First we should talk about the characters. This is not that hard to talk about seeing that all the characters are pretty much stereotypes for video games. We have the wide eyed hero in Gran, the high ranking warrior in Katalina, the mysterious powerful damsel in distress in Lyria, and even our cute little mascot character in Vyrn. The other characters we meet kind of run in that sort of suit as well. It’s not a bad way of starting out your stories but it also feels like it didn’t have much extra for it to stand out.
The world and story feel like its out of a Final Fantasy game more then its own stand alone story. Many of the different races and creatures are seen in both of the series. (Even the logo for the original game looks like its straight for a final fantasy title.) I did find out that the game was notable for reuniting Nobuo Uematsu and Hideo Minaba who both worked on Final Fantasy titles in the late 90s and early 2000s though since they were Music and art directors, I did not think that the storyline would also be rather close to a Final Fantasy style as well.
There was a point in the story that I was VERY confused about. In one of the battles (not going to say which or when it happens) right in the middle of the action we had characters seemingly coming out of the woodwork. We had never met them before, never were introduced, they just showed up. It wasn’t like any of these characters were boring too. These were characters that got me super interested in who they were but I just was never told what was going on. Because I have not touched the game, it made me wonder deeply on if these were characters we ‘could’ of made friends with? Would we be able to be friends with them later on in the anime or are they one shot characters that our dialog branch(if we were in a real game) will never come into contact with? I seriously want to know about at least a couple of them but sadly we really did not get a chance to know them.
I had to put Episode 13 in as a extra little review within this one because it was just completely odd to me. Spoilers in this paragraph I guess though I don’t think it spoils much. With certain games out there, you can choose both a male version or a female version of the character. For most of the show, we follow Gran’s adventure with everyone. Episode 13 is called Extra for a reason and it’s because Djeeta, the girl version of Gran, is our main character instead. I’m not going to lie, this episode felt more like a ‘Omake’ or special video feature on what could happen if people had picked the female lead. I use the term lightly in this case because it also felt like they just changed the main character for fan service like when you have a episode set aside in a bathhouse or Onsen (hot spring). I did not care much for that sort of change and felt like it was out of place. And here we had another problem of characters coming out of the woodwork. While some of them were characters from the first time they did this, we again had no introduction so I feel it added to my feeling of confusion.
The animation is pretty good, though it is easy to notice when they are using 3D renderings instead of 2D. It’s a little jarring when they do that although there are many other shows that do it far worse. I did like the how the 2D aspect had a bit of a sketchy sort of line art to it. A very nice change that gives the show its own style from other Fantasy based Anime around that time. As per my normal mindset though, I have to sigh ever so slightly at the fact that a big normal in Fantasy based games is that all the woman seem to be big breasted well fit women (or Lolita style in the case of one white mage and the race of little people) While the men are pretty boys or older muscular men. A little more diverse of a body type would be nice although it was not a hindrance to the story or the actual art, its more just aesthetics for me.
The script definitely sounds like it’s definitely from a video game, especially in the beginning of the show. I did watch this in the English Dub (Shocker, I know) and I have to say that some of the voice actors did bother me slightly. Vyrn (voiced by Sandy Fox) just felt like a scratchy and like it was trying to hit a much lower pitch then what Sandy could do. Lyria (voiced by Kira Buckland) sounded a little air headed and dreamy like she wasn’t fully there. Not sure if she was like that in the games but it feels a bit off. I am not blaming any of these voice actors as they have done a really amazing job in most of the things that they have been in. The music is amazing, Nobuo Uematsu is a very well respected musical director and his work really shows.
Overall, I did fall in love with the story as well as the characters very similar to when I play games like this. Sure main part of the story is sort of told over and over again in different forms, but the overall aspect of the journey was pretty good. The only problem I see is when they start adding things that I don’t think anyone would of known outside of the game. Certain people showing up out of the blue with no introduction, Episode 13 and its strange change, and the different races they seem to gloss over like we should already know what they were. There is a season 2 out there that I am going to try and find as well as a OVA (or ONA, I have seen it listed both ways) that I hope I can see but I am a little worried seeing as a new Studio and Director as well as writer did them, but I have my hopes. Take a glance at it if your interested in Fantasy and RPGs but I would consider episode 13 to be one you can miss out on if you really want to (for now).
