Forums » Smalltalk » Akira Toriyama has passed away.

https://twitter.com/DB_official_en/status/1765935471971213816?t=ETckwI0DcZCfbYjnDyR_Tg&s=19

For the unfamiliar: he created Dragon Ball, as well as had a hand in the art direction of several Japanese games and other manga. He's the reason Dragon Quest's monsters are so recognizable.
https://tinycartridge.com/post/117098336992/dragon-quest-sketches-vs-completed-designs-whoa

His passing is a pretty big deal if you're a huge weeb and/or into JRPGs.

Not sure how to feel about it myself. He created a series I grew up watching, and his style was very recognizable. I feel like this is a pretty huge loss for several industries, but on the other hand, he does have a successor and several people he trained.
I wonder how things will pan out now.

Anyway, thought I'd share. Hope it's not too much of a downer topic.

I believe the only downer of this topic was that some people (looking at you, Sweetbaby.inc) decided to use this event to shit on his legacy, but aside from that... I believe it's important to remember him and his work. Thanks for sharing.

He also worked on the art for Chrono Trigger.

Lots and lots of things.

After a google search learning who sweet baby was, I found... very irrelevant information to this topic so now I'm curious about what they actually said.

Oh, yeah. The intro to the PS1 game is phenomenally good.

Shortly after his death, they made a tweet or twit or whatever they're calling it now that said one of Mr. Toriyama's past character designs was racist in a roundabout way.

It was in poor taste.

Yikes.

Not like the DBZ fandom hasn't made jokes about Mr. Popo for ages already but if you had something to say about it maybe wait a month or two?

Exactly
And considering the company was already under fire because said guy also tried to harass another guy with intimidation and social shaming (while also inciting others to report him and his account to Steam for, dear lord, having a curator profile where he listed the game SweetBaby.inc was involved), and many other things, this was literally putting gasoline on an already lit bonfire.

There were even rumors of another employee who posted on X (and promptly canceled the tweet, but the Internet doesn't forget, although I admit it sounds more like a simple rumor than the actual truth... I 100% hope that's the case) accusing Toryama of "snatching the attention from International Women's Day" with his death... I mean, what?

To be fair, I looked into that when the name came up before in this thread and that Steam curation group was just another hate group who complains too much about Woke StuffTM while masquerading as Concerned Gamers. The reason they tracked the games the company had anything to do with was because they just didn't like what the company actually did, which is relatively benign sensitivity consultations and scriptwriting for game studios. Their group was to encourage the boycotting of any project they worked on as another thinly-veiled and unsuccessful Gamergate-style backlash against the vague concept of Wokeness. (Women and black people in video games, I guess.)

I don't agree with using a company account to harass people off Steam because I don't, on principle, like corporations on social media at all. I can't say I feel that bad about it though and would've been fine with it if normal users harassed them off Steam instead. I'm too old for these Gamergate snowflakes' shenanigans.

I also think their company provides no meaningful service and don't particularly care about its contributions unless they start erasing established canons but honestly they don't affect the quality of the games right now and that's what I care about, at the end of the day.

Besides, we all know the real scandal was Toriyama admitting the only reason he gave Super Seiyans blond hair was so he didn't have to use so much ink coloring in Goku's hair all the time.
https://comicbook.com/anime/news/dragon-ball-why-do-super-saiyans-have-blonde-hair/

Might be good to get things back on track to respect for Toriyama.

Rest in peace, king. You were one of my favorite manga authors alongside Kentaro Miura.

Man, the old guard of the manga industry are slowly dying out.

I'm not sure we'll ever recover when we lose Oda.

Hoo boy, that guy is riddled with problems of his own due to him dedicating his literal lifespan to his work of One Piece. He doesn't get much rest and I heard he has gout and diabetes. Not just that, he's also spending time and energy on the live action of One Piece so that the guys from Netflix don't screw it up with their own sorts of ideas, like him saying that he doesn't want romance between the Straw Hat crew in One Piece as part of his conditions in accepting the live action offer and him having the guys go to him to check up to see if they do things right. The guy is everywhere and is not getting any rest. I feel like he might die so young.

Yeah that guy's a powerhouse. His work ethic isn't healthy but I do get where he's coming from given how badly Netflix screwed up Death Note and continues to screw up ATLA.

All the people who make the things I like live and die by their work and I do wish that was not the case, but I wonder if it has to be? There has to be an alternative.

Well, in Toriyama's case, it wasn't even growing health problems, it was a random accident in the OR. I guess sometimes, people just go like that, too.
Heart goes out to his replacement, who has received way more abuse online than one person should ever get just for not being his mentor.
I'm sure he'll do fine though.

Yep. Netflix messed up Cowboy Bebop too. It made me angry how much of a dumb woman they made Faye Valentine, instead of this seductive and intelligent femme fatale that she was in the anime.

Well, if you can somehow change the Japanese culture of meritocratic work culture, then yeah there can be an alternative. It feels like the Japanese people are just working themselves to the bone. I know they're hard workers, but they need a break sometimes. I heard they have 10 hour work shifts and 6 days per week work. They almost have no time for anything else.

Ah. Yeah that happened with Kentaro Miura as well. His death was preventable as well, even though Miura had a weak body and been very sick throughout his whole life. He died way too young, like Toriyama.

Really? Hmm, I don't keep up with that stuff. If you think he's going to be fine, I assume he's going to be fine then.