I have been thinking to myself lately how to judge if an anime is good because the only thing I base my reviews on are my own personal feelings. However, is there something more I should expect from an anime besides being happy with it?

Like any other form of animation and cinematography it depends on what the anime is trying to depict. With that said any anime is great if it's able to fully express the story being told through distinct animation, voice acting, and sound.

Now what makes an anime stand out from the rest? It does depend strongly on personal opinion but an overlaying factor is how much you find yourself enthralled in the story. Even if a anime doesn't have a great story they can make it up through animation. What is most important is that the anime is able to make the viewer not notices the weaknesses by fully focusing on the strengths.

A good example would be with Studio Ghibli. They are phenomenal job with animation, but if you watch all of their movies some are clearly better.  That is because even though they have outstanding animation the story can falter to the point it becomes very noticeable. On the hand you can have a movie like Ponyo which has great animation and even though the story isn't really that great it's good enough to make you look past it. When it comes down to it you just want to loose yourself in the world the anime has created.

When I know that an anime is great, after watching every episode I will feel stuck in a state of euphoria. It is as if what I had just seen was magnificent and it left me wondering why I have not shared this experience with the world yet. Time seems slowed and I don't feel like the world around me is real because the air is cooler than before and the colors are so vivid. It is the feeling that the world just operates around you and that you are the only one who has experienced it. I can only completely say for certainty that the only anime that has given me this feeling was clannad. I will have to watch other anime from Kyoto Animation again some time soon.

I don't have an answer any better, or even just as great as these two. They've pretty much said it all. An anime is great when it leaves you speechless or awed. The more the animation, acting and other components are on point, the better it will be, but if it touches your heart somehow as well, then it must be a masterpiece. This is how I felt about Shin Sekai Yori. It's such a work of art, I don't know what to say about it because my words won't do it justice in my opinion. But I've also realized that for every anime I deem a masterpiece, my feelings are different: for example, my feelings for Sailor Moon are related to my experiences growing with it as a child because it was my first and biggest inspiration as an artist, but I was just obsessed with it too. When I re-watched it I was able to identify with so many other things, and I understood things I didn't even notice were there before, but I also learned something that today is very important to me. My love for Naruto is a lot different, because it communicates to me that I can be a better person, have a higher self-esteem, and it also deepens my knowledge of certain things. And my feelings for Shin Sekai Yori has nothing to do with personal development, but it does make me question some personal things, and from that I've established (or am establishing) new ways of thought. But for the most part, it's just art at its fullest potential.

What makes an anime great?
You wouldn't get tired watching it over and over and over again. xD

I think an anime is great when it brings out emotions from you. When it's sad, you can't help but cry. When it's funny, you can't help but laugh. It's great when you can connect all that it has: its characters, story, mood. It's all about the connection that brings out the greatness of it. 

 I have to say that was a wonderful statement.

By... "TheAwsome"