I guess the best place to start is with the first episode, because this is absolutely going to be the biggest barrier. This first episode is where I'd say 95% of the people who drop it will drop it. The first episode starts by sucking the skin off Super Smash Bros' dick (Ultimate, specifically) but as cringe as all that is, it's peanuts compared to what comes next. Tomozaki's worldview at this point is that of an insular, jaded loner. He's got nothing going for him but being a smash gremlin and shunning the rest of the world. Quite frankly, he's a boo-hoo beta bitch boy. Through convenient light-novel happenstance, he is face to face with the most popular girl in his school who's also actually his gaming rival and they argue about SOCIETY. The problem here, the thing that is going to turn off and probably already lost many people who watched it, is that the show makes absolutely no attempt to separate its viewpoint from that of Tomozaki's. There is no assurance that the show doesn't necessarily endorse Tomozaki's outlook, there's nothing to let you as the audience know that what the character is arguing ISN'T the position the show will take and try to justify over the next 11 episodes. Because for the bulk of this first episode, the only perspective of weight you're shown is that of the MC, through inner monologue and uninterrupted tirades against antagonistic characters. There is little done to humble the protagonist, to balance his perspective with self-reflection or other voices of equal weight, to make it less serious and absolute than it comes across as, and without any assurance of what you are watching being self-aware, this can easily lead you to take this as the show's and protagonist's viewpoints being synonymous. It's not until the very end of the episode where his perspective is meaningfully challenged, and literally from this point out, it's not really like it was before. There's more self-awareness, more dialogue, and more exploration from episode 2 onward (more or less, it's not exactly the deepest) and the protagonist is never again that much of a complete sniveling loser. So this first episode does a terrible job of ushering you in and laying out what the show is gonna be like, but if you can make it past this first stumbling block, it's honestly a far cry from what you see here.
Well, okay first let's get something else out of the way: the cosmic background cringe. The video game analogies and constant smash fellating will be omnipresent, they never go away, but they're also very easy to let roll off your back. They're cringe, they're lame, the whole LIFE IS LIKE A VIDEO GAME shit is here to stay, but it's not enough to repel a champ like you if you made it through the first episode. Good job champ. Now I won't bring it up again, but it's there the whole time, so just get used to it.
There isn't really anything especially noteworthy until episode 4 when there's another giga-cringe moment. Without getting too much into it, he basically wins new friends by REEEEEing a popular girl who called smash gay.
After this point though, the MC overnight chills out and stops being a sperg. From this point in the show onward, the show is basically standard romcomdram fare. There's one more particular moment I need to address, but for the most part, from episode 2 onward, it is coloring inside the genre lines. If you like this kind of stuff, if you want your light novel high school vicarious do-over, here it is. The show is extremely derivative of Oregairu, and whether you've seen it or not, it's still going to feel familiar to you. It's just very safe, formulaic, by the numbers, but adequate enough. If you read the synopsis, read this review, and made it through episode 1, I think it's safe to say you'll find it serviceable. Maybe even you'll find the later developments slightly more compelling than the bare minimum. I honestly started coming around to it in the last 3 or 4.
But speaking of that, I have to mention that particular moment. I couldn't NOT. This show, this genre really, is pretty indulgent wish fulfillment, but even then, what I'm about to mention is on a whole 'nother level. THE GANG is out on a camping trip and the boys bond by... comparing pen0rs. And of course, for your wish fulfillment fantasy, your self-insert can't be anything less than hung right? That's right, they felt it necessary to make the MC packing and everyone in the story know, and there are callbacks to this later (in passing but still.) Maybe you don't think it's that big of a deal, maybe this says something about me, but I'd wager most people will at the very least raise an eyebrow when they get to this part, if not do what I did and clutch my shoulders and writhe in cringe at the audacity to include this.
There's more I could say critical of the story or the themes or the characters or the drama or this and that and the other but the long and short of it is that this is your highschool romcomdram slop with extra heapings of cringe on top. Maybe you're like me and get a kick out of the agony and ecstasy of high-quality cringe, left gobsmacked by the bizarre unfiltered discomfort and savoring the eons it feels like for it to pass. Maybe you don't give a shit and can stomach it just fine. Maybe you think it's not cringe at all (hate to tell you what that means about you then tho.) Whatever the case, I think if you just trust me that it only gets as bad as the first episode and that the MC's bitch boy attitude is intentional, then afterward you'll find a tolerable experience. But if you don't want any cringe, why are you still on the fence over whether to watch this or not, and moreover, why are you watching anime in the first place?
