Ok, we’re not saying these are Best Asian websites of 2008, but we are saying they are the most popular according to the internal data we collect on Ningin. Based on the number of Frontpage articles as determined by Ningin’s Social News system, these are the Most Popular Asian Media Websites of 2008:
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Tags: alafista, allkpop, asianbite, autosubmit, dannychoo, japanprobe, japantimes, kotaku, list, ningin, nt2009, popseoul, rss, seoulbeats, social news, stats, top 10, xorsyst, yahoo

Which anime series would make the best MMO universe based on story, characters, and abilities?

Mia Lerda of Ningin.com

Okay the secret is out, Mia is not up to date on the latest MMO/RPG type games. Yet, like everyone else in the this loving world I too have dabbled in some RPG VG’s. Mostly my interest favors the genre of horror survival games. You know, games like Fatal Frame and Resident Evil. This pretty much tops of my limited VG knowledge because the truth is I really am a backseat player! No really I am… I rather watch or be the sideman to someones strategic moves. Oh I have had my share of live xbox adventures, which I will tell you about later on, but personally I rather just be in the audience.

So, when I was asked the question which Anime would make the best MMO I thought to myself, do I have enough knowledge about MMO? Surely… I watch enough Anime to know the ones I would want to be apart of, so there is where my decision would lay. So I thought…hmmmm Slayers Maybe? Macross? HackSign? Hellsing? Inuyasha? or Pokemon?
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Tags: abilites, anime, characters, discussion, games, kibouhou, lan nguyen, louis ponder, manga, mia lerda, mmo, ningin, otakuden, otakuinternational, owari, round table, simonmbc, story, universe, xorsyst

Which anime series would make the best MMO universe based on story, characters, and abilities?

Duke Hong (KibouHou) of Ningin.com

Which anime would make the best MMORPG? It’s a fun question. I would love to see my favorite animes made into MMOs, although some lack the potential (A “Lovely Complex” MMO would be a bit difficult to design). After giving it some thought, one anime seemed to have everything an MMO needs. Soul Eater was first aired in April, it’s a recent anime best known here as “that anime which T.M Revolution did the opening for”. The story revolves around Maka and Soul, both students at the “Shinigami Weapon Meister Vocational School (Shinigami Buki Shokunin Senmon Gakko) or better known as Shibusen. There are two types of students at these schools, meisters and weapons. Weapons are well…weapons. They are students that can transform into weapons (literally). Then there are meisters, students who wield weapons. The MMO could place a player in the shoes of either a weapon or meister. Between both weapon and meister, you would have tons of customization options. While playing the game, you would do what any ordinary Shibusen student would do: collect souls and hunt witches.
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Tags: abilites, anime, characters, discussion, games, kibouhou, lan nguyen, louis ponder, manga, mia lerda, mmo, ningin, otakuden, otakuinternational, owari, round table, simonmbc, story, universe, xorsyst

Which anime series would make the best MMO universe based on story, characters, and abilities?

Lan Nguyen of Ningin.com

It was really difficult just picking one anime as I’ve seen many and there are still a lot more that I haven’t. Most of the ones I have seen, I really enjoyed and felt as if I was picking which kid was my favorite so I decided to rely on my fan girl powers which worked out pretty well.

Fan girling it, I was trying to think which anime had the hottest guys in it. There’s just way too many to just pick one so why not combine them all into one MMO? It would be an epic version of Kingdom Hearts, Jump Super Stars and/or Super Smash Brothers. There’s a reason why those games are popular and it’s because you get to see all your favorite characters wail on each other not to mention they’re all bad ass.

The majority of my time would be spent man handling all the bishonens and bishojos but that’s beside the point. I would love to watch certain characters/groups battle each other like the Espada (Bleach) VS Akatsuki (Naruto) in addition to the characters people would come up with based on the different animes’ skill sets, fashion and culture. It would be a very complex game and it’s probably far from reality as of right now but I can’t help but to day dreaming of all the possibilities.

While the anime community is still small, this would an ideal way to promote anime in addition to introducing different characters/story lines/etc all at once. A lot to handle but if you’re willing to spend hours on end on a single game just grinding, why not spend it on something cooler?
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Tags: abilites, anime, characters, discussion, games, kibouhou, lan nguyen, louis ponder, manga, mia lerda, mmo, ningin, otakuden, otakuinternational, owari, round table, simonmbc, story, universe, xorsyst

For the first time ever on Ningin, we’re going to have a roundtable discussion – in a blog format. The one thing I really want to impress upon people is that Ningin is a community for people interested in all aspects of Asian media and that a community has many different parts. Today, this roundtable format will give a very clear example of how that community and all those different parts can come together in an open discussion. This roundtable post will be done in 4 parts spread throughout the day.

The people that making up this roundtable will be: Ningin bloggers, Lan and Mia; outside bloggers, Louis from Xorsyst.com, John from Otakuden.com, and BZou from Otakuinternational.com; and Ningin users, Owari, Kibouhou, and SimonMBC. They’re all going to give their opinions about the following topic:

Which anime series would make the best MMO universe based on story, characters, and abilities?
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Tags: abilites, anime, characters, discussion, games, kibouhou, lan nguyen, louis ponder, manga, mia lerda, mmo, ningin, otakuden, otakuinternational, owari, round table, simonmbc, story, universe, xorsyst

Since the rise of anime during the 1980s and 1990s, we have not only seen the creation of some great series, but also have witness the growth of a very strong and united anime community. While we may not all agree on what is the best series ever created, we do share the love of great anime. The anime community plays a crucial role in success of the anime industries both here in America as well as in Japan.

While the American and Japanese anime industries share a lot of similarities, the advantage that the Japanese anime industry possesses is that they have had longer to mature. Anime has been on American shores long before the 1990s. However, it wasn’t till around that time till we saw the explosive growth that we are still witnessing today. The 1990s brought us many great anime series like Evangelion and the rise of Dragonball Z here in America. Japan on the other hand, had their anime surge almost 20 years earlier in the 1970s and 1980s. What this boils down to is that the Japanese anime community is not only larger, but also older. Fans have more disposable income to keep the anime industry strong, and have been doing so a lot longer. Sadly, America isn’t as lucky.

The 1990s also brought us the Internet. Fledging anime companies in America had a new tool to help advertise their stores and products. They were also presented with a very tough problem that no one could have predicted. While I am sure everyone is aware of the piracy problem that plagues the entire anime industry in the states and abroad, I don’t want to spend time debating that. What’s interesting about the problem is how it affects both America and Japan differently.
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Tags: america, anime, black black gum, blogger, dragon ball z, drama, ecchi, evangelion, japan, louis ponder, new york anime festival, ningin, nyaf, otome road, pop culture, solution, web designer, xorsyst

In case you haven’t heard, we’re partners with the New York Anime Festival! This is our biggest event partnership so far and so we felt something special was needed to promote it. Well, the 7 Days, 7 New Bloggers special worked out so well for us, we decided to do 8 Days of Anime (the number 8 is lucky in many Asian cultures). For 8 days, starting on Thursday September 18th, we will be posting at least two articles a day about something Anime related. We’re hoping that if we hyped up Anime enough online, you’ll be all hyped up for the real world event in NYC. In addition to articles, we’re also doing a roundtable discussion for the first time on Ningin where bloggers and members get a chance to share their opinions on a particular anime topic. Also joining as part of this 8 Days of Anime special are two very good friends of Ningin, Xorsyst.com & Otakuden.com, because we love working with good people and they have very interesting websites.

So here’s a list of planned articles which is more or less solid:
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Tags: Ai Yazawa, artists, death god, death note, event, Fashion, festival, Le Chevalier D’Eon, Lee So Young, manga, mech, mmo, music, nana, new york anime festival, nyaf, otakuden, partnership, Peter Tatara, robot, Rose of Versailles, roundtable, specal, Vampire Manhwa, xorsyst