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Nov 16, 2023
This review is spoiler free
So I started reading this on a whim after being swept up in the hype after finishing the visual novel. I saw a lot of people using the manga adaptation on their favourites, but, as I guessed, it's used as a placeholder. It had a fairly decent score too, though, and as I assumed, sadly, it's also because people are using their score as a placehodler too.
First off out the bat the manga spoils something you don't find until about 30 hours into the visual novel. It doesn't outright spoil it, but the implications are too blatantly obvious. So that wasn't
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a good start. I had to mention this first, as it's such a blatant flaw with this adaptation that I can't not bring it up first before talking about anything else. I'll cover this more later.
I will now cover the positives of this adaptation before I delve into the issues I had with the manga. The one main positive of this adaptation so far, at least (I'm waiting for the last few chapters to be translated), is that it does tell the whole story, leaving in almost all the dialogue. While it doesn't sound like much of a compliment, it really is a big one, especially with the lack of content usually covered in visual novel adaptations. MLA is an especially difficult story to tell outside of its medium, so I am glad they kept loyal to the story.
The manga also expands on some of the side characters, which I enjoyed. I think a lot of the added content is a nice addition that fits a manga adaptation more than it would have been told through the visual novel. With mangas easier-to-consume format, it flows with the story and doesn't feel too cluttered. I think the extra pages for Isumi were particularly good, somewhat moving, and probably my favourite part of this adaptation. The best episode adapted overall for me has to be episode 9. The infamous moments towards the end look very pretty in the manga, which is undeniable.
Something I really enjoyed while reading was the covers for both volumes and chapters; they're very clean, and I think most fans will enjoy them. While I didn't like a lot of the direction with the art these covers and the TSF action I will admit I do think looked good.
Now onto the bad, and unfortunately, there's a lot of it, so I'll try to cover everything efficiently. As I already mentioned at the start, the worst part of this adaptation by far is the blatant spoiler in Chapter 3. They were clearly trying to go with teasing foreshadowing, but it misses and gives away a very big part of the plot too early on.
Artwork is one of the central focuses of manga, and for a series with such a big reputation as Muv-Luv, I think it's normal to expect great artwork from someone passionate about the series. Unfortunately, this adaptation is lacking all the fundamentals for a good or consistent manga artwork. You don't have to be a good drawer or a regular manga reader to see that the manga art is just not very nice to look at. It doesn't stop there, though the storyboarding in general is really lazy. To put it bluntly, this feels like the artist working on it has no interest in the series and is being paid the minimum wage. A lot of heavy-hitting scenes, especially within episode 6 aren't taken seriously and lose the weight of their impact because of the jankey-lazy style. Scenes that should have dedicated page spreads, or at least one page, regularly get squeezed into one panel. Having said this, I want to make it clear that I'm not an artist; my judgement is based on purely my experience reading manga and comics up until now. The artist obviously spent time on it and is more than anything I could ever draw, but it's unfair to better artwork in manga to not criticise the lack of quality here.
Somewhat related, but another thing that's odd is the absurd amount of fanservice. While yes, I understand MLA is an adult visual novel, it doesn't make it any less weird how much more lewd the manga is. There's titties everywhere in this manga. Now it's up to you whether this is a bad or good thing. I'm not going to argue about that. However, it definitely makes it difficult to take seriously at times, and a lot of the fanservice is very forced, tripped over into the girls boob cliché garbage, so it just adds nothing.
To conclude, how do I feel overall about Muv-Luv Alternatives manga? Well, it's an okaaayish experience if you're a big fan of the series and want to experience alternative again in quick format. However, for a first-time experience, unfortunately, I would never recommend it. One of Muv-Luv Alternative's main highlights is its fantastic production quality, which takes advantage of everything at its disposal to tell its story, especially for its time. To be a successful adaptation, an adaptation should replicate the source enough to be a good or great alternative for newcomers to a series. Muv-luv Alternative's manga doesn't deliver on that, though.
TLDR: read the visual novel please lol
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Sep 14, 2023
A good band girl show with a unique entertaining female cast and some really good peaks with Sakiko and Tomori and the climax of the series in episode 10. My drawbacks would be that the visuals aren't for everyone, as the 3D bandori use isn't exactly beautiful, but the camera work in this season is at least unique every now and then. Secondly, the drama feels forced and overdramatic in the middle of the season. I didn't really like how it was written; it's not awful, just overblown at times.
But yeah, bandori is evolving for sure as older bands are graduating, and I'm glad it's
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going for something bold and unique in a new direction that pays off. I look forward to seeing more.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Sep 10, 2023
I may have given this a 4/10 but there was a fair bit I enjoyed about it. Like one of the girls having an F1 car as the sound of her flying to show her speed lmao, the cast was pretty fun, and the ending was a cliche but satisfying save the world together stuff I like.
To be honest, I'd give this a 6 if it weren't all the sol being ALL bath scenes,the girls moaning with all their clothes disappearing after a fight, and the weird incest yuri.
In the end, it couldn't have been that bad. I binged it in a day somehow.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Jul 11, 2023
I love silly bunny girls
A wonderful 4-koma comedy featuring touhou 8's cast. I had so much fun reading this with the simple but effective original art style that I really like and the fun humour; it's an absolute treat. It is a lot more fun to read if you know the characters and their backstories, of course, but I still think it offers enough comedy and silly interactions to enjoy as a standalone, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend going in blind to the events of touhou 8's cast as some of the humour might miss.
Overall, I highly recommend this to touhou 8 fans, especially fellow
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Reisen fans.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Jul 11, 2023
Passionate, Charming and Necessary
Regardless of whether you love it or think it's mediocre or overrated, it's undeniable to all that the production quality for Bocchi the Rock is next level. The positive feedback and love that people have for the series since the anime was released online should be a testament and a wake-up call to how the anime industry, or a lot of the creative industry for that matter, needs to change.
Bocchi the Rock, as you may know, is a passionate, comedic, and lovable series about cute anime girls forming a band to reach their life goals or dreams. The cast's simple but iconic
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designs and personalities are really what drive home the series and what allowed it to be so easy to pick up and make waves online.
The passion and originality of this show derive from fans of the manga working on the show itself. Something that should be encouraged for more shows. The creative comedic sequences (that's mostly original content) use various different animation styles, including clay, 3D, and even stop motion at times, giving a fresh feeling to the genre.
The dramatic artistic choices isn't entirely new to comedy or slice of life anime; with Shaft doing fantastic creative imagery in comedy and slice of life in the likes of Zetsubou Sensei and Hidimari Sketch, especially in their later seasons. However this is the first time it's hit mainstream hopefully it'll be a wake up call to the industry that we want quality passionate works over quantity.
Why do some people not like it if it's so good? Production quality and passion can't break someone's strong will if they go in with higher expectations than necessary for an Iyashikei anime about school girls making a band. Because of the high expectations they might have gathered from seeing people praise it online, a lot of people watch purely off hype alone and expect to be blown away by fantastic writing. While the series writing is perfectly fine for what it is, if you're expecting to be blown away by the wrong thing, like twists or drama, it's going to disappoint. Obviously, this isn't all the negative feedback. Some people dislike Bocchi as a character for being too much of a self insert others just find it boring. Bocchi gathers praise from the majority for being cute, charming, entertaining, visually clean, and fun in general for those who like it. I suppose you could argue it's like that for many shows, but that's what you should be thinking when starting the show.
It's been said time and time again by many people, but this anime really is a show that seeps with passion, and you can really sense the work put into it while watching it. Whether you love it or hate it, For example, I find shounen like Demon Slayer and the first few seasons of My Hero Academia to be very impressive production-wise, but over time, my impression of them as stories fell off a lot. The reason I chose these two as my examples is because both series build upon the source material, not just follow it, and I appreciate the quality and drive behind them both despite not being a fan myself.
A passion driven production is always going to be better than media worked on just to be paid.
TLDR; If you like cute anime girls then you'll enjoy it.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Jul 11, 2023
Only 1/3 routes are well adapted. Why bother...
This is a spoiler-free review from the perspective of a fan of the visual novel who read EX routes in the VN before watching (Thank god).
The Ex routes in Little Busters are three additional routes unlocked after completing Refrain. In my opinion, they feature some of the best stories in Little Busters, but unfortunately, this anime adaptation of 2 of them is awful.
Saya:
Saya's route in the VN is one of my favourite works from Maeda, despite its quirks. However, this route is already, from the get-go, very difficult to adapt arc because of how it's structured into
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the VN. But that still doesn't forgive the poor, low quality adaptation that we're offered.
The anime adaptation for this route has major pacing issues because of its time constraints. While yes, it does follow the story, it rushes through it very fast, not giving time to develop Riki and Saya's feelings, resulting in their relationship feeling too comical and overall flat. While a lot of people agree Saya's ending in the VN is one of the highlights of reading it, the anime feels like a rushed mess that makes very little sense. Giving so little time to try to figure out what's going on for yourself in the plot, to become familiar and attached to the characters, and this results in a very weird story that feels not thoroughly thought out. It's not the worst adaptation in the world, but it's bad enough that I would rather you not watch it than only watch it over reading the VN.
I do want to mention some positives, though it does reference some CGs use the same soundtrack, including the infamous ED. I also much prefer Yui Horie's voice for Riki.
Sasami:
Thankfully, ironically, albeit sandwiched between 2 awful adaptations, Saisami's arc is probably the best adapted route in the whole series (including S1 and Refrain). In the VN I found that this route went on a bit too long for what it was, but the anime gives the right amount of time for everything without leaving anything out. In fact, I even think it improved upon it by removing the weird sub-plot of Sasami suddenly loving Riki despite loving Kengo the entire rest of the series. The adaptation faithfully uses all the CGs and plays the story out faithfully, and it feels just as good as reading the VN. I can even recommend watching it over playing the route as it's significantly shorter, saving people time. Unlike every other arc/route in Little Busters, this is the only part I can confidently say that you wouldn't be missing out on anything (aside from the more charming art style, I suppose).
Kanata:
Unfortunately, the good ends there. Kanata's route in the VN is my personal favourite route (aside from Refrain, of course), and its treatment in the anime is quite frankly an abomination. Kanata's route is probably the deepest, darkest-toned story in the game and has way too much content to cover within the time the anime offers, which ends up coming across as insensitive and unwatchable to VN readers. The anime does cover all the key scenes, but it's like a highlight reel, leaving out all the substance that makes this route so good and makes those scenes so impactful. Leaving an awful aftertaste to end the series on, unlike the VN which was the complete opposite.
To Finish:
I do like the new opening and ending sequences (using songs from the VN). The things this adaptation does carry over are good and fairly faithful. Like I said in my previous reviews, the art style loses the charm of the VN and the animation isn't anything to celebrate. I do think production quality is a bit better than Refrain, less weird editing and using more of the source materials CGs to go off was a welcome change. But the stories aren't given enough time at all; it ends up feeling insulting to fans of the VN and makes Little Busters look a lot worse than it actually is. Overall, I recommend watching Sasami's arc, as it's fun to see it faithfully animated, but for Saya and Kanata's, I'd rather you not watch them at all than choose to watch it over the VN
My Anime vs VN Ratings:
Saya route - anime: 3.5/10 VN: 9/10
Sasami route - anime: 7.5/10 VN: 7.5/10
Kanata route - anime: 2/10 VN: 8.5/10
(If you would like to see my short review of the VN check out my backloggd or vndb)
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Jul 10, 2023
This review has very minor spoilers, which I have carefully and somewhat ambiguously worded to spoil the least amount possible. This review is from the perspective of a fan of the visual novel that rewatched the anime a year later.
Positives:
-Kurugaya: Kurugaya's route isn't a very good adaptation, but it makes drastic changes that, in my opinion, improve upon some scenes from the visual novel. While yes, it is missing the great romance and the chemistry between Riki and Kurugaya it makes drastic changes to fit the anime story telling, which in my opinion works better as a whole for the story despite its very fast
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pacing compared to the VN.
-Beautiful new original opening for this season with an original song.
-Refrains story is all covered and unchanged.
-It uses (mostly) the same soundtrack.
-Komari and Rin's friendship building from season 1 into Refrain is a very nice touch that fans (including myself) appreciate.
-As said for season 1, Riki's voice actor/actress change to Yui Horie is an improvement; her voice suits the role better.
--There's a minor improvement in animation in general from the last season.
Negatives:
-Massive lack of CGs referenced. I can only think of 3 of the many many CGs in the VN that actually get used as references. They would have drastically fixed a lot of the poor production.
-Komari and Rin: My favourite scene in Little Busters as a whole is entirely and utterly obliterated by horrendously brushing over the scene. The most ridiculous part is that they spend 15 minutes building up to it really well, adapting the VN almost perfectly, but don't flesh out my favourite scene in the series. Making it feel soulless. Also, the direction/story boarding is awful, with really weird camera angles. Are we really so apposed to just using the CGs in the game? It looks so tacky.
-Rin 2 not adapted fully: Rin and Riki's scene in Kyousuke/Rin's grandparents house is supposed to go over the course of 3 days, not one evening. Ruining Riki and Rin's character building for the conclusion (making it less impactful).
-Kyousuke's backstory reveal: It looks like it's made in Windows Movie Maker because of the weird editing used for added content for flashbacks. It looks more like a fancam than a serious scene.
The climax scene of the series: While it is a good adaptation of the story and follows the VN the production quality looks bad, not awful. But it's remarkable how the PNGs in the VN tell the story better than the full animated production. A lot of the camera work is poorly directed, as if it's some sort of fanfilm or a student project. It clearly has some passion behind it but it looks so messy. Mostly, the way characters fade on screen looks very tacky and unprofessional. It would have worked a lot better to moving the camera or changing the focus (like Angel Beats for example).
-Rin and Riki rescue scene: Changed soundtrack ruining the tone of the scene. (I won't complain about not seeing the bad end in the VN as that's difficult to replicate in anime format.)
-This is carried over from the first season, but the different art style lacks the charm of the VN.
Overall, the anime for Refrain, while I do think it is the best adapted content of the visual novel I think for an anime adaptation, it's mediocre at best; the production quality is a worse way to experience the story than just reading the visual novel, where it's a much better experience of essentially the same thing. Even though it's essentially PNGs over actual moving animated frames, VN has better visuals overall, over the anime adaptation.
While this is a mostly negative review, this adaptation is definitely serviceable compared to a lot of worse adaptations for things out there, but I still think it's a mess that could have easily been a lot better with a little more thought put into it. Before reading the visual novel, I originally had the anime at a 9 and even during reading it, I thought it was a good adaptation. The reason why is because story wise it was ,it's visually I'd forgotten how it'd looked.
My Anime vs VN Ratings:
Kurugaya route - anime: 8.5/10 VN: 7.5/10
Refrain - anime: 6/10 VN: 9.5/10
(If you would like to see my short review of the VN check out my backloggd or vndb)
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Jul 10, 2023
Some stuff right a lot of things wrong.
This is a spoiler free review from the perspective of a fan of the visual novel that rewatched the anime a year later.
Positives:
-I'll start off by saying I like the choice of voice actor/actress change for Riki as I find that Yui Horie fits the role a lot better than the original casting in the VN.
-The main cast (Riki, Rin, Kyousuke, Masato, and Kengo) share the same chemistry as the VN, which is very well adapted.
-Mio: Mio's route is adapted fairly well as they give it enough time. It's missing some key scenes, but overall, it's a good
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enough adaptation.
-The slice of life sequences, especially the episode where Riki visits the girls dorm, are very well adapted and fun to see animated.
-The opening and ending music from the VN is still present, as is the brilliant soundtrack (albeit used oddly at times).
-Extra insight into Rin and Komari becoming friends is a nice touch for fans.
Negatives:
-Haruka: One of the worst adaptations I've ever seen. Now, I don't think Haruka's route is any masterpiece, but the adaptation is absolutely awful. It makes Haruka and Kanata look like complete nutjobs because of the weird focus on the wrong scenes and the fast pacing because of the time constraints.
-Komari: Her ending completely ruined, the original story of overcoming internal trauma by looking at it from a different angle.
-Animation is only serviceable, lacks detail, and clearly isn't made with much passion.
-Art style change is very odd, looks a bit generic, and loses a lot of the charm of the VN.
To conclude, the anime is an ok adaptation... I originally liked the anime when I watched it; I still thought Kud and Haruka's arcs sucked, but I enjoyed the rest of the story and liked the characters. But upon rewatching, it's an extremely mediocre, barely serviceable adaptation of the visual novel. I think if you're never going to read the visual novel, it does something at least, but it's most definitely a worse experience.
I've seen a lot worse adaptations before, so I don't want to be too critical, but it's a very flawed show on its own, and now that I know how mediocre its adaptation is, it makes it a lot worse.
My Anime vs VN ratings for each arc:
Komari - anime: 4/10 VN: 8/10
Haruka - anime: 1/10 VN: 8/10
Mio - anime: 7/10 VN: 8/10
Kud - anime: 3.5/10 VN: 3.5/10
Overall rating: 5.5/10
(If you would like to see my short review of the VN check out my backloggd or vndb)
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Jun 5, 2023
An adorable story following a cast of women and their passion for video games and respecting and working together in the workplace
This manga has the usual little bit of fanservice (which is more than fine because for once the cast are all adults for once) and cute scenes between the cast, but it is more than what it looks like at first glance.
New Game touches on the difficulties and significance of compliance, sacrifices, independence, teamwork, competitiveness, strong will, inspiration, and encouragement in a creative workplace. I really like how it supports being competitive in a creative industry in a positive manner by encouraging each other
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instead of knocking one another down. To put it simply, it's a representation of what the creative industry should be like and the power that the good old, indomitable human spirit truly has towards your passions.
Overall, a lovely, relaxing read created by a passionate creator, that I can recommend to all who are interested. Obviously, it is an iyashikei, so don't expect anything unexpected, but if you think you'll enjoy it based on the cover, you most definitely will.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Nov 14, 2022
(This review does not have spoilers for the movie, but it will have spoilers for the original anime to make comparisons, so read at your own risk.)
Bigger mech, bigger impact, bigger boobs, better fights, and better closure
Positives:
-Fixes closure for Simon (The best change in my opinion)
-Improved fights
-New fights
-Faster more engaging pace
-Tits
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Negatives:
-Rossiu being saved by alterations - Not as powerful as the original series. No longer uses the parallel with Simon and Kamina. However, the change is a more realistic approach to the situation, so it is not inherently bad.
-Nia being saved isn't quite as fleshed out and satisfying as in the original series. Although that's natural as it is a movie.
Conclusion:
This movie makes a lot of minor but significant changes to the plot of the original show, almost all of which I'm in favour of. I can highly recommend it to all fans of the original series.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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