Date A Live IV

Despite the numerous challenges he has overcome so far, Shidou Itsuka's mission with Ratatoskr is far from over. In a departure from his daily routine, Shidou encounters a starving woman lying on the street and ends up helping her. After the two arrive at her apartment, the woman introduces herself as Nia Honjou—a popular manga artist working under a pen name. However, cutting straight to the chase, Nia reveals that she is also a Spirit and is aware of Shidou's secret operation.

Interested in seeing his charisma firsthand, Nia challenges Shidou to win her over on a date. As he strives for an opportunity to seal her powers, Shidou learns more about Nia and her history with Deus Ex Machina Industries, a name he is all too familiar with...

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Yatogami, Tooka Main

Inoue, Marina Japanese

Tobiichi, Origami Main

Togashi, Misuzu Japanese

Itsuka, Kotori Main

Taketatsu, Ayana Japanese

Itsuka, Shidou Main

Shimazaki, Nobunaga Japanese

Tokisaki, Kurumi Supporting

Sanada, Asami Japanese

Himekawa, Yoshino Supporting

Nomizu, Iori Japanese

Izayoi, Miku Supporting

Chihara, Minori Japanese

Kyouno, Natsumi Supporting

Mano, Ayumi Japanese

Yamai, Yuzuru Supporting

Bridcutt, Sarah Emi Japanese

Murasame, Reine Supporting

Endou, Aya Japanese

Umeda, Masakatsu Producer

Matsuda, Taiyou Producer

Ishigami, Joutarou Producer

Takagi, Junichi Producer

Reviews

Jul 23, 2025

hexashadow13

Recommended

The fourth season of Date A Live continues with the same general concept as previous seasons. Shidou needs to get Spirits to fall in love with him. This season, the new spirits are a somewhat pervy mangaka named Nia and an emotionless and eventual yandere girl hanging out in space named Mukuro. Both of them are likable and have decently fleshed out backgrounds and relationship development with Shidou with lots of romantic fluff.

But to be honest, this is getting somewhat repetitive. There’s a good variety to the heroine’s and their stories, but even with that we are still at the 9th go around, not counting ... the VNs. And Nia and Mukuro’s arcs were both on the simpler side, compared to say Miku’s or Origami’s. It’s also getting pretty crowded with very few of the previous heroines getting all that much presence in the new heroine’s arcs. This season was definitely trying to give all the key characters at least some time in the spotlight, but it was clearly struggling. Mana at least shows up somewhat this season for what its worth.

Thankfully, it looks like we’re slowly transitioning into the end game and thus the overarching story is coming much more into the forefront. The conflict between Ratatoskr and DEM is a core part of both Nia and Mukuro’s arcs, and both factions get fleshed out considerably more as a result. The final arc this season once again focuses on Kurumi, but this time it goes much more in depth by delving into her past and her goal. Kurumi is a fantastic character so fleshing her out better and giving her more romantic moments with Shidou was greatly appreciated. But just as important was that in doing so there are some major breakthroughs on the truth behind spirits and Phantom. Though I should note that this season ends in somewhat of a cliffhanger in relation to that.

This season was taken up by a new studio, Geek Toys, though they are the ones that did Date A Bullet. There’s definitely a major shift in art style that I have mixed feelings on. It’s equidistant from the LN art, though different from it in different way from the previous seasons. I think I prefer the old art style, though with the way the story is going I suppose the new style fits better. In terms of quality for the most part its pretty good, though there’s some really bad 3DCG during certain battle sequences. Also, they’re cowards for no longer having dress breaks when spirits get sealed. The OP and ED are both solid enough in terms of the song and visuals. The soundtrack was also pretty good and fit well but without any tracks that were particularly memorable.

tl;dr: A sequel season that moves things forward while also staying true to the core concepts.

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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Jul 29, 2024

MNexon

Mixed Feelings

Story (6) :
This season the beginning of the story is a bit weak, because the enjoyment is still lacking. but I quite like the realm of the story this is heading. but the execution of the enjoyment is still lacking. But there is a part that is a plot twist and I think it is quite good. then there is a very important backstory about how the story became like this is also good

Characters (6) :
There are several new characters here, and these characters are very deeply told. So we can know what kind of character he is and how Shido controls him. ... Then, there is a backstory that I explained earlier to a character that is also executed well. But what is lacking here is too many characters. So these characters are like they are used as reserves or do not play an important role. They end up just having very ordinary dialogues. I hope they play all these characters the same. So the characters are not forgotten, so there must be a lot of influence with these characters

Visual (7) :
Because this is a SCI FI genre and there are mechas too, I think it's still lacking but the visual environment is good, the visual effects are quite good. And there are also some of them using CGI, but I hope they don't use it. Then when fighting, the effects are not too interesting for the visuals. So I hope their fights are very choreographed and use a lot of visual effects to follow the fights.

Audio (6) :
not focused on the opening and ending, but the audio is good for the voice actors, sound effects, and OST used

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Jun 3, 2022

worlddestroyer

Not Recommended

Preliminary (4/12 eps)

ONE Word "DISAPPOINTED"

I will keep this short and this review is about comparing this season to the previous 3. So this is what I felt after watching 9 episodes:-

1)The new studio didn't take the project seriously.

2) The didn't gather enough funds or gathered it but decided to not use it.

3) The animators are not talented enough to recreate the original more detailed character designs.

... 4) The actions scenes are horrible , they cut too many corners using CGI.

5) The story is too fast paced.

6) The only thing i feel from this is that the studio does not have enough funding (or cheap), lazy, don't take anything seriously and only took on this project because of the series popularity and the money they would gain.

7)The only thing redeeming about it is the sound quality nothing else.

I am a big fan of the series and have re-watched it a few times and even read the Light Novel and wanted to see how it would get adapted this time, but this season is just horrible. I don't know how many will read this or how many will agree with it but to me it was a huge disappointment. for those who have watched the first 3 seasons and are planning to watch the fourth hope this review helps.

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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	Poll: Date A Live IV Episode 12 Discussion ( 1 2 3 4 ) Stark700 - Jun 24, 2022	162 replies	by niookookjo »» Sep 18, 5:02 PM
	Why does this anime switch studios every season? AunixHOT - Apr 11, 2021	13 replies	by Bharathshy1729 »» Aug 22, 2:35 PM
	Poll: Date A Live IV Episode 1 Discussion ( 1 2 3 ) Giorgosman13 - Apr 8, 2022	126 replies	by almightybismarck »» Aug 17, 5:17 AM
	Go Sakabe Laplace_kun - Apr 23, 2022	4 replies	by RaVeN_Mortus »» May 8, 2:29 PM
	Poll: Date A Live IV Episode 2 Discussion ( 1 2 ) Stark700 - Apr 15, 2022	83 replies	by Tsukasa_Rio »» Apr 3, 9:50 AM