How Important are Character Designs to You?

[TheSubtleDoctor]

When deciding whether or not to watch an anime, how big a factor are the character designs? Do they make-or-break a show for you? Will you let less-than-ideal designs slide if other aspects of the show sound promising? Or do you care at all?

[Tsukuyomi]

Character design is very important to me. If it doesn't look good, I may be turned away, tbh, but there are those exceptions ^__^

[R86]

Character design is very important to me. I have made exceptions for certain shows and watched them anyway, but there comes a point where the anatomy is so vague or stylized that I cannot relate to the characters. I would give examples, but I fear I may wind up dissing someone's favorite show, so I will forbear.

EDIT: I used the same first words as Tsukuyomi, on accident, but will leave them anyway.

[Atria35]

I'm so-so. I mean, character designs can be somewhat important, but I'm watching for the story. I enjoy good character designs, but if the overall story is good, then I don't care. I will enjoy it too much to care.

[Mr. Hat'n'Clogs]

I'm going to have to go with important, since they're one of the things that make me pick up a show. Because anime is a visual medium, the visuals should be important to the story. If I don't like the character designs(and overall aesthetic of the show) it can break my enjoyment of it.

Also, maybe the reason the character designs of Jyu Oh Sei were so terrible is because they wanted to keep you from watching the show.

[blkmage]

I've watched enough stuff with character designs that I reactively found awful that turned out to be fine in general to discard it as a huge issue.

[ChristianKitsune]

I'll say this: it takes getting used to with shows like xxxholic (not dissing it, as I loved the story) have their characters created in such a ridiculous way. I pushed through it and found the series to be enjoyable though, but it did leave me with a few O_o moments.

[Wallachia]

It depends on the character designs. Sometimes the artwork in general just works for everyone even though they look similar, like in Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei.

Other times I wish more thought was put into it like how there are so many personality=/=appearance clones. Take Louise, Shana, and Taiga for an example. They don't have bad designs, but do all tsunderes voiced by Kugimiya Rie need to be short with long hair and have Tsurime eyes? There are plenty of characters whose personalities are obvious because their character designs look way too much like this other character from some other show.

[Midori]

I generally think of character designs as pretty important.

But then I think of music as important too. And general art quality. And story. And pacing. And setting. And...

Yeah, so I voted so-so, because I think of it like all the other possible qualities of an anime. Having great character design can make an anime good, but boring character design can't ruin it unless the rest of the anime also sucks.

[AJV]

I would have to say that the character designs and art style of a series is important to me,
though of course the overall story is what really counts.
But if I don't like the character designs or style I just might skip a series all together (like One Piece. please don't kill me. ).
Also poorly designed characters or those that look similar to each other even though they're from different series can be a little annoying.

There are great anime series that have what might consider boring designs, but have a great storylines.

I guess it depend on one's artistic taste.

[UniqueAngelStar]

With character designs, I don't mind how the characters look. It's not that much for me.
I just like the anime based on my taste and if is interesting for me.

Although some character designs can bother me (such as characters wearing inappropriate clothing) or typical characters (such as blonde characters portrayed as naive, tsuanderes with ponytails, smart characters with short hair,etc), I'll still watch the anime, I just ignore those character aspects in there.

[Rusty Claymore]

I don't mind unique character designs, but if it's just downright ugly for every character in the show I feel like I'm watching an american soap. (Kidding! XD) Mostly, as long as the art style doesn't change I'm fine with it as long as it's interesting.

[mouse]

Great character design would be nice, but since a lot of anime characters have similar to identical looks anyway, it's not a big deal for me. I've seen only a few series that really stand out when it comes to character design, and maybe it's because of this that I'm a bit more comfortable watching shows with characters that have a certain look (i.e., generic). I would prefer that the character design not distract me too much from enjoying the story.

[Kaori]

Not at all.

If an anime I like happens to have good character designs, it's a bonus, but I can think of anime that either have great character design but aren't very good or that I like despite the character designs.

[ABlipinTime]

...
I'm picky. I'd like quality everywhere. I can make exceptions, but even then, I don't want it too hard to look at. Actually, I think I care more about color tones used than actual character design.

[TheSubtleDoctor]

...
I'm picky. I'd like quality everywhere. I can make exceptions, but even then, I don't want it too hard to look at. Actually, I think I care more about color tones used than actual character design.

Are you saying that color tones are indicative of quality?

[steenajack]

I'm so-so. Although I appreciate art, I tend to like art in almost all forms so long as it isn't...er disturbing or inappropriate. I tend to focus more on the story than anything. The only time I don't like a character design is when it's obviously and intentionally made in such a way to be provocative/perverted/fanservice-like in nature. That's just...distracting and annoying to me. All and all, I appreciate art in any way, shape or form.

[TheMewster]

I voted important. Dunno why I'm just that way.

[Nanao]

Character designs are pretty important to me, but artwork is probably more important. Still, there are exceptions to both rules ^__^

[Makachop^^128]

Its important, I dont' want everything pretty but the character design has to go with the personality of the character.

[Arvin]

I would say, important. I mean, if you're going to watch something like this, they should at least look good. Or maybe conform to my definition of what looks good, anyway. I can make exceptions for something very well written, but since the thing that becomes evident before anything else is appearance, I might miss out on a very good series if the designs are off.

[teigeki_calesa]

Let's face it; it's a visual medium, and most people will be looking at the designs first before the story. No matter how good the story is, if the character design is just awful, you're gonna turn away a lot of your potential audience.

[TheSubtleDoctor]

How do we quantify "awful?" Many times, people equate old with awful when are just not what they're used to seeing. Often, older designs were considered good and "pretty" when the show was airing (and still are by many), though newer, younger fans balk at them.

One might claim that these things are completely subjective on a personaly level. But, someone mentioned above (and I think they're not wrong) that certain designs might turn off large sections of an audience. Surely, if design enjoyment/dislike were totally individuallysubjective, then we can't make sense of the idea of a large group of people keyying in on the same feature(s) and being alienated by them. The likelihood of such an event seems quite low considering just how many different aspects of character designs there are.

So, there must be some features that fans sort of lossely or tacitly agree are the marks of bad character designs. I think two of these are (1) "old" designs and (2) designs that are too different from what is currently airing (i.e. Tatami Galaxy's designs...they're not old looking but they are different from current stuff).

But why? What makes these kinds of designs so unpalatable?

Yeah, people expect me to say all this as "that guy who likes old anime;" however, I believe fans too often conflate "bad character designs" with "old designs" or "character designs that don't look closely like everything that's currently airing" and do so [s]without a rational basis[/s]. Well that may be a bit harsh: I'll say that I haen't heard a compelling argument for such a position yet and would very much like to.

[blkmage]

There is a difference between art style and character design. Most people here seem to be using them interchangeably.

[TheSubtleDoctor]

There is a difference between art style and character design. Most people here seem to be using them interchangeably.

I do this, but they bleed into one another so much that a distinction seems...I dunno...less than helpful to me I guess. At least, it doesn't seem productive when talking about the issue I just raised.

But, as usual, I am prepared to be proven wrong

[Falx]

Only part of character design I care about is whether the studio decided to let them wear enough clothes so I don't feel like I shouldn't be watching it.

Quality of animation on the other hand... that's fairly important. If it's not at a certain level I don't care how amazing the story is I just cannot get myself interested in it. This means there are many older series I just cannot watch despite constantly hearing how great they are.

[blkmage]

I do this, but they bleed into one another so much that a distinction seems...I dunno...less than helpful to me I guess. At least, it doesn't seem productive when talking about the issue I just raised.

But, as usual, I am prepared to be proven wrong

Because when you ask about "old" character designs, you're asking about style. Style differentiates characters from a work as a whole from characters from other works. Character design differentiates characters within a work.

One Piece has awesome character design, regardless of what people think about its art style. Cross Game (and, really, all of Adachi's works) don't have great character design, regardless of what people think of its merits. For instance, in The Tatami Galaxy, I'd judge character design by comparing the main character against Ozu or that guy with the chin, not with characters from other shows.

Otherwise, we end up with hilarious and meaningless comparisons like Hidamari Sketch and Kara no Kyoukai, or LOGH and Kaiba, or Haruhi and 5 Centimeters per Second.

[Maokun]

Unfortunately, I'm one of those people who can't help to care. In fact it's one of the decisive factors that plays on me watching a show. That's not to say that I won't try to endure poor (or weird) character design if the premise of the show merits it. One example of this is Saber Marionette. It took me several episodes to get used to it but it was definitely worth it.

However, there are some that I simply cannot possibly estomach. Like anything by Kia Asamiya. I really, really tried to watch Nadesico, because I keep hearing how great it is, but the character design is too much of a turn off. And that even taking in account that the TV series' character designer, one of the really good, took much more liberties with Asamiya's manga designs than say, the ones that made Compiler or Silent Moebius *shudders*. Also the character design for all Initial-D related stuff. Make my eyes water with the effort of not pulling them away in disgust.

Another category would be the character design that's good but for some reason looks awful when animated. The most obvious example would be Hisashi Hirai (Infinite Ryvius, S-CRY-ed, Gundam Seed.) Stills, illustrations and promotional art look gorgeous, but the animated characters looks just wrong. Another example would be One Piece. Also whomever that made the TV adaptation of XXXholic.

[TheSubtleDoctor]

Because when you ask about "old" character designs, you're asking about style. Style differentiates characters from a work as a whole from characters from other works. Character design differentiates characters within a work.

Then I guess according to your definition, I am talking about art style, though the distinction seems weird given the base definition of the term "character design." But, I retract my unhelpful comment because I do believe the distinction has merit.

One Piece has awesome character design, regardless of what people think about its art style. Cross Game (and, really, all of Adachi's works) don't have great character design, regardless of what people think of its merits. For instance, in The Tatami Galaxy, I'd judge character design by comparing the main character against Ozu or that guy with the chin, not with characters from other shows.

Otherwise, we end up with hilarious and meaningless comparisons like Hidamari Sketch and Kara no Kyoukai, or LOGH and Kaiba, or Haruhi and 5 Centimeters per Second.

I disagree on two counts:

(1) It seems like you're equating quality of character design with how different the characters look from one another. I just don't buy that quality in this area is measured on a sliding scale of Oda to Adaichi/Takahashi. Consistency restraints often force the hand of character designers, but that doesn't make their work inherently less good, does it? If there are 3-4 high quality and different designs of main characters in a work, and then supporting characters whose designs consist of various tweaks to this main set (b/c of restrictions of the world the characters are in)...I dunno...do we label the show as one having bad designs?

(2.) I don't think comparisons of character designs between KnK and Hidamari are meaningless at all. To your point, such comparisons are, in part, between the overall art direction of the shows, but we can meaningfully pluck out examples of said styles in the form of character designs and talk about which design we like better, regardless of how similar or different it is from other designs in its work of origin. In doing so, I don't believe we are not having a discussion about character designs.

[UniqueAngelStar]

Only part of character design I care about is whether the studio decided to let them wear enough clothes so I don't feel like I shouldn't be watching it.

Same here.
I would feel uncomfortable if the characters, especially the female ones, wears those kind of outfits or if they have unrealistic unessary enormous bust sizes. I would assume that the anime can overdue the eechiness of it. That can be a anime that I can turn away and ignore it.