Anime Review: Sword Art Online

A new MMO that uses virtual reality headsets to play garners a lot of buzz in the gamer community after a successful private beta. The public release is marked by a lot hype, especially when it is limited to only 10,000 copies sold. The first day it opens for play, the lucky few who manage to get a copy log in for the first time, only to quickly discover the logout button that was there during the beta is missing. The lead creator and designer reveals himself and announces the situation. Everyone is stuck playing his masterpiece game, Sword Art Online, until the final boss is cleared; everyone’s character has been altered to match their real life appearance; and most sinister of all: death in the game means death in real life, too.

Anime Review: Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo

An idiot savant girl, the namesake of the series, transfers to an art-centric high school to pursue a career as a manga artist despite already being a child prodigy in the painting fine arts. But while genius in the arts she lacks everyday common sense, right down even to basic functions like dressing herself. Yes, that sound is everybody letting out a vexed sigh at the doinky and unbelievable premise I just laid out.

Anime Review: Bakemonogatari & Nisemonogatari

Now a mostly-cured human after briefly becoming a vampire, our high school senior hero Araragi finds himself mixed up, primarily due to his meddlesome nature, with a number girls each of whom is involved with various sorts of ghosts, gods, and spirits.

Impossibly surreal and artsy. Bakemonogatari is sharp, clever, and rhythmic. It is a love it or hate it series, though. Either you dig its eclectic style of backgrounds and architecture, symbolism, character dynamics, and dialogue, or… you find it grating, pretentious, and pointless.

Anime Review: Shinryaku! Ika Musume

Thus cometh the invader, the fearsome Squid Girl! Oh wait, actually she looks twelve and keeps getting distracted from her invasion goal with other random tangents with the family that runs a cafe on the beach. She has tentacles for hair, she spits ink, and her hat seems to be actually part of her head. It's Squid Girl!

Anime Review: Tonari no Kaibutsu-kun

She is an introverted loner who cares only for her studies and grades. He is rambunctious, random, naïve, honest, and dangerous when he's mad. It is a clashing of two totally opposite personalities as they form hijinks and love.

Anime Reviews: GJ-bu, Poyopoyo, Ai Mai Mi

I don’t really have a linking theme this time around. Just mini-review triplets!