Alright, let me explain myself.
STORY: 5/10
I'll tackle the seemingly unfinished story first. The way things were built up in the first half of the season, it seemed like the production staff was aiming for this to be a 2-cour anime. The way they played with and introduced Heartseed was quirky and mildly entertaining; an average antagonist with no strings attached. The entirety of plot was based off the group's struggle with Heartseed's ploy, but quickly turned out to be a trainwreck of "teenage romance and angst". In other words, they sold out. Heartseed him/herself was washed away quite easily at the end of the series. If you ever do choose to watch Kokoro Connect with a critical eye, you will know how disappointing the resolved conflict truly is.
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ART: 7/10
The art is generic moe. It does, however, have some pretty atmospheric scenery stills. The art doesn't only come through as the paint on the picture, as is most of the case in anime. The ambiance and solemnity of some locations during a given arc are well fitting and pretty. That's all I really have to say.
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CHARACTER: 4/10
The only sensible person is Iori, and she is the most insufferable character in the cast. Taichi is a self proclaimed Mary-Sue and white knight who is relatively bland and unappealing once you pass the "bridge" arc of the anime. Inaba starts out stoic and charming but becomes bait for fanservice in order to make up for a lacking plot. She literally cannot stop making the situation any worse in the anime and Iori calls her shit out more than once.
The other two of the main cast, Yoshifumi and Yui, are a useless tool and generic character with a preventable tragic past, respectively. I feel you should watch the anime to better understand these characters without spoilers, but they're still forgettable nonetheless.
As I said before, this anime had a better first half. Until episode 6, the character interactions when swimmingly and things were going to go well with the direction of the story. But since the only driving forces of rationality were in a hesitant main character and an edgy female teenager, the plot along with the direction of character development, fumbled and burned. The product is something someone relatively new to anime can consume rather easily, but nothing special and maybe even irritating to a more diverse viewer who has seen the same thing in nearly 10 or so other anime.
But an honourable mention does go to Iori's backstory. I think, amidst all of that, hers was thoughtfully written and offered an explanation to who she was. But who Iori is, you'll just have to watch to find out. (hint: Identity crisis)
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SOUND: 8/10
The OST is ambient and compliments the art. My words can't do it justice so just go on YouTube and search the soundtrack up. It's quite nice and one of the few aspects of Kokoro Connect that I'll look fondly on.
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ENJOYMENT: 5/10
It was fun, and I think I can safely speak for a good chunk of the viewers that we only watched the rest so we can say that we finished it. I'm being rather harsh, but it really isn't anything that jumps out unless this is your go-to genre. Even then, it's somewhat shallow and lacking and there are plenty of other anime that do it better than Kokoro.
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OVERALL: 6/10
It wasn't great, but it wasn't too bad. I did like watching it, but for probably all the wrong reasons. Watching Iori snap at Inaba is a pretty entertaining if you ask me.
