Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
Koleax
This anime's plot asks a lot from you and doesn't give anything back. It's abusive, cheap, and cynically manipulative. The music carries the show. It simply does not deserve to have music this good, but somehow it's there and they take advantage off it. I can almost see a producer thinking, "Wow, this music is great. We can just have people look at a static image and call it a day." Over half the animation team phoned it in and went out to get drunk, while one guy stayed behind to actually make a few characters move here and there.
Back when this first came out, I was very interested because I like video games and virtual environments and slow-burning philosophical stories that give me plenty of time to think, but .hack//Sign does not ask you to think. It asks you to be retarded. I had al…
Read at the sourcenekogunner
This show was one the first anime I watched growing up after seeing big staples on Toonami on Cartoon Network along with the likes of Outlaw Star, Last Exile, Dragonball Z, and Gundam Wing. As such it holds a special place in my heart and still to this day has some of the most unique character and class designs. The wave master with their staff and a little orb floating inside being one of the most iconic to me along with the various tattoos.
The basic premise of a person's consciousness being stuck in a virtual MMORPG and being unable to log out and yet interact with everyone else who could log out was a unique and really interesting draw to me in the early 2000's. As the show goes on you learn more about the other characters in the show as they are introduced and their motives. Are they…
Read at the sourceMonnekey
26 episodes, nothing ever happens. Characters talk and talk and talk with no end....
This anime is only relevant if you plan to play .hack//IMOQ because some of the things are referenced and explained on the anime, and it is a prequel. Good ideas, nice music (Yuki Kajiura FTW) but a mediocre execution. A few episodes are actually relevant and the anime ends right where it starts to become interesting. It's dissapointing.
Maybe it would be better if it was an 12 episode anime and it is SO SLOW PACED that I'd recommend watching on 1,5x.
Also, the protagonist is even more irritating than Shinji Ikari from Neon Genesis Evangelion.
Read at the sourceTheColonel
Sign should not be passed up as merely the start of a grand and somewhat inconsistent multimedia franchise. It's a strange and unexciting mess perfectly characteristic of its specific place in its own specific era of anime, one that almost purposefully discards any concept of focusing on the more action-packed sides of its premise in favor of pure psychological drama that often times is not even playing on grander, darker concepts so much as very mundane reasons for why people retreat to online worlds.
All of its darker imagery is heavily contrasted with characters who are so detached from it that they spend most of their time doing basic MMO questing and joking about their personal life issues, even the main character most deeply invested in the grander supernatural mysteries ultimately…
Read at the sourcebaywomiles
i hate that im never going to get the feeling of watching this for the first time ever again, life feels beautiful. help children who need it even if they don't want it, be there for the friends you make online, meet new people and see new things. if you aren't the best at words say the things you think anyways. give children autonomy because they are smarter and more emotionally intelligent than you think.
please please please watch, get engaged in this story love these characters find your own meaning in the themes it presents.
Mimiru i hope to see you again i miss you and i hope to kiss Bear and BT in my next life💔
Read at the sourceNfeKteD
.hack is one of those animes where everything is separated into different locations, animes, games, mangas, novels, etc. However, the anime is not an adaptation of these other contents, but rather a complement, which makes people who know the universe more immersive in the story.
A highlight not only of this, but of the entire franchise, is its soundtrack, easily becoming an album to listen to while working or doing other tasks.
The anime is focused entirely on the narrative, with combats being "complementary". I would recommend watching it if, for some reason, you are interested in the franchise, that is, watching the other animes, playing the games, etc., otherwise it may be boring to watch.
Read at the sourceNitaKodiak
.hack//Sign is a solid 7/10 for fans of slower, thought-provoking anime. Set in an MMORPG, it follows Tsukasa, who’s stuck in the game with no way out. The show nails its mysterious vibe with a beautiful soundtrack by Yuki Kajiura and cool world design, though the animation feels a bit dated now.
Where the show shines is in its deep dive into themes like identity and loneliness. It’s more about character drama and conversations than flashy action, so if you’re into fast-paced shows, it might feel slow. But if you like exploring complex characters and psychological themes, this one's worth a watch.
Read at the sourceLemonadeSamurai
I'm going to be honest. This is a masterpiece and you need to see it. Ignore the score it has and watch it. It needs way more love for how compelling it is
First off let's start with the opening. The opening intro is incredibly well done and alluring. One of the best anime openings of the 2000s.
The characters? There aren't many but they're heavily developed as the story unfolds and they all have a story to tell.
The setting is an MMORPG called The World where a young boy named Tsubasa is suddenly teleported to. He didn't go there willingly and he has no idea HOW he got there nor he can he log out.
The beauty of .hack//Sign isn't the world itself but the story. See, the MMORPG isn't the plot. It's a backdrop.
The MMORPG they're in is purely used as the setting for the story. It's…
Read at the sourceGeneralSexy
I'm not sure how to feel about this one. At first glance it's about an mmo full of combat and exploration and.....it has none of that. At all. You see 4 monsters in the show total. Apparently one of the most popular mmo's of all time in universe with millions of players. You'll see about 57 people in the background over the entire show. But the main characters will bump into each other constantly as if guided by some other-wordly force (not even getting into the fact of the entire main cast living in the exact same city, what a HUGE coincidence). And with a soundtrack that is odd at some times, very good at others but usually ill-fitting of what's usually going on
And yet, despite all that, it had me hooked. I wanted to know more about the breadcrumbs of plot it would give us, about the c…
Read at the sourceTheWiseChampion
I don't often write reviews as I like to just enjoy and appreciate what I'm watching, but this anime was a complete waste of time. Not to sound immature but with the fantasy RPG setting, the massive franchise it spawned, and the flashy upbeat opening, I thought this was gonna be some grand, action-packed epic adventure. It was not. It's 26 episodes of everyone just moping and talking. Not that talking's bad, but where did any of these conversations go? Absolutely nowhere. I don't care about any of these characters. They're so dull and flat. The main character whose name I never remember even while watching is just Shinji Ikari except instead of not wanting to be in the robot he doesn't seem to really want to play the game. But who's forcing him? This was just an absolute chore to watch. I'…
Read at the sourceCaptainKenshiro
Ever since the trapped in videogame type of isekai sub-genre became a fad, you could read some people saying that this one show, the first of them all by a long margin, is actually the best, and since those comments come from people who hate that genre, I always wanted to check it out. I was initially planning to review the franchise as a whole once I finished it, but who knows if that will even happen.
Obviously, this anime is quite outdated when it comes to visuals, for a 2002 anime the artwork is solid and the backgrounds are great, while everything else is just fine, the character designs were once iconic, but now come off as simple and kind of generic, plus the character models can be inconsistent at times. Since the series is dialogue-heavy, the characters remain mostly standing or…
Read at the sourceIvanLaptev
Have you played online games where the social component is important? And did you have the feeling that you will live your life in this game, find your love, ignoring the conventions of the game? If yes, then .hack//Sign will seem very close and familiar to you.
This is the story of people who want to believe that the game is more than just a game. And literally, story lives on this faith. The characters here are not just invented images. First of all, these are people who control their avatars. At any moment they can leave the game, and for them it will cease to matter. And their actions should be regarded from the position that they are trying to abstract from reality, but not get out of it. They don't feel the pain, or the warmth of their close player - but they want to believe it.…
Read at the sourceVyaiskaya
One of my favourite anime.
What to expect:
Slow-driven social and internal developent focused on characters/groups interactions in an incomplete information atmosphere with competing goals and purposes. A great deal of the series focuses on conversation, often introspective ones. Dives into philosophy.
Realistic characters who are more diverse than a typical hyper-active "defeat everything" Bildungsroman shounen, this includes a realistic and clinically depressed amnesiatic lead. The characters all experience a variety of e.g. trauma and coping mechanisms, and these themes may not be appreciable for those searching for a simple feel good escapist story. In my experience, those who have dealt with trauma typically have a far higher appreciation of this anime.
Social issues which wer…
Read at the sourcedelesley
The soundtrack for .hack//sign is one of Yuki Kajiura's early works, and it is absolutely amazing. When it came out, it was unlike almost anything else. (Noir is another early work by YK, and also very good). You should absolutely buy the soundtrack. Don't bother watching the anime.
The music is especially noticeable, because there is almost nothing else that will grab your attention on screen. The background art is decent, but most of the animation simply reuses the same sets over, and over, and over again. The first few episodes make you think that the anime is going to turn into something really cool, but it never pans out. The plot is entirely uninteresting, and the characters are either really annoying, or really boring, and often both.
The anime is supposedly set in an online MMORP…
Read at the sourceMaiGalaxy
This could've been a 6, maybe even a 7 depending how the ending went but, sadly, that was not the case. This review will contain spoilers, particularly about the ending however, what you at LEAST need to know that isn't a spoiler is, if you watch this anime, expect to have to play the games to get all the answers and possibly also watch the other anime in the franchise for any remaining ones and even then I cannot assure you you'll have all the mysteries solved as i have not played any game or seen any anime besides this one. I have however taken a look at stuff which tells me this is likely the only way you're going to get the answers you seek at the end of this season and episode 27 and 28 of this series... (Though someone claimed some of the answers but not all are answered in .hack//Le…
Read at the sourcehalimede
It's a decent show - like the older version of Sword Art Online, kind of? I think for a show to come out that time with this plot is pretty impressive and creative (although I keep finding more plots and stories with similar backgrounds). The soundtrack is Yuki Kajiura so you KNOW it's great, but the downside are the characters. The main character is annoying and I feel like it was hard for me to keep up with plot because I couldn't understand what he was thinking / doing. Everyone else was kind of okay; Bear and Mimiru I didn't feel much about but they did grow on me.
Read at the sourceW3TFT
You don't need to know about the .sign series to enjoy this show, because I didn't know about the franchise and I really liked it. Granted, if you have a fondness for isekai or video games then you'd probably enjoy it a little bit more.
As for the pacing, it is actually good if you know what you are watching it for. I realized that, what felt like every scene (surely not every frame) had something important in it. Granted, not every scene was truly important, but while I watched it you could sense the gradual changing of a character's development.
It is a really good isekai, in the broad sense of isekai I mean ("another world"), because the show managed to get me interested in literally "The World" (the literal game) and I could understand how those mmorpg players were so immersed into…
Read at the sourceRESOLVING_POWER
I finished watching .hack//sign (including OVAs).
Above all else, the soundtrack is phenomenal. Yuki Kajiura is insanely talented.
One of the best OSTs I've heard in recent memory. Strongly recommend you check it out because it seems underappreciated.
Having said the above…
Let me clarify that I only watched the anime. Apparently this is a multimedia project, so others more immersed in the franchise might be more positive than me.
The only other positive thing I have to say is that the voice acting was actually pretty good. Definitely some talented voice actors in the cast.
The fundamental flaw of this anime is that it is extremely poorly directed. I literally felt like I was watching a highschool art project. It is that bad. There are occasional engaging scenes but overall the ser…
Read at the sourcenyanreview
If you go into .hack//SIGN expecting an epic action/adventure, a deep mystery, or to enjoy an escapist fantasy, you're going to be disappointed. SIGN is a character study, and deeply introspective. It's not about videogames; it's about people who play videogames, and why.
What makes it interesting is that the characters are roleplaying. What you see is not what is actually happening in the game (a common critique), but what they are collectively imagining is happening. The catalyst for the story is an encounter with a problem that supersedes the game, yet exists almost entirely within it. Slowly, over the course of the series, you get a glimpse at the people behind the avatars. They shed the skin of stereotypical anime characters, existing within a bright color palette and strict archety…
Read at the sourceTyphSZ
Sign was one of the first in the .hack // series that I watched, and I can say that I am completely disappointed. I already knew the problems of this anime and really thought I could ignore it, it used that proposal of the MC stuck in the online game, which makes me already excited, even because I like the style. Yes, let's go to the review!
1 - Story [6/10] - As I said earlier, I like Sign's proposal, but I don't think it was done well. The worst point of this anime is the fact that the development is extremely slow, the dense dialogue does not hold you at any time, while watching the anime I felt that the dialogues did not change much and were not interesting, the plot and much dragged and undeveloped. Believe me, I am not the type who likes to put action on everything like SAO, but thi…
Read at the source
