabor was Akira Kamiya (Shun Mitaka and Mendo in UY before that). He was likely too busy doing "City Hunter".
2. You Inoue played Kanuka, her other role of note was as Sayla in Gundam (she had serious health issues and died quite young).
3. Noa is from Hokaido. So is Hiromu Arakawa (who was in her mid teens when the shows came out), the name re-use was probably not coincidental.
4. Central Park Media had themselves to blame for a lot of the failure to catch on. Watch the old trailers, they try SO hard to sell this as an Action Series.
5. Shige (mechanic second in command), was played be Shigeru Chiba (and is drawn to look like him, AND was played by him in the live-action adaption). Considering that Chiba's big break was playing Megane in UY, it's likely the part was written with him in mind.
This show and Dominion share the beginnings of the female lead being in love with their vehicle. I'd call shenanigans, but I once met a lady who called her Jeep "Thor".
Yeah I remember those CPM trailers for Patlabor. The way the announcer said "Patlbor!" like it was some gritty noir flick has always caused me to cringe,
My introduction was actually KMFDM. That the mechas seemed to have heft to them blew me away (my only other point of reference was Robotech).
Then became quite dismayed it wasn't the techno-futurist, guns ablazin' carnage I had envisioned in my mind.
I'm more mature now (sort of).
That seemingly pretty standard closing anime song transitioning into sleazy '80s sax gets me every time.
Who doesn't love giant robots? I ask you. They who are tired of giant robots are tired of life.
Giant Robots *ARE* Life!
I dig giant robots!
You dig giant robots!
We dig giant robots!
Chicks dig giant robots!
_Nice!_
I love Patlabor, especially the 2nd movie, because of it's mix of every day life, politics and some sci-fi action combined with amazing atmosphere, including tense waiting.
I am one of those rare people who has seen all of Legend of the Galactic Heroes and all of Patlabor. I believe the first Patlabor OVA is the perfect way to get any human being into mecha anime. Maybe even beyond that. My cat enjoyed watching it, too.
They had little money to animate, but they made the traffic jams and city scenes so detailed that you can recognise the cars, for examole the Honda Today police car thats the same as the "youre under arrest" one
You nailed every topic of what makes Patlabor so special. Great video!
I'm genuinely surprised you didn't mention Leona Ozaki from Dominion Tank Police at all, the short tomboy police girl who adores her giant metal instrument of destruction, tho the Fullmetal Alchemist reference was funnier. The intro was just brilliant and now i have to go listen to the Stand Alone Complex OST for half a day!
Patlabor is essentally Police Academy but with giant robots... and I love it. Looking forward to future videos on it.
Also, I'm glad I wasn't the only one who thought of FMA at 14:49
That's a horrible thing to say. Patlabor is actually funny.
*Dominion Tank Police but swap the tanks for mechs.
Gotta love that tap-dancing on the 4th wall's grave there at 24:42.
And I like that you pointed out how deconstruction doesn't always mean dark. I think a lot of people forget that (possibly because Dark And Edgy is Cooler).
HELL YES! While not my top favorite mecha series (that honor is a tie between Dai-Guard and Giant Robo), Patlabor was a huge childhood favorite and remains so to this very day! I'm writing this article before watching the video proper but I know its going to make my day regardless!
Everybody should watch dai-guard. It is a great exploration of the real robot genre in a more grounded setting. The fact that the robot looks like a super robot just makes it all the funnier.
-- they really get the hot fuzz paperwork joke to the logical extreme.
Dai-Guard is a show that I really want to like, but never actually do. The whole premise of an overly real robot, the comedy of bureaucracy, and everything else is great. The problem is that it's such a tiny part of the show in the end. It just turns into a generic show where a group of underdogs use the power of ganbatte and friendship to save the day. Which is just kind of dull. I want to see more about how utterly impractical that drill arm is to use and how expensive it is to operate for even a few seconds. The massive amount of work that has to be done to repair the mech after every fight. Watching the kaiju wreck havoc while suits try to get authorization while being more concerned about being held responsible. Basically what Shin Godzilla did so well. Even though it still focused on a group of underdogs who save the day through sheer dogged enthusiasm.
Really love seeing all this Patlabor love over the past 6ish months from a lot of people. Really glad a ton of people in the west are finally now giving this show the watch it rightfully deserves. Definitely in my top 5 anime. OVA Series, Pat 1 and Pat 2 should be an absolute staple - and once upon a time it was for mecha heads on almost most forums. Good video!
Patlabor will always be one of my top five anime of all time. As for why it never caught on in the States, I'd say it's a number of factors.
1) It's mostly focused on the daily lives of working class Japanese citizens.
2) There's nothing "cool" or "sexy" about it. There's no high-octane violence or fan-service to be found. Another commentor mentioned that CPM tried to market Patlabor as an action series, and Patlabor... just isn't that.
3) It has mecha in it. For some reason, this is a kiss of death for a lot of U.S. anime fans.
My friends and I used to joke Patlabor was just Dominion except with giant Robots instead of Tanks! We weren't too far off but still love it! ❤
Only a anime channel can throw two intros on top of each other and I be ok with it.
TH-cam recommended me one of your videos on Looney Tunes, and while I was loving it, a few minutes in I realized it was part 5 in a longer series. I clicked on your channel to find part one... and you just put out a video on one of my favorite shows of all time! Not only that, the video is really excellent and informative without spoiling things for first-timers! I'm not sure how you have only 17k subs, your videos are seriously high quality. You've definitely earned a subscriber today, now I just have to go watch more of your videos!
Also to anyone who hasn't watched Patlabor: what are you doing? Go watch it, the show is great!
Leona Ozaki walked so Noa Izumi could run.
Thanks for your explanation on the origins of Patlabor and a stimulating analysis on the OVA!
When I was younger I was looking forward to the Labor fights, but I realised later when I was much older that Patlabor is really about the relationships and dynamics of the quirky characters of SV2.
Keep up the good work and looking forward to more of your videos on Patlabor!
My favorite scenes are when nothing’s happening and the gang is sitting around interacting. The final episode, when you finally learn why Asuma hates his father, is fantastic. It’s a cop show, but in the vein of Homicide: Life on the Street or Hill Street Blues. It failed because it was marketed as Miami Vice.
I love how your videos have that G4 X-Play segment feel to them. They’re like a nostalgic art style about nostalgic media. It’s great.
On the LOTGH note I’m still hoping that Sentai will just release a reasonable standard edition Blu-ray instead of that insane limited edition set. Right after they get out that Ideon reprint. Still with Patlabor it’s pretty easy to just follow either the OVA/movie or tv series timelines, they’re even listed on the sentai box set.
I love Patlabor. Thanks for bringing more attention to it. Did you find any connection between Patlabor and Dominion Tank Police? They share more than a few similarities. Regardless, I really like your channel. Subscribed.
Always excited when I see you upload! I literally just watched the OVA and movies last month 😁
I actually have this anime in my amazon cart. I'm trying to decide whether to get it, maybe this video will sway me. It theme song is fire tho 🔥
god, I need to get my hands on all that concept art
its sparking a violent need on me to finally get over my mecha drawing difficulties.
I'm surprised that Patlabor isn't more widely seen. Maybe it's just fallen through the cracks these days? It was certainly bigger or at least more well-known in the past. It (or one of the movies) was usually in many of the promo reels, and in one of the bigger crossovers clips from the first movie were used extensively in the music video for "Juke Joint Jezebel", which was probably KMFDM's biggest hit.
2:59 raises hand*
brazilian patlabor fan here!
desperately wishing this franchise would get more attention.
... also that the model kits were easier to obtain over here...
Did you catch it on Fox Kids like I did back in the day?
@@mafeuk I dont recall the channel
But probably :p
As a big mecha nerd it's awesome to see you doing analysis vids of mecha anime 💛
An unforgivable sin- you interrupted the OVA opening. How could you?!
And now I'm back, 90 seconds later because nothing's impossible... nothing's impossible...
The second movie was rewarded at Cannes, in a period which the anime movies were less popular in Europe than the obscure and intellectual movies presented to Cannes, talking of Europe obviously.
6:18 That took me off guard 😨
Sorry but it is one of Tomino's most infamous character deaths.
@@KaiserBeamz That's okay
@@KaiserBeamz
Damn, Animes do not hold back, do they?
@@JinxTheLooneyToon915 It's Tomino. I'm so used to him, I didn't even notice that death until I viewed the clip three times.
First thing I noticed was Tomino's name, then the first body, then the second.
I actually saw that movie and that was the moment when I learned that child murder is too much for me.
Complete series, ovas and movie Bluray set out at Sentai Film works. Look for mega sales on Sentai Film Works website as the set will go on sale for around $40 bucks for all of it. No need to spend $75 on the set. It is worth it, but since Sentai has sales so often getting it all for $40 is a steal.
i loved the show due to its references, there is an entire episode that parodies gerry anderson puppet shows like captain scarlet and thunderbirds, its clearly made by people who love the genre they are working in
The creators actually made the female characters human beings instead of just eye candy for horny otaku. I feel like it's been pretty rare nowadays to find a female character like that in most anime.
Because otaku flood the market for ancillary merchandise demand-wise, it tilts creative decisions to get those dollars.
I think you're just too narrow-minded to know anything but horny anime. Watch the shows like A Place Further than the Universe or Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! It's not rare as you think.
@@tykep1009 dude I've been watching anime since grade school. I know what the hell im talking about and the shows u just listed are an exception, NOT THE RULE.
After all these years, I still haven't seen this one.
4:50 you forgot the most important place where one could start!
the obscure cross-over disaster survival game City Shrouded in Shadows (technically part of the raw danger/disaster report/zettai zetsumei toshi series)
which features patlabor in one of its first (if not the first, that I know of) video game appearances... as a background element, along with kaiju like godzilla, ultraman, evangelion and such other insanity.
That is DEFINETELY the best playce to start with patlabor (obviously being sarcastic here)
I have that game. I really wish it had come to state side. i know the getting the rights for everything would be hell, but it would have been nice.
Another excellent analysis as always. I consider myself a huge fan of Patlabor even though I haven't watched all the anime for it. I still need to watch the new files and 3rd Patlabor movie. To be perfectly honest, Patlabor has my favorite mecha designs of any mecha anime that I've actually watched and I've pretty much enjoyed all aspects of each and every Patlabor anime that I've watched. I just love the entire chemistry of the entire special vehicle unit and it is easily one of those types of anime is when it wants to do something it does it right regardless if its mecha action, character development, comedy, drama and it's actually nice to watch an anime that uses rational and sometimes the scatter irrational thought process to get the job done. It also helps that Noa Izumi is one of my favorite female characters in all of anime. I'm guessing I've always had a fondness for short haired anime police women that love their machines (Leona - Dominion Tank Police). I look forward to yout deep analysis into the other anime entries of Patlabor.
Fancy seeing you here 😀
Just got the collection in the mail. Breezed right through the ova and two movies. On my way through the tv series. Loving it so far
Hold on, these personalities are in police academy police academy with robots
3:39 How does one mistake a Shinohara Type 95 Taisho as a Shinohara Type 98 Ingram? (Yes, MAHQ says it's a Type 96, but the Viz Comics edition says Type 95, and that's what I'm sticking with)
I know to be patient, but I am especially looking forward to your take on Patlabor 2 given its heavy emphasis on domestic Japanese and broad geopolitical themes during the "end of history" as well as its roots in Japan's radical politics of the 1960s...
I was introduced to Patlabor through the first two films. As you can imagine, I could never adjust to the tone of the ova and tv series.
*Dominion / Patlabor oddly similar*
Spunky redhead in OVA with cool 1st name: Noah/ Leona ✔
Named vehicle/ mecha after a political/ militant figure: Alphonse/ Bonaparte ✔
Public mad at police force: ✔ ✔✔ ✔
Okay I could write a fifty line paragraph about how much I love this show, but... It's 2 am right now where I am so I just want to say something.
Patlabor is beautiful
This was awesome... they tricked you in to watching a political film with big robots
Can't wait for you to get to the TV series. I watched it on TV many years ago, and I was one of the weird kids who actually enjoyed it. Now I think I gotta watch the OVAs, too! Thanks for the review, and keep up the good work!
Having seen both Patlabor movies and the original OVA but not the TV series, I recall the OVA feeling so so much like a pilot (ha) for a TV series. The way it bounced around in tone from episode to episode really put me off at first. It felt as though it were just giving the widest range of episode concepts it could to appeal to a producer: "Look, we can be funny, we can be serious, we can have action, we can have episodes where the mechs take a back seat! Please pay for a whole season!" without accounting for how they'd fit together. But as I got further into the episodes, I realized that (whether or not it was a carefully crafted splash-reel) Patlabor really worked best telling these more mundane and self-contained stories. They don't need a really complex or heady over-arching plot, because just spending time with these characters who ooze charm (and their cool giant robots obv.) is more than enough.
And watching something like Bubblegum Crisis (sorry folks, I don't like it) which also refuses to have a true over-arching plot across a comparable number of episodes but instead of feeling breezy and fun feels like a repetitive slog of the same plot over and over (except for Scoop Chase), I have learned to appreciate what Patlabor managed all the more.
The song still gets me bebopping
As always fantastic video.
Only commenting because this show has one of the greatest closing songs ever
Midnight blue
The end.
You should check out Irresponsible Captain Taylor anime.
Already have! It's favorite of mine. I do have plans to do a video on it in the future.
Just think of Tomorrow
@@KaiserBeamz
Are you also planning to do another video, regarding the beloved *Violence Canon?*
The OG OVA is a great sampler. The tv show has some of the best meta easter eggs I have seen. The movies are beutifull.
26:16 No.... Patlabor 2 grills the government and the military way, way more than it does the cops.
Hmm... I don't know if this kind of thing would be covered in your channel but as a Lost Media researcher I was curious about the history of the Playstation "Patlabor The Game", which had two playable demos released, but ultimately was scrapped and rebooted into a very different "Patlabor Game Edition".
You wouldn't happen to know any of that stuff in greater detail, would you?
The scientist with an eyepatch in Ep. 3 reminds me of Dr. Serizawa... Is that episode a nod to the original Godzilla?
Yeah, it clearly parodizes the original Godzilla movie
"Dance To The Music"? None of us are old enough to remember that! :)
P-E-R-F-E-C-T!
You did it!^^
Mechs are cool but I like Patlabor for the great characters, stories and animation.
hell yes. thank you
Either you cover LOGH or I do, Kaiser. ❤️
Much to my surprise, this is my first time hearing about Patlabor in any capacity... So, domo arigato for this introduction to what seems to be a perfectly enjoyable franchise for me.
Personally, I cannot STAND Evangelion. The angsty and unrelatable characters, the convoluted and infantile drama, and "edgy try-hard" nature of the anime just... I flat out couldn't find a single enjoyable aspect of the franchise.
Much like you stated, Patlabor almost seems like an intentional "Anti-Mecha" MechAnime... No grand galaxy-spanning warfare against extraterrestrials for humanity's survival, no post-apocalyptical edgelord showcasing -just a handful of scrubs (that you could expect to find in any grocery store) employed to keep the peace, who have questionably been assigned bipedal tanks to accomplish this.
[ Thumbs Up ]
Sounds like watching this series is just a good time, and likely to entice newcomers and create fans of the genre far better than the ludicrous WtF-marathon Angstvangelion ever could.
Could you talk about Rose of Versailles? I recently read the manga and watched the anime, it's so good 🙏
you are criminally undersubbed
I’ve been meaning to watch patlabour, is the show, OVA or films the best way to do so? Is there a specific watch order?
No real specific watch order, but the OVA really does acclimate and introduce you to the concept the best. If there is a watch order, you can't go wrong with release order.
@@KaiserBeamz thanks bro, much appreciated!
I'd like to see your take on Assemble: Insert, a 1989 two episode OVA based on a manga by Masami Yuki. In the same way that Patlabor is a light hearted deconstruction of mecha anime through a police procedural, Assemble: Insert unravels magic girl and idol anime tropes through a comedic police story.
I loved this anime lol I watched all of the patlabor stuff back in the day.
Point of interest 1:
While playing Resident Evil 2 and its Remake, I often thought about the RPD's officers lives before the city got infested by hordes of the dead.
Something about the environment and care that went into those police stations are still forcing me to imagine the same game but where the zombie apocalypse never happened, and the game is about spending your time with the police force as a young rookie and also the player takes control of micro managing the development of the station, in a mix of 90s managing games from Bullfrog games and old XCOM games management.
Point of interest 2:
Captain Gotto, dimention hopped from Patlabor to another anime called After the Rain where he dates a high schooler that can resemble one or two girls of Patlabor.
I often wish we got an XCOM style game for something other than alien invasions
be it managing a futuristic police force; Or even a GI joe sort of deal, against exaggerated terrorists and stuff.
Its specially appealing after chimera squad showed that it can be done very well with pre-existing characters
Something like you mentioned on point of interest 1 just sounds close to a perfect game really.
@@Maioly how old are you ?
@@DrRESHES not sure why that matters, but 30
@@Maioly Man, do i have an elevator pitch sale for you, i don't believe how much this game fits your needs right now.
and it's not just a game that i haplened to play, nothing like that ever, this game is what i played since childhood, tried many other turn based tactical/strategy games but even after 20 years this game is still on top, there's nothing that can even come close to it's briliance and depth variety, hell i still find some new mechanics or ally behaviours that hit me from no where, and i've playing it 1-3 times every year.
I don't know if you heard about Jagged Alliance 2 but if you only looked at it, it doesn't look like something that spent point into its presentation vut under the hood of that game there's so much intuitive systems and so much power.
for example, most of Turn Based Tactical game i.e XCOM Disgaea Valkyria Chronicles Fire Emblem all take place in a base and you select missions from there, you can't get out of there and walk around near your place.
JA2 is open world, by 1999 standards which means it's a map devided by sectors, 200 to be exact, where you can go where ever, when ever, most annoying XCOM gimmick was is that you were on a timer, even when you were in stealth mode, which was so poorly and artificially made to create tension it only made the game look so cheap.
In JA2 you don't have that pressure.
In XCOM the chance to hit was nothing more that bullshit, I love the point blank miss in xcom 2, where your soldier sways away his gun almost like he is taking the piss out of you, after he misses he then tries to sound genuine about his miss, or even more stupid when you a 95% chance:
your bullets bounce off the alien's head, he has a brain fart, and then he plays the "bullet near miss" animation, it's got to be the most farcical display of combat in a game, and the most hardest suspension of disbelief.
You know what JA2 has ? they have pretty much the same system, but it doesn't show you anything, you have a gun power and distance, if it's out of range the aim cursor blinks and also gives a sound cue, also your aim and chance to hit not only dictated by Marksmanship, it's dictated by your Mercs Dexterity, Experience, stance, did he moved before he took the shot, or did he stood or crouched or proned and his previous turn Action Points Interrupted the enemy that he caught in his sight, did your merc slept week, what's his moral condition, what attachments does he have on his gun ?
and even after that the game has a Ballistic system, you know what this is ?
it's a system that renders any bullet abd explosion as an real object, you can have a merc that fails in everything, but if the enemy is at point blank distance the bullets have no other way but to hit him, thisis why anyone can spray and pray and still get results, even the enemy, because let's not forget you're on an equal footing here, there's no gimmicks here.
JA2 isn't a game of replayability, it's a dirty word in my opinion made for games that don't have great gsmeplay so they make different ending so yoy can do another replay of 90% of the story only to see a different cutscene in the end.
JA2 is a simulation of events made out of gameplay systems, it doesn't mean it's going full realistic, it's going more simulating the reality, but never goes full realistic.
remember how many things i noted for a character to shoot a bullet ?
Believe me that's the same ammount of work that went into every system the game has and those systems are connected.
only thing that i can add to shooting is that some guns has burst mode, just press the B button and the cursor changes when you place the mouse on the enemy, also very important, right mouse click makes you spend more Action Points but it makes the shot more precise, but like i said stanxe is also important, some guns are easier to fire if you're prone, that's just logical but it's crazy that you can that way in a game.
after all said and done i haven't really scratched the surface.
and i'm talking about the vanilla version. in 2004 the devs released the source code for fans that really love the game, it's been so many years and the mods grown into massive titans that not only can change the maps add weapons and mercs, not very good coice acted or drawn well, but there's one mod, called 1.13, called like because the last official version was 1.12, this mods job was to take all those overwhelming mechanics of the vanilla and make them even more advanced and deeper.
for one tiny example, you spent AP to aim right ? every gun has it's own max AP you can spent, a pistol would have much less than a Sniper rifle, much less.
you can aim and also spend more point on that aimed gun to shoot in a burst, and you can choose how many bullets exactly you want to spend, and even if you miss all of them, if they fly near, it takes out of the morral of the enemy, or you too, and if enough is went close an enemy can get supressed and will lose AP in his next turn.
I don't want to talk about the mercs, you can experience it by yourself, or just go the the site TV Tropes and read very interesting titbits, and info that enrich those characters for you, it's a fun read.
Jagged Alliance 2 is loved by Germans and Russians, not only in the mod community but also in the game industry, as small as that fan base is, since 2012 JA had 4 tries of ressorections, all of them were failures bucause you can't recreate God.
The fans praise this game a lot if you go to GOG you'll see only good stuff said about this game, if you go to steam you'll see many People disappointed how badly it launched.
If you want to hear about JA2 just add the word Podcast to it's name in google, people usually talk how intuitive it is, it's a game about subjective plays, so don't take one playstyle to heart, this is why JA2 doesn't have much reviews, because it's easier to show it in a playthrough, which are filled to the brim on youtube.
If you want to read about it, there's a book on Amazon from the book company Boss Fight Books.
if you want to play something else there's a table top game called Jagged Alliance 2 The Board Game, which is a bit hard to come by, good game actually.
So i don't want to spoil anything beyond that, i talked about many things but i feel like a told nothing, and that's good i don't really play the game setiously, i play on easy, i sometimes want to have fun i use exploits that i found many years ago by myself without the internet, my exploit is the copy paste items. so yeah play the game however you like.
Sorry if i didn't checked for typos, i'm a bit busy, playing JA2 while recovering from the corona.
@@DrRESHES oh yeah
I am fully familiar with jagged alliance 2 and the open source mods too
Still have fond memories of it
Like an absolute bullshit headshot my sniper somehow pulled off on the hospital area.
Wish the sequels/remakes werent trash.
I am also very familiar with the many spiritual sequels out there (many of which are russian?), even own a few on steam.
Sadly it lacks the base bulding elements of xcom which i am also fond off (and i do wish it had a larger scale)
Need toget back to playing more of it sometime, specially sonce its always installed XD
Patlabor was on AZN back in the day. I wanna say it was the first series.
The OVA series probably my favorite in the series mostly it's a good length and it's a good showcase of Oshii's comedic side but still his usual direction that we know him today. That and I think the dub isn't bad either, sure it has faults and stumbles for a CPM dub but it's not bad compared to other dubs from the company.
It is always nice to see the bots in blue get some love in America.
This does remind me that Wisdom and Bravery is the best motto. Wisdom is knowing that it sounds like a bad idea. Bravery is doing it any way.
A better translation of “Chie to yuuki” is “Brains and balls”.
What is the song playing in the opening for these videos? I couldn't make it out from the credits.
Wow I've watched (and loved) both this and galactic heros. Lol guess I'm pretty good at anime. Saw them years ago
So the creators themselves didn't understand what they had in Kanuka Clancy? That explains why the TV show turned out as the most inferior version of the franchise.
Here's the secret of Clancy: Any association with SV2 automatically puts into question your entire history, everything you did and everyone you know. You could be the most distinguished officer in the world but once you're with SV2, you're there because you did something, doing something now or will do something in the future. Ragtag bunch of misfits- by association.
Cowboy cop by proxy. End of the day, Clancy's the only one who could keep Ohta in check.
9:02 birdy also a great under ratedmanga and an ok tv series
01:20 After you described all that in the intro, I pictured "Tank Police." Would you please do a video on "Tank Police?"
I watch the movie first, then i watch the serie and i love it, all the serie, i love it, for me Patlabor is the best mecha anime
Just got back into this show. From browsing the web, seems like the fandom generally considers the OVA to be superior to the tv series, but I disagree. I think people might be conflating it with the OVA TIMELINE being superior to the TV TIMELINE, because I just don't really see why the ova itself is held in so much more regard than the series. I think the love for the movies might be giving them rose tinted glasses for the ova. I watched the og ova, and I'm only 8 or 9 eps into the tv series, but here are my thoughts so far:
With the 47-ep tv series, the characters are given more time to actually BE CHARACTERS. The plots and scenarios so far are a little more down to earth and not as contrived. The characters seem to have way more personality, and the comedy just hits harder for me. The combat has also been better than in the ova.
Also, the main thing that people seem to give the ova props for over the tv series, is its art and animation. However, I honestly don't see how it's any better than the tv series. The tv series looks nicer and a tad less dated to me. Overall, I'm enjoying the tv series much more than I enjoyed the ova.
4:00 now you’ve got me wondering if you’ll ever do Legend of the Galactic heroes review. If you did I’d really enjoy it, it’s my favorite anime and not enough people talk about it.
Also check daiguard is more or less the same, but super robot
I have the TV series OST on CD and it is one of my favorites! I think that the OVA/TV/Movies are all on HiDive.
06:02 Macross: am I a joke to you?
18:00 Even Transformers Energon?
It's Pat Labour. Guess the gender of the mecha if you can!
03:05 that's an overexaggeration, Patlabor was definitely a success, but it didn't change the anime industry the way Gundam and Evangelion (and Macross) did, that's not even close. Gunbuster and the Gundam ovas were also successful in those days, but they didn't end up changing the industry.
I own the bd box set and i love it
You’re Under Arrest
My patlabor's vhs need an update, the first 2 movie are a master piece of animation. Must have if you like animation.
Personally I prefer the manga to the oav.
Can you do a review of Rayearth OVA please?
Please do a video on long forgotten ova series karas the prophecy/ revelation
I wanna love this, I really do, but my PTSD surrounding police just keeps me from doing it.
I'm really glad it kicked off the trend of well-realized female characters with depth. Instead of, you know, what we have today so much.
That’s fair, although Japanese police and American police are very different.
music?
Huh, wasn't Bandai Namco the product of the merger in 2005?
Patlabor is a gold mecha anime because unlike other merch anime, this mecha anime is about the characters and not the robots!
Okay, I'll stop.
cartay blansh
Is it waird that one min he an anime reviewer then the next min he do an history about loony tune
Kanuka clancy is mai waifu
She is just so mesmerizing.
is that hows its pronounced? Its not PAT -la - BOAR?
I somehow managed to find the first film on TH-cam. The franchise is on my to get list alongside the Bubblegum Crisis OVA and 2040 versions. Partly because I would classify both franchises in reference material to recommend for tabletop Cyberpunk games.