Quanzhi Gaoshou

Everyone is saying Quan Zhi Gao Shou(The King's Avatar) is like Sword Art or No Game No Life. IT IS NOT LIKE SWORD ART or NGNL other than the fact that it is about an MMORPG but, its based around Esports. Its centered around one of the best professional players in this mmo(Glory) who is forced into retirement and begins to play again on the games new server. I wont spoil anything. I'm just writing this review to say : YOU NEED TO WATCH THIS ANIME. Get over the Chinese voice acting and you'll love it. It took me a few episodes, this show getsbetter every episode. PLEASE WATCH. 15/10

Judging by the high overall score this seems like it's the next Sword Art Online. By that, I meant being horribly overrated. I like the gaming genre as much as the next guy, but come on man. The anime was incredibly and utterly boring. At the very least it's not SAO tier of being bad, but I guess the people who told me that this is "a better SAO" meant that because barely any anime can be considered as bad as SAO. But enough about that. This anime wasn't written very well. The premise is that a popular game's best pro player is smurfing around. That's it. Nothinginteresting happened from start to finish. There was no suspense, drama, and I can't fathom why comedy is one of the genres when there was barely any funny stuff, most of the few comedy scenes were very forced. They keep introducing new characters, new enemies, but barely any development to almost any of them. Characters of interest in an episode will disappear and never be heard of again in the next episodes. There was no clear boss, main antagonist, or any sort of challenge to the main character, you know it's bad when in the final episode they introduced a character and made him the antagonist for the day. Would have been a more interesting final episode if the enemies the main character was facing was his previous teammates; at the very least, those guys had some buildup. But no, they forgot about all those guys and just used new characters as enemies in the final episode. Ugh, at the very least even though I terribly disliked SAO, that was for other reasons; SAO at least had an interesting premise, there's a main villain in the first season, there's the suspense of death there too. Battles there are not complete snorefests too. And the final episode for the first season was the established enemy in the first episode. Here... There's nothing. I don't know who's the main chartacter fighting (aside from his previous teammates, but they aren't really built up and written well). The battles are so boring because the main character never really breaks a sweat, even in the face of other countless pro players smurfing and large guilds, there was never really threat. All we can see in the whole anime is his smug, confident, uncaring face, and I don't think I ever saw him become tense. The whole art and sound aren't particularly interesting too. They're not amazing, I don't really get hyped from the music as much as I get hyped from something like "Don't Lose Your Way" in Kill la Kill. The art, well, it's probably just normal, but majority of anime is normal to me so the anime is fine in that department. (They did use horrible CGI often though) Overall, poor anime. It's not as cringe-bad as SAO but it's worse than that anime in other aspects. Probably the most boring, uneventful anime I've ever seen. (Sorry about the frequent SAO comparisons, but really SAO is the main face of game-related anime as well as controversially overrated anime which also fit this anime well too)

Quan Zhi Gao Shou, or King's Avatar, can be seen as many things. China's first big-budget foray into the world of animation. A realistic take on MMO gaming in Anime. An OP protagonist stomping everyone with masterful mechanics and strategies. The long-awaited "eSports anime". A character study about a master of his craft striving to reach the peak one last time. It is all of these and yet none of them, a unique entity that is truly one-of-a-kind both as a novel and in animation. The entire novel clocks in at a whopping >1700 chapters, of which this first season covers ~250 in 12 episodes.Now for a more detailed breakdown... 1) Story King's Avatar has a fairly simple premise. The man known as the "Textbook of Glory" (Glory being the MMO game at the center of this anime) carried his team to 3 championships in the glorious past, but is now being discarded by his organization because of his rising age and unmarketability. Now he must start over as a new character on Glory's newest server, where he quickly rises to the top due to his unparalleled experience with the game. He meets both old friends and new, and eventually builds a team of his own aiming at the pro gaming scene as his final hurrah. I will say there are occasional flaws at times, especially in regards to pacing. The source material loved worldbuilding, including long discussions about the game mechanics and the current events of Glory's pro scene. The animation cuts down on these exposition dumps, which can be both a plus and a minus. In general, the story takes a while to start up, as Ye Xiu and his friends are initially engaging in relatively small-scale activities (leveling up, setting dungeon records, etc.). It's a fairly predictable plotline overall. However, King's Avatar understands that the simplicity of its plot can be used as an advantage. There are no obvious plot holes, and every character behaves in a sometimes startlingly realistic manner. Like a sports anime, King's Avatar is very much about the journey, not the destination. And what a journey it is! 2) Art The Chinese animation studio behind this has really gone for a distinctive, detailed style in its character design. (I personally love it). Of note, they do use quite a bit of CGI, especially for backgrounds: some instances it turns out fine and is practically invisible, while other times... not so much. They will also recycle some animations, such as when the main characters are repeating the same skills in-game. However, I will say that every single fight scene is a joy to watch, complimented by unique situations and the choreography to go with them. And my gosh do I want to buy a poster of the beautiful character designs. 3) Sound I was impressed by the consistent quality of the music and sound design for this anime. Each song fits very well with the appropriate scene. The main OP is surprisingly catchy. The voice acting is also excellent--every voice actor fits their character perfectly, from Ye Xiu's calm and dry attitude to Chen Guo's brash spunkiness to Su Mucheng's sweet playfulness to Huang Shaotian's babbling. Not much to criticize here. 4) Characters Given how this season was limited to 12 episodes and many characters only had limited screentime so far, I feel that the studio did the best they could to flesh out each character. Even the most minor of characters have understandable motivations, they have realistic biases that color their thinking, they try to make logical decisions based on their knowledge of the situation... they all feel human, which is my highest praise for a character. And yes, every single character is an adult, so no high school level drama here! Let's take our main man Ye Xiu as an example since he gets the most spotlight anyway. Normally, I avoid OP protagonists because too often they come across as blatant wish fulfillment for their audience, with a cardboard box for a personality. However, Ye Xiu's character strikes a perfect balance between "a Glory god incarnate given his gaming knowledge" and "a sympathetic human dealing with very relatable problems." We of course enjoy the many moments where he is delightfully badass and smug about his own awesomeness. But we also empathize with his struggle against time and his own age, his unresolved feelings about his former heights of glory, his deeply hidden sorrow at being kicked out by the team he poured his soul into, his compassionate mentorship of all the adorable noobs he meets. Best of all, the show can be surprisingly delicate/subtle about the depth and growth of its characters, from major to minor. (Of course some characters got cut out or reduced in the transition from novel to animation, but I think the adaptation definitely preserves the spirit of the original work.) Overall, while this area of King's Avatar isn't perfect, I get the feeling that it's doing its best with the time it has. This means the characterization of this show can only go up from here as we get more scenes with each character. 5) Enjoyment I will admit that individual biases will definitely color this area. I personally had extreme amounts of fun with both the show and the original web novel. At times it made me cheer. Other times it made my heart hurt. And there were many many instances where I just couldn't help but laugh at the hilarious situations. But there are specific types of people I would highly highly recommend this anime to. - If you want a take on gaming/esports that is both realistic and turned extremely awesome... this show is a love letter to every level of gaming: from the colorful trash talking/ranting to the helpful/kind advice, from the most clueless of noobs to the most seasoned of pros. - If you have strong nostalgia for MMOs and cooperative gaming in general... this show will hit that button like nothing else in existence. - If you want colorful character designs (both real-life and in the fantasy world of Glory) and awesomely choreographed fight scenes - If you want a show that knows how to have fun, while also quietly pointing at the real world of gaming beneath the surface. It never takes itself too seriously, never engages in silly melodrama, it knows exactly what it wants to be: an awesome protagonist kicking tons of ass, helping his juniors, and fighting his own battles both in and out of game. Overall, does King's Avatar have its flaws? Of course, just like any other anime. But most of all, King's Avatar is a joy to watch.

**TL;DR at bottom* *Spoilers are clearly marked* The fact that this series is getting rated so low really saddens me. To put it simply, the King's Avatar is great, and hopefully, in this review, I can provide a reason to convince you. Before I begin, however, I want to preference this is NOT an anime about eSports. This anime does not deal with, nor care about the struggles of, eSports players. It has eSports elements to it in order to logically and naturally bring in the topic of video games and how the main character Ye Xiu is so good at them. Elements of this are glorifiedquite often, if nothing else as a love letter to eSports in general. It is not about the struggles of players and the industry. If you're looking for something like that, I suggest Valve's eSports documentary Free to Play. So, if TKA doesn't deal with eSports, what does it aim to do? The answer, quite simply, is to watch a likable character and his friends be good at video games. That may sound boring, but it's really not, due to the sheer quality of TKA. The only real and only main character is Ye Xiu, who is, like many of his contemporaries in video game anime, a total God at this universe's most popular game, Glory. The justification for this is that Xiu is a former leader of one of the best professional teams of the game, and after a decade of leading it, is maliciously kicked off from the team and is forced to make a new account and grind his way back up. If the fact that he's spent a decade playing this game confuses you, then let me inform you on one of the bigger selling points of this anime -- all characters are adults. Xie is said to be between 25 and 26 in the series, and he only plays with adults throughout. That allows the majority of the annoying, overused anime tropes such as excessive fanservice, stupid love triangles, a high school setting, etc. to be totally vacant from the anime. This really helps the series both focus on being about games and also have a fresh feeling to it, as it's not super interested in feeding into the wish-fulfilment teenager crowd many video game anime target. Ye Xiu, (Western order Xiu Ye) is a really well written character, which is important since he's the only one who gets a major amount of screen time. A big element of the series is watching Xiu grow from replaying the game out of spite (and simply not knowing what else to do with his life) into loving it once again, which is done very subtly but ends up being satisfactory in the end. A big element of Xiu's character is subtlety, primarily considering the air of "I am better than you" he frequently puts on, however, the series shows time and time again that he has doubts about his own skill, fears, and goals of his own, even if he could easily wipe the floor with anyone he battles. A fantastic example of this, and a great example of the amount of care put into the show, is Xiu's smoking. Both a symbol and an indicator of his stress, the cigarettes always come out when he is put into a situation that upsets him, notably when he's reminded of his eSports past. **MINOR SPOILER WARNING** In episode five, he does just that -- Xiu, a character still keeping this sense of superiority around him, makes some remark about a professional event going on, before leaving the net cafe he's in to take a smoke outside. The way he does it in private, and the stance he takes, including his expression, show simply how upset he is about the whole thing, and that he's not the one up there in the tournament.**END SPOILER WARNING** It's subtle--quietly great--but tells so much more about Xiu's character than any dialogue saying "he feels this" could ever do. TKA has so much of this sprinkled throughout, and it works great to really make the audience sympathize with Ye Xiu. I've spent so much time talking about the lead simply because the series focuses on him, but for anyone interested in both interesting side characters and fantastically animated fight scenes, TKA does both well. No supporting character gets as much development as Ye Xiu does, but some do grow quite a bit from the introduction to the conclusion, notably Rou Tang, a friend of Xiu's. All of these side characters are still very likable, and none are some dumb anime trope designed so heavily to be liked, they just come across as artificial. As for the animation, TKA's is both experimental and well done. Many of the smaller scenes are where the series falters, having to opt to use 3D models for background characters to allow for room to the incredible animation during in-game fight scenes. Absolutely all of them are extremely well done -- great fight choreography, framing, and extremely detailed animation, especially during the bigger fights. If you're the type of person who loves good fight scenes or animation, this series will more than please you. Regarding the voice acting, yes, this is a "Chinese anime", more properly referred to as donghua. Donghua has a bit of a bad name to it, considering it's known as both invasive to Japanese anime and lesser quality, to which TKA is neither. Yes, the people in the series speak Chinese. If you can get past how odd it's going to feel initially, the voice acting is very good, albeit different, than Japanese. Rather than the bigger, more campy style voice acting that tends to come out of a series like this, the Chinese opted to do something a lot calmer and natural sounding, which definitely helps the series stand on its own and makes the entire show seem more grounded. (TL;DR) Overall, the King's Avatar is a fantastic series about skilled video game players. It uses a logical setup, interesting and developed characters, and well done but easy to miss symbolism and character development, while not slacking on the action and animation in the slightest, to bring a great story about adults who love games. While it may not be the best representation of the eSports scene, it doesn't aim to be, and still manages to have compelling characters and growth.

Merchandise

Links may contain affiliate references

Студия

Продюсеры

Темы