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What do you think of the Slice of Life purge on MAL?

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Jan 20, 2023 1:35 AM

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Aug 2018
8518
I think this massive change might be due to so many people erroneously thinking that basically any drama which takes place in a modern setting is SOL, no matter how plot-focused it is.
Jan 20, 2023 2:53 AM

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Oct 2013
9984
Calal-Chan said:
MAL has no excuse. If you look at my post above yours it is insane how many shows by their definition are labeled wrong now. MAL is nice to use for customization stuff but the staff has no idea what they are doing honestly.

The funniest thing about this situation is that if one wanted to strictly follow the definition of slice of life anime as presented on MAL, then I believe even more shows would have to lose their "slice of life" tag, including shows respected and considered by majority of viewers as model SoL shows.

It seems that the next problem after manga database having many entries pending for months (or years) to be added might be the problem of properly tagging animes, lol.
Jan 20, 2023 3:11 AM

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Sep 2010
4739
El001 said:
ateks said:
It's dumb but it's not even the worst part of the genre system. Toradora is currently not even listed as comedy and I could name dozen other examples.

The MAL database is an absolute joke but nobody seems to care about it, the mods are in denial and just power tripping. I even tried to help them fix it but only got negative feedback. Honestly fuck yourself MAL, I've moved to other websites to get my anime information now because your database sucks ass.

https://myanimelist.net/forum/?topicid=2067749

lol forget that. The DB page of Death Notethe second most popular anime on this website has straight up wrong information. The second opening plays from episode 20 to episode 37, but it says "30-37." I even informed these clowns, but they still haven't fixed it.


lmao let's not forget about that one To Love Ru special that doesn't even exist but is just a duplicate of some regular episodes but mods have ignored my complaint multiple times.
ateksJan 20, 2023 3:20 AM
Jan 20, 2023 3:45 AM

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May 2020
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I wouldn't be sure what to think about it. I have always thought of SOL as a genre that tells the lives of the characters but some aspects can be included such as: comedy, drama, music, mystery etc... At this point several series can be considered SOL by me, and others that are considered SOL from the audience I would disagree. Then again if Lucky☆Star can't be considered SOL then I don't know what to tell ya...



MAL is the perfect place to shit talk about people's opinions.
Jan 20, 2023 7:08 AM

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Feb 2013
17583
This would make more sense if it was just Iyashikei, but not with Slice of Life... these 2 genres are too similar now...
Jan 20, 2023 7:36 AM

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Dec 2019
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machy871 said:
I am not trying to say that it's right as it is, but it's a re-do of thousands of entries and even just a first part out of three for now. So it's still ''work in progress''.

And despite all this complaining I have yet to see you guys post in the genre/theme request thread. :I

Yeah, the Genre/Theme Overhaul is still in progress, but the changing of genres is only part of part 1, and the other two parts focus on interest stacks and themes.
Also, I'm aware of the genre/theme request thread. The problem with posting there is that, according to MAL's definition, these changes are justified. I can't go there and say "give k-on the SoL tag" because that directly contradicts the definition since K-on is a comedy. Unless the definition changes, posting there won't do anything.
Jan 20, 2023 7:45 AM

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Aug 2022
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ThorLL said:
If you stretch the definition too far then pretty much every anime is a form of SoL, so some more clear boundaries are needed.
But if you shorten the definition too close then nothing is a Slice of Life anymore, since there are very little anime where there are absolutely zero overarching themes where nothing of note happens during the show.

Jan 20, 2023 8:04 AM
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ateks said:
El001 said:

lol forget that. The DB page of Death Notethe second most popular anime on this website has straight up wrong information. The second opening plays from episode 20 to episode 37, but it says "30-37." I even informed these clowns, but they still haven't fixed it.


lmao let's not forget about that one To Love Ru special that doesn't even exist but is just a duplicate of some regular episodes but mods have ignored my complaint multiple times.

Unbelievable how wrecked this site is. Steins;Gate is another good example; the show takes place in modern day Akihabara; Daru is always talking about the VNs he's playing & his 2D waifus and is obsessed with cat girls; Mayuri works in a maid café & does cosplay as a hobby AND attends anime conventions; the cast regularly hangs out at said maid café; the "moe" culture of Akihabara is a major plot point in one of the episodes; Rukako does cosplay in episode eight; 2channel lingo is regularly used in conversations. And yet, despite all that, it doesn't have the Otaku Culture tag.
Jan 20, 2023 8:17 AM

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Jun 2017
3111
Three obvious problems with MAL's definition:

1. Most of it is negative:
"absence of a central plot"
"lack overarching conflict and resolution"
"without a specific narrative"
etc.
But you can't make definitions by saying what something is not: "A dog is an animal with four legs that doesn't go meow or moo or oink". The right way to go about it is "An animal with four legs that goes woof".

2. It uses the same word in two different senses. If SoL does not have a "narrative" that enforces conflict, slapstick comedy certainly can't have a "narrative" that elicits laughter, as the definition says.

3. Saying that "Slice of Life is incompatible with Comedy, Drama, and Romance by definition" assumes that the "Slice of Life", "Comedy", "Romance" labels are a matter of yes/no rather than of degree. It might have made more sense to say that the classification depends on whether "Slice of Life" aspects take precedence over "Comedy" aspects or the other way around. But fortunately the reality is that this rule of "incompatibility" is not being enforced: there are about 750 entries with both "Comedy" and "Slice of Life" tags. Not even MAL can take this definition seriously.

On the other hand, I agree with some people that there is no need to overreact. It isn't as if having the SoL label on MAL is some kind of badge or prize. If a SoL you like is not regarded by MAL as such, that may even be seen as an honor., given how bad the definition is.

It's not like I want K-On! to be classified as Slice of Life or anything, baka!

Jan 20, 2023 8:43 AM

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Mar 2016
1472
My choice is "some of them makes sense but disagree with lot of them."

How the hell K-on and Lucky star isnt listed as SoL?

Jan 20, 2023 8:50 AM

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Aug 2020
8894
I disagree with it. Also, there are so many titles that aren't there.

Jan 20, 2023 8:54 AM

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Aug 2020
8894
Also, no Hyouka and 3-gatsu no Lion on this list is highly questionable.

Jan 20, 2023 10:58 AM

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Feb 2016
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Roevhaal said:
There also needs to be a comedy purge.
ateks said:
It's dumb but it's not even the worst part of the genre system. Toradora is currently not even listed as comedy and I could name dozen other examples.
The database mods may have purged too much.
その目だれの目?
Jan 20, 2023 11:08 AM

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Oct 2022
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n-nichijou?!? 

i don't think slice of life has to be "mundane", a lot of comedy can be classified as slice of life. 







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Jan 20, 2023 12:19 PM

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Jul 2019
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it was fine back then, now they just complicate things for no reason
Jan 20, 2023 12:24 PM
Tail On!

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Lucifrost said:
Roevhaal said:
There also needs to be a comedy purge.
ateks said:
It's dumb but it's not even the worst part of the genre system. Toradora is currently not even listed as comedy and I could name dozen other examples.
The database mods may have purged too much.
It's really dumb because some anime with no comedy at all have the tag like Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha (atleast StrikerS, it was a while ago since I watched the first 2 seasons so they might contain trace amounts of comedy I suppose) while some full blown comedies lack the tag like Hangyakusei Million Arthur. So yea you might accidentally watch a dedicated comedy while avoiding the tag or run into something with no trace of it when following it. It might be more efficient to remove the tag from every entry and start over from scratch.
Jan 20, 2023 12:42 PM

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Aug 2018
8518
the Clannad/Little Busters situation is another example of MAL's new tags being an epic disaster. Both shows share the same framework as all key anime does. But Clannad had its comedy tag removed and replaced with romance. Why? Only reason I can figure is because Clannad has a reputation for being tragic. Because tragedy is like antimatter to comedy, right? Little Busters still has the comedy tag even though they have suffered so much more! Child abuse, depression, suicide, bullying etc etc.
Jan 20, 2023 7:58 PM

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Feb 2016
15003
epidemia78 said:
But Clannad had its comedy tag removed and replaced with romance. Why? Only reason I can figure is because Clannad has a reputation for being tragic. Because tragedy is like antimatter to comedy, right?
I wondered if this might be the case. MAL still refuses to add a "tragedy" tag, unfortunately. And very few anime are tagged both "drama" and "comedy," even for something as obvious as Clannad. The current rules explicitly allow both tags on a single anime, so I'm not sure why so many comedies and dramas had their tags removed.
その目だれの目?
Jan 20, 2023 9:07 PM

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Jun 2007
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epidemia78 said:
I think this massive change might be due to so many people erroneously thinking that basically any drama which takes place in a modern setting is SOL, no matter how plot-focused it is.

I agree, there were definitely a lot of series on the cut list that had no business being slice of life, like Clannad, Toradora, Mob Psycho, Violet Evergarden, Kokoro Connect, and AnoHana. Among others.

Overall, paring down the criteria to eliminate "any non-action series in contemporary setting is slice-of-life" syndrome is a good move, but I do think the baby's been thrown out with the bathwater in cases like K-On!, Nichijou, Lucky Star, and maybe Blend-S. If SoL is "incompatible with Comedy," does that mean that slice-of-life series have to be completely unfunny and unamusing? I think a distinction can be made between "slice-of-life with comedy elements" and "straight up comedy."

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Jan 20, 2023 9:28 PM

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Jul 2013
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Guys, what if instead of a select few people deciding the genre and themes for every anime, we could all vote on the genre and themes for every anime. This democratic process would cause the majority agreed upon genres and themes to rise to the top for a series. Holy shit, I wonder if anyone has implemented that… oh wait.
Jan 20, 2023 9:58 PM
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Jan 2012
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Like, I agree not every single SoL tagged anime is going to be SoL, but I agree with most here in saying there's a handful that absolutely are SoL which for some reason had the tag removed.

It ain't a pressing issue, but like, why? This took actual work just to make people searching for SoL anime have a marginally harder time. An anime not being an SoL while being labeled as so isn't really going to affect people all that much since honestly if it was capable of being mislabeled as one in the first place it had enough SoL to put off people that don't like SoL, whereas people specifically wanting SoL will miss some because they're no longer labeled SoL. 

Again, really not that big of a deal, I'm going to forget about all of this the second I finish typing this up and leaving the thread, but I'm just baffled because that's so much work for, at best, things to not change at all.
Jan 20, 2023 11:23 PM

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Dec 2021
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toxicsmurf said:
Guys, what if instead of a select few people deciding the genre and themes for every anime, we could all vote on the genre and themes for every anime. This democratic process would cause the majority agreed upon genres and themes to rise to the top for a series. Holy shit, I wonder if anyone has implemented that… oh wait.


This has its own problem. Let's assume we agreed on a genre by majority choice but after some time the former people are replaced by new and their cumulative mentality has different opinion in such cases we need to update everything's once in a year, technically that's very inconvenient for a database system.

Also genres like SoL, Avant Garde & Psychological would face the biggest problem as most of the people still don't have proper understanding of of these genres. People think only sitcoms are SoL, being edgy is Avant Garde and mind games are Psychological. So we do need a consistent defination but at least it should be more logically stated not in a self conflicting way.

𝓢𝓪𝓴𝓾𝓻𝓪
𝓚𝓲𝓷𝓸𝓶𝓸𝓽𝓸
Jan 20, 2023 11:24 PM

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...In what world are Nichijou and Lucky Star not slice of life...?
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Jan 21, 2023 12:03 AM
Tail On!

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Aug 2018
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toxicsmurf said:
Guys, what if instead of a select few people deciding the genre and themes for every anime, we could all vote on the genre and themes for every anime. This democratic process would cause the majority agreed upon genres and themes to rise to the top for a series. Holy shit, I wonder if anyone has implemented that… oh wait.
That sounds absurd, the current system is perfect where users can go into the genre and theme suggestion thread, get on their knees and plea to moderator-sama to consider adjusting the tags just to be ignored.
Jan 21, 2023 12:43 AM
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Aug 2018
2261
Slice of Life is incompatible with Comedy, Drama, and Romance by definition.
Only 46% of SoL tagged entries follow this requirement. Not even half...
Jan 21, 2023 4:47 PM

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Dec 2019
3240
This thread inspired me to make a club whose objective is to find a better definition for Slice of Life. So, if anyone's interesting, you can join it. https://myanimelist.net/clubs.php?cid=88643
Jan 22, 2023 12:25 AM

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Apr 2018
1844
So what's the problem you don't start disliking the anime itself just because it isn't included in the sol genre.

May 2, 1:27 PM

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Feb 2020
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MAL and their habit of fixing things that aren’t broken
May 2, 2:02 PM
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Sep 2022
424
They have become confused. Slice of Life does not have to mean Slice of Real Life.

Nichijou is obviously SoL as well as being an absurdist comedy.
May 2, 2:04 PM
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Sep 2022
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Reply to NekoZamurai
So what's the problem you don't start disliking the anime itself just because it isn't included in the sol genre.
@NekoZamurai All genres are a form of recommendation - if you liked X, you might like Y because they are both G - so it's mainly an issue for people searching for the next thing to watch.
May 2, 9:46 PM

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Jul 2024
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I think it's always good to have more slice-of-life anime, they are very relaxing
May 2, 9:49 PM
I don't care much about SOL except for the ones I like.
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May 2, 9:58 PM

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Reply to therealnagora
They have become confused. Slice of Life does not have to mean Slice of Real Life.

Nichijou is obviously SoL as well as being an absurdist comedy.
@therealnagora
Everything is slice of life going by your logic.
その目だれの目?
May 2, 11:09 PM
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Jun 2008
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Slice of life is always a great genre just to mellow out to, I can see why there are so many.
May 3, 12:00 AM
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Reply to Lucifrost
@therealnagora
Everything is slice of life going by your logic.
@Lucifrost Not really. AoT is obviously plot-driven, for example.
May 3, 7:39 AM

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Jul 2013
12161
I don't care how people classify slice of life anime. I just care that it is still listed on this website. I enjoy looking up anime shows on MAL to later watch. I don't care about the specific definition of slice of life. All I care it is still being listed on here.
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May 3, 7:58 AM

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Jun 2019
7878
Still disagree with it as thoroughly and completely I did on day one of the changes, still didn't expect any sudden coming to reason or positive changes to revert the misstep in that regard in either the short or long-term (and lo and behold, there weren't any, at least to date at the time of writing this and submission of the post), and still committed therefore to just largely relying on my own manually-typed genre tags especially for entries I had already entered in prior to the horrible anti-logic changes. It's really a perversion of logic and outright downgrading of the site in that respect. Every bit as much now and today as the first day it came down.
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