Elemental Gelade.
Really good soundtrack (enough to where it's my one purchase that isn't manga), decent story (based on a manga that ended maybe last year so the plot goes off on its own midway), neat characters, and the concept is cool (special humans that have powers that allow them to combine with normal humans to have special powers, but it isn't some lolpowerlevel bullshit).
Nice bit of romance too.

That's actually a really hard question. I honestly can't really think of anything that meets both criteria. Possibly Natsume Yuujinchou, but everyone's seen that by now. In fact, I've just realized how horribly generic my taste is.

I'd say that Otaku no Video is an enjoyable series that's definitely worth a viewing for people interested in otaku culture and other such things. It's just a short OVA with two episodes. It is Gainax's response to the 80s, much like FLCL was to the 90s.

I'm probably gonna incite a massive shitstorm for this, but fuck it: I also think that K-ON!! is a must-see that is too-often passed off as generic moeblob and thus not watched. The animation (look at the immense and realistic attention to detail in the scenery) and transitions are beautiful, the characters are vibrantly realistic and well-developed, and the music is enjoyable. It's a series that shows the maturity and hard-work put into it by the creators, particularly improving over the first season. Haters gonna hate.

Most brohnos are pretty familiar with it already, but for a wider audience I would highly recommend (still) Koi kaze. Considering that lolicon, imouto and bro-sis incest in general are such widespread thematics among the entire otaku culture, it's interesting how this (manga/)series shines amongst them with its characteristic seal of raw realism...

- Traditional old-school manga style, for character design (no fancy CG, puni plush, spaghetti people, technicolor eyes or hair)
- No moe or fanservice (no sweet meganekos, pantsu shots, tsundere twintails, sweatdrop, nosebleed, uberfashion sailorfukus, victory V's, catchphrases, gigantic tits/pettan gags or "accidental" groping)
- No ecchi or explicit ero (no need for it...)
- No harem (it was never a VN, so no reason/pretext to force such an overused format)
- No magic (no shinto, spirits, leyends, fabulous creatures, paralel universes, helping miracles)
- No concessions (easy ways out are avoided; main characters are pushed to their limit)
- Short and concise: 13 episodes with no waste (no marathonic Da Capo sagas)
- Neat soundtrack

I wanted to go with Cencoroll but then I realized everyone saw it already. Oh, by the way, it's getting a sequel - I'm not sure how I feel about it. It was supposed to be a one shot, really. At least it's another short movie, if they would go with a full anime season I could only see it ending in a disaster.

... Oh, sorry, what was the question again? Oh yeah, I also wanted to go with Sunred but again, that's nowhere near unknown. It's still a little more obscure than Cencoroll but I guess ~80% (I feel I might be underestimating it) of Brohnos have seen it.

If I were to talk about this season it's sad how few people are actually watching Kuragehime (compared to other shows, of course).

Overall, I can't really recommend anything (other than maybe some obscure shorts but that's almostcheating). I feel that anime communities do a decent job at making good stuff popular (of course I'm not talking about all of them), unlike, say, video gamers (as good games go unnoticed even nowadays).
Of course, there are some shows which belong here, it's just that I haven't seen them. I'm talking about some obscure 80s (and maybe 70s) shows.

>>637
>it's getting a sequel - I'm not sure how I feel about it.
But didn't the first one leave you wanting more? Everything in that OVA felt like a good setup for an entire series.

>>647

>But didn't the first one leave you wanting more?

That's what good media should be like in my opinion. Once I hit the point where I decide I've had my share I just give up on said anime. It's much better to be left just a little unsatisfied whith the amount of content than to be overwhelmed by it.

>Everything in that OVA felt like a good setup for an entire series.

For me it was a complete story without anything missing from it. It didn't feel like an introduction at all, as they chose to forgo all the explanation bullshit and just gave you a nice story. That was it for me and I already wish they left it at that.

Since I saw Dennou Coil mentioned on /an/ earlier today I can tell you how I felt about it, since it's closely related. After 2 episodes I felt it might be one of those series deserving straight 10 out of 10 if I were to rate it. The setting was brilliant and again, nothing was explained in a textbook form, they just jumped straight to the action and left connecting the dots to the viewer. In that sense it reminded me of Cencoroll (actually, it was the other way around going by the order I watched it in). And then, suddenly, the story. And let me mention this, I felt that it was a boring one. And then, suddenly, the explanations. Again, nothing interesting, really (even though it was nice to see that someone actually thought the whole thing through). The two 'filler' episodes about Illegals midway through the series raised my hopes for a switch to an episodic format but they soon gave up on it an never came back to it (although I felt that those two episodes - along with first two of course - were the very best of the series).

Overall, it was good but it had the potential to be some much more. Or rather, so much less but in a good, condensed way. If they remade the first two episodes into a short movie (and they wouldn't have to change much, really) and left it at that I would gladly label it as the best short of this kind.

Oh, that's just a minor nitpick but Cencoroll wasn't technically an OVA.