It is the present day. The Internet is integral part to a lot of people’s lives. Also, it is the core component to some games out there, subscription-based. One of those games is “The World”, a Massive Multiplayer Roleplaying Game, much like World Of Warcraft. Roughly 30 million people are logged in at any one time, enjoying themselves, have a good time. The game is played with a sort of Virtual Reality thing you put on your head, in conjunction with a Dreamcast-like controller.
Not so however for a player with the name Tsukasa. He finds himself waking up in a dungeon with a treasure chest, but has no recollection as to how he got there or what happened prior to waking up. As he is to find out, to make things worse, he is actually unable to log out of the game. He has now been stuck for 10 consecutive days on the game’s servers – wandering the places, puzzled by what happened. He seems to be what is referred to as a “Wavemaster” – a character with the highest skillset available to the game. In his case however, he seems to have the ability to change game mechanics as he sees fit.
The core cast of the show, from left to right: Crim, Sora, Silver Knight, Lady Subaru, B.T., Bear, Mimiru and Tsukasa
The show I’m talking about is called .hack//SIGN (pronounced ‘dot hack sign’), and actually is the second series in the franchise of the .hack project and is the first of two, as far as I know. The successor is called .hack//ROOTS. The .hack// shows are set from within the actual game and shows the interaction between the characters and the development of the story.
During the course of the show, Tsukasa gets and makes new friends… he is skeptical at first as he has trouble understanding his own situation. However Tsukasa eventually opens up and accepts the people around him. Together they embark on a quest to find out what actually happened to him, and why. A mysterious item crosses their way, named The Key Of The Twilight. The game has been running for years and apparently this item is nothing more than a myth – or is it? Who knows. It is however believed this item might have some answers for the question as to what happened to Tsukasa and why he is unable to log out. To add spice to the soup, it is learned that Tsukasa is playing the game – BUT not in front of a computer.
The show is produced by Bee Train (the makers of Madlax!) and was originally released and aired back in 2002. As most animes, each episode has an approximate runtime of about 25 minutes. People have had mixed opinions about the English dubbing of the show – I believe it was very well done. The people who think it isn’t well done, basically say using the voice of Bruce Willis for a John McClane anime would not be right. Anyways – the English voices were very well done indeed again.
For Mac + PC. You’ll need a pretty high-end graphics-card though.
Beside the interesting story, I found the concept behind it very interesting. The show explores the interactions and relationships between characters in a game, and people in the real world, and the effect it has on people. It shows how such a game can create very great positive moments in one’s life, moments you will never forget – regardless if it was a game or not. In the end those people have been there, pulled through until the end – and that made them more than they were before. They have had an experience they will never forget and made new friends. Think about that when you consider the equivalents to that in the real world – like World Of Warcraft, GuildWars, or EVE Online. People actually make friends in there and things happen in those games. And regardless of your perception – to them, it is very real and they will remember that. And that, ultimately, is what makes these games a great thing.
All in all a very awesome anime show, another one not to be missed. Life’s a game sometimes.
.hack//SIGN
Original release: April 4, 2002
Genre: Adventure, Fantasy, Mystery, Science Fiction
(c) 2002 Bee Train Entertainment
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1 comment
Elix says:
September 7, 2009 at 2:20 pm (UTC 0)
I’m going to presume that you know that .hack//SIGN is just one part of a larger multimedia deployment of the .hack project, with seven PS2 games, two anime series (including SIGN), two OVA anime series, multiple novels, several manga series, a CCG, and an MMO (since shut down). There’s a lot more depth in The World if you want it. The best part is that it’s all coordinated. If you have the .hack PS2 series (Infection, Mutation, Outbreak, Quarantine) and you watch SIGN, you can actually jump to fields mentioned in the anime series (if you have the right keywords in The World) and SEE the same areas replicated faithfully between each area. The same is essentially true with the sequel, G.U.
Incidentally, ROOTS is canonically after SIGN, as it’s set in the G.U. version of the world, The World R:2, seven years after the original .hack timeline.