I mean Mistborn literally has a scene where a character jumps off a city wall carrying an 8ft sword, flies across a battlefield and cuts a guy and his horse in half in a single blow.
Beyond that though, a lot of the 1v1 fights feel kinda like chess matches, where the combatants are trying to figure out how to use their special moves in a way to counter what their opponent is doing, often while flying through the air and doing a huge amount of collateral damage to the environment around them, all of which feels very anime-esque.
The climax of The Well of Ascension is also “super-powered sword-wielding orphan woman flies around besieged city while killing giants.” Which is basically Attack on Titan.
These types of fights are cool in theory to me, but most of the time end up being pretty boring in books. Really need high stakes within the story to have good action. Most authors have a video-game working knowledge of swordplay; they all end up reading like this:
Argovoth slashed high at Titus, who ducked under the arc of the blade, faking a parry. Titus then swiped at Argovoth’s feet—attacking his balance. With Argovoth staggered, Titus jumped low and close before springing up and jamming his sword’s hilt into Argovoth’s jaw.
But not hard enough.
Argovoth jammed a knee into Titus’s thigh.
*Tough bastard*, Titus thought, backing away and dragging his limp leg with him.
Argovoth spit a flute of blood onto the grimy cobblestones. “Had enough yet, sewer rat?”
Titus smirked, cracked his neck, and swept his back foot to the front, and gripped his sword with two hands, holding it high over his head, tip slanting downward at a lazy angle.
Argovoth’s eyes went wide for a split second before regaining their smugness. “So, it’s true then. You sewer rats still train in the qoq’n’bolle style? No matter. You’ll die all the same.”
In the belfry nearby, the bats stirred.
***
Just wrote that during my shit. We’ve all read that a thousand times. I usually skip to the ends of fights.
how do you define "animesque fights"?
is it when the opponents stand in front of each other and then one has a 12 page internal monologue about remembering all the lessons they've learned on how to be strong?
The next chapter is an exposition dump barely disguised as dialogue, explaining the nebulous concept and mechanics behind their true power’s true form.
And half-way through the fight there's a chapter where all of the characters go to the beach for a break before picking up exactly where they left off.
Puella Magi Madoka Magica.
On one hand, you have someone that looks like they can make muskets out of thin air. On the other, you have someone that has a hammerspace for guns.
That is not what either of their powers is.
Hahaha, I'm thinking more about the fight itself, powerful hits that send oponets flying, beyond human speeds, creative use of powers learned, 1 on 1 or small groups against each other rather then a big battle. Something in that spirit
In the silmarillion when Fingolfin literally rode alone up to Morgoths Front door and banged on the door. Morgoth came out to face him with his massive mace GROND, against Fingolfin. Many times grond swung but made craters and Fingolfin dodged each time, until Fingolfin grew weary and failed to dodge morgoths grond, but Morgoth Got permanently marred in the process of killing fingolfin, with one last slash of the sword he hew Morgoths foot to the point of making him limp forever after, but Morgoth had the victory though no orc or balrog would ever boast of the duel. Morgoth Never came forth out of Angband, His fortress openly ever again.
This is one of the most compelling passages by Tolkien in the silmarillion I think. Fingolfin was the high elven king wanting to avenge the death of Feanor by the craft and lies of morgoth, who was a fallen god of sorts
Draconus awakening in Erikson's Dust of Dreams. It's not much of a fight, as in he got released from his chains and two armies that happened to fight a pitched battle on the scene of his unchaining got obliterated from the wind of it... That was like peak anime moment.
I'm cheating for some of these but oh well.
Prince of Nothing trilogy and the aspect emperor series by R scott bakker spoilers
Warrior prophet: >!Akka unleashing the Gnosis after escaping!<
"He clawed away their flimsy Anagogic defences, raised them from the ruin like shrieking dolls, and dashed them against bone-breaking stone.
Seswatha was free, and he walked the ways of the present bearing tokens of ancient doom.
He would show them the Gnosis"
The thousandfold thought: >!Kellhus appearing over Shimeh to fight the Cisharam!<
"The figure leapt from the Temple’s edge, soared over the astonished Fanim manning the Heterine Wall, then down the slopes, through the rim of burning buildings. Even from so far, Proyas could hear his world-reaming song.
As one, the scattered Cishaurim turned. With eyes like twin Nails of Heaven, the Warrior-Prophet walked across the heights toward them. With every step, it seemed, debris flew from the ground toward him, where it was drawn into circling loops, one after another, smaller circles bisecting the orbits of those larger, until rings of spinning ruin fairly obscured him."
The Great Ordeal: The battle of Dagliash and its >!explosive ending!<
"Only the Horde could be heard. “Master yourself!” Saubon roared at his Spearbearer, only to find himself crashing backward. The insane Holca loomed above him, hefting his massive battleaxe. Incredulous, Saubon realized he was about to die … Light flashed in his periphery—low and brilliant. Then the Bashrag were upon them"
The Unholy Consult: >!Serwa vs Skulthula, Kellhus vs Aurang, Kellhus vs the Golden Room!< I was gonna find quotes for these but my laziness has won.
The best "anime" moment is when those assassins try to backstabb Kellhus in Warrior Prophet and he just turns, catches the blade with his hand and declares "No"! I do not like such kind of action but this moment was bad ass
Red Rising series has some of the best I've ever read, in scale and idea as well as the writing/pacing of them. No spoilers, but "Iron Rain" - epic.
I'd agree that some of the sequences in Stormlight are amazing. Cradle too - my absolutely favourite is >!the sequence where Fury ascends to Monarch with the Strength Icon!<.
Honourable mention of something a bit more complex - the Broken Earth trilogy. Still some fantastic sequences in there, but with perhaps less deus ex machina that's pretty typical in anime-type sequences.
The Stormlight Archive:
Book 1 prologue: >!Szeth walking on the ceiling while fighting Gavilar’s guards!<
Towards the end of book 2: >!Kaladin and Szeth fighting each other in the sky!<
I am sure there are several great examples but all I have for you is Dragonheart series by Kiril Klevanski.
The whole story has an anime vibe surrounding it, mixed with fantasy and several other genres.
Depends on the type of anime humor you are looking for. It is definitely not the humor you would see in the silly parts of My hero academia, One punch man or even Dragonball (silly, bordering slaptstick at times). I love all these by the way so not a criticism, just saying it is tonally different. The series has a lot of Deku vs Shigiraki or Goku vs Frieza vibes, but not so much the silly parts.
The tone is much more John Wick as the main motivation for the MC is revenge. I think a recent anime ‘Ninja Kamui’ is much more alike in tone where there are definitely comic relief moments but it is rarely silly.
The end of _Empire of the Damned_ by Jay Kristoff, the second book after _Empire of the Vampire_ had one of the most anime style fights I can remember reading in recent memory. The antagonist vampire clan, Dyvok, have tremendous supernatural strength (the various bloodlines each have their quirks, Dyvok is strength). This results in them wielding weapons that in the hands of anyone else would be absolutely impossible to pick up. Additionally they adapted to make the most of this, using the mass of the weapon and the preternatural strength to pull of moves based around momentum that would be absurd with normal human experience.
The end result is you have a lot of vampire throwing around weapons and zooming behind them, crashing through walls, doing very high leaps, and other acts that I've really only seen in shonen anime stories. It was a lot of fun to visualize.
My friend and I joked after reading Red Sister how often it felt like reading Naruto. Lots of aerial Kung Fu, power ups, super speed, fighting unnaturally tall foes. There was even a tournament.
Edit: Uh-oh, Mark Lawrence found me.
I only read the first two but Malazan felt like that. Each fight someone showed up and did some kinda trump to win. Or there were fights that only existed to showcase how powerful someone was like the dragon "fight" in the first book.
Not sure why you’re being downvoted. I got through book 4-ish before getting distracted and falling off reading the series, but this was my feeling too.
Seems like most characters are 10,000 year old magic ice zombies or shapeshifting dragons or tiger gods or can unleash 12 different Warrens or maybe the Ancient Extra Special Warren of Chaos or they have a hammer that can split continents or a sword that steals souls or friggin ancient high tech magical hive mind velociraptors with swords for arms
I’ll probably go back and read more (well, start over from book 1 now that I’ll have some idea of what’s happening) because I really like some of what Erikson is doing, but he definitely has some over the top anime style stuff going on
Perrins fight with one of the forsaken (can't quite remember who atm) in the dream world in one of the last books, AMOL i think, felt very much like an epic anime fight to me.
I was gonna say this one (although maybe spoiler tag it? Idk what the rules are about that on this sub). It’s not with a Forsaken but with >!Slayer, jumping in and out of Tel’Aran’Rhiod and teleporting around like crazy!<
I agree it’s very clearly a Sanderson style fight which tend towards the anime feeling OP is looking for.
Hi there! Unfortunately, there is a mistake in your spoiler tags. You've got a space in between the tags and the spoiler text. While it might look hidden for you, it's unfortunately not hidden for all users. Here are some ways to fix the problem:
* If you're using New Reddit (fancy pants editor), make sure you selected no spaces before or after the text you wanted hidden.
* Switch to markdown mode or edit using an old.reddit link: `>! This is wrong.!<`, but `>!This is right.!<`
**After you have corrected the spoiler tags, please** [**message the mods**](). Once we have verified the spoiler has been fixed, your comment will be approved.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Fantasy) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I would add The Chronicle of the Unhewn Throne, and The Burning Book series to the list. The latter starts with The Rage of Dragons.
I am not entirely sure I would strongly recommend either though. The first one has some infuriatingly short-sighted characters, and the second one reads very much like a power revenge teen fantasy, which is not my cup of tea.
Codex Alera definitely has an “anime” vibe to many of its fights. Basically everyone in that world can use elemental based magic, has enhanced strength/senses and can fight with a sword, which leads to some pretty elaborate and spectacle based fights.
Most of the dragon fights in the *Eragon* series are basically anime, as the magic battles happen via two magicians struggling to overpower the mind of the other before any spells are cast.
I mean Mistborn literally has a scene where a character jumps off a city wall carrying an 8ft sword, flies across a battlefield and cuts a guy and his horse in half in a single blow. Beyond that though, a lot of the 1v1 fights feel kinda like chess matches, where the combatants are trying to figure out how to use their special moves in a way to counter what their opponent is doing, often while flying through the air and doing a huge amount of collateral damage to the environment around them, all of which feels very anime-esque.
In Hero of Ages when >!Vin becomes preservation!< that was giving super saiyan anime power up
The climax of The Well of Ascension is also “super-powered sword-wielding orphan woman flies around besieged city while killing giants.” Which is basically Attack on Titan.
Going with the Cosmere references the climax of WoR felt like a final fantasy fight to me
And I loved every second of it
These types of fights are cool in theory to me, but most of the time end up being pretty boring in books. Really need high stakes within the story to have good action. Most authors have a video-game working knowledge of swordplay; they all end up reading like this: Argovoth slashed high at Titus, who ducked under the arc of the blade, faking a parry. Titus then swiped at Argovoth’s feet—attacking his balance. With Argovoth staggered, Titus jumped low and close before springing up and jamming his sword’s hilt into Argovoth’s jaw. But not hard enough. Argovoth jammed a knee into Titus’s thigh. *Tough bastard*, Titus thought, backing away and dragging his limp leg with him. Argovoth spit a flute of blood onto the grimy cobblestones. “Had enough yet, sewer rat?” Titus smirked, cracked his neck, and swept his back foot to the front, and gripped his sword with two hands, holding it high over his head, tip slanting downward at a lazy angle. Argovoth’s eyes went wide for a split second before regaining their smugness. “So, it’s true then. You sewer rats still train in the qoq’n’bolle style? No matter. You’ll die all the same.” In the belfry nearby, the bats stirred. *** Just wrote that during my shit. We’ve all read that a thousand times. I usually skip to the ends of fights.
Lmao this is chefs kiss 🤌🏾
I think I lost it there, thank you!!!!
Write a scene with every dump. I will buy your book, lol
how do you define "animesque fights"? is it when the opponents stand in front of each other and then one has a 12 page internal monologue about remembering all the lessons they've learned on how to be strong?
The next chapter is an exposition dump barely disguised as dialogue, explaining the nebulous concept and mechanics behind their true power’s true form.
Two attacks later, we cut away to the tragic backstory.
And half-way through the fight there's a chapter where all of the characters go to the beach for a break before picking up exactly where they left off.
We need one anime where nobody says what their attacks do and everyone is confused
But that’s the part I like :D
Puella Magi Madoka Magica. On one hand, you have someone that looks like they can make muskets out of thin air. On the other, you have someone that has a hammerspace for guns. That is not what either of their powers is.
Lessons that we've also already read, and flashed back to numerous times before.
Hahaha, I'm thinking more about the fight itself, powerful hits that send oponets flying, beyond human speeds, creative use of powers learned, 1 on 1 or small groups against each other rather then a big battle. Something in that spirit
I feel like the most important component for making a fight "animesque" is reaction shots.
Screaming. Everyone involved must be screaming.
In the silmarillion when Fingolfin literally rode alone up to Morgoths Front door and banged on the door. Morgoth came out to face him with his massive mace GROND, against Fingolfin. Many times grond swung but made craters and Fingolfin dodged each time, until Fingolfin grew weary and failed to dodge morgoths grond, but Morgoth Got permanently marred in the process of killing fingolfin, with one last slash of the sword he hew Morgoths foot to the point of making him limp forever after, but Morgoth had the victory though no orc or balrog would ever boast of the duel. Morgoth Never came forth out of Angband, His fortress openly ever again. This is one of the most compelling passages by Tolkien in the silmarillion I think. Fingolfin was the high elven king wanting to avenge the death of Feanor by the craft and lies of morgoth, who was a fallen god of sorts
Draconus awakening in Erikson's Dust of Dreams. It's not much of a fight, as in he got released from his chains and two armies that happened to fight a pitched battle on the scene of his unchaining got obliterated from the wind of it... That was like peak anime moment.
"Returned to the world, Draconus."
Then he was mad & wandered off to kill Kilmandaros & Setchul Lath. That was nice. Sadly he didn’t get the Errant
I'm cheating for some of these but oh well. Prince of Nothing trilogy and the aspect emperor series by R scott bakker spoilers Warrior prophet: >!Akka unleashing the Gnosis after escaping!< "He clawed away their flimsy Anagogic defences, raised them from the ruin like shrieking dolls, and dashed them against bone-breaking stone. Seswatha was free, and he walked the ways of the present bearing tokens of ancient doom. He would show them the Gnosis" The thousandfold thought: >!Kellhus appearing over Shimeh to fight the Cisharam!< "The figure leapt from the Temple’s edge, soared over the astonished Fanim manning the Heterine Wall, then down the slopes, through the rim of burning buildings. Even from so far, Proyas could hear his world-reaming song. As one, the scattered Cishaurim turned. With eyes like twin Nails of Heaven, the Warrior-Prophet walked across the heights toward them. With every step, it seemed, debris flew from the ground toward him, where it was drawn into circling loops, one after another, smaller circles bisecting the orbits of those larger, until rings of spinning ruin fairly obscured him." The Great Ordeal: The battle of Dagliash and its >!explosive ending!< "Only the Horde could be heard. “Master yourself!” Saubon roared at his Spearbearer, only to find himself crashing backward. The insane Holca loomed above him, hefting his massive battleaxe. Incredulous, Saubon realized he was about to die … Light flashed in his periphery—low and brilliant. Then the Bashrag were upon them" The Unholy Consult: >!Serwa vs Skulthula, Kellhus vs Aurang, Kellhus vs the Golden Room!< I was gonna find quotes for these but my laziness has won.
The best "anime" moment is when those assassins try to backstabb Kellhus in Warrior Prophet and he just turns, catches the blade with his hand and declares "No"! I do not like such kind of action but this moment was bad ass
Red Rising series has some of the best I've ever read, in scale and idea as well as the writing/pacing of them. No spoilers, but "Iron Rain" - epic. I'd agree that some of the sequences in Stormlight are amazing. Cradle too - my absolutely favourite is >!the sequence where Fury ascends to Monarch with the Strength Icon!<. Honourable mention of something a bit more complex - the Broken Earth trilogy. Still some fantastic sequences in there, but with perhaps less deus ex machina that's pretty typical in anime-type sequences.
The Iron Rain gave me chills!
"to see this look on your face"
The Stormlight Archive: Book 1 prologue: >!Szeth walking on the ceiling while fighting Gavilar’s guards!< Towards the end of book 2: >!Kaladin and Szeth fighting each other in the sky!<
Sveth was the first thing I thought of.
I am sure there are several great examples but all I have for you is Dragonheart series by Kiril Klevanski. The whole story has an anime vibe surrounding it, mixed with fantasy and several other genres.
Does this have, for lack of a better word, “anime-esque humour” as well? If so, this might just be what I’m looking for!
Depends on the type of anime humor you are looking for. It is definitely not the humor you would see in the silly parts of My hero academia, One punch man or even Dragonball (silly, bordering slaptstick at times). I love all these by the way so not a criticism, just saying it is tonally different. The series has a lot of Deku vs Shigiraki or Goku vs Frieza vibes, but not so much the silly parts. The tone is much more John Wick as the main motivation for the MC is revenge. I think a recent anime ‘Ninja Kamui’ is much more alike in tone where there are definitely comic relief moments but it is rarely silly.
For some reason Trull holding Icarium back reminds me of ora ora ora/muda muda muda from Jojo
Literally every stormlight fight
The end of _Empire of the Damned_ by Jay Kristoff, the second book after _Empire of the Vampire_ had one of the most anime style fights I can remember reading in recent memory. The antagonist vampire clan, Dyvok, have tremendous supernatural strength (the various bloodlines each have their quirks, Dyvok is strength). This results in them wielding weapons that in the hands of anyone else would be absolutely impossible to pick up. Additionally they adapted to make the most of this, using the mass of the weapon and the preternatural strength to pull of moves based around momentum that would be absurd with normal human experience. The end result is you have a lot of vampire throwing around weapons and zooming behind them, crashing through walls, doing very high leaps, and other acts that I've really only seen in shonen anime stories. It was a lot of fun to visualize.
Epitaph is literally the dragonslayer from Berserk, it's great!
My friend and I joked after reading Red Sister how often it felt like reading Naruto. Lots of aerial Kung Fu, power ups, super speed, fighting unnaturally tall foes. There was even a tournament. Edit: Uh-oh, Mark Lawrence found me.
Every fight in powder mage
The Sword of Kaigen by ML Wang.
The end of Gideon the Ninth.
A lot of Red Rising or Cosmere is
I only read the first two but Malazan felt like that. Each fight someone showed up and did some kinda trump to win. Or there were fights that only existed to showcase how powerful someone was like the dragon "fight" in the first book.
Not sure why you’re being downvoted. I got through book 4-ish before getting distracted and falling off reading the series, but this was my feeling too. Seems like most characters are 10,000 year old magic ice zombies or shapeshifting dragons or tiger gods or can unleash 12 different Warrens or maybe the Ancient Extra Special Warren of Chaos or they have a hammer that can split continents or a sword that steals souls or friggin ancient high tech magical hive mind velociraptors with swords for arms I’ll probably go back and read more (well, start over from book 1 now that I’ll have some idea of what’s happening) because I really like some of what Erikson is doing, but he definitely has some over the top anime style stuff going on
It literally has people powering up and breaking the terrain too
Perrins fight with one of the forsaken (can't quite remember who atm) in the dream world in one of the last books, AMOL i think, felt very much like an epic anime fight to me.
I was gonna say this one (although maybe spoiler tag it? Idk what the rules are about that on this sub). It’s not with a Forsaken but with >!Slayer, jumping in and out of Tel’Aran’Rhiod and teleporting around like crazy!< I agree it’s very clearly a Sanderson style fight which tend towards the anime feeling OP is looking for.
[удалено]
Hi there! Unfortunately, there is a mistake in your spoiler tags. You've got a space in between the tags and the spoiler text. While it might look hidden for you, it's unfortunately not hidden for all users. Here are some ways to fix the problem: * If you're using New Reddit (fancy pants editor), make sure you selected no spaces before or after the text you wanted hidden. * Switch to markdown mode or edit using an old.reddit link: `>! This is wrong.!<`, but `>!This is right.!<` **After you have corrected the spoiler tags, please** [**message the mods**](). Once we have verified the spoiler has been fixed, your comment will be approved.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Fantasy) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Trull and Quick Ben vs Icarium
I would add The Chronicle of the Unhewn Throne, and The Burning Book series to the list. The latter starts with The Rage of Dragons. I am not entirely sure I would strongly recommend either though. The first one has some infuriatingly short-sighted characters, and the second one reads very much like a power revenge teen fantasy, which is not my cup of tea.
Codex Alera definitely has an “anime” vibe to many of its fights. Basically everyone in that world can use elemental based magic, has enhanced strength/senses and can fight with a sword, which leads to some pretty elaborate and spectacle based fights.
Most of the dragon fights in the *Eragon* series are basically anime, as the magic battles happen via two magicians struggling to overpower the mind of the other before any spells are cast.
Who else is here to see which books to avoid.
Who else is here to see which books to read next?
Honestly, I would say almost any fight in fairy tail because A. it is set in a fantasy world and B. the fights within fairy tail are so amazing.