(This review will contain a few minor spoilers, but nothing major.)
Story 5/10
-1 point for irregular story pacing that somewhat goes all over the place.
-1 point for no satisfactory payout or conclusion for a few of the story arcs.
-2 point for convenient "shadows", and other plot devices that show lazy writing.
-2 points for uneccessary artificial conflict. A whole arc could have been put to rest if our Hero Naofumi had done things differently (I'm specifically talking about episode 13 but there are other cases).
+1 point for having a "traveling merchant" sub-plot in the early episodes, it really brought back some nice memories of Spice and Wolf; and was also somewhat very Log Horizon-esque.
Art 7/10
Graphically; the show looks fine, good enough for me at least. The male characters look dull, but I guess they had to get the additional resources somewhere to get somewhat good looking female characters. The Animation was kept at the same quality throughout all the 25 episodes, unlike another 2-cour anime airing at the same season. There's also not much bad CGI, so there's also that.
Sound 7/10
Watching this show, clearly shows that the music and the OSTs are not meant to be the main focus points of the show. I certainly couldn't remember hearing any unique tunes; that's for sure. Nothing really stands out in all 4 of the OPs and EDs. I'm really surprised to see that Kevin Pekin worked on the music for the show, couldn't really tell. Sound effects are not jarring as to cause distractions. Voice acting is good. Overall it's "meh" for the sound department.
Character 4/10
Characters in this show (excluding our main cast) are piss poor.
-1 point for the King and First Princess, I get that both of them (especially the princess) are supposed to be annoying; but there are limits to how much I can take before being annoyed out of my enjoyment.
-2 points for the Spear, Bow, and Sword heroes existing.
-1 point for the character interactions between the heroes. It basically boils down to pushing blame around at some points.
-1 for the Spear hero being annoying. Two episode's worth of time was basically relegated to show how stupid, stubborn and annoying he was. I basically got the point after the first 3 minutes, there was no need for the show to use precious screen time for him, it could have been used to show Raphtalia in her swimsuit.
-1 point for insignificant/forgettable characters. I can only count on one hand the names of characters that I remember (and I just finished binging the show a few hours ago).
Finally, I found it funny that the VA for Kirito (SAO) is reprising his role as the OP black swordsman again.
Enjoyment 7/10
Did I enjoy the show? yes!
But if I start to think critically of the story and characters (after finishing fawning over Racoon girl); it's not a good show, and has some flaws. I had to suspend my disbelief to the extreme in some cases while watching the show. Chances of me rewatching it are really low as well.
