Rave

First i would like to say i really enjoyed this anime and manga. To be honest i loved the manga more then the anime but i would have to say the story is far to complex for it to all be in an anime so maybe that's why they stopped doing the anime. After i watched the anime i quickly went to find somewhere to read all the comics to it. I really wanted to find out what happens with all these wonderful characters. To be honest most of this artists characters have qualities that i would hope that all humans would strive to have in their lives. I really felt like i cared what happened for them i felt like i was right there in the battle field with them saving the world! I did feel like it had some extra fillers in the story line but to be honest what anime doesn't have those. Overall i enjoyed this series and its a series that actually has a good ending one i can be proud of after reading a lot chapters. It wasn't the greatest art but i thought the feelings of the characters and the purpose why they are fighting was well portrayed. Though this series is not for everyone you really have to love what this series brings to the table to understand to not judge a book on its cover and go deeper with this series cause i believe there is more then meets the eye to this. This series deserves a chance to be seen so don't pass it by if you have the free time!

story
the story of rave master is great and epic i loved the plot. the plot is very original.
art.
the art is great mr hiro did a great job and hes a very great artiest.
characters.
the characters are great you wil have alot of fave i know i did .
enjoyment.
i very munch enjoyed this manga.
overall score.
10 out of 10 this is a great manga and if you like love story's and action then you will love rave master.

Rave from the author of Fairy Tail is a regular battle shonen story. It is the story of Discount Natsu becoming the Rave Master and has to find the rave stones to unlock his full potential. However the stones were scattered due to an explosion 50 years ago. Now Discount Natsu must journey the world to find these stone in hopes to find these magic stones. Along the journey he will gain many friends and allies including discount Lucy who has lost her memory and her plot point is totally not related to the rave at all, totally. There is however an anti rave organization. Called the Demon card. They will do whatever it takes to do regular bad guy stuff that bad guys do. Also rule the world (bet you didn't see that coming),

Now considering this was made by Hiro mashima himself I didn't really have high expectations after reading Fairy tail. However i was also completely right. This series is by every definition medicore. The Characters are as generic as they can be. To the villains, to the main characters, to the nice guy bad guys, to the bad guy nice guys, to the evil government. It is literally amazing how many cliches there are in this series. This is like 101 on how to make a battle shonen. The deaths are underwhelming, the dialogue is cringey. The only legitimate entertainment this series has is the fight scenes which is really important for a battle shonen. I mean this manga took every single by the book thing a battle shonen could do like omg. Honestly the most surprising thing in this series is how everything is so incredibly predictable. Everything is just so cliche. Regardless that doesn't mean the series is bad in itself. Its really how you play the cliches that depend. And the author plays them incredibly medico-rely. 0 risks were taken when making this manga. At least most of the time which i will get to.

Now the action itself which is easily the most important of any action series. Its good. Now don't get me wrong it also cliche. But the author does do a ok job of hyping and tagged with his art and amazing double page spreads i think we get some amazing panels. Now discount Natsu has a sword which has 10 forms meaning that they can deus ex machina when need to be. Literally this was created so they can be whatever they want to be when the need arises. Its pretty cliche. If you think I've said cliche too many times. I haven't even gotten to part 2 of the series yet. The fights are also cliche but they do have there own sense of style. Which i guess is really the only actually good part about the series.

There is a massive power creep issue with this series. Where the fuck were all these characters before? The author just keeps pulling monsters 1 out of the other. But the real issue i had with this series is that the main characters kept fucking getting ridiculously stronger as well . Holy shit like you think after the 7th time they used there ultimate ability that has a 1% of succeeding and 99% of failing resulting in there death you'd think it would fail at least once. The power was a major issue in this. Everyone was somehow able to keep with little to no explanation and even if an explanation was given it was pretty BS. I mean i have no idea what the author was thinking., but at least it had style.

Honestly though this stuff did matter and did pull the series without a doubt the worst part about this series are the female character. This has some of the poorest written heroines i have seen in a while. Like Discount Lucy every single time. needs rescuing. She gets forcibly kissed and loses her will to **defend herself for the entire firght**. It is insane. The only real decently written heroine was one of the villains who was basically Discount Juvia. She was also drawn sexily like every single heroine with a name but she had gutso and her personality didn't revolve around screaming discount Gray's name. Now there is another strong heroine but because her clothing gets conveniently ripped **every single time** im not counting her. It really is disappointing because fan service is also a major issue with this series. There is an entire underwater mermaid arc so the author can draw half naked chicks. for an entire arc. It is also one of the longest arcs in the series. Its funny too since this was actually the turning point in the series. The quality got noticeably better. Not like really good but you could see a visible improvement in the series as a whole. Issues with paneling and fights scenes become smoother. I do wish people relaize as great as cleavage and mid driffs are. Women don't need to wear lvl 99 armor all the damn time. Honestly Fairy Tail's fanservice is way worse but this is still a major issue and legitmatly upsetting and un-entertaining part about the series. I've also seen people compare this to male fan service in the series saying its equal but there is a very big difference. Male fanservice is used for comedic purposes whilst Female fanservice is used for sexually pleasing purposes. And the latter really is way worse.

The characters though cliche were also entertaining in there own right. Like there are many bad ass moments involving the characters as a whole. So many rage moments which are exemplified by the double pages and do there jobs. I like this and it is always entertaining to watch the good guys get pissed and absolutely destroy everyone. Now the villians were definitely the main issue. The author pulls the whole bad guy turned good at last minute and does sacrifice so he has paid for his sins BS. Which is completely and horribly wrong man. There is this guy who is a total Richard. Like a hardcore Richard. But the MC forgives Him... WAT😕? Like the crap he did is worth execution and you are just letting him go. Its honestly insane how much the good guys let bad guys go and it works in there favour. I also enjoyed the fact that some of the characters do actually die. Not last minute rescues death. Fairy Tail has to be the only series where 100% of the cast is alive in the beginning and by the end of it 120% of the cast is alive. thankfully though only 98% of the cast is alive in Rave giving somewhat real depth to the fights that were always to the death.

The best character however is Discount Jellal. This guy is fucking insane and i'm in love with him. All the unique personality all the well written drama. This guy has it. Discount Jellal really was by far the best fucking character in this series. Every time he showed up on screen,, hype was heavy inducing.

I will say this though. Volumes 31-34 are amazing. This is like it was written a by different person entirely. and im so mad that it took me 2 days to read volumes 1-30 yet it took me less than 2 hours to read volumes 31-34. Like this is next level stuff. I won't say the entire series is worth reading for these volumes alone. But it defnitly took me by surprise. This is where all the passion and quality went. this is was legitmatly entertaining exciting edge of the seat action. Though it isn't worth reading 30 volumes for especially cuz of the ending (which i will get to) but it was definitely where author actually feels like he took risks. and actually made the series more and more fun.

As far as endings go. I mean you wish for more. Especially when it comes to ships but discount Fairy Tail cast can only get so much. It does enough in terms of the main couple you want. But i do wish side characters got more closure but i guess we are gonna have to live with Implied.

TLDR: Medicore, but it was just good enough at times for me to give it more than just a pass. 6/10

I thought this was good in elementary school, but I'm not in elementary school now so I don't know what to think. It's a fun read if you have the power to go back in time when you were much more simple minded and far less critical. Cool shit happens and you're happy about it. But now that you have developed better taste for the media you consume, it is probably trash compared to your current favorites. I also don't really remember anything other than that weird dog, so this review probably isn't very helpful. If you're in elementary school, you should read this.

Groove adventure rave is a rather unique manga. The story is quiet simple and usual, but after some point(where the anime series ends) the storyline becomes better and better. The art is wonderfull, both with unsual creatures and great characters. I recomment this manga to all manga lovers and to all who finished the anime.

i havent read any manga for a while so it was interesting to finally read another one. i found this rave master and thought it looked good so gave it a try. it was an origional manga so you had to read it backwards which is part of the whole enjoyment tho a little confusing to begin with.. anyway...

the characters are interesting and you get to know their personalities very well.. they also have new characters that arent human which are fun. plue for example.

the main story is good although its one that has been used many times before.
basically a young warrior wannabe meets someone who tried saving the world but failed...he then finds out from the other warrior that its his 'destiny' to save the world this time.. then the quest begins..

its a good read with some great battle pictures..

Great beginning! Likebable characters, exiting story, funny dialog and very well drawn fights. Volume 1 was absolutally fantastic, extremely well written, good character introduction and dramatic. Volume 2 was a bit weaker, it could get a bit messy at times and more fights than story telling. But it was still good! Great character development, and cool that a new funny and cool character (Elie) joined the adventure.

- PS: If you already have read the comic DONT watch the TV series. It leaves out volume 1 and is just absurd. You will get frustrated!!

- I will update as I read more

Moderator Edit: This review contains spoilers.

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Groove Adventure Rave, or Rave Master, was the first long-running manga of the mangaka now acclaimed for Fairy Tail. I used to be pretty biased towards it, due to it being one of my first manga, but the nostalgia wore off on my latest reread.

At one point a character is introduced as being just an ally of Demon Card, which is this manga’s cliché “evil organization.” Then it's decided that he's a Demon Card general, but he is the weakest of the generals. Then it's decided that he's somehow the strongest. I’m not basing this on observation, I’m actually writing it based on what people in the manga said. Observation is useless when determining power tiers in this manga regardless. Many characters are endowed with completely broken powers, such as the ability to absorb all life, the ability to create anything from nothing, the ability to control gravity, physical invulnerability, regeneration, the ability to twist and break any object, or the power to pulverize anything that touches the user's skin, but they either don't use those abilities in the big battles, they don’t use them to their full potential, or the powers just don't work due to the willpower and power of friendship possessed by the heroes. In most battle shounen, the protagonists always win, but it's still fun to see how. In Rave Master, it just isn't. The battles always follow the same exact arc and I consistently find myself thinking "really, again?" Dark Bring powers get repetitive and some of them are rip-offs of each other. We never fully understand the mechanics behind the characters’ powers either. The way Dark Bring are created is changed about 4 separate times, along with the tiers of them, their extra abilities, what effect they have on the user, and how they are distributed, and then magic is eventually thrown in and utilized in a very cliché manner. In the Q&A section of an early volume the author admits that he did no little to no planning before writing Rave, and it really does show. This is an incredibly lazily told story.

Unlike in the world of One Piece, where people almost never die no matter what, or in an actual realistic manga where people die all the time, people only die in Rave when the plot commands it. Someone can be riddled with stab wounds, get hit with a blast that is imbued with infinite energy, get shot in the head, be struck by lightning, be fatally poisoned, or fall from an aircraft and be perfectly fine, but a wooden-staff inflicted stab wound or a falling rock is enough to kill some of the stronger characters. At one point a little kid gets riddled with machine gun bullets, and he is shown dying, but he is magically resurrected for the convenience of the plot. Well, no, he is never even resurrected, that would be absurd. Instead, the mangaka just ignores the clear fact that he died.

This manga is filled with like contradictions. Sometimes the main characters are perfectly fine with killing people and sometime they aren't. At one point one of their best friends goes missing and is presumed dead for about 5 to 10 volumes. They never mourn or mention him while he's gone and then he just pops up again, somehow managing to know exactly where they would be. At one point it’s stated that two characters are close friends, but then it turns out that one just tried to kill the other once and that was the extent of their relationship. I have no idea how the characters mixed those two concepts up, but that happened. At one point, several main antagonists are killed off and are instantaneously vaporized in a huge explosion; later they reappear with the half-assed excuse of “dude, we had a bunker” even though there’s no possible way they could have seen the explosion coming or hidden anywhere in the vicinity of the blast. Just to make matters worse, events like this, among others, are constantly alluded to by characters who could not possibly know that those events took place. These inconsistencies and plot holes litter the manga. If spoilers were allowed, and if it wouldn't be unnecessarily redundant, then I could spend an entire 3000 word review listing them all. Seriously, I listed them all out on my latest reread, just to get a feel for how bad it was, and I hit that milestone around the halfway point without even using complete sentences or paragraphs. This manga is also filled with anti-climaxes and half-assed explanations that were clearly written after the fact. As a fan of One Piece and Fullmetal Alchemist, I think continuity is one of the most important things in any battle shounen. The lack of continuity destroys the atmosphere, kills the world-building, gets rid of all empathy the audience has built up for the characters, and makes the combat more contrived in addition to being less compelling.

The art is bad for the first seven volumes and it never really gets good at anything but fanservice. The characters are all more primitive versions of designs that were recycled for Fairy Tail characters. About halfway through, the art quality peaks at "mediocre" and stays there for the duration of the plot. It’s generally not very creative or detailed. What I can say about it is that it's usually easy to follow, although the character designs aren't too distinctive.

Just about all of the cute women love the main protagonist, without him ever really having to do anything but be his annoyingly cliché idealistic self. The main antagonist for the second half of the series is supposed to be very charismatic, but the source of this charisma and influence over others is not at all apparent to the audience. Characters' entire personalities are changed by tiny things like seeing a pretty dance. Villains are portrayed as absolutely evil, then they are all given some little contrived sob story; they were originally great guys but they turned evil and did bad stuff because they were lonely or because their wife died. The characters are often supposed to be funny, but far too much of the humor consists of ridiculously immature fart jokes and recycled facial expressions. The main cast also consists of a mindless pet, a delinquent with a heart of gold, an airheaded heroine, a perverted land jellyfish, and a dragon-person with a ridiculously inconsistent personality. I barely know what to make of the characters except that they all suck.

This manga is not very good. I found the combat to somehow be less boring than Fairy Tail was (not saying much,) but the issues with continuity ruined it. Then the art and characters made it even worse. This all culminates in a lackluster and bland conclusion, which makes me wonder why anybody would want to read through the whole thing in the first place. There are better and more creative battle shounens out there. A whole lot of them. This manga brings nothing new to the formula and continually trips over itself even while telling the most predictable story possible.

Groove Adventure Rave : An epic adventure with lots of emotional events.

This is probably the only manga I completely read, so I think I should write a review about it.

Note : I have watched the 51 episodes anime 10 years ago. I just finished reading the manga recently. I am also watching Fairy Tail, the same story wrote by Mashima Hiro, so I will write this review based on this condition.

If you read or watched Fairy Tail, you should also read this manga. They had a 51 episodes of anime based on this manga, but that anime is not done, so reading the manga is the only solution to understand the whole story. This story is also the origin of FAIRY TAIL (I thought).

This manga is just like a normal shonen type manga. A hero battling evil, journey through various places and meet a lot of comrade along the journey. Like another shonen type story the hero is powerful and with the journey he become more powerful. The hero is also poses a very powerful item that can only be used by him to defeat the evil. In the end the hero and his companions defeat evil and save the world, BUT the cost is too high, AND that's what make this manga (Groove Adventure Rave) really ROCKSSS. Several important characters die and the event is really touching.

That's enough of the story, so, The story is amazing, I give 10. The art is kinda unique, it change several times and not consistent, so I will just give it 8. The character development is GREAT. For the enjoyment, I really enjoy it because of the masterpiece story, so overall I give it the score 9.

so, for those who wish to experienced a different kind shonen manga, RAVE is the best. For those who read or watch fairy tail this manga maybe the ORIGIN of it, so you should read it..

Please enjoy the read..
WineZ

I started watching Rave Master a long time ago - it was one of my first ever anime that felt like an anime - before I even knew what anime and manga were. I was kinda lost watching it out of order on TV and then it's abrupt end. A year ago I found the manga and dived right in. By then I already knew the beginning plot and was accustomed to the shounen style; this is typical of the shounen formula.

Story - 7
Rave starts as a light-hearted adventure with three goals - one each distinctly for Haru, Elie, and Musica - a small key cast with a predictable progression scale. But then the story became erratic with an inconsistent pace and every single possible opportunity to add a twist, a new character/group, or deviation is beyond exploited. I actually often forgot the ultimate goals and interesting plots that we had been so excellently drip fed earlier - and I'm certain the characters forgot too!
We were given so many epic goals, big one on one battle climaxes and classic angry shounen hero "I'm going to put this right!" moments, that all turned out to be just another false alarm. These would have been fine in a slower paced arc format such as in One Piece but presented as they are it's too much in too short a time to actually register it all.
The overall story if you can weed out the keys points that actually refer to the Rave is very good and does have that "epic long quest with many sacrifices to win this war against evil to save the world" presented very well with enough originality. Unfortunately it's cluttered.

Character - 7
Our three original heroes are typical and interesting enough through the base story to put off a final design until later through thee coming of age formula. Haru is the typical coming-of-age kid on a mission with the usual shounen outbursts of shouting and rage about morals or showing off his naive confidence - he's a safe bet. Elie is the typical female co-lead personality who's gutsy and cute but generally a burden until her sudden power-up near the end. And Musica is the streetwise slightly older character who is briefly an antagonist before dumping all (why I don't quite get) and joining the gang.
But later after developing the storyline and characters - including the supporting lot - we are suddenly bombarded with antagonists after antagonist and so many allies and new mains that outnumber and shrink the significance of the originals. All of the are brilliantly developed with their own unique abilities and sob stories and very likeable - but there's just too many! Nearly every "bad guy" they defeat suddenly has a revelation and swears to change, thus they are spared or even recruited.
I'd love to give this section a nine for all of the characters are brilliant. Unfortunately from the magnitude of them the story loses focus and evens ends up with the characters fighting for limelight.

Art - 9
I found the art style very nice and easy on the eyes. All the character's designs are distinct despite their number and unlike in many manga I never found my self confusing any key characters. The character's developed over time and changed clothes regularly which is a nice detail. The background does often lack details but there is never a deja-vu recycledness and the actual characters in the background (including the insignificant ones without names) are developed with unique hair/face/clothes. The artist does like to focus a quite a bit on the qualities of women - edging towards ecchi in how often they have skimpy/torn/no clothes but it adds to the humour (and fanservice).

Enjoyment doesn't get a section but it's score is a 9.

Overall I give a 8 because it's very good but not quite great.

Story: 4
Character: 4
The story and characters are really cliche. There is a warrior, and he is the only one who can save the world from an evil organization. Along the way, he meets people who join him because he changed their heart. He brings a few evil people onto his side, absolutely refuses to kill, is the typical naive good guy. I found the general direction of the story easy to predict as well.
Art: 6
Reminiscent of One Piece, and I am one of those people who likes One Piece, so I could tolerate it. The art got a lot better after approximately 7 volumes? I think. But there are many well drawn fight scenes. The mangaka uses many of his character designs over again in Fairy Tail, and I absolutely love Fairy Tail, so it kinda made me annoyed to see the same or similar characters.
Enjoyment: 10
Overall: 8
I know, I know my previous scores were relatively low, but I somehow really loved this manga. It was really lighthearted and there was a lot of comedy, but it was pretty serious too. It was a bit cheesy and lame, but the emotional rollercoaster and the tiny plot twists were amazing.

I recommend this to people who want an emotional read, but are very tolerant of cliched lines in story and character and can stand the art.

(This would contain some punctuation mistakes)
One of the worst failures in manga history. Just surpassed in being a bad manga by craps like "Fairy Tail", "Karakuri Circus" , "Akame ga Kill" and other terrible works. This is just a "Kodomo" story trying desperately to fall for a great mature Shonen but just tricking someone too stupid (like me in the past).
The story is very "cliché" and has a lot of childishness on it with a lot of childish dialogues and childish messages so childish situations that are exalted to try to look serious and awesome,oh, also the series has a lot of moments of pretentiousness where it tries to look smart or epic but if you are intelligent enough (you don´t have to be a genius either) will note its stupid pretensions.

Characters are (Like the story) pretentious and try to look cooler and more great which they really are also they are just asses (specially girls like bitch Ellie)

Art is very infantile and looks aimed for kids (seriously, this crap should have been a kodomo, it would been awesome, but Mashima loves make fan-service) just look at it, it has "Childish" written on its face and looks not made by a very talented man and talking about anatomy ,well, is fucking shit which is very disappointing coming of a manga-ka who loves fanservice (and the guy doesn´t improve too much not even in "Fairy Tail")

My personal enjoyment with this shit has changed with time, some time ago i used to love with my heart this bullshit but now that i have got a better criteria i just see clear like water how terrible this pretentious shit really is, and couldn´t recommend it not even to my worst enemy he will just be tricked by a moron

Don´t read this crap at least you are those ones looking for a bad work of fiction to make fun of (2/10)

Story: At first I didn't think the story was originial. It's mainly about a guy who is destined to save the world, and he's given a sword and travels around in search of something (in this case Rave stones) in order to save the world. But when I began to read Groov Master Rave aka Rave Master, it captivated me. The story may not be original but there's a spice to the series that makes me love it. But what Haru (main character) does on his journey (the friends and enemies he meets, the obstacles he faces, the story twists) are all original and are fantastic.

Art: I love how the art is unique. (If you ever read Fairy Tale (Which is made by the same person) the art is exactly like that. But the art had resemblences of other fantastic series such as Shaman King, YYH (to an extent), One Piece, and Naruto. I am not picky on art, but the art is really cool.

Character: Haru Glory is a very honest person. He is like normal protagonists (Honest, loyal, strong, has good morals, determined, etc.). I felt an instant attraction toward his good nature, but I felt the character could be developed more. I wish he could reveal a "dark side", but that is probably wishfull thinking. And of course no benevolent hero can live on without the annoying, worthess love (Elllie in this case), and the super cool, strong, player, attractive side kick (Musica in this case too). I felt Ellie had a good background and mystery to her, but I feel she is not strong enough. She enjoyes to gamble (like most annoying female characters do), but I feel she is too dependent on the others. Musica is just awesome, I enjoyed Musica a lot because he grew as a character, as a figter, and ultimatly as a person as a whole. But there are of couse an annoying mascot (Plue). I enjoyed the most of couse was the way some villians were developed (such as King Gales Raregroove of Demon Card). I loved some of the characters, but I felt some lacked originiality and development. But none-of-the-less all (or most because I despise Ellie for her weakness) are loveable and are able to connect with the reader.

Enjoyment: Would I read a long series of a series I didn't enjoy? As I read the series I felt I throughly enjoyed it. But hey, it's better than doing homework right?

Overall: Even though there are some aspects of this series that I didn't love 100%, I added this series to "List of Series That Are Underestimated". I hated the anime dubs, they did not give the manga series justice. (The dubbing was horrible and they edited out any violent parts.) Please do not associate the anime with the manga, and please read it. If you think this is for a younger audience (like I did), read it and be surprised. There's plenty of action, adventure, romance, drama, comedy, fantasy, everthing! (Well not everything, but you catch my dirft. Please read it now!

tl;dr: A Shounen action series that has a really arbitrary plot and pretty underdeveloped characters, but has enough charm to make it a really enjoyable ride. 

This manga is incredibly messy in a lot of ways, but it’s still an immensely enjoyable ride. The story feels really arbitrary. There are a lot of things that are incredibly forced and pulled out randomly in order to push the plot in a certain direction like characters suddenly appearing or random mechanics that pop up once and are never seen again. There were some scenes that were clearly supposed to indicate or foreshadow something, but the author decided to change where he was taking the plot and hence what was hinted at never materialized, these elements being completely ignored or twisted in a ridiculous way to keep things consistent with the new direction. And it kind of bugs me that it pretty much tries to make every villain likable in the end, with some even getting instant redemption, which seems incredibly forced and undeserved a lot of the time. So, the manga definitely lacks consistency in terms of the overarching narrative and plot threads. Still, even though it’s really messy and chaotic, it’s still really enjoyable. The main characters may not have all that much depth personality or character development wise with some rare moments being the exception, but they are interesting, amusing, and really likable, making them really easy to get invested in. And though it’s incredibly subtle for pretty much the entirety of the manga, the relationship between Haru and Elie is really sweet and great to see progress. The story is random, but it manages to capture the sense of adventure really well. Plus, the randomness even feels like a plus at points. The plot starts off really rough, so using the randomness to run around these issues and not worry too much at being constrained by them certainly helped the plot. Some of the crazier overarching twists were built up pretty well and were great when they were fully revealed. And eventually, once you get used to the arbitrariness, it was pretty awesome to have something major happening constantly. It allowed things to move at a really fast peace, and it let the author do a lot of awesome things that would otherwise be impossible if he was trying to keep the story more consistent. The ending very much embodies both the negatives and positives of the randomness, it is incredibly forced and arbitrary, but in a way that does right by its characters and makes sure to hit all the right notes to feel really satisfying. The action is fast paced and epic enough to be pretty awesome. Powers are interesting and really varied, and though that leads to a bunch of consistency issues, it works well enough. About half of the time the end of these battles despite the powers simply comes down to the power of will, friendship, and all that, but these scenes are well written so it doesn’t feel like too much of a drag and often actually feels pretty awesome. In addition, there's enough of other elements that don’t ever make things all that complicated, but are enough to keep the combat interesting and varied. I also really liked the atmosphere all the way through, with it being incredibly optimistic and keeping up a steady stream of humor between the serious moments. The art starts off being not all that good, but by about half way through it evolves into becoming good, especially in terms of character designs, and keeps that up all the way into the ending. 

When people hear the name Hiro Mashima today, they instantly think of his most recent work, Fairy Tail, which is steadily growing in popularity since its debut in 2006. However, its clearly easy to see where Fairy Tail's roots come from when one decides to undertake his previous, massive shounen story, Groove Adventure Rave. The anime adaptation of Groove Adventure Rave, named Rave Master, suffered considerably because of character designs that were not consistent with the manga counterpart, and because the anime adaptation covered only the first 90 chapters or so, leaving many unanswered questions and open plot holes. Groove Adventure Rave is a story that is unbelievably shounen, through and through. However, despite obvious plot twists and predictable characters, it still does not take away on what turns out to be a highly enjoyable read about a teenager's coming of age journey to save the world.

Haru Glory, Rave's shounen hero, is a young teenager living away from civilization with his sister on Garage Island. One day, an old man happens to pass through the Island and Haru eventually learns the identity of this old man is none other than the Rave Master, a hero that is destined to save the world from the atrocious organization, Demon Card, who plan on ruling the world. The old man, in poor health, eventually passes on his title and sword to Haru, entrusting him to find the Rave Stones to stop Demon Card. And thus Haru, becomes the 2nd Rave Master. Early on in his journey, Haru meets a young girl, Elie, who has amnesia and is seeking the truth about her past. This fateful meeting will eventually trigger events that become the foundation that eventually shakes the world.

From this synopsis, any reader familiar with shounen stories can get a sense of what kind of adventures, pitfalls, powers, themes, etc., Haru and Elie will encounter in their journey, and without fail, Mashima utilizes all of them. The sudden power ups, the talk about dreams overpowering thirst for power, friendship overcoming critical death status, so on and so forth. Groove Adventure Rave has all these shounen plot elements and in today's standards, the story starts to get pretty predictable as to what will occur. Fortunately, there are a few plot twists that occur deep in the story which some readers will be surprised to learn about, and it are those saving graces which help keep the reader entertained.

Readers familiar with and fans of the art in Fairy Tail will easily come to love the art Mashima utilizes in Rave because its the same exact style. While not as refined in the early chapters, Mashima designs his character rather attractively, the men with defined muscles and distinct faces; the women with heavenly chests and attractively looking figures. The battles are rather easy to follow, however, there are some instances where things tend to get a bit cluttered. The only critique I do have with his art is that Mashima does sacrifice detail in the background. This is especially apparent during battles, where the background will either be plain white or black. But again, this isn't too bad, as it does make the battles easier to follow.

While the characters look attractive, their personalities are rather predictable. Meaning, Haru is your typical shounen male lead; Elie is your typical female co-lead, and the same with all of the other characters Mashima introduces. They are nothing you haven't seen before, both good and evil. On the other hand, Mashima is able to adequately tell the history's of each of his characters without taking up too many pages or chapters, which is a nice change of pace from other stories where character past's are either too long or too short. Though character personalities really don't undergo a drastic overhaul from start to finish, all of the main heroes do evolve in a sense where you'll be able to pinpoint the difference from when a character was first introduced and where that character is during the last chapters.

Despite Groove Adventure Rave being the poster child for all things shounen, there is something about the story and the way Mashima goes about storytelling that makes it all seem enjoyable. You actually start caring for what happens to Haru and Elie, and watch in awe as their relationship develops from acquaintances to love throughout the plot. Mashima introduces a plethora of different characters that help shape all of the different arcs, and despite the length of the story, with the exception of a few gag chapters inserted in between, you never get the sense that Mashima doesn't know where he's going with the story. Although the story does go from point A to point B without much deviation, it's still an enjoyable read.

One of the big knocks I do have is the fact that almost every evil character, after being defeated, will undergo an instantaneous change from evil to good, which gets to be really old, really quick.

After reading Groove Adventure Rave, its easy to see where many of the ideas, character and guild names arise in Fairy Tail. All in all, if you're looking for a lengthy shounen, "coming of age" journey of a young man, with a nice side of romance, Groove Adventure Rave is something you'll definitely want to check out.

Rave Master was one of my first mangas so I might be slightly biased towards it but don't say I didn't warn you! I also won't be using my review to compare this to Fairy Tail.

Basically, Rave Master has it all. You want fighting? It has that. Romance? Got you covered. Comedy? It has some of that too. This manga has a bit of every genre in it so it appeals to a wide range of people. The story isn't all that special, but it is executed well and is supplemented by some nice art and fantastic characters.

The fights aren't too dragged out like a lot of shounen manga, and there are often humorous moments within fights to make it even more interesting. The characters are lovable from the moment you first meet them and it's easy to grow attached to them as they mature through the series.

Rave Master is definitely worth a read and even a re-read.

Rave Master is by far, my favorite manga/ book/ anything ever written (though the anime kind of sucked). It is Hiro Mashima's work before Fairy Tail. Even if Fairy Tail is amazing, this is even better. It is amazing, and I give it a 10. Heck, I'd give it a 17 if I could. T^T Anyway, to the review:

- STORY - 10 - I love the story, and I feel it is quite original. I know, it probably could relate to something here and there, but it is still good, I mean, what other stories have you heard about a boy who was chosen to be a hero (ok so that's every Shonen anime/ manga out there) to find special magical stones with a giant transforming sword, with a snowman dog thingy, finding Ellie's (his friend, the girl) memory, and trying to save the world?

- ART - 9 - The art was really quite good. It got a little weird from time to time, becuas ein that period of time he was writing RAve Master his art style kind of changed from better to a little worse to better, and than okay, but overall it was good.

- CHARACTER - 10 - Usually, in a manga/ anime you get an weak, annoying, whiny brat as a female lead ( ok that's not entirely true, and sometimes it's not annoying) and a stupid, over powered male that's always trying to save her. I can't argue with overpowered and the part where he's always saving her, but this time, the girl is the stupid one!!! XD She is hilariously funny, and Haru, he's funny, but he's not stupid or mean. He is very kind.

- ENJOYMENT- 10 - I enjoyed almost every last minute of it (I hated the mermaid arc I'm sorry.. -_- ) But it was amazing. It is HILARIOUSLY funny and an amazing story. Although it is somewhat pointed towards younger teens/ tweens, older ones will still enjoy it (unless your a boring old person who only enjoys politics XD)

- OVERALL - 10 - It is really amazing and you should ATLEAST read 35 volumes of it before you decide if you like it or not. XD

Forget about Fairy Tail kids, Rave Master is the real deal when it comes to battle shonen. Having read over both manga several times, I can easily say that Mashima really dropped the ball with Fairy Tail and that Rave is a much better story and it stands above almost every other shonen I've read.

Now, as much I as I enjoy hyping Rave Master up, I can't deny that it's another generic and cliche shonen. It has the stereotypical characters and tropes. But what I am saying is that Rave takes these cliches and executes them in a way that is better than just about any other shonen.

I'm sure many of you have seen have watched the watered down anime with it's watered down dub several years ago, but don't let that fool you into thinking that Rave Master isn't very good, the manga is so much better that it's ridiculous, especially considering the anime stopped before the best parts started. And if you guys think characters like the jiggle butt gang are silly, it should be known that they're only in two chapters and are later written off completely.

What makes Rave Master so great is that compared to other shonen manga, the characters in Rave Master felt a little bit more human and actually had developed personalities. I'm not saying they're NGE level deep or anything, but compared to people from One Piece or Naruto they felt a lot more realistic and less contrived at times. It often makes for great emotional scenes and the characters do have great tension with each other.

Story is pretty good for a shonen as well. At first, it just starts off as "evil empire with super powers are trying to take over the world" but it eventually evolves into something far deeper than that. The pacing for the story is also excellent, seeing as how Rave completed it's run in just under 300 chapters with several story arcs.

Fights are also pretty good too. Most characters have abilities that are similar to ones from Fairy Tail. See, in Rave, the characters have things called dark brings, which basically give them magic like abilities. Unlike in Fairy Tail though, these fights actually have a good deal of tension and suspense in them, as the heroes in Rave aren't as invincible as the ones in Fairy Tail. Not to mention Mashima is talented in drawing out fight choreography. So the battles and EVERYONE gets a real chance to shine, unlike other manga where a lot of characters are thrown away so the MC can steal the precious victory.

Now, I'm not saying the manga is flawless, the ending was rushed and I didn't particularly like the main villain. But aside from that I can't really say that I could find anything else that I didn't like about it.

Rave Master is great when you add all the parts together, it really works well as a manga. I can only feel as though Mashima didn't really take a long enough break between writing Rave and Fairy Tail to get any good ideas for it. Rave Master is actually a quality series.
Fairy Tail just feels more like a fanservice one.

Groove Adventure Rave(known as rave master in north america) is easily one of my favorites for shonen's also it's my 5th favorite manga EVER! Let's get down the story, A boy named Haru Glory is the chosen one...The rave master (meaning he is one of the only one's who can use rave stones) along his journey with a snowman named plue (who is called a dog) meet's an etherion girl named Ellie, a man who can shape shift metal named Musica, a dragon from the mystic realm named Let, and numerous other characters. Along the story, Haru goes through hardships to make him stronger and fight against the main antagonist of the first half of the story...Demon Card, as for the second half read to find out who the villain is. The art of this manga is great, character's are very good, story arcs are fun(it became better after sieg hart's fight for me). One of my only problem's is the slow start in pacing, art problems and shaky story, but after the 6th volume everything changed for the better. When first picking up the manga, I thought this wasn't going to be good...but how I was wrong, this manga could be read by any age group and still be enjoyed, that's why this manga will always hold a special place in my heart.

Art: Art wasn't anything Special, there weren't any moments where it made my eyes widen on how beautiful a picture was drawn. It was passable but through out the series you didn't even notice it improving.

Character: The main characters were good, they all were well develop through and grew strong bonds with one another but the most of the minor and side characters were forgettable not only because they were so many of them but because they weren't interesting to care about ( This is my second time reading Rave and I forgot two of the main antagonist).

Enjoyment: I loved Rave Master the first time I read it because of the amount of plot twist it had and most fights makes you wonder how are the they going to get themselves out of it but it times they literally use friendship and that turns a fight down.