As a big time fan of Mitsuru Adachi, I was quite looking forward to this anime. But I was a little optimistic too. The only decent animation based on Adachi's manga I have seen so far is Touch. And I had to drop H2 anime just watching the first half of the first episode. So, I started watching Cross game with a critical mind........... and just after watching the first episode it banged me so hard in my heart that I became obsessed with it :D. No doubt, this is the best anime adaptation of Mitsuru Adachi's manga so far.

The story is more about human emotion than baseball. The mangaka did a really good job playing with the characters emotions - love, pain of loss, ambition, friendship. The story is not completely same with the manga, but it followed the manga story line in it's own way. There are a few additional character and side story which were not present in the original manga. But I can't say these side stories filler. These side stories actually made the anime more solid. Specially they helped the character development of Aoba Tsukishima.

The animation is really good. They kept the original Adachi style character expression :D . You will know it when you watch it. As the sound, for a couple of months I'm listening the musics almost everyday. The opening theme is same for all 50 episodes. The ending theme changed 4 or 5 times.

The character development is really well thought of. Of course Mitsuru Adachi is a master mangaka. But as i said, the anime story differ a little than the manga. But the difference really made the character better. In my opinion, in some respect the anime is better than the manga.

I enjoyed this anime for the last one year. After the series was complete, i re-watched the whole 50 episodes non stop in 2 days. It made my eyes hurt a lot. But, I can still do the same thing over and over again.

About the encode, I shouldn't praise myself too much. But these is the best encode i have ever done. almozayaf also did a pretty good job encoding the first 15 episodes.

Overall I will give it a 10/10. This is a must watch anime if you like romance, baseball and slice of life.

I first saw Initial D: First Stage in Animax Asia. To me, it was a completely new type of anime. I have seen other car racing anime like eXD, but Initial D is the most realistic.

The story and animation is really good. Specially the animation. Every type of car moves and drifts on its own way. The animators were well aware of it.

The sound theme for the English dub is some what a disaster but who cares about it. The original Japanese musics are mind breaking. The character design is a little bit odd though, but you will get used to it.

When I first started to encode this series, I was afraid of the quality. I have seen small size rmvb encodes and they are close to rubbish specially when it comes to night scene in the mountain pass. After the encode I am satisfied with the work.

Enjoy everyone.

Another must watch anime. I basically started to watch this anime because of its awesome sound tracks. Then the story line caught me. But at the end I was a little disappointed. There are some major unanswered questions which really takes a toll on your enjoyment. Questions like the real what is the real identity of Al? What relation does she has with Exile? What kind of ship is Exile? If the people migrated from earth then how did the Gild took control over the superior technology? etc.

As I mentioned before, the sound track is really awesome. The animators did a good job too. I believe they used a fade color shade in the whole anime to express the struggle of life on this bare planet where water is the most precious object. The air ship designs and its flight mechanism concept is interesting.

But the script writer should have put a little effort in the development of character. Some background could have made the story more solid like how did Tatiana and Princes (later Empress) Sophia came abroad Solvana and of course the story of how Captain Alex (who as just a Van Ship pilot only 10 years ago) got hold of such a superior air ship like Solvana.

Anyway, if one can omit the errors, then it can become a most enjoyable anime to watch.