The art style seemed to be a throwback to some older animation style. It was not bad, but was not spectacular either. Many characters looked the same, given the same major characteristics such as stature, facial shape, hair style and nose. In any case I have seen worse so I rated it a 5/10 thinking it to be average.
The characters in this series were probably what bugged me the most. The protagonist was someone I really wanted to like. Much like any great hero he is irreparably flawed. In Kaiji's case he is an emotionally stunted, immature fool. That is made up in part by the fact that the author attempted to make him out to be intelligent, or have the capacity to be. Unfortunately he is also very weak willed, and incapable of making a decision. I spent the entire series hoping he would grow a pair and stand up for himself. The antagonists were, in Kaiji's mind, anyone wealthy. Though more specifically an organization dedicated to profiting off of gamboling on and through their debtors. While they were portrayed as being emotionally uninvolved, and even taking delight in cruelty, they always presented a logical argument. (That is not to say that the argument was always correct, but it was almost always a common argument used by many people everyday). Whenever Kaiji was faced with one such argument his default action was to deny its validity, cry about it, and attempt to delude himself into rising above such a petty thing as logic and conquer it with what little 'strength' of will he possessed. So while the antagonists were portrayed as evil to a certain extent, at least they were rational. Then of course there is all of the other debtors, and participants in the games. All they do is cry, moan, wail, scream and fall into a self-piteous stupor, including those who set out to take advantage of everyone to succeed themselves. I can appreciate the blatant metaphor here, but it was not well done, and very much thrust down the viewers' throats at every possible opportunity. So for these reasons I rated the characters as 3/10
Adding everything together and the rating does not equal the sum of its parts. Episodes dragged on, I found myself skipping ahead a few minutes at a time towards the end with no real change, as the only thing I was missing was whining, crying, moaning, cursing, and various other meaningless things taking up the entirety of each episode. It became a chore to even finish the series. That said, my enjoyment of the show was a 2/10, and I rated the show overall 3/10
Worst perhaps of all, I forgot I had ever even watched this show it was that bad. The writer barely half-assed the logic behind the games and attempted the pass it off as the pinnacle of reasoned thought. Add that to all of the vacillating and crying and groaning and moaning, and all of the "woe is me, my life is terrible" crap, and you get Kaiji. It is a horrible show not worth watching ever.
