Here’s another thread about sharing our experiences. Which Key game or Anime was your first, and how did you discover it? What was it that then lead you to try other Key stories, what attracted you to Key?
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Probably due to my passion for drama/tragedy. I like finding buried treasures under the wave of popular animes a la Attack on Titan or SAO, or you name it. At some point a few years ago, I watched CLANNAD. While the characters and routes were pretty entertaining, it didn’t rank up to my favourite animes/games in any way (I only really cried at Fuuko’s route).
But I started really getting into Key back in 2012 when the first episode of the Little Busters Anime was airing. Some friend who tried it out yelled at me that there was a character that looked a lot like me, and not just physically, so I went to check it out and found a liking to said character and the childhood friends.
I started following the anime, though at some point before Komari’s route I dropped the anime and decided to go for the visual novel since it had one with a full English translation and I was tired of waiting on a per-week basis (yes, I’m impatient, lol).
Fun fact: When I played the visual novel, I had no idea Little Busters was a Key work. I only realised it after Komari’s route.
I really lost it and gained utmost respect for Key at the end of the Refrain route. That route alone made Little Busters climb up to one of my favourite animes/games. So I started looking at other Key works since I liked LB and Clannad and wanted to try out the rest of their works (mostly Maeda’s though) .
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I first learned about Key after watching Kanon 2006. It was pretty sad and yet heartwarming, but it didn’t get me addicted just yet. Fast forward to 2008, and I got Planetarian from a friend who introduced me to Visual Novels. It was also pretty nice, but didn’t get me hooked.
After a while, I introduced my girlfriend to visual novels in general. One day, she comes and tells me “Hey I am downloading CLANNAD” and I’m like “Alright, sure, gimme a copy when you’re done” and… that’s what got me really hooked. It was just so intense that I had to try out everything Key-related. Watched the rest of the series (Angel Beats, Clannad and Air), played Kanon… Shortly after, the Little Busters Patch came, and Rewrite a year later.
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Quote from the introductions thread~
Person had recommendations for animes. Clannad was among them. One day was bored and decided to click ‘random anime’ on a site I go to, Clannad came up so I watched it. Certain amount of time later the user AngelofDeath720 found out from a mutual friend that I had seen said show, introduced me to the rest of Key.
How I got into Key’s works is kind of a strange story for me. I was introduced to Key by the Anime adaptation of Clannad in late 2012. However at the time, I didn’t know who or what Key was. I got introduced to Clannad via a YouTube video of The Top Ten Saddest Anime Deaths by an Anime reviewer named ShadowACS. He put Nagisa’s death at #1 so I was curious to see why her death was really sad. . So I watched both Clannad and Clannad Afterstory for the 2012 winter holidays and I really loved it.
A few months later while I was looking for AMVs I discovered Kanon 06 and I assumed it was made by the same people who did Clannad. It was then that I found out that both the series were adaptations of Visual Novels made by a company called Key. I decided to watch Kanon 06 in the winter of 2013 and while I didn’t love it as much as Clannad, I still thought it was a good Anime.
Soon after, through a recommendation from my high school friend, I watched Angel Beats and I thought it was an awesome show despite having some noticable flaws.I still have yet to play the Visual Novels, but I’m gonna start with Planetarian this comming May.
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Well I was unaware of Key until I had already watched a couple of their anime.
I found Clannad on some guy’s top 10 favorite anime video (I don’t even know whose it was) and it sounded good, so I gave it a shot and then some one recommended for me to check out Angel Beats!. It wasn’t until I found a reviewer named ShadowACS did I make the connection when he paired Kanon with Clannad and Angel Beats!
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I’m more on the olden side.
I used to read Megatokyo back in 2004, where there were references to both Kanon and Air at the time. Nothing happened then
Then, on late 2005, my sister asked me for the source of a cheap poster I bought on a convention at the time. It featured Misuzu Kamio from Air, but then I didn’t know the name. It wasn’t until June 2006 that I could watch the Air anime… while on a trip. While it didn’t clicked to me that much back then, later that year I rewatched it and made me sob. Then I knew about Kanon 2002, Kanon 2006 and EFZ, and from there, into Clannad anime in 2007, but not before I grew interested in other Key works. I played Planetarian and sobbed, too
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It was around three years ago…
I was visiting a friend and I saw an Angel Beats wallpaper on his pc while he was listening to My Soul - Your Beats. He was only a few episodes in and all he could tell was that there was a Haruhi clone in there. Interested in many ways (eh? a high school girl with a gun?), I started watching Angel Beats. I was mesmerized. This amount of intense drama was absolutely new to me.
Many months later, when listening to Angel Beats songs on YouTube, I’ve noticed that it was compared to something called ‘Clannad’ a lot. So I got some info on Clannad and watched it. Season 1 was kinda nice but it didn’t give me what I was looking forward to, namely Angel Beats-level feels. After Story blew my mind.
So I did some research on the connection between Clannad and AB and found out that they were created by Key. I proceeded to watching other Key works, those being Kanon and Air. Shortly after that, I started playing my first VN: Clannad. Kanon followed. The next on the list would’ve been Little Busters, but the description kinda made me hesitant. Just a few days later, the first episode of Little Busters aired. I grabbed the LB VN and started playing it. Refrain was the first, and only work of fiction up to date that make me shed tears. The Little Busters VN also became my new favorite game, replacing my formerly favorite game that held its position for 7 years.
Next up was Rewrite and lastly, Planetarian.
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In summer of 2012, my friend had been trying to get me into anime for a few months, but without much avail. I started watching some shows available on Netflix at the time, and one of them was Angel Beats. I didn’t know it was by KEY at the time, not until a while later, after I’d watched Clannad, Clannad After Story, Kanon and AIR in late 2012 or early 2013. Then, since one of my friends has lots of VNs, he recommended I play Planetarian, which I enjoyed quite a bit. Then over the summer of 2013, I played Little Busters (yes, it took me all summer pretty much to finish that damn game). Right now I’m playing Rewrite. Don’t ask how long it’s taken me so far though T_T
Back in 2007 when I was still a casual to the toons, I watched this here Kanon thing on a whim, I wasn’t even told to watch it, just someone mentioned it was good.
Changed my life and shit I guess.
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For me, it started with Clannad. Most of the Anime I was watching I discovered myself through things like ANN database searches, fanart and MADs, of all things. I went into Clannad right off the heels of Lucky Star, expecting another feel good slice of life. I got something so much more, something which changed my life for the better, and helped me gain some kind of emotional fulfilment other Anime had never given me before. From there I went to Kanon hearing they were related, and I enjoyed it quite a bit, but it still wasn’t Clannad. I quickly discovered that they were made by a company called Key, which lead me to Air, the Clannad Visual Novel, and then Angel Beats once it came out. (At first I didn’t know Angel Beats was written by Jun Maeda, when I realised I quickly picked it up!) Once the Little Busters English translation was well underway, I picked that up, and it quickly became my favourite work of fiction ever. But you can hear me gush about Little Busters in heaps of other places.
Well, number 2, to Umineko anyway, yahaha~
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As for me, I played Kanon back then… I was watching for some VN and downloaded it in a forum that I can’t remember well.
Then, I tried to get to the Uguu-girl’s (Ayu) route with no luck. In the end I’ve reached her route after finishing all of the remaining routes.
Since then I’ve been a fan of nakiges, then I played Clannad, but I didn’t liked like Kanon tho. After that I tried to find similar VNs and learned that Key made all those games… Then played One and well… The rest of the story should be known.
Since then, I’m still a hardcore fan of the Uguu-girl.
For me it was kinda magical. I’d just entered university, after I had just revisited Elfen Lied and decided it was one of my absolute favorites. I happened to meet someone who also thought very highly of Elfen Lied, but was FAR more into anime than I was, and gave me several recommendations. Soon enough I asked him what his favorite anime was, and turns out it was Clannad. He hadn’t recommended it to me yet on the basis that he had no idea if I’d like it or not, but he did tell me that it was “the one anime that can make ANYONE cry”.
Well given that my tastes were more or less identical to his, or at least very similar, and I was very much intrigued by that last statement of his, I gave it a watch soon enough. After Story had an impact on me like nothing else had ever had before. But for a while, it was a solid #2 on my list. Then I realized… that there was more to Clannad. That the anime was merely an adaptation. Unacceptable, I need to get to know everything about Clannad. So I got the visual novel, and in one month I was through, and by the end of it, I resolved to read everything Key ever made.
So, yeah. That happened. I couldn’t even imagine what I’d be like if I hadn’t stumbled upon it by chance. It changed the way I look at many things, and I feel very much enriched by these experiences.
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If only there were more people like this…
Oh, wait. :3
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Hmm. Where did I first hear about Key? Well, I know I’d heard the name here and there, but it wasn’t until a couple years ago when I decided to watch Clannad (and After Story) based on a friend’s recommendation. I really enjoyed it, and that spurred me to watch roughly 13 full length (24ish ep) anime in a bit under two months. Kanon was somewhere in that mix, and I attempted to watch Air but didn’t get too far. At this point I became totally burnt out on anime, and have a ton of difficulty starting or finishing shows, even still.
One year (and a week) ago I met a someone while co-commentating on a friend’s stream. He’d mentioned something about visual novels, and since I was looking to get more info on them (I was still pretty new to VN’s) I added him and we hit it off. I asked him for a suggestion and he pointed me to Rewrite, which was his favorite VN. I was kind of surprised, since I’d never heard of it even though it was a Key work. It blew my mind. Sure, there were some flaws here and there, but it was a story and scale unlike anything else I’d read at the time. From there I went on to play Little Busters and Planetarian (among other things). So there ya go, my lengthy explanation that could be boiled down to something a lot shorter. I still plan on going through Key’s other works, but it’s all in due time.
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After two months? That’s admirable somehow ._. I’m stuck in that phase too~
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Little Busters!
One of my friends told me about the anime so I watched and I got hooked. Now I’m here xD
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Like mentioned in the intro thread, I’m another one of the oldies who got introduced through Megatokyo and its “sad girls in snow” references 
The author was quite excited about the Air anime when it came out, so I watched that too, and then imported the Kanon game after.
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Megatokyo brofist The amount of veteran Key fans is growing 
