Summary
Iride Akatsuki has unlocked hidden content in the game he's playing, 'Nakanohito Genome,' and it turns out that this content is a real-life game! He soon wakes up to find that he has been kidnapped and taken to a strange place, along with a number of other teammates. Each of them specializes in a certain sort of game, like cultivation games, fighting games, puzzle games, etc. A llama-headed 'teacher' gathers them after level 1 is cleared to explain how the game will proceed. Will this group of gamers succeed, and make it back to their real lives?
(Source: MangaHelpers)
(Source: MangaHelpers)
My First Episode Impressions
This is really intriguing! Both from the premise, and the cold open! I like the concept a lot! It's not exactly an Isekai, though it has a lot in common with the genre; this show features one of my favorite Isekai tropes, experienced gamers being dragged into a game world. I also liked the set up, how the characters were introduced, and how they chose to react to their situation. As they are all popular Let's Players, this show would be falling down on the job if it weren't specifically interesting to watch how they 'play the game', as it were. The characters are encouraged to 'play as though their lives depend on it, which does a good job of ominously raising the stakes without smacking you in the face with it. (Contrast to SAO, which I don't care for in part because of the immediate 'die in the game, die 'IRL' stakes). I really enjoyed the introductions scene, and am digging the cast and there wide array of unique personalities so far! (Except for the creepy alpaca mask guy, but I think he's supposed to be mainly antagonistic, so that's okay, Was really not a fan of him hitting on one of the gamers) I really like that they all have a specialty, and I anticipate that their skills will reflect those specialties in some way, which I look forward to seeing unfold! I like the character designs, as well. Also, this show is so far refreshingly light on fanservice!
Main Characters
The point of this post, really, is for me to indulge in rambling about how much I'm liking the characters of this intriguing show so far! At the moment, this post covers (and contains spoilers for) the first episode. I may update this post as I continue watching the show!
Akatsuki Iride
I love him?!?! I love that he is so friendly and cheerful and his solution to most things is 'Friend? Friend!' I am a huge fan of peaceful/positive solutions and 'can't we all just get along?' is frequently my own first response in RP games (both video game and tabletop/LARP), so I also strongly identify with this character. I also love seeing characters in difficult situations who choose to be kind and compassionate. I also love that this tendency has already served him well with future returns on his kindness, such as when Panda-friend saved his life in the very next game! I am a bit curious over whether his final line of the first episode, that there just isn't much that bothers him, is going to lead to interesting character depth and directions -- the timing and framing made this sound significant in some way!
Karin Sarayashiki
She leans towards tropey, but I enjoy the strong female character vibe! I like that she wasn't too extreme, she felt more like someone unafraid to speak her mind than just a tsundere-type trope given human form. She apologized quite straight-forwardly to Akatsuki at the end of the episode about smacking him in the beginning, and I really appreciated that. I also thought it was kind of charming when she turned out to be scared of ghosts IRL, despite being super into horror/a horror game specialist! (And on that note, I also like that they explicitly made the horror game specialist a female character, from an American perspective at least it's a nice reversal of gender stereotypes!)
Anya Kudou
He's definitely an archetype I enjoy - argumentative angry boy who turns out to be much softer than he lets on. I loved the little moments of soft we saw during the ouija board game, when he agreed to play along after Akatsuki offered to eat the peppers he'd been threatened with, and then later crying out in distress when it looked liked Akatsuki was going to die by defenestration. Then when he sits next to Akatsuki clearly just so he can pass him all the peppers (which don't get me wrong he is also doing) and is all like 'ugh don't bother with my last name' and friendship.
Zakuro Oshigiri
I enjoy the immediate, intense rivalry between him and Kudo (*cough*ship it). As a fan of stealth games and thief-rogue type characters myself, I'm hoping we see him go in that direction in future game scenarios!
I haven't quite seen enough of the other major characters to have developed more detailed thoughts on them, so stay tuned for possible updates as I watch more!
....I lost a version of this post with much more content, which is frustrating. Trying to recover, otherwise I might just leave this as-is. (Pro-tip! Don't use out of date apps to attempt to edit your blog posts!)
Couple of highlights I remember adding:
I like Anya even more after ep2, he's probably my favorite.
Yuzu is pretty batshit. Borderline evil aligned, but not an antagonist, just sadist/mad scientist/stalker type
Himiko is great, I like that she's soft but with a core of steel and fire
Zak is everything I hoped he'd be re: actually being stealthy
Maki is a sleeper hit (literally, apologies for the bad pun). Spends most of his time sleeping, but is great in his few awake moments where he is taking action. Loved one bit where he beaned an NPC for being rude, and when the npc turned around and was thoroughly charmed by him after one look, beaned him again.
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