✪ Genre: action (swordplay, gunfights), contemporary fantasy, magic (spellcasting), RPG, seinen, (superpower) with elements of sci-fi (artificial intelligence, post-apocalyptic, dystopia, virtual world)
✔Positive Aspects✔
◧ Animation: even though this series was created by Shaft, the design standards fit the same mold that previous studios followed - a combination of colors of moderate to low saturation/medium to high illumination, with the environment and landscapes, urban, natural and surreal, being comparably more "muted".
◧ Soundtrack: cool soundtrack, mostly dominated by slow and medium tempo orchestral music, whereas, and more infrequently, new age and medium temp electronic music is used.
◧ Character development: probably the best aspect of this title, since every single episode devotes significant time into explaining the motivations, intentions, and personal histories of the protagonists and/or deuteragonists and/or respective antagonists. On the downside, significant filling out of the protagonists'/antagonists' background histories took place during episodes 8, 9, and early 13, instead of taking place throughout the series in an even manner. Lastly, I found the regendering of the protagonistic servant a very interesting touch, especially given the unlikeliness of such a figure occupying that high of a position of power during his respective time period.
✘Negative Aspects✘
◧ Plot: spin-off titles tend to retain the premise of the Fate franchise, with magicians battling each other in order to acquire the omnipotent magical artifact called "Holy Grail", but reinterpreting it in a way that diverges enough to create a standalone product, and this title is no exception. However, this title reimagines the premise so radically that it moves into sci-fi territory, leading to a fairly convoluted end result. The entire series is largely incoherent until episodes 8 and 9, and 4 minutes into episode 13, and, even then, I can't say that I finished it without any head-scratching questions.
◧ Action sequences: they tend to escalate and finish up quickly, while being fairly generic, even for the genre. Previous studios, especially after Ubisoft's groundbreaking releases, followed a specific approach (various camera perspectives, different camera 'heights', quick zoom-ins/outs, etc.) that produced pretty satisfying fight scenes. Unfortunately, Shaft chose not to follow said approach.
Overall: This is a pretty tedious and confusing title. Usually, I go through a 13-episode series in a day or two, but I was not able to finish this in no less than 5 days.
P.S. For further reviews of the Fate franchise, please take a look at my profile.
