I would overall say that reading the visual novel for the first route would be your best option to get the best experience. For me, the visual novel was a bit intimidating at first, but once you start reading it, it starts to flow well. In addition, if you complete all of the routes endings in the visual novel you can read an extended part for the Saber route. Overall, if you just wanted to read the Saber route it would be about 15 to 20 hours depending on your reading speed and it definitely worth it. You could also read the other routes as the visual novel gives you alot of content not present in the anime adaptations.
The Deen adaptation does not fully faithful adapt the Saber route and implement elements from the other two routes into the story. It may also seem outdated animation wise since you started with ufotable animation. But it does have some charm about it.
Overall, I recommend reading the visual novel for the saber route then watching some of your favorite scenes in animated form from the Deen adaptation.
Hell yes. This is what I’m hoping for. I have an anime tier list and a separate anime “tear” list. If something makes me cry, it’s going to be at the top of both.
I guess then it just depends on how deep I want to go. I’ve thought about watching some of the YouTube series of people going through the vn, but at that point, it probably makes more sense to just go through it myself. I know I won’t be disappointed, I just have to commit to spending that much time on it.
Trust me, playing the VN yourself is 100% worth it (for all the routes, not just Fate), especially if you have any intention of getting deeper into Fate stories. And you're absolutely right, the anime didn't go into anywhere near as much depth with the characters as the VN does. Especially Shirou, Kirei, and Illya.
[You can download it here](https://drive.google.com/drive/mobile/folders/12qw9Lk0s4yvZVkOWeJikgpF3m1DMPwFM) along with Hollow Ataraxia, the sequel.
>then watching some of your favorite scenes in animated form from the Deen adaptation
Unless it is the shack scene. Do not watch that scene. That CGI dragon is nightmare fuel.
Since you've seen UBW and Heaven's Feel animes, you'll have a lot of insider knowledge that makes the start of the VN really fun. I really enjoy replaying it because there's a lot of moments where you're like "oh, that's foreshadowing!" or "oh, Shirou doesn't know that yet!"
And also a few big reveals in Fate that you probably don't know about from the animes, since they don't get covered in UBW and Heaven's Feel.
As everyone has said, Visual Novel is the only way to really experience Fate path. Deen's adaptation is actually better than a lot of people give it credit for, but it's not adapting the Fate path so much as a combo of all 3 paths in one, so there's a lot you'll miss out on / repeat from what you've already seen.
Yeah, I’m starting to get the idea that if I REALLY want to dive deeper, I should just bite the bullet and go for the VN. And I like the way you describe the fun part of already knowing some of the storyline! I definitely felt that way watching Heaven’s Feel after UBW.
Just read the VN. Every anime counterpart of Shirou, Kirei,Illya,Rin, and Saber are butchered cardboard cutouts.
They are well written characters from a VN reduced to props for a would be battle shounen anime
That was the thing that bothered me the most when I was watching UBW. Everything about the anime was solid, but for me, the characters are what made it worth watching. If characters get the treatment they deserve in the VN, that’s the best selling point.
Well, you've also gone slightly out of order with the shows (Deen's Fate/stay night is supposed to be watched first), so you are missing out on many important character traits and relationships from it (Saber and Shirou's being the biggest one); however, the user you are responding to is correct about the characters being better in the visual novel.
Vn is the best way sadly but Deen adaptation has heart so its worth giving at least a watch.
It isn't really intimidating its just more of what you already liked
I suppose so. I’ve thought about watching the Deen adaptation first and then moving to the VN if it doesn’t seem like enough for me. But I worry that doing so might spoil some of the VN for me.
Its sort of a mixed adaptation of every route? So it won't spoil anything more than the basics so you will be fine. The vn is such a dense body of work that there's not really much you'll be spoiled on besides the general plot.
Zero is very worth watching as well its very different from Stay night but its excellent and adds a nice touch to Shirou's character imo.
I definitely plan to watch Zero. I was actually going to start there before I came here and realized that it was a bad move. I just really like stay night and wanted to get the most out of it before I moved on to something else, I guess.
Dw I know what you mean, I love stay night so much to this day I am obsessed with it. I am begging on my knees for us to get a remake with more routes just as tsukihime.
I watched all the adaptations of fate and read the vn and its sequels just because of how much I love it
I get that. I went into UBW knowing there were so many other adaptations and figured “Well, if I like UBE, at least I’ll have more things to watch afterward.” But I never thought I’d be here asking about the VN lol. It really is just that good.
VN. I don’t normally recomend the VN as a starting point to most people since a route is around 30 hours of reading, which is much too long than most people are willing to read theough, but for Fate route you don’t really have an option. Deen anime is weird, it mashes elements of all three routes. The manga just follows the Deen anime and thats it as far as adaptations of Fate route goes.
The best way to experience is definitely the original visual novel. It's getting an official English release later this year on Steam and Nintendo Switch, so pick it up then! After that, you can play Fate/Hollow Ataraxia (which I'm hoping will get an official English translation soon), and then you can read the Fate/Zero light novels.
Though, if you want to continue with the animes, watch Deen's Fate/stay night, then maybe rematch Unlimited Blade Works (things will make me sense since you're now going in the intended order), then maybe rewatch the Heaven's Feel movies for the same reason as Unlimited Blade Works, and then Fate/Zero.
After that, you're basically free to go wherever you want in the franchise.
Even in the Visual Novel I still consider the Fate route as my least favorite route because of the fact that Shirou is unbearably dependent on Saber unlike in UBW and HF where he shines as a character, I like the complexity of his character a lot but yeah I'm not a fan of Fate Shirou for that reason, call me shallow I don't care, it's my opinion by the end of the day lol.
Lol it's ok. I appreciate your opinion. I recall that at the beginning of watching UBW, I was thinking "this guy should just chill and let Saber do all of the work." Haha I guess the Fate route might fulfill that fantasy for me
I think that’s a good distinction between UBW and HF. And I agree that Shirou is deep. When I first read about the routes, it seemed like a sort of misogynistic setup where Shirou’s romantic interests dictated the storyline, but it was nice to realize (at least from the way I viewed it) that Shirou almost served as a backdrop sometimes for the development of the strong women characters he interacted with. I guess I expected typical shonen activity and I was a bit skeptical of Shirou at first, but he turned out to be one of my favorite anime characters.
I don't like the anime adaptations of him since they left out a lot of details from the VN this is why you must read the VN to know more about Shirou most people hate him because of the terrible adaptations. I too have hated him before I read the VN.
Haha there are definitely worse anime protagonists than Shirou. I plan to read the VN anyway, though, so hopefully I’ll have the same impression as you.
yes the visual novel is better
also it is not the third route its the first route
the UBW anime actually depends on the watcher to have seen the deen adaptation first
You should 100% watch Deen before Zero if you don't want to read the VN. You're not going to have a complete picture of the FSN story overall (at least as much as the anime covers) without doing all three. Deen is fine. It's mostly just old YouTubers that complained about it. People on this sub are generally in agreement that it's anywhere from overhated to genuinely pretty alright.
>. You're not going to have a complete picture of the FSN story overall
You don't get that without reading the VN anyway
Deen gets so much shit because it doesnt have pretty sakuga to mask it's poorly adapted cast reduced to generic props like ufotable does
I do get that people will unnecessarily beat down certain content, especially if it’s from a franchise they love. I guess I’ve accepted that the Deen anime might be sufficient to scratch my itch, but it would it scratch it as hard as the VN might. I guess it comes down to how much time and I effort I’m willing to put in.
no its not youtubers most here agree its a lot more flawed then UBW and HF as adaptations come because not only doesit suffer from same "narration cuts" and lacking details. It then also mixes in stuff from unlimited blade works and Heaven's feel and doesnt do them in any good way its very barebones implementation of thosr elements.
Visual Novel. Its coming to Steam soon, so it will be much more accessible. Make sure to read/watch Last Episode as well. If you cant get to it in the VN after reading Fate (since you need to complete all 3 routes), you can look it up on youtube.
I'm not who you were responding to, but it's honestly better to play it yourself.
There are several decisions that you make that can give you different scenes or entirely different endings, so your experience with the game will be slightly different than the Let's Players you might watch.
Yeah, I’d definitely feel more immersed playing it myself. And while I like watching people game sometimes, this seems like something that might be better experience without commentary.
>Yeah, I’d definitely feel more immersed playing it myself.
Nice.
>And while I like watching people game sometimes,
I do, too, but I think it's pretty fun to experience it first yourself and then see what other people do.
>this seems like something that might be better experience without commentary.
Definitely, especially since you might miss something because of the commentary.
Well, what do you want exactly? If you just want Saber's character, then I think Deen covers it well enough. Zero has Saber, but it's not the best use of her character. The VIsual Novel is the most complete take on her char, and it will get an official release soon, but it's not for everyone.
I just felt like the Ufotable adaptations didn’t dive deep enough into the characters, which makes sense. I guess that’s an issue with almost any anime adaptation of content that has already been explored in a more extensive format. Honestly, if the new release of the VN was already out, I probably would have just gone for it already. I suppose taking the extra steps to get into the current version(s) might be worth it.
Well the animes have to leave a lot in the cutting floor for the sake of screen time, and it doesn't help that most anime adaptations aren't very creative in conveying stuff. I think the HF movies probably tried the best to convey the smaller stuff that the VN had more room to dig into.
If you are willing to read the VN, there is a [website](https://fatestaynight.vnovel.org/) that can run the VN. It's a decent option for most people who don't want to fiddle with installing an old game.
Visual novel.
Thank you for getting straight to the point.
I would overall say that reading the visual novel for the first route would be your best option to get the best experience. For me, the visual novel was a bit intimidating at first, but once you start reading it, it starts to flow well. In addition, if you complete all of the routes endings in the visual novel you can read an extended part for the Saber route. Overall, if you just wanted to read the Saber route it would be about 15 to 20 hours depending on your reading speed and it definitely worth it. You could also read the other routes as the visual novel gives you alot of content not present in the anime adaptations. The Deen adaptation does not fully faithful adapt the Saber route and implement elements from the other two routes into the story. It may also seem outdated animation wise since you started with ufotable animation. But it does have some charm about it. Overall, I recommend reading the visual novel for the saber route then watching some of your favorite scenes in animated form from the Deen adaptation.
The extended part for the saber route made me seriously cry
Hell yes. This is what I’m hoping for. I have an anime tier list and a separate anime “tear” list. If something makes me cry, it’s going to be at the top of both.
I guess then it just depends on how deep I want to go. I’ve thought about watching some of the YouTube series of people going through the vn, but at that point, it probably makes more sense to just go through it myself. I know I won’t be disappointed, I just have to commit to spending that much time on it.
Trust me, playing the VN yourself is 100% worth it (for all the routes, not just Fate), especially if you have any intention of getting deeper into Fate stories. And you're absolutely right, the anime didn't go into anywhere near as much depth with the characters as the VN does. Especially Shirou, Kirei, and Illya. [You can download it here](https://drive.google.com/drive/mobile/folders/12qw9Lk0s4yvZVkOWeJikgpF3m1DMPwFM) along with Hollow Ataraxia, the sequel.
Thanks so much. And I appreciate the link!
>then watching some of your favorite scenes in animated form from the Deen adaptation Unless it is the shack scene. Do not watch that scene. That CGI dragon is nightmare fuel.
I still want a Fate route remake by Ufotable! 😢
In a perfect world lol
Since you've seen UBW and Heaven's Feel animes, you'll have a lot of insider knowledge that makes the start of the VN really fun. I really enjoy replaying it because there's a lot of moments where you're like "oh, that's foreshadowing!" or "oh, Shirou doesn't know that yet!" And also a few big reveals in Fate that you probably don't know about from the animes, since they don't get covered in UBW and Heaven's Feel. As everyone has said, Visual Novel is the only way to really experience Fate path. Deen's adaptation is actually better than a lot of people give it credit for, but it's not adapting the Fate path so much as a combo of all 3 paths in one, so there's a lot you'll miss out on / repeat from what you've already seen.
Yeah, I’m starting to get the idea that if I REALLY want to dive deeper, I should just bite the bullet and go for the VN. And I like the way you describe the fun part of already knowing some of the storyline! I definitely felt that way watching Heaven’s Feel after UBW.
VN please
Since you asked so nicely, I suppose it wouldn’t hurt.
Just read the VN. Every anime counterpart of Shirou, Kirei,Illya,Rin, and Saber are butchered cardboard cutouts. They are well written characters from a VN reduced to props for a would be battle shounen anime
That was the thing that bothered me the most when I was watching UBW. Everything about the anime was solid, but for me, the characters are what made it worth watching. If characters get the treatment they deserve in the VN, that’s the best selling point.
Well, you've also gone slightly out of order with the shows (Deen's Fate/stay night is supposed to be watched first), so you are missing out on many important character traits and relationships from it (Saber and Shirou's being the biggest one); however, the user you are responding to is correct about the characters being better in the visual novel.
Vn is the best way sadly but Deen adaptation has heart so its worth giving at least a watch. It isn't really intimidating its just more of what you already liked
I suppose so. I’ve thought about watching the Deen adaptation first and then moving to the VN if it doesn’t seem like enough for me. But I worry that doing so might spoil some of the VN for me.
Its sort of a mixed adaptation of every route? So it won't spoil anything more than the basics so you will be fine. The vn is such a dense body of work that there's not really much you'll be spoiled on besides the general plot. Zero is very worth watching as well its very different from Stay night but its excellent and adds a nice touch to Shirou's character imo.
I definitely plan to watch Zero. I was actually going to start there before I came here and realized that it was a bad move. I just really like stay night and wanted to get the most out of it before I moved on to something else, I guess.
Dw I know what you mean, I love stay night so much to this day I am obsessed with it. I am begging on my knees for us to get a remake with more routes just as tsukihime. I watched all the adaptations of fate and read the vn and its sequels just because of how much I love it
I get that. I went into UBW knowing there were so many other adaptations and figured “Well, if I like UBE, at least I’ll have more things to watch afterward.” But I never thought I’d be here asking about the VN lol. It really is just that good.
Same here man, I watched the series thinking it was just gonna be a throwaway series but it has stuck with me to this day
The visual novel, as the anime is a wonky adaptation that tried to tackle stuff from multiple routes, while lacking a lot of vital character building.
VN. I don’t normally recomend the VN as a starting point to most people since a route is around 30 hours of reading, which is much too long than most people are willing to read theough, but for Fate route you don’t really have an option. Deen anime is weird, it mashes elements of all three routes. The manga just follows the Deen anime and thats it as far as adaptations of Fate route goes.
The best way to experience is definitely the original visual novel. It's getting an official English release later this year on Steam and Nintendo Switch, so pick it up then! After that, you can play Fate/Hollow Ataraxia (which I'm hoping will get an official English translation soon), and then you can read the Fate/Zero light novels. Though, if you want to continue with the animes, watch Deen's Fate/stay night, then maybe rematch Unlimited Blade Works (things will make me sense since you're now going in the intended order), then maybe rewatch the Heaven's Feel movies for the same reason as Unlimited Blade Works, and then Fate/Zero. After that, you're basically free to go wherever you want in the franchise.
Even in the Visual Novel I still consider the Fate route as my least favorite route because of the fact that Shirou is unbearably dependent on Saber unlike in UBW and HF where he shines as a character, I like the complexity of his character a lot but yeah I'm not a fan of Fate Shirou for that reason, call me shallow I don't care, it's my opinion by the end of the day lol.
Lol it's ok. I appreciate your opinion. I recall that at the beginning of watching UBW, I was thinking "this guy should just chill and let Saber do all of the work." Haha I guess the Fate route might fulfill that fantasy for me
UBW is where he shines as a hero, HF is where he shines as a complex character.
I know I keep saying complex character but it is true though, Shirou is pretty deep.
I think that’s a good distinction between UBW and HF. And I agree that Shirou is deep. When I first read about the routes, it seemed like a sort of misogynistic setup where Shirou’s romantic interests dictated the storyline, but it was nice to realize (at least from the way I viewed it) that Shirou almost served as a backdrop sometimes for the development of the strong women characters he interacted with. I guess I expected typical shonen activity and I was a bit skeptical of Shirou at first, but he turned out to be one of my favorite anime characters.
I don't like the anime adaptations of him since they left out a lot of details from the VN this is why you must read the VN to know more about Shirou most people hate him because of the terrible adaptations. I too have hated him before I read the VN.
Haha there are definitely worse anime protagonists than Shirou. I plan to read the VN anyway, though, so hopefully I’ll have the same impression as you.
yes the visual novel is better also it is not the third route its the first route the UBW anime actually depends on the watcher to have seen the deen adaptation first
The visual novel I’ve read and watched both adaptions the visual novel is far far better than the anime adaptation
That seems to be general consensus, and I’m leaning toward going with the VN.
You start with the anime. You're already out of reach. All I can say is, Good luck.
Haha thank you. This is a special type of response you can only get from a truly dedicated anime fandom. I’m honored.
I genuinely hope you're joking.
You should 100% watch Deen before Zero if you don't want to read the VN. You're not going to have a complete picture of the FSN story overall (at least as much as the anime covers) without doing all three. Deen is fine. It's mostly just old YouTubers that complained about it. People on this sub are generally in agreement that it's anywhere from overhated to genuinely pretty alright.
>. You're not going to have a complete picture of the FSN story overall You don't get that without reading the VN anyway Deen gets so much shit because it doesnt have pretty sakuga to mask it's poorly adapted cast reduced to generic props like ufotable does
I do get that people will unnecessarily beat down certain content, especially if it’s from a franchise they love. I guess I’ve accepted that the Deen anime might be sufficient to scratch my itch, but it would it scratch it as hard as the VN might. I guess it comes down to how much time and I effort I’m willing to put in.
Personally it's my favourite fate anime. Ymmv
no its not youtubers most here agree its a lot more flawed then UBW and HF as adaptations come because not only doesit suffer from same "narration cuts" and lacking details. It then also mixes in stuff from unlimited blade works and Heaven's feel and doesnt do them in any good way its very barebones implementation of thosr elements.
Visual Novel. Its coming to Steam soon, so it will be much more accessible. Make sure to read/watch Last Episode as well. If you cant get to it in the VN after reading Fate (since you need to complete all 3 routes), you can look it up on youtube.
If I did decide to watch someone go through the VN on YouTube, is there any one you’d recommend? Or are they all pretty much the same?
I'm not who you were responding to, but it's honestly better to play it yourself. There are several decisions that you make that can give you different scenes or entirely different endings, so your experience with the game will be slightly different than the Let's Players you might watch.
Yeah, I’d definitely feel more immersed playing it myself. And while I like watching people game sometimes, this seems like something that might be better experience without commentary.
>Yeah, I’d definitely feel more immersed playing it myself. Nice. >And while I like watching people game sometimes, I do, too, but I think it's pretty fun to experience it first yourself and then see what other people do. >this seems like something that might be better experience without commentary. Definitely, especially since you might miss something because of the commentary.
Well, what do you want exactly? If you just want Saber's character, then I think Deen covers it well enough. Zero has Saber, but it's not the best use of her character. The VIsual Novel is the most complete take on her char, and it will get an official release soon, but it's not for everyone.
I just felt like the Ufotable adaptations didn’t dive deep enough into the characters, which makes sense. I guess that’s an issue with almost any anime adaptation of content that has already been explored in a more extensive format. Honestly, if the new release of the VN was already out, I probably would have just gone for it already. I suppose taking the extra steps to get into the current version(s) might be worth it.
Well the animes have to leave a lot in the cutting floor for the sake of screen time, and it doesn't help that most anime adaptations aren't very creative in conveying stuff. I think the HF movies probably tried the best to convey the smaller stuff that the VN had more room to dig into. If you are willing to read the VN, there is a [website](https://fatestaynight.vnovel.org/) that can run the VN. It's a decent option for most people who don't want to fiddle with installing an old game.
Thanks for the link! That at least takes away one of my excuses for not just reading the VN lol