-Story (9/10):
The story is what makes Texhnolyze appealing and worth watching. It turns around the young price-fighter Ichise, in an underground city called Lux, who loses an arm and a leg after hitting (who I suppose is) his boss. Limping through the city, with no one to come to his aid, he collapses on a stairway. There, Kamata Eriko (the Doc) finds him and uses him to improve the tecnology of 'texhnolization' and gets his new limbs. Taken under Onishi's (the leader of the Organo, the city's main powerholder) care, he will get involved in a war for the control of the city. Meeting Ran, a girl who can see the possible future, he will get to know his destiny and walk straight to it while he fights for survival.
The problem with this anime is the lack of proper explanation and dialogue. In the first couple of chapters the amount of dialogues can be counted with one hand, and the only explanations you'll get are the couple of flashbacks here and there.
-Art (8/10):
It's the kind of realistic-looking style, which reminds of animes such as Ergo Proxy. The design and colours are very gloomy and 'dry', suiting perfectly to the story. However, it's nothing special.
-Sound (6/10):
With the near to inexistence of BGM and the boring ED, there's not much to say. The sound of the anime itself is very low. It's quite messed up.
-Characters (8/10):
All characters are too superficial: there is hardly no psychological progress whatsoever, and apart from a couple of details, the characters' background is to the biggest part unknown.
However, almost every character's personality was interesting on his own way. For example, you have Yoshii, who appears to be a normal traveler, but turns out to be totally abnormal (further details would be considered spoiler) or Ran, who appears to be just a curious little girl who doesn't talk, but turns out to be of great importance.
-Enjoyment (7/10):
Truth to be said, I didn't really enjoy it. Not mentioning the slow pace of the story, it was a bit too serious and realistic (for example the reactions of the normal people towards Ichise as he stumbles through the city), almost depressing. But it was a great change from the typical mainstream crap and although it wasn't the best, it certainly wasn't the worst.
-Overall (8/10):
Do I recommend this series? Yes and no. This is not the kind of anime that'll raise in popularity, simply because it's no fun. If you're looking for a good time, feel free to skip this one. However, if you're looking for a good story or you want to run away a bit from the mainstream stuff, go ahead and give it a try. It's worth your time.
Hope this helped you make up your mind. Thank you for your attention.
