Story - The story was clear and concise. Save the school from closing down by starting a school idol group as a publicity stunt. While it was easy to follow, it was also easy to predict. The show gave little in surprises or excitement and was just too basic for my liking. But I must commend them for staying on track. A short anime like this has to stay on track, because they don't have time for fillers and side stories. While the story was basic for my liking, I must admit there were times when I enjoyed the simplicity, when I knew what was going to happen, and it happened, it was kind of refreshing and I could sit back and enjoy the show.
Art - The art in this show is beautiful. 'Love Live! School Idol Project' is a slice of life anime, and therefore you can't expect real artistic spectacles like unique settings or amazingly detailed weapons or spaceships. It is standard for this genre; school, arcades, modern towns and students. The show is detailed though, and you don't get any faceless people in the crowd which is nice. The only place this anime really stands out in terms of art is the character design. I am not going to hide it, I thought the girls were stunning! They all had lovely hair and each girl had a different colour which distinguished the members of the group nicely. It was also clear that they were drawn with the purpose of being attractive, that typical pretty school girl look you get in a lot of slice of life anime. I would also like to commend the show's artists and directors for omitting panty shots, this show manages to avoid fanservice and for that I thank them. It really is unnecessary.
Sound - There isn't much to say on this. I watched the subbed version, and so the Japanese voices were the same old voices you get in anime. The girls all sounded fairly similar, young and cute and girly with few exceptions. The voice acting was on par, and I have no complaints there. The music was pretty good, not to my taste, but if you like the genre of music, idol music, then you'll probably like this. Personally I preferred the music in shows like Kids On The Slope and K-On! but hey that's just me. The music was catchy and upbeat and so no complaints there either.
Character - I rated the characters a 5 because I felt they were way too shallow. Love Live! is only a 13 episode anime, so maybe that was the reason, but I felt they could have developed the characters further. I feel like I hardly know them. Not a single character had back story and the only way we got to know them was through their interactions with the other members of the Idol group during the course of the anime.
Enjoyment - It was alright. Like I said in my introduction, I wasn't very impressed. I would only recommend this show to people who had expressed to me that they like idols or are really into music anime. But other than that, there's no reason to watch this show. It was a fun ride, with a few laughs here and there and the way the girls smiled throughout most of the anime had me smiling as well. Those damn contagious smiles :D
Overall - I am rating the show a 5 for mediocre. It's nothing special, but also it does do it's job. It's an idol show, and so people who like idols and the music that goes with it probably don't care that the story is generic and the characters are shallow.
