Now onto the actual review.
Story:
The story is a fairly standard "Stranded in a fantasy world, we must survive.", however there is a lot of time where nothing happens to drive the plot forward, but instead shows the daily lives of the characters. There are of course action sequences, the killing of orcs and goblins and such, much like you've come to expect from any kind of action/fantasy anime. The overall story seems to be mainly driven by the characters, with the overarcing story taking a back seat in order for the characters to take the spotlight.
Art:
The art is phenomenal. If you were to completely disregard the story and characters, and you just watched this for the landscape shots I think it'd be worth your time. The backdrops all seems to have been domne in water colour or a similar medium which is very interesting.
Sound:
I had to go back and watch a few episodes to get a feel for the audio since nothing stuck out for me, but going back and purposefully listening out for the sound made me realise that everythingthat needed to be there was there. The audio for armour pieces clinking together was there, the audio for chess pieces being moved and so on, attention to detail was everywhere with audio. The background music was also good and built on the athmosphere of wthe scenes where it was used.
Characters:(This will be split into two parts, Visual character design and character design.)
Visually, the characters are all well designed, each having thier own style and quirks. Most of the gear used by the characters isn't hugely outlandish and unwieldable. A little thing I liked was that they actually carry their gear, for example Moguzo carries a large backpack while the party is out adventuring, it's a small thing but it shows that they're out in the wilds for a few days at least. There are no fairly generic cut'n'paste secondary characters either, even the secondary characters have been drawn well, with them all also having their own styles of gear and clothing.
Character development and the design of the personalities for the character is hands down the best part of this series. The characters are very well developed, even down to things that they do in their spare time. All the characters feel rather unique too, while watching I never thought "Oh look, another Kirito." or "That guy reminds me of Naruto.", all the characters have very definite edges to their personalities and habits.
You spend so much time with the main party, just seeing them do the menial everyday tasks people do that you can't help but connect with them, even though you're just seeing Moguzo buy a helmet or seeing Ranta fishing, you start to realise that these people have lives besides going out and killing orcs and dragons and this series does an excellent job of building them in that way.
You also see how the characters emotionally develop as the series progresses, alongside their abilities as adventurers this really drew me in since with other "Trapped in a fantasy world." anime that I've seen I didn't see a whole lot of development, so this was a nice change. Our protagonist also has a pretty interesting way of looking at things, so his internal monologue has some good moments of sarcasm.
Something that particularly made me happy with the characters is that a 'small cut' will seriously hurt, and put them out of action, and losing blood is a somethig that can incapacitate them ((Looking at you Bleach)), and that the main party has no idea how to fight when they first enterthis fantasy world, as most of us wouldn't have any idea with how to start with magic or sword play except 'Hit them with the sharp bit'.
Enjoyment:
As mentioned earlier, if you don't like slow anime then you won't enjoy the story progression, as whole episodes pass by with nothing happening; if however you like slice of life, and you enjoy seeing the characters go about their lives in this new fantasy world they're in, then you will really enjoy this anime.
