King's Raid: Ishi wo Tsugumono-tachi

At this point, I think only a few of us actually got through all 26 episodes of King’s Raid. I for one, don’t regret a single moment of it.

Yes, King’s Raid is a pretty generic fantasy gacha game adaptation that does absolutely nothing game changing or innovative. Yes, there’s plenty of better shows out there. No, that doesn’t mean I didn’t like it. In fact, I loved King’s Raid. It is a slow burn over the 2-cours span that it runs, but once it gets going, I found it to be very entertaining. For context, when I watch anime, I usually multi-task by farming ... FGO or other gacha, KR was one of the only shows in the past two seasons that actually held my interest long enough for me to put my phone down and fully lock in.

Despite the generic set up of a chosen heir to the throne going on a quest with his standard JRPG party to defeat a demon lord, I thought Kasel and RIheeto’s juxtaposition as duel protagonists was well done. In fact, by the end of the show I was feeling much more sympathetic towards the secondary protag than the main guy. The dynamic between both of the MCs and their parties was really fun to compare and contrast over the course of the anime. The studio aids with that by alternating perspectives every episode. I also liked the mystery down the stretch with unravelling Kasel and RIheeto’s pasts. It seemed like the studio knew exactly when to end episodes to leave you on the edge of your seat wanting more.

Due to its nature as a gacha game adapdation, as you’d expect the animation is meh at best throughout much of the show. For the vast majority of the 26 episodes it’s pretty average. I’d put it above Hortensia Saga, but well below the likes of Priconne or even the Gran Blue anime. The art is REALLY nice and was actually one of the big reasons I liked this show. It has this really glossy look that makes the characters shine a lot and really makes the waifus in the show pop out.

I probably wouldn’t recommend King’s Raid to most people, not because it isn’t good to me, but because it probably would be boring and uninspiring to others. I think for most people, there’s more enjoyable ways to spend 8 hours. That said, I’ll never apologise for liking what I like and finding something to be entertaining. King’s Raid gets 8 holy swords out of 10.

Oh wow, I get to be the first review!

Well, King's Raid: Ishi wo Tsugumono-tachi is based off of the South Korean mobile game, and so you would think that this would mean this is nothing more than piggy backing on a small trend. And in that perspective... you might be right.

However, there are a lot of merits to this anime. The first of all is that it is able to set up a pretty decent narrative from the get go, showing us a world split between dark elves, dirty politics, and the common knightly defense of the capital. Not only that, but it slaps ... us with the knowledge that this is going to be a serious ordeal when the demon start to appear near the outskirts of the capital, when the scouts sent to deal with it are all wiped out except for one guard and the main character's friend. Later on it is revealed that the main protag has to go on a journey to find the holy sword in order to stop the demon king from destroying the world!

Yeah, its not really the most unique of shows, but it is able to set up a pretty intriguing story and reason for our heroes to go out. In fact, the character for this show are also pretty decent, as you learn basically everyone's motivations as well as bits of their backstory to get things flowing. Like how the main protag must be strong to protect those he loves, because he is scarred by the fact his mother died protecting him etc.

But here is where I'm going to have to stop praising the show. While it is able to set-up intrigue with, lets be frank, pretty basic story elements, it lacks a couple key things to really make this a show anyone would bother taking the time to look at, especially considering how many good shows are airing this season.

The first hurdle is the art. Now this show is actually very competent with its animation and art. This is co-produced by the same studio that made Pokemon, and in recent memory that has been greatly improved. But, there is nothing here that would really stand out as particularly good, either. Especially for every good swing of a sword, there is a cheap special effect that looks so out of place considering the scene.

The second hurdle is the music/sound. The OP and ED aren't too good, very skippable. But the sounds man. When you watch enough anime, you start picking up on all the stock effects that a studio used, and this show has basically all of them, especially considering the monster sounds. Not only that, put the voice acting is very plain and doesn't really strike me as a quality product.

Speaking of quality product, that leaves me with the final element that will be the final nail in the coffin, and perhaps why most people will probably drop it without even reading this review. For a while as I watched the show, I had this pestering thought in my head: "Everything is in place for this to be at least a good show, but why am I not enjoying myself?". Why oh why when the story was cheesy but good, characters has some depth etc. What was throwing me off? And that's when I realized. It was the quality of the production.

I started to notice how the show would pad out for time, lingering for long stretches of time at the end of each character's words or a small, inconsequential scene as we see a zoomed out person walking 10 feet across the screen. Small, yet large chunks of time eaten by dialogue that expanded the story but didn't give you the experience of the details being told. Combine that with the okay animation and we have something that could have been a lot better if there was proper directing or time spent on each story element.

So, thanks for reading the first and maybe only review for a show that I'm wondering why you even have interest in. I only looked at this because I'm planning on doing a video over each show airing this season, so consider this my official review! It is an OK show. Take with that how you will.

This adaptation is... really boring.

Now, I'm one of the few people who actually played the mobile game before the adaptation came out. And yes, I know that the story in-game isn't interesting to begin with. But they could've at least done something to make it more... bearable...

Let me start with the story. Like I said, it's bearable. It's as rpg as you can get. You got a young knight destined to save the world and... well, that's it. There are some things that one might think would make the show interesting (I'm not gonna show that here cuz it's a spoiler), but even that made ... it super boring. Did I mention there's so much exposition? Cuz there's a lot.

The characters aren't that better. They're as cardboard-cut as they get. Dense hero who just goes with the flow and no proper motivation? Check. Beautiful sidekick that acts as nothing but eye candy? Check. Emo kid out for revenge? Check.

And I think this is the problem with mobile game anime adaptations. It takes away the imagination of what it would be like to be the protagonist of the story. At its core, mobile games like king's raid have protagonists that serve as stand-ins for the player. And you can't really do the same thing with anime.

Everything else is pretty mediocre: Art, sound, setting, etc. Overall, this is not a great adaptation. I'd rather watch a show that twists its original plot rather than do nothing with it. But hey, that's just me.

Recommendation: You can probably skip this one unless you're desperate for a new fantasy series to watch. It's not that it's bad exactly, more that it's inessential, and everything that's good about it is done better by other shows.

King's Raid is a series that is basically fine, but is absolutely crying out for something to make it unique. If you can imagine a completely generic and predictable fantasy anime in your head, this is basically that series. The main plot has basically two tracks, and the main one is as straightforward as it gets. Kasel is searching for the Holy Sword ... to defeat the Dark Lord. He has to journey to meet 3 different people and prove his worth to each one to unseal the sword before the Dark Lord is revived. If you weren't aware already that this was a video game adaptation, it's unmistakable once you start watching. The B plot, following the Black Edge mercenary company and their revenge conspiracy against the Kingdom of Orvelia, is considerably more interesting, but ultimately ends in disappointment when it merges with the main story a little past the halfway point of the series.

There are a couple of teases that the series will become more interesting or complex at times, but it never actually comes to fruition. It can be quite frustrating to watch because it feels like it could have been a much better series if there were more of a follow through on certain parts, character relationships and so on. There's a lot of wasted potential.

The art and animation were also a bit disappointing. The character designs actually look fine for the most part, but some characters can be a bit dead-eyed. The really unfortunate part is the mediocre animation of the action scenes, which feel sluggish and lack smoothness.

While the series overall is fairly mediocre, it's not entirely without strong points. I would hesitate to call any of the characters "great", and the main character Kasel is almost totally without personality, but there are a lot of fun secondary characters in this series. Cleo is best girl and gets the most to do of any of the side characters except Frey, but there are plenty of others, including Maria, Scarlet and Reina, that make the show fun when they show up too.

Most importantly, the 2nd OP absolutely slaps. Eclipse by Dreamcatcher is the name, and it's worth looking up even if you don't watch the show. I am not generally a fan of anime music or K pop groups, and really don't even like rock/power ballads as a genre that much, but this one is great.

I usually don’t make early reviews of stuff that is still airing but seeing the poor reception this title gets I just wanted to do it, it also serves as a sort of follow up to my Dragon’s Dogma review. I will of course update this one once the show is over.

Note: There's an update at the end of the review

King’s Raid is a more than typical AJRPG with the most generic fantasy set up and characters archetypes and the gameplay is not really innovating, it’s easy to mix it with a hundred more similar games, I did it when I watched gameplay of it ... on YouTube, it does have beautiful artwork and great opening songs that’s for sure, and I liked how the game has its own version of the Google dinosaur so you can play it while you wait until it finishes its download.

I wish I could say I did but I don’t have enough space on my cellphone for that and thus I couldn’t even begin to play it after I heard the opening about 20 times so that’s it, this is the end of this.

Wait am I talking about the game here? No this is an anime review. Well I already mentioned the problems that videogames anime adaptations tend to have in my Dragon’s Dogma review thus I won’t repeat myself here and I’ll just point out which ones appear here.

The first and most noticeable thing which made people drop the show is how heavy it is on exposition. The first three episodes tell you a lot about the protagonist, the main girl, the setting, the lore, the background story, the conflict, the political struggles, the racism present in the show, the main objective of the dark elves and how they are treated by the humans.

Absolutely everything here is told instead of shown and it’s really boring to see people talk about these things, especially with the average or slightly above average visuals, King’s Raid is a weird case in this department as it looks like it is not doing anything wrong here yet at the same time is not doing anything right either. The character designs are beyond generic but there is not something really bad about them and there’s one good thing it has over the game and that’s how the female characters have more clothes here, especially Frey. Thanks, we don’t need fanservice to ruin the image of already bland characters.

The artwork does not look bad either, as there are no significant quality drops, but it also has a weird filter, it makes you think that someone set up the brigthness of your screen almost to the max when you are watching it. The backgrounds are also well done but they are as typical as they get. This is a problem I have with most fantasy anime these days but King’s Raid is just in another level, typical jrpg backgrounds as typical as they get, I can’t even say something particularly negative or positive about them. The motions are good when it comes to battles, which in turn have decent choreography but it’s hard to appreciate that when most of the time you see people standing and talking or sitting and talking and even when they do something, said action is shown with lots of still images. Is a weird case where a show is rarely animated but when it does, is well animated.

As for the special effects, well, for once I have to give it to a fantasy anime, it does not have crappy looking CGI attacks nor monsters, a rare thing nowadays, but they are not impressive either, in fact it is the second weakest visual aspect after the character designs.

The second issue of the show is how simple and generic is it, when I read people talking about it, the few who have positive things to say about the show are either people who like fantasy stories so much to the point of accepting every cliché within the genre without a problem, or people who played the game and keeps telling others about the potential it has, and the twist that are yet to come once the adaptation reaches the 9th out of 10 chapters of the game.

Yeah, I don’t think anyone besides Detective Conan, One Piece, Gintama or Pokemon fans can wait that long before the series “gets good” but whatever, this seems to be the main excuse for every show that comes out these days, it gets good once there’s only half the series left, or in its nth season, stuff like that.

Until that happens, if at all, all you are left with is the basic premise of an evil demon emperor which is going to revive in this world and bring doom with him so its time to go on a travel and get a macguffing in form of a holy sword to stop him and his whole army of typical monsters, which are referred as demons in here but they otherwise encapsulates about every monster you encounter in an rpg, from undeads to giant worm things which comes out from under the grounds.

And this premise just can’t avoid having a cast consisting of a noble knight destined to save the world, the kind female healer who is also his childhood friend and possible love interest, a cheerful female wizard who uses fire, wears a red dress (it’s not really a dress but w/e, I don’t know about clothes in english, or in general to be honest), a big purple hat, constantly jokes about the protagonist being and looking completely normal (which is true, but the same can be said about the whole cast), and is just clumsy and sometimes sets up stuff on fire by accident and she also wastes all the money of the party, do you like Aqua and Megumin from KonoSuba? Rejoice for they are combined into one here! If she had only a fraction of their memorability and funny quirks, sadly she doesn’t and is still the funniest character in the show.

There’s also a rogue like assassin but aside from his not really funny interactions with Cleo, the wizard, nothing else is known about this character.

There are some other characters but they don’t appear much, such as two female elves, one who doesn’t trust humans and a member of the party who defeated the demon lord 100 years before the beginning of the story, they are not bad but they appear for two episodes and are not seen again.

Ultimately the most interesting characters are the dark elves, as they plan to take over the kingdom by slowly taking over the royal army for all the discrimination they received in the past, as well as all the crap they get even in the present. This is also the most interesting part of the show, waiting for the moment they will strike…when and if that happens is still unknown. Sadly, this is filler according to the people that played the game, as they don’t appear there, too bad. With that said, whenever they are not angry and just talking among themselves, they have a very relaxed behaviour and typical personalities, the naive kid, the calm and mostly quiet girl, a whole bunch of those WHEN ARE WE GONNA KILL ALL OF THOSE HUMANS type of guys, and the leader, the one who plans and does all stuff and is usually calm until someone try to do something to one of his friends, that’s when he snaps and becomes enraged, nothing to see here either.

Besides the no surprises, there’s also the problem of how poorly writen everything is, a weak protagonist who can’t do anything sets up to kill the demons when a whole veteran squad got killed off, demons appear in the middle of the sacred forest of the elves when it’s supossed to to stop everyone that isn’t an elf, they kill a creature in the same episode it appears and I am supossed to feel sorry for this little creature. Look, I don’t know about you, but I can’t feel sorry for the death of someone I knew for about 10 minutes, even less if it’s a creature that only says one word. When this happens, the hero, up until now useless, goes berserk and kill this demon with ease, what happened there?

Also he is giving one third of the power of this holy sword shortly after that, being considered kind and worthy right after that, but I will recognize how that was pointed out in the show, as for the little creature, is a plant, thus he begins to grow again in the very next episode, so much for the drama. A thing I didn’t like here i show the protagonist got that sudden power up.

A sort of witch appears and almost kill the protagonist while his whole party just stand there, she also hints that the goddess of light or whatever is not what she seems to be but for now that remains unclear. Oh, and she’s also told about the connection of the protagonist and the former hero about 4 or 5 minutes after the party agreed to hide that fact, and no one pointed that out. Afterwards we see her with a one dimensional villain by the way.

And the leader of the dark elves, always telling the rest to don’t succumb to the racism they get on a daily basis when he almost killed a noble and blew eveything up, and this somehow didn’t have any repercussion of any kind. The theme of racism is also portrayed very poorly, very onesided in order to try and justify and victimize the dark elves. Although there are good humans that don’t treat them like shit, most of them act that way only because the dark elves are seemingly helping them fight the demons. The rest of the humans? The worst incompetent scum ot the world.

But the real issue here is how this began, which is shown on the third episode, I won’t spoil what that was but come on, a whole race being exiled because of something only one of them did? And it wasn’t even that big of a deal, is not believable and feels like too much, the only interesting thing in that is the possible connection to the shady sign of the goddess of light which can or not be revealed later in the story.

Side content from the game is also added here, in the form of relaxing moments and slice of life moments, usually ruined by minus encounters with minor enemies. This is supossed to give time to know more about the setting and the characters but the episodes are wasted on silly comedy than fleshing out the main cast. The minor characters who only appear for one episode don’t have anything interesting about them either. The backgrounds can be summed up as being traumatized because of being previously attacked by the demons or in the middle of a fight, common and expected within the setting, not atrocious but not interesting, these episodes just drag the plot and turn the tone very lighthearted for the supossed world crisis that is around the corner, an issue I have with this video game genre in general.

Well, at least the series is not an isekai with otaku pandering, fanservice or harem vibes, and the main party does travel to each important place instead of just teleporting themselves to them or flying towards them, that is something good I can say about it.

A typical series obviously has a typical soundtrack, the kind of which you listen in just about every fantasy work regardless of its medium, but to be fair these tend to be good and is the same case in here. The opening and ending songs are typical jrock/pop but I don’t have a problem with them, they are nothing special or amazing but I like how they lean more towards the rock side, especially the ending song which focuses on the dark elves.

Other than that, King’s Raid is not exactly atrocious, it’s just slow, boring, and has the type of bad writing you usually get in videogames but don’t pay too much attention to, if at all. Is just that, as I said with Dragon’s Dogma, it is easier to notice those things in a medium where plot and characters are the main focus and there’s no fancy looking gameplay to make up for it. At least the protagonist wasn’t kill and revived in the very same first episode or gets a new party member wherever he goes, as it happened in Granblue Fantasy and again, no isekai, no harem, no fapservice.

That aside, the series does not offer something which didn’t happen earlier in about thousand fantasy stories and is thus not worth watching. I rather rewatch The Lord of the Rings, or replay arcade videogames from the 90s such as Golden Axe, Dark Seal or Dungeons & Dragons: Shadow Over Mystara, the first one is obviously way better and the videogames are way more fun, the D&D game even has a better plot with better characters, believe or not, and you have to play with different characters in different runs, going to different places and fighting different monsters in order to get that, which adds to the replay value.

There’s also the fact that the Dragon Quest remake is airing at the same time and features a typical jrpg plot as well, but unlike this one, it has a huge fanbase behind to back it up. So it even has direct competition favored from the get go, because of its long line of videogames, anime, manga and Toriyama art style, such a bad timing.

Will I keep watching it? Yes, because is not an isekai and because I want to see if the dark elves and the possible twists make up for the rough start, after all Warhammer and Warcraft began as the most typical fantasy stuff and evolved into something much crazier later on, for better or worse.

Update: After eight episodes the series got better, but not by much. In terms of visuals, the odd brightness is still there but not as prominent, and the special effects get improved. The second cour has different opening and endings, and I’d say they are better than the first ones.

As for the story and characters, Kasel still goes to meet the different people that can remove the Holy Sword’s seals from him, someone attacks, he fights them and looses himself in the process, gets tired for days and is lectured about the way he fights, again, but this time there’s some time spent on his mentality and background, even if it’s nothing special.

There’s still side content that doesn’t matter much and episodes that feel pointless and drag the plot, plus not one but two recap episodes…in a two cour series. And the take over the kingdom subplot is pretty much forgotten.

Well at least Roy’s backstory is shown, even if it’s nothing special, and the whole thing with the dark elves gets a resolution, it felt rushed and lacked impact but it served in terms of fleshing out Riheet, by far the best character in the show.

Anyways the main story keeps being boring and the dark elves’ subplot is rushed, thus the only thing left to pay attention to is the backstory and lore, which is pretty cool, again, nothing mindblowing nor atypical, is the kind of stuff you have already seen in different fantasy stories, including Record of Lodoss War, but it’s serviceable. It has to do with different dieties at war, characters being corrupted by dark powers, the truth about the dark elves’ backstory, and all tied with what happened between the former King and the Demon Lord, thus connecting the two storylines from the beginning. The problem is, between the recaps, the pointless or repetitive episodes and the backstory, the actual main plot is reduced to just the final two episodes, where everyone arrives at the same time (despite the villains having the ability to teleport) and somehow before the main party to a final battle, which is short, doesn’t have much of a choreography, ends in a rather disappointing way and leads to a typical finale that has nothing to do with the supposedly mind blowing dark twist from the ninth chapter of the game.

Thus it’s another complete failure of a videogame adaptation that won’t even get a continuation since it was a big flop in terms of audience, I mean even the blu ray sells were cancelled before the series even reached its mid cour, that’s just…sad.

Ah...King's Raid, one of the most popular indie mobage games in South Korea, such a good game that's amassed with the huge popularity in its home country. The anime version which features a different story from the game's plot, frankly, I can sum in one word: TRASH.

As with every other game adaptation, it's nothing more than the marketing ploy of tactics to get people to play the original game, and that by every aspect, has succeeded one way or another without going into the specifics of numbers. But the way that King's Raid was planned with the anime adaptation, I have no idea what the ... production committee was thinking to make it more than twice as long (as any typical 12-episode run), which in return makes it compoundingly twice as boring. And with twice the story plot (the hero and the villain), sadly, when the villain's story is more interesting than the hero...that's just one of many make-or-break moments that this show could've capitalized on, but went in the motive of DRAGGING the journey for "God knows how long the hero must play King Arthur to find the sword in the (magic realm) stone that slays evil".

The story...nah, heck it, I'll impose a question instead: Do you prefer to watch the typical cliche Hero and his mercenaries on a long-ass journey to find the Holy Sword, or focus more on the villain side with the Dark Elves and the reasons behind the usual kingdom tyranny that causes them to go berserk to the point of rebellion? I'm pretty sure you know the answer deep in your heart as to which is more compelling if you want to watch this needlessly 6-month long run that only increases boredom with the passing of time.

The characters...extremely cookie-cutter as per RPG standards. They're supposed to carve an identity of themselves, but to me, I can just sum them up as just being cardboard cut-outs in the skewed sense of genericness. You got the usual Hero who's dense and only strikes like a ferocious dog, the mercenaries of a beautiful magicians (one attuned to the Hero for "romance" eye-candy, another for childlike childishness) and the occasional warrior for extra strength (and seeking revenge from his past). The only consolation I'll give is the sympathy to the Dark Elves' side for much they've suffered and seeking their own justice for being the oppressed, and that's about it.

The animation...just undercuts the entire production run as a whole, because it's the same amount of mediocre as you'd expect from a decades-old studio that other than most modern-day mediocre-average kids' shows, doesn't know how to tackle a series that is vastly different from the pedigree of works before and after it. Even worse, with the surmise and acquisition of Xebec under Sunrise, and resurrection under a new name (Sunrise Beyond), I know that Xebec has done some great dark-esque shows, but the result of this is nowhere to be seen. So yeah, heck this one as well, because the animation and visuals are subpar.

Even the music is boring as well. This is one of those times that fripSide's song just somehow doesn't click well with the entire theme of the show, yes the song is somewhat listenable but nope, the mesh is just crude, and I don't care much for KOTOKO's ED...so a strike out for the ED, which makes the 1st half's OST sound palpitable. The 2nd half's OST sounded a lot better-suited to the show, and yeah, you can hear the difference in both OP and ED songs, so that's a tick.

Nope, anime adaptations from games are supposed to make you feel welcomed to the game itself, as if you're the MC who's playing the game and making decisions yourself, but to see an adaptation like this that serves no purpose other than clickbait for the actual game, why bothering making this show for the intention of the audience to suffer more than twice the length of a bad show? It all comes down to the saying of "Money as the root of all evil", and this is no different.

Skip this one and save your precious time, you would not want to watch more than a cour's worth of this gosh-darn slow-as-molasses bull-crap.

Even though the story is different from the game, it's very enjoyable. Sure some scene and episodes can come off boring, but it's really not bad. The characters are still amazing as their game counterparts, the new characters are enjoyable.

To me, this anime gives me something new and fresh from what I usually watch. It's got what you look for in a fantasy, action anime, maybe not everything but most of it. I highly recommend you give this a watch and give it at least half way through before knowing how you feel. That's how you'll get the full experience.

King's Raid is a show that starts off very much like your typical Game story adaptation that's as RPG as it can get. You have a hero with brown hair who is special in some way that makes him chosen for the role of saving the world.

If I were playing a game, this might be a fine role. However, this is an anime.

The show actually has a decent story to tell and a good amount of worldbuilding of the history and events leading up to the start of the plot. However, it's biggest problem is that its writers chose probably the most boring point of ... view (the RPG hero) to tell the story from.

From the very start, we have shiny graphics, at least an okay budget, fairly pleasant character designs and decently detailed backgrounds. Visually, this show is shiny enough. At least a solid 8/10 here. Sound is more mediocre, about 5/10. There's not much to speak of in this category either good or bad. It's just meh.

So what was wrong with this show? Why is its choice of protagonist so... off?

Those of us who have been playing video games for a while, who are at least genre saavy with (J)RPGs, would probably be aware of that trope: That swordwielding dude who is some kind of chosen one who goes saving the world for the reason of protecting the world and everyone in it.

This character is everywhere in fiction, each iteration showing up with a different face, a different hairdo, a different set of clothes, and a different name. Yet, at their core, this character is the same each and every time. They are that swordwielding dude who is chosen to save the world from the big bad and protect everyone. By making this the main character again, we are effectively seeing the same story again.

Yet, the biggest disappointment with this show is that it didn't have to do this.

From the start, we see an interesting character - someone who has effectively lost his entire family and kin, save his sister. This character is not your typical swordwielder, he has a vendetta. He has a vision, a motive. Were this show to be his story, we would have a driven story from an interesting perspective with a decently built world to play in. It could have been a Lelouch type-revenge story where the vendetta transforms into a benevolent desire for salvation and a genuine growth in the form of new appreciation.

Unfortunately, though we were given the glimpses of what could be, we are ultimately left with a show that spends the majority of its time following the generic MC-kun and his entourage on their happy, save-the-world, "nakama" adventure.

Despite almost solid world-building and so much potential in that one character, this entry of anime ultimately falls flat.
Story: 6/10
Characters: 5/10 (Carried primarily by Riheet's characterization, but let's be real: he's not the MC, he just teases a good story that was haphazardly told between the happy "nakama" adventure.)

Do you want to waste time? Watch this anime.

Game-based anime is often a long shot, in which they are either very good (which is difficult) or they are (most of the time) average. That typical disappointment at the end of everything that could be that story.
And this is the anime "King's Raid: Ishi wo Tsugumono-tachi", a story that disappoints you in the end.
Let's go to the findings:
1. Anime wastes too much time with subplots that don't add up in the story. It walks at a slow pace of development that is more still than a rock at times and this makes the plot partially boring.
2. ... Boring and reasoned characters, with the exception of the female protagonist "Frey" and "Riheet", all other characters tend to be boring. In the general context, some developments are justified, too repeated at other times and really meaningless at others. The characters' decisions are also stupid, unnecessary and really questionable.
3. Romance? What is that? What? Was there romance in this anime? -Someone reminds me of a scene... AH! Yeah! There is... THE ROMANCE OF THE FATHER OF THE PROTAGONIST WITH THE MOTHER OF THE PROTAGONIST. ONLY. ONLY THAT! Seriously... do not develop anything from Kasel (boring protagonist) with Frey (wait to read about the end of the anime that you will understand the reason).
4. Fights stop by... It's not for the animation, the animation is good even (better than some super famous animes). The fights are stopped sometimes because they are not so exciting, they are accelerated sometimes or very disappointing.
5. The Final... That was what you were wondering, right? Okay... I will summarize the ending in an expression: You spent 3 hours waiting for a cake in an expensive restaurant, when finally that cake arrived, it was a badly decorated and soled cake, without much taste and totally artificial. Although the cake would at least kill my hunger. The ending was open. Semi happy. Incomplete in my point of view. It is serious, it is not teasing, the end is that cliché in which the characters are friends. And because they are friends, don't you have what? ROMANCE! The Quartet of friends, has an open ending. With an inigmatic phrase from one of them about new problems... As if this boring thing was going to have a second season ... (Here I even stopped writing for 5 minutes because I really laughed at it, that I wasted time putting it at the end. ) The final fight was very fast, disappointment.
The creators of the anime are to be congratulated... They managed to speed up the parts that were supposed to be good and prolong the boring, this is an incredible gift... I don't think everyone would be able to ruin a story so much.

That's basically it. If you've read this far, know that I thank you and tell you, don't watch this anime.

Well, we're almost done with this series. I did enjoy the series, and I love the game (if you haven't played King's Raid, do so now, as at the time of this review, which is May 12 of 2021, the game is having its 3rd Anniversary, which will give you a ton of freebies), but this is one of those series that I find somewhat enjoyable in spite of its flaws.

Story: I'll give it a 5.
The pacing is extremely uneven, and at the beginning the dark elves are even more interesting as characters than Kasel and friends, but after Episode 15 it improves significantly. Kasel ... and friends stop being a bore to watch, people start dying left and right, and the series drops all the previous goofiness. Also, Kasel grows a spine.

Art: 7
A few off-model moments, and the colour pallette is too bright and cheery for the kind of story this is. Or at least the game was darker and edgier than the anime.
The character design is decent. It at least makes more sense than the overly exaggerated 3D in game models. The anime, however, is lacking on the tremendous amount of fanservice that the game has.

Sound: 10
Hoo boy! That Dreamcatcher opening...
The OP/ED are wonderful, and the ambient music is also good. This at least doesn't fail. Also, the in-game music is featured every now and then.

Character: 7
My only gripe is that my favourite character (Artemia) is missing in this adaptation, and Theo and Jane are grossly underused, only having a few brief apparitions and leaving through exit stage left (which is sad, but a necessary evil, as their romance is a very iconic ship within the fandom but it would have become a romantic tumour in the plot).
Other than that, in spite of how boring was to see Kasel and friends do their own plotline (and how exciting it was to watch Riheet, Ripine and the other Dark Elves), as I said, Character Development actually kicks in on the second half of the series, when the characters stop being boring.

Enjoyment: 7
We could have gotten rid of all of the filler episodes and we would have gotten a solid anime series. What in my opinion ruined it the most is how during the first half we had Kasel and friends fighting for their protagonism against the Dark Elves of Black Edge, and during this first half the latter actually had better character development and were way more sympathetic. But after the next half the protagonism is handed back to Kasel and friends, and that's when the plot actually picks up and they start showing personality.

Overall: I'll give it a 7.
Hopefully, once the series is done, we will be on for a treat on the final chapters.

I didn't play the game, so I'll be talking as someone who only saw the anime. Also, I wrote that as the anime isn't finished yet (I watched 23 episodes out of 26) so keep that in mind.

The story takes place in a fantasy universe where humans, orcs, elves and dark elves "coexist", as in they're all in their own little place and dark elves are victims of heavy discrimination coming from humans. The story itself isn't bad, but it's not particularly good either. For the whole time, watching the series felt like watching a final fantasy style game turned into an anime (party of ... 4 with a barbaric, dark mage, white mage and more of a rogue character). There are a few nice plot twists but they're quite predictable.

In terms of art, everything is quite basic. It's not impressive, but it's pleasing to watch. The sceneries are good but they didn't particularly draw my attention either.

The sound effects are fine, the background music is fine, the voice actors are good yet not really impressive to me, but I personally really like the openings and endings (that's more a matter of taste though).

The characters, although not completely stereotyped, are quite basic as well. I was worried at first because all the female characters have big boobs, but there's literally no fanservice and the characters aren't oversexualized or anything (which is nice to focus more on the story).Their designs are distinctive and it's easy to recognize each character, even if it's one that you don't see very often like Kasel's mother. One thing I like though is that despite not being overdramatic, Kasel (the main character) does get swayed by emotions, he's not a pure gem of hope and determination like would be Black Clover's Asta. He's determined to help others, but sometimes doesn't do things right or needs a slap in the face and I think it makes him more realistic in that way.

As for my personal enjoyment, I think it's a nice anime, but it's quite forgettable if that makes sense. There's nothing particularly bad about it, but there's nothing that really stands out either apart from the openings. What I like though is the fact that the anime is really only about the story. By that I mean that I didn't see any fanservice, characters that seem to be created to be waifus or anything of the sort. It's probably not an anime that I'd have the strength to binge, but it's still good. You'd think that with all I've said it's boring, but then again, despite not being impressive in any way, it's simply well executed.

I wouldn't RECOMMEND it, but I think that if you're looking for an awfully normal and basic anime of that genre that doesn't have heavy fanservice to try to compensate the other things just so you can have a nice day watching something nice yet not mind-blowing, then you can watch it. But definitely don't put this on top of your to watch list.

As a person who get through 26 Ep with recap included, Kings Raid is a quite jolly good show. As my Uncle once said "keep stupidly simple, but worked" fit perfectly within this show.

YES, The show sometime gets boring because sometimes they bring the story in a slow-calm pace, but it still Action-packed tho.
AND YES, this show is not Epic as others, But a relatively simple happy-end story is what make King's Raid shine the best.

As for Art, well its not the best, But its considered good and well made tho (trust me, i have seen art dat even worse than anything ... you could imagine XD)

For sound, they done a gud decent job for bringing ambience to life in this show

Charaters, They created with simple quirks and developed as it should in RPG type of story (generic type). Nothing overlap with the plot bcuz every each one of them had Problems and Reasons just like human irl do. i meann, People make mistake and learn from it, sometime once twice or more. DAT is How Char Dev Works. Its Fine as long as his development synergize with the plot & story.

As you know im not very familiar with its game, music, colab and what-so-ever, but i tell you dat this one is gud damn fine Anime (yes , like i said "just fine" no less no more). I ENJOY king's raid as a fantasy anime with classic RPG style story.

Overal, Some would watch and gib neutral or gud review with critics, AND some drop half way and gib not just bad review but also a tantrum. but i tell you, sometimes ppl in MAL tend to give Harsh Number on a good or fine art without considering detailed Content Value.
AS a person who watch anime on a whim to pass time in his busy but boring life, i would say this show is quite FINE WITH GOOD AFTER TASTE.

I would give this series a 8, (normally its a 7 but considering harsh number dat ppl give.)


I WOULD recommend this show to people on this term :
1. there are nothing worthwhile to watch
2. Those who yearn a generic and simple RPG set
3. Fantasy theme
4. Easy to understand and slow pace
5. Something lightly to kill time

But to be honest i wouldn't Re-watching this show again EXCEPT if there's a Sequel toit

(Ex: like Shingeki no Bahamuts)

Might contain a few spoilers

This anime is a mobile game adaptation yes but here's the thing its boring and feels kinda bland with no taste that's the conclusion I arrived at while I binged it all' i decided to let episodes build because at first I don't know it was a mobile game adaption i never played kings raid before so i don't have much knowledge about this series so i thought episode 1 was interesting you know it gave off a fantasy vibe but after watching all current episodes I felt kind of meh I really cant explain it too well but my ... interest slowly started to fade after episode 1, the main plot is like this demon lord has to return Main Character has to go on a journey to unseal a sword that can defeat the Demon king except Main Character isn't exactly mentally stable he looses himself few times to rage for things i thought wasn't that deep like example he met chibi a small tree thingy they only spent what looked like a few minutes together but when this chibi thing died he went crazy like id understand if he knew chibi longer but you cant meet a stranger now and feel this type of rage or sadness if they pass away maybe its just me but i didn't think it was logical.
The Characters felt soo bland we have Main Character Kun who is destined to be great yes but he has no personality aside from wanting to be strong to protect whats dare to him and he lets us know this a lot he repeats this like a broken record also mentally he isn't strong don't get why they didn't make him strengthen his mentally or train him before he went on his journey to wield the sword that is powerful enough to send Demon king kun back to sleepy land and we have his side chick sorry his female companion who is just there for the sake of being there she as well is probably worse than him a empty body with no soul that's how I see her now the pink haired girl has some personality but i kept finding her a bit annoying at times like she wants to try to hard to stand out etc and we have the other guy with the cut on his eye I guess he is somewhat decent he seems to have a past or some thing to him but I cant put my finger on it but yeah most of the characters in this show is bland and empty ohh the elves seemed interesting tho the leader in particular has some meat to his character well that's just what i believe others might think differently.
The Animation is well not exactly Sakuga or brilliant but its not bad either but some frames do seem a bit weird to me also Character design is pretty cool I love all the designs props to the Character designer for making it look nice to be honest it was the character design that really pulled into this series to begin with.
OK about the Voice actors. they are OK i guess pink haired girl still kind annoying tho.
anyway my enjoyment was like this episode 1 had me interested but as the series progressed my enjoyment stated going out the window and then that time I had already watched 15 episodes in already and it would be a waste of time to drop a series at episode 15 so i decided to solider on like a warrior

I'm only making this review since dreamcatcher did the ost for the second season, which i'm obsessed with and have been repeating the full ver. my thoughts on this anime is that its average for sure, i like the added characters but despite that the anime isnt super unique. its not bad, i was entertained but my excitement for the anime came from dreamcatcher. the character's are alright, my favorites are frey and ripine. the mc kasel is pretty basic but hes not unlikable. the male characters are kinda boring while the female characters have more design but im honestly not surprised. the anime has ... a lot of potential, esp with the added elves. so parts i disliked were the storyline and the static characters but things i liked were the soundtracks and the dynamic characters. I really hope in the future dreamcatcher can do more openings for them, since their opening added alot to the anime and brought in more fans.

Definitely an underrated anime, in my opinion. I think this anime was good it had decent animation, although it could be better in some scenes, but it was acceptable for me. I liked the story, and I wasn't aware that a game existed for King's Raid, so I didn't have any preconceptions while watching this anime. It was a little boring in some episodes, but I still had a good experience watching it. I have mixed feelings about recommending this to others because it doesn't have top-tier animation like some other anime, but if you enjoy adventure or hero type anime, I say go for ... it!

Kasel. Kasel. Kasel.
I watched this because I wanted to support Dreamcatcher- a K-pop group that made some of the soundtrack for the game. Deja Vu, the title track of the game is absolutely chilling (and the acting and planning in the m/v is absolutely amazing). I recommend watching all the music versions on YouTube. That said, after briefly trying the game-- it's quickly apparent that this is your run of the mill hero's journey. Everything is a bit bland, and that translates to the anime as well. It's not super thrilling, but it's not a bad watch. It gets better--at the very least, but it's ... pretty low priority with minimal cliffhangers.
I'd recommend it to pass the time, as it does feature some nice voice actors. The music is pretty good as well (although not nearly as powerful as the game's soundtrack). It translate the game pretty well as far as I can tell; (although I dropped the game immediately). However, I'll thoroughly just be disappointed because it doesn't live up to the hype that Dreamcatcher set for them. Characters, Art, Enjoyment are on the lower end. The show itself isn't bad, it's just a flat and predictable storyline. Even the romance and comedy falls flat.

We had a few generic fantasy adaptations this period so you know what to expect to a certain extent,the question is it good?

Well the story actually had 2 protagonists which we switch around that have different goals that end up overlapping in the end,one of protagonists having the generic hero journey and the other is one of revenge.But both their paths do not take exactly the route one would mostly expect.

Now thats interesting enough because while they take different paths we see(even a little)how their actions affects the path of the other while we switch perspectives.

The animation is okay,nothing special but you get some decent ... animation at the important parts while the art and character designs are amazing and makes each character stand out.Both opening and ending songs are really good as well.

The characters are again okay,the focus is more on each protagonist as to be expected so you are gonna get more on how their journey affects them and their groupd dynamic.

Overall it was a decent show,i would not reccomend it since its not something all would like but i would not say its a waste of time either since it has okaying twist and is a little different than other shows of this genre.

Review of kings raid anime episode 26:

Its now the last episode, episode 26, and its good! a happy ending at least, even if the fight was fierce, tho begins another journey just right after they defeated the demon king.. and even if things have settled in that country, there is another place or country that needs saving, which is what the holy sword has let kasel sense.. and a hint for a season 2, if there may be one.. i think that the princess will have many things to sort, as well as riheet, since there are still others who bear so much hate ... towards each other.. even tho many people are good at heart.. and yet another thing, is the revival of riheets sister?! Damn these cliffhangers.. haha.. the anime overall is good btw.. anyways, i rate the anime 4.5 out of 5, 4.5 for both story and art.. 🙂

https://www.facebook.com/talk.anichan/posts/2197315987069096

Overall a good series, the characters were satisfactory enough if not excellent. Kassel does become stronger as he and his companions continued on their journey to find the holy sword and to vanquish the dark lord Angmund. There’s also the added story of the dark elves, and the persecution they have faced at the hands of Kassel’s kingdom Orvelia. Riheet the dark elf leader has lost all of his comrades, yet in the end he chooses to help Princess Scarlet in her quest to help Kassel. I wish there was a little more romance in this series rather than just friendship ... though.

I have a few unanswered questions of my own, feel free to comment on them.

1.) Will Kassel and Frey ever become a romantic couple in the near future, and maybe start a family of their own?

2.). Kassel can’t wander around forever he’s gonna need to settle down someday, am I correct?

3.). Who will Princess Scarlet take as either her Prince or at least a Prince Consort I wonder?

4.). Scarlet is going to need to have heirs to carry on the Royal line, so who will she become romantically involved with someday, any thoughts?

I didnt play the game just watched the show and it starts off kinda boring but when you get to ep 7-10 it started to get better for me anyway. The action starts to pick up but i dont see why theres so many bad reviews im pretty picky when it comes to anime i have over 100+ tabs open on my phone of shows i havent finished or started and this one caught my eye after a few episodes. If you get to episode 8 and dont like it then its not for you. Its your typical adventure, dark lord, hero party that has ... to find a sword to save the world and its animated really well compared to ningen fushin a similar type of anime but compared to that kings raids animation is god tier and people have ningen fushin rated higher lmfao wtf is wrong with people ningen fushins action scenes are literally still images of the characters in a single pose with a knife in the air while png goblins are flying by thats every action scene in that show still png images with the background moving around the characters.