Ranked #3194

Metal Fight Beyblade

PROLOGUE
Beyblade is lame but at least it’s good at what it is trying to accomplish. Anime based on some product are made solely to advertise it and start an addiction to its possible consumers (usually nerdy kids with loaded parents). As such, most game –based anime are quite lame, with childish scenario and carton characters being just an excuse to shovel us flashy techniques or strategies of the soon-to-follow game. Despite this scam, Beyblade has a lame scenario, pathetic characters but makes a great (but exaggerated) advertising of the homonymous game.

ANIMATION & SOUND SECTION: 5/10 [trendy kids, cool monsters, average presentation.]
- Simply drawn 2D characters are using 3D flavored spinning tops. Spinning tops, I say! Does this sound interesting to you? It is a terrible concept! But it will sure take time to realize the stupidity. Although it is about kids playing with spinning tops, the animators easily trick us into believing that each one of them has unique techniques that make every battle different. Each user has a different strategy and some spinning tops have cool-looking monsters inside them that make special attacks and fill the screen with optical effects. You almost forget that it is actually just 10 year-olds throwing spinning tops at each other!
- All characters are typically drawn to look confident and/or cocky. Having a sense of style in their minds, the animators dressed their characters in trendy fashion and added tattoos and gimmick accessories to boost a bit their otherwise shallow presence. Without being anything much, the characters look and talk in a bearable way most of the time. And their spinning tops are packed with enough visual and sound effects to keep being interesting to the 10 year old target audience.
- As for the sound department, it is simply a bunch of screaming idiots yelling “BUY THIS GAME! IT’S LAME, BUT BUY IT ANYWAY”! But it has its nice moments.

STORY SECTION: 3/10 [Spinningtopmon! Got to buy them all!]
- The protagonist and almost everyone else in the story plan on becoming the best spinners in the world. So, they pretty much waste their lives training and playing with spinning tops and are finally pitted against a powerful organization, which plans to rule the world. How? Why, through spinning tops of course! Because the monsters inside them are in fact creatures from an ancient civilization that held tremendous power! Owwww! Scaryyy!
- Sounds like the story was written for AND by 5 year-olds. Seriously, the much similar Yu-Gi-Oh story is a masterpiece compared to this crap.
- By the way, this series has several sequels and movies besides this one… What? Sequels?! For Beyblade?!!! Many great series stop airing because of low ratings or lack in funds. Vision Of Escaflowne had to cut down 13 episodes because of a lack in funds. Legend of Galactic Heroes needed 10 years to produce a hundred episodes. And Beyblade actually gets extra seasons in a few years???
- Nah, it can’t be the ratings; the series simply sucks and spinning tops never became popular. Most likely it was the funds. The series was so cheap to produce that even crummy sales of Beyblade merchandise would be enough to make up for the expenses of making another series about this pathetic game. Like its theme, it’s cheap, superficial and forgettable in a few weeks. Man, those money-mugging game developers are EVIL! They are willing to make a thousand brain-killing series, if it helps them steal money from little kids addicted to spinning tops. Why waste time and money on producing a good series? Just repeat the same stupid stuff over and over until those 10 year olds are brainwashed to like it and then just wait for the money to pour in! Don’t you just love the materialism of our times?
- Anyway, the sequels are nothing different than before. The same stuff happen all over again, only in a slightly higher scale in terms of visual effects and story.

CHARACTERS SECTION: 3/10 [Get a life you dorks!]
- There is a trendy-looking bunch of kids who care more about spinning tops, than, let’s say, finding a job or getting laid, and a bunch of costumed weirdos who plan to control the world with ancient monsters. All of them just talk and care about them as if there is nothing more interesting or alternative to watching spinning thingies bouncing and crashing with each other. This gets boring after a while.
- Most of them have some purpose they can only accomplish through the spinning tops that makes their obsession with them understandable. But if you try to reason it a bit, you can find a thousand other alternative choices they could have made instead of loosing their time with this game.

VALUE SECTION: 1/10 [What is that?]
Value your money and stay away from this pathetic example of awful anime… AND the game, for the same manner. They are just spinning tops for God’s sake! In reality, you have no control over them and they don’t unleash huge monsters that blow up buildings. Don’t be fooled!

ENJOYMENT SECTION: 5/10 [All the spinning makes you nauseatingly addicted to it.]
Ok, the customization the spinning tops may have is huge and may interest gimmick and miniature fans. Some battles are actually good to look at and the fighting arenas constantly change. Half of the time, there is something bearable to watch… HALF, I say.

VERDICT: 3.5 / 10
The accused is found … GUILTY! … For selling us a pretty box with nothing inside.

SUGGESTION LIST

This series is better than:
Duel Masters and Bedaman. The kings of lame game-based anime.

This series is equal to:
Medarot, Pokemon, YuGiOh, Bakusou Kyoudai Let's & Go. These series also advertise games but they are bearable half the time. read more

First of all: I watched the italian dub and I'm still learning the language so I didn't understand it perfectly.

STORY
It's definitely not the best storyline, mostly it's quite predictable (sometimes suprising though, because they really manage to keep the suspense high). Ok, it's not exactly very realistic - I mean why does a grown up man nothing else to do than playing with his spin top? I felt a little sad for him to be honest ...

ART
The art is well done and the fights are well animated - i'm not a fan of these 3D-animation, but well I can look over it.

CHARACTER
I was suprised, besides of the main chara and his rival - who are stereotypes, everyone else is quite unique. Especially outstanding was their development, for example Kenta, who was a loser at first but finally managed to be able to fight alongside his friends.

ENJOYMENT
I really enjoyed every second of it - ok not the end fight because yeah you know the main chara will win in the end. But besides that it was really good, well otherwise I wouldn't have given it a 10. ^^ read more