hehexashadow13
October 4, 2022
Mixed Feelings
tl;dr: An anime that while definitely lacking in some areas should still be pretty enjoyable for fans of the game. Sakura Wars the Animation is a sequel to the 2019 Sakura Wars game. Considering that these days it seems most anime is made primarily with the goal of advertising other media, it’s pretty rare for an anime to just straight up require having consumed some other type of media. However, that very much is the case with this anime, which was very clearly designed for people that already played and enjoyed the game. If you don’t, you’ll probably understand most of the major story beats, butyou’ll miss out on a lot of the more subtle elements and will lack any context to what’s going on in the larger scheme of things. You’ll also be confused by who some of the side characters are because it doesn’t even try to introduce them properly. You may also understand the character interactions and such that occur, but it very much feels like the writing assumes that the viewer is already invested in the cast from the outset, and thus they won’t have nearly as much impact.
Thus, I’ll say it once again for emphasis, you should play the game before watching the anime and if you’re not going to play the game you shouldn’t bother to watch this anime. That most people didn’t do this is probably why this anime scores so low as it’s definitely not as bad as scores suggest, though that certainly not to suggest it doesn’t have issues either. And to be fair it’s the anime production committees and SEGA’s fault this is such an issue in the first place, considering the anime started broadcasting, including the Funimation simulcast, before the game was released in English. Regardless, at this point there’s no excuse, and thus I will be assuming anyone reading this review has already played the game and enjoyed it enough to want to watch the anime. Thus, while this review will not have any spoilers for the anime, it will freely have spoilers for the game.
Like the game, this anime is a blend of action where the cast fights demons with mechs, and slice of life centered around living in a theatre and all that entails. And just like the game, while there is build up throughout the anime, the plot only really gets moving in the last quarter or so, with the rest being pretty much entirely character focused. It should also be noted that this definitely isn’t filler, the plot here has major impacts that will definitely be present if the game ever gets a sequel.
The lighter character focused parts I think are where the anime is clearly inferior to the game. At first I thought that it was purely a writing quality issue, but about half way through it became apparent it was pretty much entirely centered around a single choice, the lack of Kamiyama. While the rest of the cast, plus a few new characters, are still in Tokyo and that’s where the majority of the anime takes place, Kamiyama is off on a secret mission in various places around the world. This mission is ultimately important in terms of the plot, but it’s one that has very little screen time, and more importantly, one that results in him not being part of the daily life of Imperial Combat Revue. It didn’t really hit me until I watched this anime, though it probably should have, but Kamiyama was a critical part of why the writing in the game was so good. With him gone the character interactions in general just aren’t as funny or enjoyable in general. This becomes clear when he comes back for an episode in the middle and that episode by far is the best in terms of those. There’s still some good highlights outside of that, but overall it’s just not as charming.
I will also note that it’s a lot of fun just seeing more of the cast and the theatre. A lot of the anime takes place in locations you could freely explore in game so there’s a strong sense of familiarity. The map in general seems to be pretty much exactly as it was in the game, though the sense of scale is different at points, so you can easily map out where characters are and where they’re going. It gives the same comfy feel playing the game did by the end. There’s a bunch of new locations too though, so it’s not like things start getting old or anything like that.
In terms of the more serious aspects to the characters, it does a better job, though there were still some issues. The primary focus on character development is on the new characters, Clara and Layla, which is decent enough in concept, but felt somewhat rushed, though I suppose that should be expected compared to the game which had significantly longer to work with. The only character’s from the original cast that get development in the anime are Sakura and Hatsuho. Sakura’s development is pretty simplistic and essentially just part of Clara’s character arc, but worked well enough. Hatsuho’s was a bit more messy. It’s nice to see a softer side to Hatsuho as she does her shrine maiden duties, but the climax and everything leading to it was kind of off. One of the strongest scenes in the game is when Sakura get’s depressed, goes back home, and Hatsuho confronts her in front of a Cherry Blossom Tree. The anime clearly really wanted to parallel that, so they end up using pretty forced writing that makes Hatsuho look pretty inconsistent in order to do so. I like what they tried to do, but the execution was lacking.
As for the overarching plot, it’s similar to the game in that it gets all sorts of crazy, wild, and messy at the end, though it’s still a pretty awesome when it does. I felt the anime’s plot had two major issues though, which overall make it messier than the game. The first is that it abruptly without any build up or explanation introduces the concept of demons that are just like humans and want to coexist with them and humans that want to do the same as if it’s just kind of normal for that to be a thing. I haven’t played the earlier games, so I don’t know if that was built up to in them, but that absolutely does not fit with how demons were portrayed in the most recent game. I’m totally fine with the concept, but it needed to be fleshed out more and not just kind of thrown in the way it was. The second is that it does a really bad job handling Sakura’s mech situation. A core component of her arc in the game was her obtaining and becoming able to fully utilize her Obu. But in this in the first episode she’s suddenly in a Mugen with no explanation. An explanation is eventually provided, but it’s very lackluster and doesn’t make much sense considering the events of the game. The writers clearly wanted to make her finally using her Obu an important scene, but weren’t able to do it well, and to be honest there really wasn’t a need to do so as she gets another mech power boost with much more impact that also fits the plot much better.
In terms of art and animation, it was a mixed bag but I’d mostly say it’s pretty good. The visual style is like the anime cutscenes in the game, so if you’ve played to the game you’re probably already used to it by now. It involves heavy use of CGI, which works fantastic for the mech action and such, but only so-so for the regular character models. I think it’s some of the best anime character CGI I’ve ever seen, but that only makes it decent when compared to traditional hand drawn art in my opinion. The OP song is exactly the same as the OP of the game, but the song is amazing so I completely support that choice. The visuals of the OP are different and a bit weaker though not by much, and seem to have been intentionally designed to parallel the visuals of the game OP thematically which I thought was a nice touch. The ED has a new song sang by the three other revue heroines with decent enough visuals, though it’s strange the one’s singing aren’t in the visuals. The insert song is one of the group character songs in the game, A Star is Born (スタァ誕生), though now sang by the main heroines with a version that includes Clara. The soundtrack has a lot of reuse of the music from the game including instrumentals of character songs, but I thought it was used well enough and it was nice to hear them again.
