First thing's first, it was personally hard for me to focus on the actual content when I was constantly being reminded that they needlessly localized the names and locations from Korea to Japan. I know the OVA did it first, but it still feels like a needless change and after GoH left everything in that regard the same as the original, so it just felt petty to me considering they are adapting a Korean series.
With that out of the way I can focus on the many other failings of this adaptation. As others have pointed out, the Noblesse anime starts out in the second season, with only an abridged 30 minute OVA of the first season to help viewers meet the characters and setting, which most people also probably don't even know exists, so basically the viewers are basically given nothing to go on and are thrown in the middle of the story. The first season could have provided a fun introduction to the characters while also explaining the characters motivations and backstories, but for some reason it was decided that less is more until eventually there was barely anything left.
That being said, the characters and story from this arc have been adapted pretty faithfully and even with zero knowledge of them, newcomers to the series can still get a decent idea of what each character is like and the story is simple enough that they can at least follow the plot. However, the actual substance is severely lacking: lazy animation and art quality really made it tough for me to enjoy what few action sequences there were, and even though other adaptations of Korean manhwa like Tower of God and God of Highschool had their issues, they usually compensated with their art style or fluid animation, but Noblesse sadly gets none of these and comes across as being low budget.
Overall, as a fan of the original, this adaptation missed every box I wanted, and if anyone is interested in the series after watching it, I would recommend just reading the comic instead.
