30-sai no Hoken Taiiku

From the synopsis, I already knew that this would be good. I had high hopes and knew I wanted to give it a shot. Now, I am disappointed, but not for the reasons some of the others listed. Let me tell you why: I expected a high-quality anime about two lonely people who find a way into each other's hearts while dating for the first time.
What I got: A ridiculous parody filled with pervy jokes and stupid decisions, a show that isn't to be taken seriously because it is not - in fact - serious.

"A Thirty-Year Old's Health and Physical Education" is a simple, stupid ... and questionable anime that isn't exactly worth watching, but if you do watch and finish it, I'm sure you'll find that it was quite enjoyable.
It is not a masterpiece, but it connects you to other animes and their clichés. If you manage to understand the story and the way it was written, you will understand why the background was so simple and why the art resembled a "Chibi-" anime rather than a fully animated show.
(Just look closely at the poster..)

Let's go a bit deeper for those who are interested:
For our main characters, we have an unlikable yet accurately described awkward 30-year old man (now this might not be the case for everyone, but that is exactly how the men around me are, so I found it hilarious) and a sex God who reminds me of a certain "Gilbert" (those who know, know. For those who don't, the information is not important) so I fell in love with him right away - connecting the two characters and understanding Daigorou's personality just helped find him not annoying.
As disturbing as Macaron was, this anime is a parody anime - taking that in mind, he worked well with the story and was a funny supporting character. The same goes for Kuu-chan and Pii-chan (which sounds like a pu**y in my language).
And as you might have noticed, I forgot to include Andou. And that's because she didn't stick with me. Opposite to Imagawa, she didn't really fit the image of a virgin lady and her character was...quite forgettable. Which is a shame since she is the main character...
Worth mentioning would be the Dorm Supervisor and Wada-san - for me, they were really funny and I enjoyed how they worked with the story.

Now the story itself can't be considered good. It's simple - I am a God of sex and I need you to lose your virginity. That is it. There are sex lessons, perverted jokes, kinky encounters and a Virgin King and a traditional Japanese embarrassment. At times it felt like the story was inferior to the characters, not the other way around.
And that's why the art style suffered too. Since it was simple and not very deep, there was no need for serious faces and quality details. In the first few episodes, I was actually surprised at how good it was. But as I progressed, the amount of "high quality vs. chibi art" switched completely. Can't say I didn't enjoy it, the faces they made were pure gold.
With everything else, I would just repeat myself. It was parody, it didn't need anything high quality, but it was still good. That's applicable to music, to supporting characters, to jokes, to how the story didn't make sense at times... In the end, when it mattered the most, we got a serious goodbye and a good ending.

So like I said, I am happy I've seen this and if you are, any intrigued, you should too.

30-sai is about divine intervention trying to help two 30-year-old virgins hit it up, quite literally. The divine intervention is in the form of a pair of sex gods, two per virgin. Underneath an unbelievable amount of ecchi content and references you'll find a very light romance. Throughout the show, though, I kept wondering whether this show is actually trying to serve as a helpful guide under the guise of comedy, or whether this show is just making fun of the topic of sexuality.

This is quite a unique series. Apart from wondering how this ever got on TV, you'll also notice a very unique flavor ... of comedy. I found some of these references humorous, but quite a few of the others in bad taste. This is an ecchi-comedy with a slight romantic development, and a random, short divergence to action-land. If you willing to sift through the ecchi overload, try out the first two episodes to see if it piques your interest.

Animation:
The animation of this series is, again, unique to say the least. The character models are a bit simplistic and often go into comic-mode (no backgrounds, few character details). Backgrounds are also very simplistic and solid-colored (no detailed shading). There are also portions where the animation style is purposefully grotesque (really ugly drawing style or dis-proportioned figures).
However, most noticeable of all would be the ecchi. The show is full of endlessly censored frames. It's sometimes feels random as apparently french kissing by fake lips is filtered while a banana with two small tangerines next to a mango sliced in half is apparently totally fine. The main point in the show is to have the sex gods teach the virgins how to date and do things that follow a date, therefore, you should expect this to be very explicit at times; i.e. this is most definitely NSFW.

Sound:
The OP is energetic but I don't particularly like the voice. The ED is a rock song with a fairly decent melody, and a fairly interesting sequence (shows the virgins as they grow up). Surprisingly enough, the BGM is actually quite memorable in this series. It plays a very significant role as many of the scenes are more visual-oriented than sound-oriented, there will almost always be some BGM playing.

The VAs do a decent job but Imagawa really does sound like a scary creep at times. You will also get a lot of bleeped out lines as they can't say *** or **** or any other words that I also shouldn't be posting here.

Story:
The story is told from the viewpoint of Imagawa and Andou, two virgins who now live with sex gods who refuse to leave until the former are no longer virgins. The two virgins eventually encounter each other and slowly learn how to date and grow closer through "lessons". Some of these lessons are simple dating tips while others are attempts to get them more to be more comfortable with explicit content. These lessons form title screens that divide each episode. These somewhat spoil what's coming up so I'd recommend not reading the subs for these. Even without the lesson titles, the story is very linear and isn't terribly deep. The focus is definitely on the comedic aspects, with a plot existing to support the comedic events.

Character:
Imagawa is completely creepy and sleeps with a blow up doll, while Andou is just embarrassed and ends up turning down anyone who approaches her. Though there is development as the virgins do learn eventually to interact at some level with the other gender, it feels artificial as the characters themselves don't have much depth. You never really get to know the actual virgins as the show primarily uses them as "dolls" to bring across the point of the lesson. Despite this, some of the character interactions are fairly humorous. Just don't expect the same warm fuzzy feeling that you'd get from something like Amagami SS.

Value:
This is a short, light show that emphasizes that hanging out with the other gender can be fun. It gives some potentially useful dating tips as well as a whole lot of sexual references, most of which doesn't really serve any meaningful purpose. It was decently enjoyable but doesn't really have quite enough depth of characters. The end message is actually probably a good way to finish this off: "If you do nothing, there will never be a chance!".

30-sai no Hoken Taiiku (30HT) is supposed to be a sex guide for 30 year old virgins but only ends up being a light time-waster. The concept is very interesting and there have been some other attempts at it along the years, but they all end up taking the comedy routine and are thus mostly erotic comedies (or even parodies of this sad situation) so don’t exactly expect to learn how to get yourself wise and deflowered by watching it.

There is no other way to explain how dull it felt for me without comparing it to the oldest of this kind, a set of OVAs ... titled Futari Ecchi (FE) and in a way it is a semi-review of it as well. Whatever, once again the first title of a genre is the best and the point of reference to all those that followed it. Don’t blame me if the successors of an idea barely manage to do something better with it.

The anime adaptation only covers the first chapters of an extremely long and still on-going manga but the issue is dealt in a very bold and interesting way. 30HT on the other hand is hardly trying to have the same feeling and context. So compared to FE, it loses on all aspects.
- Very short episodes. No time to get into the mood properly.
- Censorship of the bad kind. FE was keeping the naughty parts invisible or replaced them with bananas. Here, they use these stupid boxes that hide everything and they can’t even speak basic naughty words without being BLEEPED.
- The advises it gives are mostly about dating and flirting, and even those are things most people know anyhow. FE was about ACTUAL sex education.
- Barely any actual sex; the whole show is a slow build-up with high amounts of non-H ecchi towards the first time, while FE was beginning straight with it.
- Stupid Deus ex machina cupids. I mean seriously, you get these supernatural chibi thingies messing with the characters lives because fate demands it or something. HORSE SHIT! FE was always about normal people having to find the guts and the brains to learn and do things right on their own instead of waiting some miracle to happen. Noce messages you give use there you stupid show; it’s like only God can help middle aged virgins.
- Not many characters present. Although FE was also focusing on the main two, there were still many others (especially in the manga) whose advises and their own sex life issues were constantly present to flavour the plot. Over here it remains very basic and linear.
- Low production values. Ok, they weren’t that high in FE either, but DAMN look how cute everybody looks. The cupids are excused somewhat but the main characters are supposed to be middle aged people and look like they are still twelve or something. Stupid moe fad; leave me alone!

So after all this mess what are you left with? A high amount of sex jokes around a four-eyed dork and a frustrated damsel. They are pitiful and I guess there will be many amongst the target audience who will identify with their issues. They are also kept as blunt as possible to make them as identifiable as possible but that is exactly what makes them nothing more than generic plot devises and not fleshed out personalities. Plus, the show DOESN’T teach you anything significant. The FE manga had endless charts of statistics and graphs and stuff about the human body but this one is just the basic stuff you can learn by simply scrolling through porn sites or something.

So in all, it is not much of a title to have high expectations about. Watching any high calibre ecchi or harem show will most likely be more entertaining than this for having better production values and for not pretending to be meaningful.

And now for some excused scorings.

ART SECTION: 3/10 [Cute-looking but otherwise run-down]
Analysis: General Artwork 0/2, Character Figures 1/2, Backgrounds 0/2, Animation 1/2, Visual Effects 1/2

SOUND SECTION: 6/10 [Nothing that stands out]
Analysis: Voice Acting 2/3, Music Themes 2/4, Sound Effects 2/3

STORY SECTION: 5/10 [Very basic and far-fetched for its premise]
Analysis: Premise 2/2, Pacing 1/2, Complexity 1/2, Plausibility 0/2, Conclusion 1/2

CHARACTER SECTION: 4/10 [Everyone is a plot devise]
Analysis: Presence 0/2, Personality 1/2, Backdrop 1/2, Development 1/2, Catharsis 1/2

VALUE SECTION: 1/10 [Meh, doesn’t really offer anything worthy to remember] [/b]
Analysis: Historical Value 0/3, Rewatchability 0/3, Memorability 1/4

ENJOYMENT SECTION: 2/10 [/b]
A bit funny but other than that Futari Ecchi eats this one for a snack.

VERDICT: 3.5/10