Gamers! – Misunderstandings Abound

What’s up Gamers? Jon Here with Another Review!

Since I’ve been rewatching School Days for #AniTwitWatches, I thought it might be fun to look at another show that focuses on relationship drama and misunderstandings. Unlike School Days, however, this one is more comedy focused and a lot less… well, intense. I actually started this in Summer 2017 when it was airing but shelved it for whatever reason. Looking back, I can see why…

Gamers! has heart, and at times, it is a pretty good watch. The opening episode is really well done, when a joke lands, it really lands, plus the idea of misunderstandings taken to bonkers extremes is a fun idea. Unfortunately, the execution is clumsy, repetitive, and sometimes even a bit frustrating.

The initial appeal to this show is the same as it is for School Days for me. Gamers! starts off with a simple boy-meets-girl scenario and then spirals to a ridiculous love polygon that exceeds the standard triangle. While the viewer can clearly see how things should shake out, shenanigans ensue and things go a bit sideways.

The players from left to right:  Amano, Tendou, Hoshinomori, Aguri, and Uehara

However, that’s as far as my comparison to School Days can really go. After a few episodes, Gamers! has a hard time keeping up with itself. The drama is artificial, propped up mainly because the runtime demands it, and not much else. This isn’t to say I didn’t have fun with the show, but when it was finally all said and done, I was a bit disappointed.

Perhaps the biggest reason for this is by time the conclusion of the series comes at episode 11, I didn’t feel like anything was resolved. Obviously Hoshinomori makes her decision here, which should be a big moment, but it lacks impact. This is not helped by the final 12th episode where the show does a fanservice gag OVA, even though it is part of the show proper and not an OVA.

I haven’t read the light novels this anime is based on, but it feels like this was a pretty clumsy adaption. Not in that the events aren’t logically ordered or anything like that, but that there wasn’t enough to fill the 12 episodes it received. It’s a bit difficult to explain, but the experience feels off as a result.

Let me give you an example of one of these things so maybe you can see what I mean a bit better. At one point the relationship drama gets out of hand but the characters sit down and get everything all sorted, we are all on the same page again. Well, then the show just decides, NOPE, and resets it all. There’s logic to it, but it feels more contrived, like an excuse to keep the show going, and less like a thing that needs to happen to make the story fun.

Finally, my lasts negative is actually in the dialog. The characters use a lot of nerdy lingo, shoehorning in references to video games and the like as much as possible. Sometimes this is fine, but most of the time it feels forced and unnatural. It’s not like a one-off remark once a conversation, sometimes these can make up almost the entire conversation. People just don’t talk like this, even really passionate nerds. I know, shocking.

Putting those aside, the show still has some nice things to offer. When the main character, Amano speaks passionately about video games, that’s where Gamers! shines brightest. There’s a clear message about passion in this series and why people like video games as much as they do, but the drama/comedy stuff gets in the way.

Another great moment for the show is the episode where they play a spoof of the board game, “Life”. It’s kind of like a recap episode that still advances the plot. The jokes are mostly funny and that kind of creativity is nice to see. In a way, I’d almost recommend the show just for this, but it isn’t quite that good.

Otherwise I suppose the show offers some genuine relationship advice. Had I been younger when watching this, in high school or something, then this may have managed to be more relatable. I’m at a point where this advice isn’t helpful, it’s stuff I know or have learned through trial already. Kind of a, “take this point as you will” sort of deal.

That’s really it for this review of Gamers!. I wanted to like this one more than I did, but sometimes that’s just how things shake out. At least I still have School Days, so I supposed I can’t complain too much. If you were on the fence about this one, I’d say you could do worse but I wouldn’t rush to get it watched either.

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What did you think of Gamers!? Let me know in the comments. If you would like to support my work, you can do so by utilizing either of my donation buttons below. Thank you for reading and I hope to see you again soon!