天下制覇

What does this think it is, a Call of Duty game?

Impressions:

Oof. This lays on the nationalism and xenophobia thick and right out of the gate. And unlike, say, Code Geass, which has magic powers, crazy costumes, boobs, Pizza Hut, and rollerblading mecha to flavor the unabashed nationalism with a zesty spice, this instead goes with squawking magical pets. I am pretty confident in declaring that is not a good trade. Not that I'm advising replacing the nasally voiced squawking teddy bear with a magical girlfriend, but it would certainly be easier on the ears and the eyes, especially when it launches into long expositions about how sure, it looks and feels like you're a mech, but you're actually in a full body VR suit that only makes it feel like you're doing the things that it's showing you doing. And then, oh god, it starts telling him that he needs to use his special attack which can only be done by shouting really loud. So shout, protagonist! Shout! No, shout more shouty! His special attack being… to punch them. Whew. Barely got out of that pinch. Who could have anticipated that he might… uh… move?

The most surprising thing about this is the lack of CGI, but it definitely has Xebec's production quality, not Sunrise's. It's definitely a show that needed a hell of a lot more going on through the first half, preferably more character driven, because as someone who is not a Japanese national, half the episode being dedicated to how much the rest of the world is nothing but war mongering oppressors is a bit much. Then the second half is kind of consumed by the goddamned magical pet. So I feel like it's a very paint by numbers mech show, where all the parts that make it distinctive or separate it from others are not pluses. But there have been very, very few mech shows in recent years, and I'm not a connoisseur anyway, so I could very well just be talking out my butt.

Next Episode:

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