Prince of Stride: Alternative

There's no real explanation to it, so let's just assume that "alternative" in the title of Prince of Stride implies that you should watch an alternative show.

So, anyone willing to tolerate sports anime thought this would be pretty cool. Running with some parkour elements? Shit, parkour’s awesome, this oughta be good. But instead, we’ve been given a thoughtless, soulless, utterly boring show with no point in watching to completion unless you really, really like sports or writing yaoi fanfics.

Fortunately, Stride conveniently makes all of its fuck-ups clear within the first episode, so this doesn’t require a lot of work. Every major character (with the exception ... of a couple that won’t be introduced until later because reasons) gets introduced within the first ten minutes. It’s too much too quickly, like going to your parents’ favorite hangout and having to suffer through all the introductions to their stupid friends who only talk to you to ask about how school is going. But, don’t think about it too hard, look alive because the plot’s coming through!

A school with a famous stride club (whatever that is) is now close to disbanding because they don’t have enough members for official matches because no one likes stride. Wait, what? I thought this was famous? Where did everyone go? That doesn’t matter now, because Riku (whose name I only remember thanks to my fifteen years of playing Kingdom Hearts) joins the club and fills the deficit, and now the almighty Honan Stride Club is ready to go. The whole school sets up a course for the club because they’re all so excited to see stride return that they didn’t even remember the club existed five minutes ago, because no sports anime would be accurate without a bunch of bandwagoners! Go Royals!

Wait, aren’t we forgetting something…………? Oh yeah! WHAT THE FUCK IS STRIDE?

Stride, the sport, is introduced to us after giving an incredibly vague explanation of just a few things about it. You know, it’s not really the audience’s job to put more thought into your own work. We’re expected to figure the rules of the sport out for ourselves because the authors were too lazy to do it themselves. But after a couple episodes, you can see that stride is just some relay racing with parkour with a coordinator from the sidelines, with some specific details that won’t be necessary. See how easy that was?

But some questions still remain. Why do we need the gimmicks? What’s the point in the end? One guy did a run while completely skipping the obstacles and nothing really happened, he still had a great run. If they’re there just to make the runs look flashy, it’d be good if you could actually implement flair into the rules of the sport, even making it part of some score. It’d be even better if the parkour was naturally part of the course and not just some shit they threw in the middle of the road. People racing over rooftops and over fences would be pretty badass. They could at least put more shit in the road. But my point is that I’d like it if the parkour had a bigger focus and speed wouldn’t be the only thing necessary.

Then you have the relationers, who coordinate the runners from the sidelines via headset. One team told their relationer to fuck off and one of the runners did all the work while the actual relationer was there as a formality. If the runners can control things themselves, what’s the point of the relationer in the first place? Shouldn’t this be illegal, at least? Why isn’t anyone even watching this race, like a referee? Does ANYONE care about what’s going on??? WHY AM I ASKING SO MANY QUESTIONS?

Ignoring the dumb sloppiness of the sport itself, we have the actual story. Yes, I care about a story in a sports anime, at least to an extent. It’s a sports anime so you can only expect so much, but as long as you write better than a 10-year-old then I can accept it. But when Stride tries to incorporate some human drama, it just gets idiotic.

Prince of Stride being about some high school sporting event just won’t cut it, so we need some DEEP and COMPLICATED backgrounds or something. The reason why Honan’s stride club was low on members in the beginning is because of an incident that caused most of the team to quit. This incident is one of the most bafflingly brain-dead events ever conceived. To not spoil it specifically, the old relationer got rekt by the other team’s, and that caused the runners to crash and lose the race. The relationer and another member then act like complete fucking idiots and escalate the situation way beyond reason, and the knight in shining armor, the only person with a brain, the one who breaks it up, is then blamed for it without anyone trying to communicate like human beings. I am laughing so hard while writing these very words right now.

The other sort of incident involves the main character not knowing how to get gud and then quitting stride for a while. That’s it, that’s his backstory.

Having some human drama is nice, definitely. I’ll admit that at least the last few episodes had some sort of weight and tension, but all of this is just so stupid, man. But I could at least respect the nerdy guy, he had some actual problems and characterization that wasn’t dumb. Maybe as a token of my appreciation I’ll go look up his name on the database when I’m done.

Beyond that small number of characters and their dumb stories, the rest of the cast is incredibly flat, boring, uninteresting, generic, and other synonyms, no matter how many memes they try to force. Their only chances of being likable come with how many of their stupid, annoying LOLSORANDOMXD jabs they throw at you. Nice try, Dr. Meme. Oh, whoops, that’s a SIGNATURE PHRASE!!!!!!!!!!!!1111111!!1/1?11/1

Shoving away that nonsense, the characters include Leg-lover, who’s the only yaoi bait you’re gonna get, unless you got a kick out of that one guy who had to dress up like a girl. I felt like kicking myself in the nuts just for putting up with this. No one else has anything worth mentioning (except nerdy guy who eventually drops out of relevance anyway) except the girl because she’s a girl and she’s voiced by Hanakanamanahawamawallama, which really isn’t a compliment because she doesn’t have a personality either. The only thing she’s good at is being really worked up over what the other relationer is doing. DO YOUR JOB, IDIOT.

The woman who directed No Game No Life was told she couldn’t make everything purple in this, so instead she used normal colors and brightened them up about a thousand times. Okay, it’s not unbearably bright, but it really isn’t pleasant to look at, even deep into the anime where you’re expected to be used to it by now. The animation itself isn’t that big of a deal, either. In fact, it’s pretty lackluster, especially given that Madhouse used the same budget as One Punch Man. Maybe they spent it all on memes to try and recreate the magic. I dunno. Anyway, doing cool parkour shit is okay. I guess. But the running is often poorly framed--I don’t give a shit about people moving their arms around really really quickly, you run with your L E G S. LEGS, MAN! Some clever angles would’ve made this pretty interesting to watch, but I guess no one cared as usual.

Hey, remember Overlord? That one anime about Mr. Skeltal trying to take over the world? That opening song was incredible, right? Well, the same guys came back to do Stride’s, except not nearly as loud, exciting, cinematic, catchy, or even enjoyable. Which still makes it a decent song because Clattonia was just pure awesome, but the song doesn’t have a lot of punchiness or flair, and it’s marred by some pretty goofy lyrics. The art accompanying it has some style, at least, even if the runs presented look confusing. The rest of the soundtrack has a number of insert songs, which are pretty intelligible when used amongst the action, but I thought the non-inserts were surprisingly good. Not crazy good, but they have a smooth style and presence and are just exciting enough to make you keep your ear out for them without distracting you from what’s on screen. Not a bad ED either. I only listened to it like twice, though, because I wanted to move on as quickly as possible.

The last thing I wanna talk about are the guys, because this show is supposed to be yaoi-bait and I need to make this clear. These fuckboys don’t even look that good. Thanks for reading, everybody, have a great day!

Story - 2/10
Art - 4/10
Sound - 7/10
Characters - 3/10
Enjoyment - 3/10
Yaoi - tryharder/10
Overall - 3/10
Favorite character - Ayumu
Favorite episode - 11
Recommendation level - Very Low

Initially, I started watching because I liked the sleek and colorful aesthetic, and the idea of parkour races sounded cool. I like the first few episodes and thought the races were exciting and nice to look at, with a killer soundtrack. Upon watching the next episodes up the the sixth that has aired I've lost interest, with a super melodramatic plot that makes zero sense, backed up with paper thin characters.

The sport itself does not even take the least amount of effort to make any sense. It is a race based on speed, but people waste time doing flashy parkour moves. Would it not have ... made sense to give credit for style points if it is an integral part of the sport? They could have added in a number of explanations for the sport to make it a little more plausible, but there was none.

Speaking of implausibility, there is the plot. It's full of melodrama with the characters over reacting to everything like their life depends on it in stand anime fare. The backstory of the stride club and the reasons surrounding people's reluctance to join is completely laughable. It is the standard annoying anime logic sort of thing where the good guys get bad press in the eyes of the public, but really they didn't do anything wrong. Such bad press could be avoided by reasonably explaining the situation, but common sense does not exist here. All this serves as set up for the scenes with cheesy inspirational music, inspiring speeches and some nonsense about "connecting emotions" as the stride club works to redeem itself.

The characters are all one note which makes the dramatic plot points even more lame. It is fine when all they are doing is racing and having fun, but they do not go together with a plot that asks me to sympathize with them. They are also all pretty boys making some of them look downright goofy because of how out of place they are on the stride courses instead of posing for magazines. There is some of that as well; a boy band concert, photo shoots and such show up to appease the fujoshits.

Visuals: The reason I started watching this in the first place. Unfortunately, you do not get to see as much running as bobbing torso. Not that much of the running gets animated. It was most apparent to me when a big, surprising parkour move was performed, and we don't get to see any of it. It is all conveyed by implication.

One aspect I did enjoy was the soundtrack. It got me pumped up for the races and fit well with the artstyle. I'll be looking forward to the ost release.

Prince of Stride, a show based off of an otome game with a bit of sports and competition added in. Advertised as a sports series, yet it’s obvious that the show appeals to the female audience with its cast of pretty boys. What is striding? It’s basically a fictional extreme sport of running similar to that of parkour but with unique obstacles.

Produced by Madhouse studio, the show runs pretty fast on its feet, literally. The first episodes introduces the main characters in standard fashion. Nana Sakurai, the main heroine transfers to Honen Academy and quickly becomes the manager of the Stride club, a club ... dedicated to striding. The members of the group consists of a variety range of characters and personalities ranging from the cheerful Riku Yagami to the cool Takeru Fujiwara. Each member of the club also possesses individual skills and characteristics that makes them unique on the team. While this is all good and dandy, the show doesn’t capitalize on their traits but instead follows a generic route of competition. Yes, there’s risks and strategy that is adapted into each race. However, the ending result usually is predictable. And that’s honestly something that isn’t so admirable.

The story structure is designed as more carefree although striding is the main course of the plot. Other times, the show feels like it’s taking a breather such as fashion shoots, hot springs, and even the infamous beach episode. In general, the story turns into a mixed affair of comedy and competitiveness. If that makes any sense, the series also takes every advantage of the boys to make them stand out as bishounens. There’s nothing wrong with that except the show focuses perhaps a bit too much on it for the first half of the series. It takes the serious nature of the striding when the boys are presented more as fan service rather than athletes. On the other hand, the show does take its game mechanics seriously. Every relay race is designed aesthetically and never the same. In addition, the show adds commentary to explore the physical aspects of the obstacles, short-cuts, and potential strategies runners can use to their advantage.

However, the story isn’t the main problem with the show. The main problem lies with the characters. It’s hard to feel attached to any of them. Takeru is like a Free clone of Haru but hardly has a strong relationship that can be relatable. Riku adds a bit more of casual atmosphere that people can get used to quickly but it’s hard to accept his character. He’s just too damn carefree. Heath Hasekura, the half-man, half-model is probably Mr. Fan service and there’s little depth about his character at all. Finally, Hozumi Kohinata exposes almost all the weakness of the show with his non-existent characterization, girly face, and weakly timed jokes. Luckily, there’s some characterization and background storytelling through mid-story but the overall execution lacks steam. Don’t expect Honan Academy’s rivals to be memorable either. They have cliché written all over them with easily forgettable characteristics.

If you’re interested in some fun excitement, then Prince of Stride might be a show for you. While the storytelling and characters are easily forgettable, the relay races themselves lives up to the hype on most occasions. Stride is apparently a fictional sport so the rules and risks are a refreshment to any sports fan. It invites speculations on what strategies can work and what may fail. The risk is also realistic as well that includes near fatal injuries. Furthermore, the show does a clever job highlighting the body movements of the athletes. Each episode is choreographed consistently whether it’s jumping across shortcuts, bypassing obstacles, or just running against the wind.

The artwork is like colored rainbows. Bright and flashy are just few of many words that can describe the background visuals. It also has a sense of flamboyant feel as each relay race has a different style unique to each competition. And of course, who can forget about the boys? They are the main stars not just for being athletes but an eye candy for the female audience to see.

Soundtrack is surprising attractive with a good amount of psychology mixed in. There’s good timing during crucial points of each relay race to capture the thrill of competition. It’s also creative enough to be legitmently entertaining to the ears. Character voice mannerism is moderate although I personally find them lacking with the exception of Riku. Meanwhile, the OP and ED theme songs are rather mediocre in respect.
In essence, Prince of Stride is more of a show that seems to appeal to a certain demographic and advertised for the audience to play the game. It isn’t an entirely awful show despite the lackluster story or mild characterization. Rather, it doesn’t deliver with the premise and each episode seems to lack more and more steam as time drags on. I find it hard to also get attached to many of the characters and in the end didn’t really find liking any of them. Blurring the lines of fictional sport and modern man service, this is a show that easily feels like an advertisement.

Introducing Stride: an extreme high-thrilled sport where parkour and endurance running collide together!

The rules of Stride are really simple: you form a team of six people and you compete against one other team. Five of you run across the race course as a relay, avoiding obstacles, and staying on track. The fastest team who crosses the finish line first wins.

It’s definitely a very interesting concept straight from the get-go. So why can’t I rank this show any higher?

Well, for one, whenever you introduce a sport, it is imperative to consider your audience: they have no clue what the sport is about or never ... even heard of anything like it before. Furthermore, sports often incorporate a lot of new terminology that can lose the audience quickly. As a result, the screenwriters must absolutely take the time to explain these terms well.

This is where Prince of Stride begins to crack. In the first few episodes, terms such as “relationer” will be thrown at you and leave you second-guessing until you actually see it in action. Techniques associated with parkour or the relationing process itself, too, are never properly explained. And, most importantly, the rules of Stride are very open, and this is a recipe for disaster. For instance, shortcuts – what exactly constitutes an acceptable shortcut? Couldn’t you technically just “shortcut” an entire leg? Since this rule and others like it are never thoroughly explained, viewers who are making an attempt to understand what is happening are more than often left hanging and utterly confused. And mind you that this is just one rule – there are plenty of others that don't make any sense either.

The other issue is the characters themselves. As you probably know, Prince of Stride centers on the members of the Honan Stride team. The characters on this team had serious potential but were never given ample time on the show to have enough depth. Some characters were given no time at all and honestly were not a significant factor in the show (e.g. Hozumi). They could have been left out from the story and the plot of the entire show would not have changed much (minus the fact that you would have an incomplete team, oops). Others are what I like to call half-baked: some characterization but somewhat forced. A good example of this is Nana. Nana’s true colors begin to show when her father shows up back in Japan, but since her father was never mentioned up to this point, it seems as if his entire purpose was to elicit some emotional response from her. Thus, her actions and thoughts come off as a little unbelievable. I would argue that the only decent characterization was of Riku (see episode 11), since we later learn that he uses Stride as a way to dissociate his own identity from his more talented brother’s.

As for the plot, there isn’t really anything remarkable about it. As with all other sports anime, Prince of Stride: Alternative tries to balance Honan’s training and the tournaments that they participate in. In the first half of the show, there is more training and other trivial things that they do (e.g. obtain a sponsor) than there are actual tournaments, and some of these training sessions do not produce anything fruitful other than heightened, excited emotions. Towards the end of the show, however, the plot finally gets somewhere when the Honan team comes face-to-face against two of their toughest, most challenging rival teams during the End of Summer semi-finals and finals.

For the art, let’s just say it’s different. The color palette that Madhouse chose to use in this show often comes off as overly bright or pale. It’s not oversaturated as in the colors of No Game No Life but will take some time to adjust to. Despite this, the animation and artwork is very consistent. Sound and voice acting are also of high quality, albeit none of it really stood out.

So, just to summarize, I wouldn’t say that this is one of the better sports anime out there. Its premise had a lot of potential but unfortunately the plot does not build off from it at all. If you’re looking for a more balanced story or characters with more depth, you won’t find them here. I felt like too often this show came off as a little dry since nothing is really explored well, and it’s likely that you will think this way too.

Overall rating: C

Author's Disclaimer: Please remember, this is my own personal opinion. I critique anime primarily on how the story is executed and how well-rounded the characters are. This review is not meant to target any other review but was intended to provide a more holistic analysis.

It should also be noted that this is a full-fledged review of the entire season.

Nana Sakurai is a first-year student at Honan Academy. She decides to attend the school in hopes of managing the Stride Club. Stride is an extreme sport involving running and navigating obstacles on an uneven course. Nana meets two boys named Takeru Fujiwara and Riku Yagami and convinces them to join the club in efforts to compete in the "End of Summer" tournament. Together, they learn that Stride is about so much more than just running; it's about connecting with each other.

...Or so Madhouse would have me believe!

As someone who has willingly jumped into [and stayed in] sports anime hell over the past ... year or so, I'd like to think I'm fairly experienced in critiquing sports anime. I've seen all kinds of tropes, some good and some bad, but through it all, I believe the there are a few things all sports anime try to achieve. Whether a sports anime's characters have hyperbolic, unrealistic personalities or are more well-rounded, whether the sports skills resemble stunts you'd see at Hogwarts or actually seem humanly possible, all sports anime have two common goals in my opinion. The first is to teach viewers about the particular sport in question. And the second is to show how the sport in question changes its characters, typically for the better.

Prince of Stride fails to achieve either of these goals.

Stride is never really explained well. We get it, there's running. But why all the tricks and acrobatics? Can you get extra points for jumping all over the place, or are those tricks simply to get fans screaming? And if the latter is true, then why don't acrobatic tricks affect a team's final score? Because they should! In addition, the main characters are never shown to really improve. Aside from Yagami changing his posture, none of the characters evolve in their sport.

Nearly all of the main characters are flat; they embody one-dimensional stereotypes. Yagami is the angsty teenager going through an emo phase. Takeru is the Furuya of PoS; he's good at everything just because, and he doesn't know how to communicate. Sakurai is in the anime simply as a formality, since the anime was adapted from a video game. Kominato and Kadowaki are the comic relief, Heath is the reliable senpai hunk, and Kuga is the strong, silent weirdo who likes to stare at the sky and won't shut the fuck up about the wind. None of these characters have depth, aside from maybe Yagami, if you're willing to qualify his struggles as "depth."

Multiple episodes repeatedly emphasize Yagami's inferiority complex, but each episode "resolves" his issues by the end with no believable sequence of events. Prince of Stride attempts to convince us that Yagami truly loves running deep down, but despite it TELLING us that, it SHOWS us a very different message. Yagami seems to hate Stride. He hates his brother, he hates running, and he hates Takeru. But somehow, every episode ends up with him smiling into the sunset, only for him to repeat the same angsty routine in the next episode.

So here's the problem: Without dynamic, developing characters, and without even a proper education on Stride, what's left in this anime? All that's left are ridiculous amounts of drama, cheap tricks, filler episodes, training montages, the same stupid insert song, and characters on the sidelines yelling "HASHIRE!!!" at the top of their lungs. And oh, so much drama. All of which lead up to a finale that frankly, these characters didn't earn. Unfortunately, none of those things is enough to make an anime compelling. There are many scenes that attempt to hype up the audience, and they do succeed at first. However, those scenes get old without any connection to the characters, and the anime very quickly becomes stale.

The art of Prince of Stride is a little jarring, mostly because of the weird color scheme. The shading and coloring of the anime definitely didn't help promote a "real" feeling to the show. It could have been a strong point, had the plot and characters been up to par. Similarly, the music for this anime was pretty good, but it didn't have nearly the impact it could have because of the plot and characters. What's more, many victory scenes used the same annoying insert song until, again, the effect was lost and the song became an annoyance.

I have always thought very highly of Madhouse, but they kind of missed the mark with this anime. Between the bad character development, misplaced music, and lack of proper exposition, a lot went wrong. I love to joke about being stuck in sports anime hell, but watching this anime was actual hell.

I got baited. Hard.

With the sports anime craze that others and I were in from Haiykuu and Kuroko, I was pretty damn excited to learn of one that focused on parkour/free-running.

Then I had my hopes dashed as I watched on.

This is a shitty version of Free, plus I'm not the target audience for this show.

I could see the intended appeals of the show, but Free does it way better.
What I could not see was the free-running or parkour, which was the sport!
...
We had shots of shadows running in the background, or unimpressive vaults that I've done on the regular. Being someone into free-running, you'd think they would try and appeal to that audience.

I could understand the reason of the episode where they needed sponsors for their team, but that meant watching them play cross-dressing dress-up for it.

Go watch Free for the appeal, or watch Kuroko/Haiykuu for the sport.

There was not enough story development in my opinion and I feel like the creators of this anime had so much potential to work with but they either had too little funding or were too lazy and tried to make it as short as possible. Sports anime are not meant to have only 12 episodes and you can clearly see why, since the creators did not allow us enough time to warm up and get to know the characters and the story. I feel like the creators rushed the story line because they were like shoving plot after plot up our throats and not even ... letting us digest it. Overall I think this was the worse sports anime I've ever seen.

First of all, if I had to describe this anime to a friend in a really succinct way, I would describe it as being a "shittier version of Free! since it has more cardboard for characters and less of a plot."

I enjoy sports animes immensely and it's definitely one of the genres which I enjoy watching more/give higher ratings to. So when I heard that Mad House was making a sports anime, I was hyped. That coupled with the amazing voice actor cast this anime has, and I honestly had no doubts that I would at least enjoy it even if it turned out to ... not quite meet my standards.

I was wrong and I'm saying this as someone who did low-key enjoy Free! as a guilty pleasure.

The first half of this anime feels incredibly tedious. I was bored whilst watching and didn't find any of the comedy stuff funny at all. The first half focuses quite heavily on characters since there are quite a few character introductions. Usually I wouldn't have a problem with this but when your characters are pretty much cardboard, it's just a waste of screen time. I think it was around episode 8 for me when I realised that I was so apathetic towards all the characters that I actually didn't know any of their names. Obviously this is a major problem for any anime, but especially a sports one. An aspect which makes a sports anime so enjoyable to watch, is that you want to root for the characters/teams because they're likeable and you want to see them achieve their goal of victory. An especially good sports anime in my opinion will also have the side characters developed so you don't know who to quite root for... but in both regards, (of having both the main and side characters developed), this anime completely failed. After just finishing the anime, I can only recall the names of 4 characters max and that's probably me stretching it to be honest. I didn't root for anyone and I didn't care about anyone. The characters are quite literally just their character designs - 'pretty boys' so fujoshis can ship them together and probably write fanfiction about them.

Also, I'm not someone to question 'anime logic' but the realism of some the stunts displayed is practically non-existent. Don't get me wrong, I'm quite the fan of Prince of Tennis and KnB and both of those can be pretty ridiculous at times, but the ridiculous things which happen in those series can sort of be accepted because of how they are set up. In those series, the special moves which some of the characters do are sort of justified by, (all be it - complete bs), stretched physics logic/explanations. There is none of that here. A dude jumps from what looks like some cliff edge and lands on both his feet without breaking anything and continues to run without any sort of explanation? Oh he also swings around a flag pole a couple of times even though he's seemingly only ever been in the track club his entire life, not gymnastics or whatever. Sure anime sure. (Me nitpicking but it's something which personally bothered me.)

There were also some emotional conflicts some of the characters went through and some pointless backstory sort of crudely thrown in half way through which I felt didn't really add anything at all except maybe help some of the ships sail. Didn't care for these plot points at all and again, I was bored whilst watching these parts.

That being said, towards the end of the anime, I was getting some sort of enjoyment out of it. The races in the last few episodes I found myself actually getting a little hyped and I was actually looking forward to the final race... but then they ruined that too. How you think it's justified to NOT show half of the final race in favour of some shitty monologue is absolutely beyond me. Honestly I was appalled with how that final race was showcased and how the anime ended. When the entire goal of the characters, (and thus the anime), is to complete the End of Summer race and you don't even show HOW the race ended just the end result in a magazine? Absolutely dreadful.

Okay so on to some of the few positives of this anime - nothing wrong with the voice acting. Just look at the seiyuu cast and that's not really a surprise. The OST was fine too and the track played during the races did it's job in getting me hyped. Not really a fan of the OP or ED but I don't think they're particularly bad, just not to my taste.

It's mad house so the animation is fine. Honestly, the blues and greens in this anime look absolutely beautiful to me. I'm not really a big fan of the sort of 'white-wash' look they have going on with the character's skin tones though... but again that's personal preference and possibly me just being nitpicky. Character designs are fine. Nothing too special about them but they're clearly suited for the demographic this anime is obviously aimed at - fujoshis.

My personal ratings for this anime:
- Story: 3
- Art: 7
- Sound: 8
- Characters: 2
- Enjoyment: 3

So overall I would give this anime a 4.

Story: 4/10

To be honest for being a sports anime is quite poor. At the beginning you think the girl is gonna be the main character and she ends up being a secondary one. The story revolves around the two main boys and their drama. Mostly the blonde one (I can't even remember his name) and his inferiority complex with his brother. They participate in this competition of stride, which is some kind of parkour sport, and after they solve the inner turmoil of the blond one, we are surprised to find both guys and the girl were childhood friends and they had made the promise ... of winning that competition. Not cliche at all.

So, to sum it up, the whole story is one giant cliche after another. The sport looks interesting but the story is more focused on the boy and his brother.

Art: 3/10

I'm actually confused with the animation of this series. At some points the characters look nice, and others you just want to take your eyes out because they're completely out of proportion and in general terribly drawn. And after 12 episodes the scenes with poor animation are way more present than the good ones.

Sound: 8/10

Surprisingly I found myself enjoying the music. I personally liked the ending song the best.

Character: 4/10

Little to no development of most of the characters, apart from the main one.

Enjoyment: 4/10

At the beginning seems nice but with each chapter it becomes more and more predictable and more and more boring.

Overall: 4/10

This series was a whole disappointment. It can't even compare to other sports animes. The characters are extremely plain and no developed, the story is one cliche after another and the animation is terrible.

Quick Points
-Great OP and ED
-Solid art design and use of color
-Lack of tension in races, due to a predictable story.
-Unable to distance itself from otome game source material

Review
Before I began to watch Prince of Stride I was cautious in my expectations, both positive and negative. Positive because the director of the series Atsuko Ishizuka, did such a great job with No Game No Life. Which stood out last year for its art design and color palate. However, Stride’s source material originated from an otome game (romance games targeted at women). This fact had me worried that the show would become a clone of a certain ... swimming show involving men from a commercial.

The art and style of this show is on point. The styling of the races and OP are reminiscent of Air Gear and Persona, using different textures to create a vibrant background involving all of the characters that filled the screen. Anticipation for each race is a result of how clean and polished the environment was. Everything from the obstacles, to the design of the large scaled font on the sides of buildings created some wonderful scenes. Making me yearn for more action in each race.

But that excitement was doused upon by Strides inability to present a race coherently. In early episodes, it was hard to understand the scale of the objects the runners were maneuvering around. Mainly due to the editing and the abundance of tight shots on the runners clearing the objects, the distortion that it created was frustrating. In later episodes this issue is less frequent, but the secondary annoyance is the decision to not provide the audience a layout or map or distance or anything really, to convey basic information about the area where the teams are running. There are quick cuts to a top down map on a screen, but the issue is unresolved because the shot follows the runners instead of pulling out to show them in relation to the map as a whole. The best that Stride can muster is the time difference between each leg of the race as members prepare to relay with their partners, but that information is slightly useless due to the fact that the audience is rarely given overall times or even the average time of each member.

All of that should make it obvious what the show is concerned with. _Stride _is a show that puts the relationships first and the competition second. There is nothing wrong with that focus in a sports themed show. One of the common tropes in sports anime is the childhood promise to win a big tournament, stating that you compete for your friends and not yourself, and the clash of two rookies who end up working well together. Stride hits all of those beats and more, but the balance of the show feels distorted.

It is hard to justify viewing Stride as sports show about running. While there is a framework for that is in place the running and training is just a device used to enable the students to participate in various antics, whether the students are modeling for a sponsor or going on a trip to their rivals -Galaxy Standard- training facility and throwing a beach party. Even though Stride doesn’t seem to fully embrace its otome game origins, it does not shy away from the potential male/male romantic pairings that are occasionally implied. Making the show awkward at times to sit through.

Stride in general is plagued with an attempt of trying to please a wider audience, but wounded itself in the process. There is the generic sports show about running, along with the romance (or “bromance”) created from the winking subtext of the relationships between members of the team. In simpler terms, it’s hard to enjoy the show as a whole if one of these aspects doesn’t appeal to you. Potentially leaving certain members of the audience disheartened when the show is unable to earnestly present enough of a race, or move away from the dreamlike world of male teenage bonding.

It is just fine if you enjoyed the show, I know there will be some individuals out there who did. But the if you are considering whether or not to watch Stride just be ready to come face to face with a lesser version of Free!.

*Review may contain minor spoilers*

Story 4/10
A young prodigy joins the Stride school club to re-obtain its old glory.
From here on out they will do training and a few ''matches''

Art 7/10
The art is a little bit on the ''smoother'' style, it is not my cup of tea but it isn't bad either. it stayed consistent throughout the whole anime. There was nothing out of the ordinary or ''unique'' hence only a 7.

Sound 5/10
the voice actors weren't to bad, but they definitely could have done a better job throughout the races and duels they did, I didn't get that exiting feel at the star of a race ... etc.

Character 3/10
all the characters do have a small story line around them, but you definitely can't feel the bond they are trying to give them together.

Enjoyment 2/10
As a fan of sport anime, it hurts me to watch this, you do not feel the bond between the team mates, the concept of stride is quite cool, but poorly animated, it doesn't feel as epic as it should feel.

Overall 4/10
I would say give a pass on this one.

Okay. Here we go.

Story - 3

So to start with the story. If you're a sports anime fan, you're probably used to all the cliches and have seen them a million times in all sorts of different sports anime, well let me tell you, Prince of Stride: Alternative was no different. It uses almost every cliche in the book. Not in an oh-this-is-kinda-refreshing way but in a haven't-I-see-this-a-million-times-? sort of way. Honestly. However, the title doesn't lie when it says 'alternative'. Prince of Stride is an anime centered around a COMPLETELY FICTIONAL and MADE UP sport, throwing any chance of being compared with an anime about ... the same sport out of the window. Now that's novelty. I personally had high hopes in - only - this aspect of the anime; after all, how often do you get an anime that invents a sport completely for itself? The execution of the races themselves were actually acceptable (I'll go into detail in the enjoyment section) but I think the producers missed a teeny-tiny detail: If you're going to invent a sport, how the hell do you expect the viewers to know what it is?! I just binged all 12 episodes of the anime and I quite frankly still don't know the rules or point system of the sport. Heck, I didn't even know if there was a point system (A character mentioned 'extra points' but I didn't even know there was a point system in the first place! and it was never even mentioned again. Unless they meant it metaphorically but reeeaaallly now). Okay, like I said before, the idea of a completely new sport was what made me watch Stride and I believe that with more time to elaborate (I would suggest between doubling the number of episodes or even doing that and making another season on top of it by splitting the content in the first season up), it could have been a masterpiece and could maybe even have made it all the way up to Kuroko no Basuke and Haikyuu. But unfortunately, that's what they lacked: elaboration. One more new-ish feature in the anime is that it dives straight in to the thick of the plot and you can tell they didn't mean to do it when the timeline was planned out. It starts with the typical fallen club looking for members - the show decided to give less than an episode's worth of screen time to this but that was okay. What I mean is that there's practically no training. Well at least at the start, it plunges straight into the plot because what the hell's practice anyway and instead, puts it's practice into the second half of the plot, instantly killing the albeit forced momentum gathered by the dive at the start. I felt like the halfway point actually killed my excitement for the show. But that's enough of my ranting about the story.

Art - 4

So the art. Nothing special. Looked like a cheap reverse harem anime (sorry!), to be perfectly honest. The style was bland and the characters lacked the realism that sometimes carries appeal (refer to any sports anime where everyone doesn't have idol-group hair). The background art was as plain as can be, especially when they should've had a lot of freedom in developing the settings because of the nature of the sport used in the show. In quite a few ways, the style for the characters reminded me painfully of an extremely washed out version of Free (refer to characters section). To be perfectly honest, I can only say that it didn't stand out as anything special like Doukyuusei, it didn't have amazingly drawn and choreographed action scenes like Haikyuu and it wasn't plain but enjoyable like Kuroko no Basuke. In short: It's bland. Probably like what it feels like to eat a tissue (don't question it). The best part of Stride's art is its action scenes, and even those sometimes don't really hit the spot.

Sound - 4

The voice actors were actually decent although they didn't really strike me as anything special. The soundtrack, like the background art, is just kinda bland. The opening was actually catchy and I quite liked it and the song, along with some of the other soundtracks, fulfilled their purpose of getting the viewer pumped up (I guess). The sound was not at all memorable (I can't remember any of the songs, including the opening) and they don't leave an impression, and there are even parts where I felt that a good OST would have boosted the scene by miles but it just wasn't really like... I don't know... Just kinda mediocre I guess? As a sports anime fan, I love soundtracks that really get your blood pumping as you watch your team score that point; or kick that goal; or shoot that hoop. But this just... I don't know... I was pumped sometimes but I don't give credit to the soundtrack or voices for that.

Characters - 2
Okay. I feel mean but at the same time I just couldn't being myself to rate this section any higher. I, however, don't blame it on the character designs (although I didn't like those too much) but on the lack of time instead. There just simply isn't enough time in the space of 12 measly episodes to make viewers become attached to characters. Of course, this anime just used the usual cliches: the forced crossdresser, the reluctant one, the emotionless genius and the emotionally unstable in the character you'd "least expect" but I was sooo annoyed at some of the characters plainly because I felt like they could've been better. I didn't understand the logic more than half the time and sometimes I even caught myself thinking: "What could possibly possess a person to (insert whatever this rant is about)?!" A bunch of family members do pretty confusing things and the character's reactions sometimes JUST DON'T MAKE SENSE. There's a lot of forced bonding and friendships that only feel that way because they didn't get sufficient time to develop. None of the characters got a satisfactory backstory so in the end, instead of having one or two likable and developed characters, we end up with about 25 odd bland, shallow, uninteresting and unrelatable characters. Now onto character designs in terms of art: they all had weird hair was my first thought. Second thought: Wait... Didn't I just see this character?? But anyways, to be honest, I felt like they ran out of character design ideas because of all the replicas I seemed to see where ever I looked. Actually... Wait a sec... Maybe everyone was a twin... Dun, dun, dun! Oh wait a sec... There was a pair of ACTUAL TWINS. But anyways, like I said, the art was bland and this didn't exactly affect the characters in a good way. In many ways, the characters were quite obviously made in a feeble attempt to appeal to the female audience, with the cute neko boy, the long haired stoic one, the emo kid, the glasses dude. Just generic. for those that enjoy shipping, there really isn't much inspiration and there are technically ships but they feel forced. But yes: lacking develop and design creativity. Any humour also falls so flat I don't even know. I hardly even smiled throughout the whole duration of the series, the jokes weren't bad they were just kinda like: Oh, that was a joke? Okay..?

Enjoyment - 7

Okay, to tell the truth, despite all the technical and story faults in this anime, I did legitimately enjoy it at some point; maybe I wasn't exactly in paradise most of the time, but there were still times when I had liked the show when watching it. This is where I say: I reckon this section of my review would be biased. So basically, I'm in high school and I run in competitive track events - 100 m, 200 m, relay and 3000 m. Do we get it? The thing is, there's a high possibility that my enjoyment of the show stems from having some sports background to connect with the characters. To tell the truth, the reason I enjoyed the show as much as I did were the races. It certainly wasn't a mistake to invent this sport because I was sweating when they were running and I was trembling as well as I heard the 'go' being said. For me, this really reminded me of all the 'ready, set, BAM's I've heard during my own races and I was SO PUMPED UP after watching the races. The show is a majority of tournaments so if that's what you feel like - a show where you don't really pay attention to the characters but it would get your blood pumping like in a real race, then this wouldn't be a bad choice as most sports anime focus on the characters more so that you grow attached to them and because of the characters, it gets you pumping. Other thing with Stride: I didn't have any worries about who would win. I usually always have a team/s but this time, I didn't feel frustrated no matter which team won because I just loved the races themselves (and because I could hardly remember the names of everyone because of the lack of character development). But a warning, the first races will probably be adrenaline full but the novelty of watching a fictional sport soon wears out when they put the training and stuff in the second half. This actually really ruined my enjoyment of the show because the second half was all about fitting in training that they didn't seem to need at the start of the show and character development that couldn't have been more forced, pointless, or fallen more flat. But my enjoyment of the races was still there and I wouldn't say no to re-watching the anime if a friend wants to watch it with me, just so I could feel that rush as I watch the races.

Overall - 4

This anime was... Okay? I guess the characters sucked, the art was mediocre, the soundtrack was anything but outstanding and the story was poor. In the end, I gave this show a 'decent' overall score because of the novelty of the sport and because of my enjoyment of the races.

Recommendation rate - 3

It really depends on who it is. I would love to recommend it to people who have a track background and like sports anime, but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who doesn't have a prior connection to elements in Stride. I wouldn't recommend it to modern sports anime fans where the characters really take the main focus of the viewer's attention. So... If you're wanting to watch something 'alternative' and sporty, I guess it wouldn't kill anyone to watch this if you are desperate for a sports anime, but, take it from me, this is no masterpiece. But I definitely recommend watching some clips of the races beforehand (don't watch spoilers!) so you can get an idea of how much you like them (I had previously dropped this anime after not even finishing episode one, which means I didn't get to see a race, but then I watched an AMV and I thought, this looks really good, so I gave it a second try), if you thought, this is really cool! Then watch the anime. If you watched some of the races and thought: meh, this is fine. Then don't watch it. Because again, the races are really the redeeming feature of this show, the characters and the story aren't gonna boost it but actually drag it down so... Yeah.

If you're gonna watch it, have fun! If you decided it's not your thing, well good luck in your pursuit of another good sports anime! Thanks for reading my review ;)