H2O ~Footprints in the Sand~

[Buffalobiian]

Plot Summary: Takuma Hirose, a blind young male high school student, though the cause for his blindness is undetermined. After his mother died an unexpected death, it left a deep emotional scar on him, which caused him to become very lonely and reserved. Due to this, Takuma and his father move from the city out into a rural area and Takuma is enrolled into a new high school. At his new school, he meets several new girls, though three of whom he gets to know the most out of anyone else. They are, the firm and obstinate Hayami Kohinata, the kind and obliging Hinata Kagura, and the cheerful and mysterious Otoha. As Takuma interacts with these girls, his medical condition gradually begins to heal. (Source: ANN)

The first of 12 episodes released by BakaWolf & m.3.3.w.

ep 1

[KrayZ33]

wooo... sounds interesting somehow
i hope the characters do a look better than on the pictures.

edit: weehhh.. i dont like the char design at all.

[Buffalobiian]

Well, I actually like the characters quite a bit. Not just them, but the story as a whole. First episode takes us right into the troubles of the school. First punching scene makes you really wonder why the guys are so shameless, and why the girl puts up with it. Hinata doesn't seem to be the only person to refer to the main character as -sama. Pretty good first ep, I'll be on the lookout for more.

OP/ED had a nice feel to them too.

[Yukimura]

Wow this show already has pretty much everything I look for in a show about school life. A 'queen bee', a dopey main character with a shady past, a hyper formal timid girl, a tsundere, and unexpectedly gritty undertones. Plus they threw in the semi-loli character designs. I can't imagine not continuing on with this one, it looks to be a blend of Myself Yourself, School Days, Magikano, Clannad and a bunch of other themes from school anime that are more than just slice of life.

[NeoBear]

oh i like this it always shocks me how in anime things that would be so unexceptibull here in the states are often explored without out so much as a flinch. im betting this will be more then your typical harem anime, hell ill even go so far as to bet we dont get a hot springs episode how often can you say that =O

[David75]

Geez, quite ecchi if you ask me, that butt on his face thing was a bit embarasing...

[Ryllharu]

Well, I didn't really expect much after I saw the ridiculous promo video that was partially in English, but I'm pleasantly surprised in the series so far. Many questions all from the start.

- The class rep's (Hinata, who looks exactly like ToHeart2's Sasara) excuse for calling him "-sama" really didn't seem to make any sense, and as it turns out, her grandfather also refers to him that way. Is she from an ancient ninja clan, or is Takuma and his family a lot more important than we suspected.

- Yui controls the school quite obviously, but why does she pick on Hayami so consistently, and moreover, everyone in the school either tolerate or endorse it? How does Hayami's family fit into the social structure of this rural town?

- Who or what the hell is Otoha? She claims to be a spirit, which Takuma didn't take seriously until she actually made him see. So far, no one else has seen her, and she disappeared completely before the Takuma and the boar came across Hayami. I suppose we will have to take her at her word.

I'm sure these will all be answered in time, but this is a very good start.

[animus]

It was Ok for a first episode, but the art just looked so mangled a lot of the time.

[Board of Command]

The 720p version looked like it had a blur filter on top of the video, making the edges look fuzzy and distorted... It looks like watercolor in some scenes.

(it's not due to pausing in the middle of motion or anything, since this blurry stuff is consistent throughout the entire episode)


^ watercolor eyes and distorted edges

As for the episode itself, I thought it was a pretty good start. Lots of mysterious elements and interesting characters. The plot has quite a bit of potential.

[David75]

Edit:
The 720p version is the MKV one.
At first I didn't beleive it since the file were the same weight around 170MB... since the MKV wasn't labelled as 720
Thanks for pointing out there's a better resolution (even if not better quality?)

[Kraco]

Not too many series start with guys beating up a girl. Quite a shock start.

The whole blindness thing seemed peculiar though. It's hard to imagine any regular series could have a main character with such a disability due to the obvious constraints it imposes (unless we are talking about Daredevil), and so unless the blindness is a central theme of the show, it's obvious it will get bypassed one way or another. And if that happens, why was it there in the first place? Now it looks like the dude got rid of his unseeing eyes already in the first ep (it would actually make sense if the other students thought he was just faking the blindness during the first day for extra attention whoring).

This looks like a show with spirit.

[Yukimura]

I think the blindness is there as an obstacle to be overcome through interaction with the heroines. His visions and memories seem to include enough detail that I don't think he's always been blind also. Maybe he's not actually blind in the physical sense but he can't processes what his eyes show him normally for some psychological reason. Then there's the whole magical girl element which makes things even more murky. All in all it seems like it could be pretty interesting.

[DDBen]

I found this one pretty questionable it didn't flow very well for me and as stated why make a guy blind and have his eye's work on occasion in episode 1 of all things it just seems to soon.

Anyway not sure I'll finish this series but I'm willing to give it another episode or 2 in order to find out if it gets interesting.

[Buffalobiian]

I was also trying to figure out if they guy is really blind or not. And also, the significance of the beach and sand. We have no idea if that school is near the shore, but nothing hints it, and the narration about God not being there when needed. I thought it was the girl being beaten, but in the ep, it was the guy who ventures into the sand. Guess I'll have to wait for next week.

[Ryllharu]

I thought it was much clearer after we find that Ami Koshimizu, narrating the opening scene, was playing the boy and not the girl getting beat up. Take that with what Otoha kept calling herself and doing to Takuma (the boy) and it makes perfect sense.

Takuma talks about God "not being there when he needed [her] the most." Hayami is getting beat up by the loli-bitch's two goons, and Takuma is stuck sitting at the house, blind, with the rain pouring down. Otoha granted him two times in the first episode alone the ability to see. Now that Hayami truly needs him to defend her (even if he is just a weakling), there's simply nothing he can do. Obviously blind again in that scene, he's unable to find his way to her, especially in the pouring rain where he can't hear anything.


The beach was just a figurative thing near as I could tell, maybe even a dream Otoha is somehow getting near him. The town is deep is the mountains.

[Buffalobiian]

Bakawolf & m.3.3.w's episode 2.

Xvid.

H264

[Ryllharu]

How quickly a series can turn from promising...

In the first episode, the mysteries were interesting, but now they've just become trite and pointless. Hinata is supposed to be "saving" Takuma from something, and the evils of Hayami, but not bothering to explain it by now just makes it seem incredibly childish.

Yui becomes beyond annoying, attacking Hayami for no reason, and no one, even the teacher, doesn't give a shit?! Apparently she's not even as affluent or as important as Hinata, but she's somehow the dominating force in the town and school. Maybe that's because all Hinata ever does is make the pouting noise and get all quiet.

Yui's interactions with Hamaji were cute the first time, getting all angry, but in this episode they were just obnoxious.

Everyone uses Hayami as the whipping boy, but by not explaining why, it just becomes stupid and pointless. So everyone hates her, tell us why. It's already been established that everyone hates or avoids her, she's done something to make her the ultimate target, but now it's just wasted time that could have been used for development.

The, to top it all off, they take Takuma's blindness, and make it appear that no one noticed he was blind in the first place! Why even bother, other than make the opening scene of the first episode more dramatic because he's suddenly helpless again. Even if we assume Otoha is so powerful to not only make him be able to see, but also make it so that everyone thought he was never blind in the first place.

Even the animation got worse.

Subsequently, I'm dropping this series here. I could barely even finish this episode.

[Board of Command]

I agree with Ryllharu. This series turned sour pretty quick. The blindness thing is my biggest problem. Nobody seemed to care or notice that he's able to open his eyes all of a sudden - not even Takuma's uncle! What's up with that?

[animus]

By the sounds of it, you guys saved me from a headache.

[narutosharingan]

I definitely thought the whole blindness thing was odd...what is going on. But I'm going to watch a couple more episodes and see if they explain all of this. Maybe there's a reason for the complete switch.