First off, this is a question that I really want an answer for.. When I was younger I watched anime a lot. Akira, Ghost in the Shell, Vampire Hunter D, Evangelian, Last Exile, and more..  I haven't watched any in awhile. I tried searching some and everything seemed to be Funimation with boobs bouncing and crappy story.  It use to be the most in depth stories you could find. I would be very greatful if someone could point me in the right direction for newer anime that is like the classics. Thanks for your time....

People still watch it, just a lot less people *buy* it with how the internet exists and hands it out for free.

I grew up on DBZ and Cowboy Beebop, but my tastes changed bi-laterally over time, that is, I lean to both ends of the serious/silly spectrum now... though, some things are just plain ridiculous, and not my preferred angle anymore. Mostly things aimed at kids don't click anymore, but anything by the late/great Satoshi Kon is pure gold in my book. I always despise anything that refuses to wrap itself up neatly, like Bleach, One Piece or Fairy Tail. A good story has to end at some point, goddammit.

Anyway, the absolute best anime I've seen in the past year or so was The Future Diary, it's mind-blowing. Even inspired me to write up a game concept of 'prediction-based mechanics', but I decided not to litter the dev corner here with it until I knock more kinks out of it - as well as dish it out in terms hte layman can understand. The show, though, is fucking brilliant... Christopher Nolan brilliant.

Also, give Funimation some credit. Desert Punk's dubbed version is 100x better than the subtitled ones, has boobs a-bouncin', and has one of the best (and totally understandable) anti-heroes I've ever seen in any kind of format. Great show, lots of fun, and also really dark at times.

~Oh, and The Tatami Galaxy was pretty warped, and had a great ending.

~Additional note; seeing as how you are stateside, you can watch everything I mentioned on Hulu, sans subscription. Tehy even have the dubs I mentioned, paired alond with the subbed versions - which, pretty much always makes for a good argument of which one is better than the other.

I used to watch anime.  Then I had to live with a 2GB a month bandwidth limit or else they reduce internet speed to 128kbps.  So I stuck to mangas and Ive never really gone back to anime o.O 

A  chance to infect someone with my fav animes?

This is going be delicious...

I usually go for the slow paced and maybe sometimes off the wall animes

1. Monster

Monster is about Dr. Kenzo Tenma who is a renowned young brain surgeon who at the begining of the anime is forced to choose who is saved. A mayor that the boss of the hospital wants kept alive so he can get political bonus points or a Young orphan who was shot in the head. This decision made all the things in his life fall to pieces and soon he hears that the child he saved turned into a mass murderer. This is the tale of how he hunts down a the monster he kept alive.

http://myanimelist.net/anime/19/Monster

2. Legend of Galactic Heroes

This aired  from Dec 1988 to Oct 1997 and has 110 episodes and 20 ovas. So it is very old but one of the best animes I have ever watched.  for decades, the Galactic Empire has been locked in an interstellar war with the Free Planets Alliance, a conflict that involves thousands of spaceships and millions of soldiers on both sides. Two new commanders enter the conflict with great hopes: Imperial Admiral Reinhard von Lohengramm and the FPA's Yang Wen-Li. As they deal with superiors and subordinates, maneuver through complicated political arrangements, plot strategies, and win battles, each will be tested, and ultimately, changed, by the reality of war.

Its an anime that makes you think and is the best space opera of all time. This is StarWars the one you know is crap compared to this.

http://myanimelist.net/anime/820/Legend_of_the_Galactic_Heroes

3. Kaiji

Its about gambling, Manly tears, And making you hate humanity and making you want to cheer when kaiji gets his way.

http://myanimelist.net/anime/3002/Kaiji

Full metal alchemist and Dog days are also good ones.

Feel free to ask questions!

Kaiji is crazy slow, but absolutely brutal. It's crazy how intense a card game can get when your life is on the line.

It really shows a lot of humanity (the good and bad) as well, much agreed.

As long as Manga is still around Anime will always be around.

I've been pretty disappointed with the past 3 or 4 years of new releases. To many schoolgirls running around trying to look cute. Optionally with super powers or something.  Makes for good rule34 I suppose but silly stories if you ask me. Then again different strokes for different folks.

Anywho recommendations..Texhnolyze, Boogiepop Phantom, Yukikaze, Time of Eve, Planetes, and Karas come to mind for now.

X/1999 is an oldie but a goodie I think, Welcome to the NHK is interesting as well for a slice of life series.

Genius Party, Perfect Blue, and I guess Paprika for psychological stuff, if that's your thing.

edit: And of course the others recommened by above posters.

Summer Wars, The Girl Who Leaped Through Time, Fate Zero, Puella Magi Madoka Magica, Samurai 7, Full Metal Alchemist & Panic, Gensoumaden Saiyuki, Highschool of the Dead, Gundam series are the only ones I can recommend for now.

It's not really dead but it's struggling to survive. It's hard to buy anime nowadays since it's pricey.

Well that's my opinion

Oh yeah... School Days.

Yeah, you think you know where it's going from the first episode - you are fucking WRONG.

Please say the lot of you at least follow Studio Ghibli!

to me - yes. I've tried getting back to the roots so to say but it's not fun anymore. 

although, I have lots of friends who still watch it like 24/7 and would kill me for typing this message.

No! Japanese Animation is not dead but is ever contiounously evolving.

It's shocking to see so many artistic references and creativty in those shows. The animation took plenty of hand-artist skills to accomplished and the stories were mind-blowing in some of them. My favorite show was Magical Emi and a couple of others as well as Chobits.

A lot of the older animes simply had charm or signifiance to them. Love-stories were love-stories it didn't matter who the characters were! It's not like the political show-breaking stuff that gets attatched to anime genres now.  The newer animes are advance in modern graphics but they have a tendency of being replicas of the moe-factor.

Not that I don't mind the moe-factor, I love it! It's feminine innocence and charm all over again. I don't understand why condemn anime so badly over here now like it's insignificant or niche genre of animation that has no place in the U.S.

Originally posted by BrainDeadG

Not that I don't mind the moe-factor, I love it! It's feminine innocence and charm all over again. I don't understand why condemn anime so badly over here now like it's insignificant or niche genre of animation that has no place in the U.S.

I honestly don't know the difference between moe and ecchi, and I doubt most westerners do...

...but I find ecchi shows to be friggin hilarious because sexual frustration is pure comedy.

~Aside from those kinds of comedies, I really, really like tragic themes (it's why I stuck it out with Kaiji). I'm finishing out a series called AnoHana atm, but I feel like I've seen it before already, in a movie or something. It's about a group of kids that fell apart after one of them died, but her ghost came back to haunt one of them and convince him to get the group back together. Sounds familiar right?

Well, every ep tugs at my tearducts a bit. Might have to turn in my man-card by the time I finish it. Love that kind of shit though... like Rainbow (another good one, prison drama in the vein of Sleepers), though, the first season of that is the best one.

~Finished Ano Hana and I teared-up like a bitch on the last ep. Amazing story.

Cartoons have been around for a long time. There are plenty of 20+ year old losers still watching cartoons.

I didn't think it was that common for adults to watch cartoons.

Originally posted by Deleted User

Cartoons have been around for a long time. There are plenty of 20+ year old losers still watching cartoons.

Lol, coming from a guy who made a username called "youraloser" just to tell us that and then delete it.

~excellent use of your time and effort, big guy.

Originally posted by BrainDeadG

No! Japanese Animation is not dead but is ever contiounously evolving.

It's shocking to see so many artistic references and creativty in those shows. The animation took plenty of hand-artist skills to accomplished and the stories were mind-blowing in some of them. My favorite show was Magical Emi and a couple of others as well as Chobits.

 

A lot of the older animes simply had charm or signifiance to them. Love-stories were love-stories it didn't matter who the characters were! It's not like the political show-breaking stuff that gets attatched to anime genres now.  The newer animes are advance in modern graphics but they have a tendency of being replicas of the moe-factor.

 

Not that I don't mind the moe-factor, I love it! It's feminine innocence and charm all over again. I don't understand why condemn anime so badly over here now like it's insignificant or niche genre of animation that has no place in the U.S.

moe seems to be killing the over-all anime/manga industtry, just like it is killing the gaming industry.  there are anime out there  that don't just exploit moe for profit, but the ones that do out number the ones that don't.

i guess this is just a matter of trends, just like the american comic book fixation on stoic heroes and anti-heros of the 90's, the problem is that moe is turning off people to anime and manga, even though japan puts out some great stuff.

but just like the gaming industry of japan, the anime and manga industry care little for international popularity anymore, they are becoming rather isolationist again, judging on their fixation with niche genres.

game companies seem to be suffering the same fate, the people that play games in japan seem to be less and less interested in anything but dating sims and romantic games involving moe.

Originally posted by GTwander

Originally posted by BrainDeadG

Not that I don't mind the moe-factor, I love it! It's feminine innocence and charm all over again. I don't understand why condemn anime so badly over here now like it's insignificant or niche genre of animation that has no place in the U.S.

I honestly don't know the difference between moe and ecchi, and I doubt most westerners do...

...but I find ecchi shows to be friggin hilarious because sexual frustration is pure comedy.

 

~Aside from those kinds of comedies, I really, really like tragic themes (it's why I stuck it out with Kaiji). I'm finishing out a series called AnoHana atm, but I feel like I've seen it before already, in a movie or something. It's about a group of kids that fell apart after one of them died, but her ghost came back to haunt one of them and convince him to get the group back together. Sounds familiar right?

Well, every ep tugs at my tearducts a bit. Might have to turn in my man-card by the time I finish it. Love that kind of shit though... like Rainbow (another good one, prison drama in the vein of Sleepers), though, the first season of that is the best one.

 

~Finished Ano Hana and I teared-up like a bitch on the last ep. Amazing story.

uh moe is so far from ecchi i don't have a clue how you thought ecchi was related.

moe is basically a feeling or desire to protect an innocent from the harshness of reality, whether male or female.

they call characters "moe" that invoke this desire, it is rather like the feeling you have for children,  in fact scientists surmise that what we find cute we are more prone to protect, that is why babies look the way they do, big eyes and small mouths. we  evolved in such a way as a way to survive.

it is also why anime looks like it does, because the japanese are obsessed with cuteness.  

Well if all of them feature "cute" girls, and the line between moe and ecchi is whether the male characters are over-the-top perverted about it, then you can see where the line blurs throughout the entire genre.

Besides, I seen a "moe pillow" before, it's quite ecchi... so I don't even think THEY know where the dividing line is anymore.