Taiyou no Kiba Dougram

Interested in the genre? Despite what people might say, mecha is a rich character focused genre with a variety of incredibly unique stories to tell. Here's a collection of shows with short, straight-to-the-point descriptions about each. Note that some of these were translated by fans, and aren't available officially/legally. A good amount of these are available on various streaming services, tho as for all well you might have to sail the high seas a bit. Disregard my personal scores, as its subjective at end of the day and you might like it. Also please don't dismiss some of these just because they're really old, they pretty much all hold up well even today. Check each out, and see what strikes your fancy. Any shows I personally haven't watch I got info on from fellow mecha friends of mine:

Real robots are a subgenre of the mecha genre, in which the mechas are depicted as realistic warmachines as opposed to the superheroistic depiction of the super robot subgenre. It was started in 1979 by Mobile Suit Gundam.

Series that been represented in Super Robot Wars in the Decade the Series Debuted In.

1970's: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/4725
1980's Part 2: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/4734
1990's Part 1: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/4737
1990's Part 2: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/46112
2000's Part 1: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/4758
2000's Part 2: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/4780
2010's and 2020's Part 1: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/4784
2010's and 2020's Part 2: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/4856

Anime directed by Ryousuke Takahashi

Anime that comes packaged with socio-political commentary. Sometimes as subtext or metaphor, sometimes screamed out loud with abandon.

Japan has waged countless wars within its territories and beyond her shores for thousands of years now, and in anime we can see some of the perspectives, interpretations and depictions the Japanese people have developed with regards to this topic.

In this stack list I have gathered what I consider to be the essential anime with the theme of war, whether they show it from the perspective of the soldiers who fight them or from the experience of the bystander civilians who have to endure its effects on society and the environment. War is a theme that comes up, even tangentially, in most of everything, so I can't really make a list of every good anime that has some reference to war in it, so here I tried to put shows that either have a direct focus on war as a core theme, or shows whose main focus isn't war and only have war related elements in certain limited sections, but still do provide an interesting and valuable perspective on it when the theme of war eventually comes up.

I don't necessarily agree with all of these shows' views on war (I actively disagree with some), nor do I believe every show here is good. I just think that all of these could offer interesting insight on the different perspectives about war that come up in Japanese animation. You decide which view of war you agree with the most or find most emotionally genuine and politically nuanced.

These are the anime that appear in Super Robot Wars X-Ω, a mobile phone game that is now defunct.
It's being split into multiple parts because there are so many.

Since Mecha/Space animes is somewhat not appreciated nowadays by the general people, i'm making a list to someone who want to see more than the surface of what it offers.

So my list will be filled unpopular Mecha/Space that is worth watching.

Part two of the list of anime released between January 1963 and January 2000 that are worth your time. (For better or worse).

Part One: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/30488
Part Three: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/30498
Part Four: https://myanimelist.net/stacks/30811

Note: Moderators had taken down the stacks before, since it was not wholly information based. I will post this as a note as to why such series are essential in order to defend them all as a blanket statement.

Most of the series featured have some sort of significance in terms of first best or darkest for their era which can be categorized by decennium or part of a decennium (early, middle, late). These are mixed around in order in order to give those who subscribed to list a challenge. While I could give an individual breakdown, I think some research is better left up to those who have subscribed to the stacks, since this allows for additional cultural insight into what was popular in Japan at the time, which is sometimes disconnected from the United States, as well as the rest of North America and Europe in many ways. For example, the Crayon Shin-Chan that aired in the United States and Canada is different to the one that aired in Europe, is different to the one that aired in Japan. By recommending to seek out Japanese versions of series, it grows understanding. I am not the first one to have thought of this. In the United States, there used to be a channel called ImaginAsian TV which had the same purpose of informing people about Japanese popular culture through anime. The San Francisco and San Diego PBS stations did the same thing and NHK World Japan carries this on through series like Little Charo and previously Maiko-san Chi no Makanai-san.

I think it is agreed upon that retro is a niche, but with handicaps on subject matter like availability.

http://fightingstreet.com/folders/variousinfofolder/ripofffolder/ripoffpage1.html
Theres a couple manga on here too

For most series the score is falling over time, however some special series it is rising over time.

This is the list of these series that used to be scored lower on MAL but have been rising in score over the years, excludes currently airing series and series where the score rise happened when the series was airing or within 5 years of its airing.

Source: Wayback Machine


Updated: 29th March 2024
Updated: 8th May 2024
Updated: 16th May 2024
Last Updated: 24th May 2024

Probably wont be updated anymore there was a change today (24th May 2024) in how the scores are calculated (?) and because of that everything in this list went back to lower scores again, so I'll probably leave this as it is currently to preserve the history before they edited the system (?)

Tired of adaptions, reboots, and remakes in your sci-fi anime? Frustrated that MAL doesn't allow you to filter by source material? Well, this list has you covered.

For the sake of including as much as I could, I've only listed one entry from each franchise/series (generally the first installment). Some entries have a manga that came out shortly before they premiered, but those aren't really adaptions since the production of the anime predates creation of the manga.

Part 2:
https://myanimelist.net/stacks/46791

Part 3:
https://myanimelist.net/stacks/46796

Part 4:
https://myanimelist.net/stacks/46816

These are extremely good, high quality mecha anime picked across 5 decades of the medium you can get emotionally invested in, creating a genuine level of immersion to their masterful work. They are meaningful, real life influencing works, with themes that serve as important life lessons, with characters so connectable they might as well be real people, with fully realized concepts and fantasies, with stories worth the gravitas and seriousness they demand. While they might be on different levels in the immersion scale, they're all pieces of art that with their good animation, writing, directing, sound direction, art direction, and theming are well worth a watch even for non-mecha fans.

Large variety of mecha shows for people trying to delve into every corner of the genre.

Ryousuke Takahashi is a Japanese anime director, screenwriter, and producer. He has worked for Sunrise on many anime shows in the real robot genre, including Armored Trooper VOTOMS, Fang of the Sun Dougram, Panzer World Galient, and Blue Comet SPT Layzner.

Takeyuki Kanda was an anime director for Sunrise who was known for directing Vifam, The Ultraman anime, Kiko Senki Dragonar and the first six episodes of Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team. He was a close friend and coworker of Ryosuke Takahashi.

On July 27, 1996, Kanda suddenly died. Umanosuke Iida took over for the remaining episodes of The 08th MS Team. The final episode of The 08th MS Team, the movie Miller's Report and the first episode of Ginga Hyōryū Vifam 13 were all dedicated in his loving memory.

The best anime I've seen, not all of them appeal to me or align with my preferences, but I can't deny their qualities. That being said, I still have a lot of anime to consume, so this list will likely change over time or not.