Customer Reviews

Initial D - Battle 1 - Akina's Downhill Specialist

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

It's mangled, just like the manga (US release). In the English version on the disc, they really bent over for American Censorship (TM). K.T.? Natalie? Iggy? Who came up with these names? Also, the original creators actually sampled the authentic engine sounds for each of the different cars for the original version. But the english audio has these "tricked out" rice rockets in an attempt to be "cooler' and "more hip" to the same people who think "The Fast and the Furious" is real. The background music as well was mangled, as they replaced the original tracks with - face it - horrible garage and punk bands. The major KICK-IN-THE-PANTS is that the relationship between Natsumi (errr, Natalie?) and her "daddy" has been deeply removed. I guess enjou kosai is too deep a subject for American audiences. My advice? Don't buy the TOKYOPOP release. Save your money for the R2's.

I love Initial D. Initial D is one of the best animes out there. And I've been paciently waiting its arrival in the U.S. After buying and watching Battle 1 I've got a few things to say. There's good knews and bad knews. The good knews is that Inital D is a great show. The story, the characters, the cars, and definately the racing is awesome. I really like the whole CG effect used. The bad knews is that the "tricked out" version on this dvd is absolute garbage. They changed way too much. First off, they changed the music from the awesome eurobeat techno type of stuff which gets your blood pumping, to some really gay and loud rap. Not only is the music horrible, but in almost all parts of the episodes, the music is so loud you can't here what the characters are saying. Another bad thing is that the voices and some of the things they say have been somewhat changed. There is not possible way that they could have made Iggy's voice more annoying. The good thing is the enhanced video. It seems that the picture is clearer and brighter than the orriginal which makes it much easier to watch. Despite all these drawbacks, the best thing is that you can watch the original Japanese on this dvd. My advice is to choose the original version, make sure subtitles are on, and then also make sure in the settings part the video is on enhanced video. Because that way you can watch it with original music and voices, yet keep the higher quality video. That is the savior of this DVD. If it weren't for the horrible english version that has been created, I would have given this DVD a 5. Get it, no questions asked. Just make sure you watch it in Japanese. ^_^

Ugh, I've been a fan of Initial D for several years. For those of you not familiar with Initial D, the series has been divided into three stages, 1st stage, 2nd stage, and 3rd stage. From reading about the product on the website it sounded to me like this dvd contained all episosdes from first stage (probably 10+ episodes, im not sure the exact number). Well in actuality this dvd has 3 episodes from first stage, barely enough episodes to get the plot even started. I was very dissapointed when I found this out. Also, even though they have a classic setting on the dvd, they still changed the subtitles. Even despite that they change the wording, what I found particularly annoying was that they tended to cut long sentences in half. If you can read at any reasonable speed though, you are left waiting to read the next half of the sentence. It makes the dialog feel much less smooth. Maybe for the price I shouldn't have expected all of the first stage episodes, but at the same time, 3 episodes at probabably 20-25 minutes each doesn't seem like its worth what I paid (although with all the extra features they get to say they have 150 minutes of footage).

I was extremely dissapointed with this product, and I'm going to go see if I can exchange it or anything right this second.

Man I am reading some of your reviews and I must say STOP BI*CHING! I mean I see people complaining about the American version of Inital D and how they changed the music SO WHAT! Toykopop also added the Japanese verison for people that like to read the fast subtitles and miss the action.

The story is great about Tak not even knowing that he is a born street racer and he non-shalate (sp?) atittude makes he a very good main character. To me this is the best of Anime and street racing all in one cartoon!

Takami Fujiwara doesn't know why his best friends Iggy and Cole are always making such a big deal out of racing down Mt. Akina all the time like it's some ultimate accomplishment in their lives. Cole even has a "pro" team called the "Speed Stars" which owns the bragging rights for fastest times down the mountain. Little do they know that Tak's father was a great racer in his own time and has taught Tak everything he knew. Not for racing, but to deliver tofu for his business! Iggy and Cole talk Tak into getting a job with them to save up money to buy an "Eight Six", a legendary racing car. Imagine their shock when they find out that the car Tak has been delivering tofu in IS an "Eight Six" but he was so ignorant of automobiles he didn't even know what it was! Another racing team, the "Red Suns", arrives on the scene to conquer the Speed Stars, and even Cole might not be able to beat them. But there is a car, like a ghost in the night, that defeated one of the Red Suns....that just happens to have been an Eight-Six! Will Tak reveal his skills to his friends to keep Mt. Akina under Speed Star territory or not?

Initial D looks so bad visually that any good points it has are undercut. The character designs look awful with everybody's head looking like swollen bananas and their lips looking like dead butterflys. It almost felt like I was watching the Simpsons! But I can't fault the anime creators because the manga looks just as bad and looks like a fan comic that somehow caught on with the teenage set during the street racing craze. So this sketchy and unfinished look was translated to the anime. What's funny is that in the middle of these awful looking characters are these CG cars that stand out in huge contrast to the crudeness of the animation around them and look like rhinoceri sliding across ice. The shaky edit cuts where the picture literally jumps doesn't increase my respect for the show either. It was mildly entertaining, but to me, for a racing anime, there wasn't a lot of racing, just a lot of talking by faces that would look at home on the Munsters. Interesting enough to try the second volume.

Theres only one thing wrong with this anime. The characters are poorly drawn, but other than that its an awesome anime with a great story behind it. The story starts with a car formally called a 86' toyota driving down the hill of Akina. There are conflicts between the racing gangs known as the RedSuns and the SpeedStars. I highly recommend this movie to anyone who likes a good story and enjoys cars!!!

although i didnt purchase any of the initial D dvd's i did see all of the episodes they feature and from what i saw they dont leave much to be desired. the animators really went all out for the racing scenes and it was worth it. it was all around a good series and there are only two minor complaints i have about it, the subtitles were a little fast, either that or im a slow reader, and secondly the show falls into the same trap that every other good anime has and that is the occasional corny line here and there but otherwise this series was mesmerising,and one of my favorite things about it was that it was one of the more realstic ones that I've seen unlike those childish shows like dragon ball or pokemon.

This is an awesome anime series. If you're a fan of cars and/or anime then this is for you! Some people are calling this the Fast and the Furious in animation, but it is much different. F&F focuses on illegal drag racing and the use of nitrous to win every race while Initial D is about the Drift and grip styles which take a lot more skill to master and it also shows that you don't need super power to win.

The racing scenes are awesome and done in CGI while they also keep the typical Japanese animation style for the characters. Tokyopop brought this series over and changed the names of the characters and the music to make it more hip, which in my opinion is lame. While they offer the original or the 'tricked out' version, they still cut some important scenes that you will need to see to understand stage 2 (season 2) which may or may not be released.

Overall, it's very well done and fun to watch. Reading subtitles isn't as hard as a lot of people think and you won't miss any of the action. I gave it 4 stars because they changed the original music, names, and cut some scenes.

I am a HUGE fan of Initial D and I was very disappointed to hear that the music was changed and names were changed. I haven't seen the American version but to hear these changes were made is appalling. The music is a major part of the series, the whole Japanese culture is a huge part of this show. It cannot be compared to Fast and Furious. Get the subbed version, reading isn't as bad as you would think, you get used to it very quickly. As to the Japanese version I cannot recommend it enough.

the entire reason i dislike this dvd is because of how much tokyopop changed. they cut story elements from the original japanese, they changed a LARGE percentage of dialog. when i mean changed, they changed WAAAY too much. the basic jist of what the characters say is more or less the same, but tokyopop tried to direct the dialogue towards teenagers still living in 1993 despite how fairly recent the anime is (1995 in japan at earliest is my guess...1997-1998 in north america via tokyopop at earliest).

initial d is all about the driving skill and techniques. the animation was never great because the anime is driven by the races and the events leading up. tokyopop apparently didn't realise this and REMOVED a good percentage of the technical talk. the tokyopop version has been HORRIBLY dumbed down, and thus is pointless for a drift fan to watch.

the only reason i'd suggest you purchasing this is so you can legally get a fansub of it and watch the anime with proper dialogue and real racing music rather than old-school rap. i love rap, but it has no place in racing games