The series is split between 4 arcs in which the main three take up the majority of the portion of the story. This is always the issues I have with reviewing long running shounen with hundreds of episodes not all arcs are created the same & can drag it down if not done correctly. If I were to rate them individually it would probably go:
1st arc: 8
2nd arc: 9
3rd arc: 9
4th arc: 7
Of all those arcs what really brings the score down for me is the last & final one, now while it definitely works & is not a disaster by any means of the imagination. Not sure what the production was like back then or if they ran out of manga but there was several things that happened with no explanation when the assumed setup gave me the opposite impression & feels particularly rushed compared with how well they fleshed out every arc up until then.
There is also something that may be specifically to me or others like me who are sensitive to light, this is an old anime & came before the infamous pokemon episode, the strobe effects in this series are wild & after a few episodes really started to hurt the eyes & after that I had to turn every light in the room on just to balance it out.
The characters are great & well thought out (again until the 4th arc) & really like all the main cast & their antics.
The art is very well done for an anime that came out in 1992 & really fluid at some points, dynamic range of fighting styles and powers & certainly feels like a lot of power is going back and forth with the animated effects/character damage.
Also something that I did like was how mature it was: swearing, flipping the bird, the immature jokes is something you don't see a lot of today which I found quite amusing.
I was on course for giving this a 9 until the final arc but if your eyes can take it, give this a go, it's a really fun & emotional rollercoaster ride.
