Review of The King's Avatar

It was a surprise that I had this title on my "plan to watch". I thought I've already watched it. And the funny thing is: I did. I didn't remember any of the specifics, but some of it came back while watching. Have I watched the season, the live-action (at least I think there's one), the movie, all the above? No idea. I don't know the sauce, I don't care about the sauce. The review is for this format. And its gonna be a long one. Here I go. The high rating this anime gets if from people that are nostalgic eSports fans. Because you mustbe one. A body & soul one. It rides the waves of the hype that was back then (10 or more years ago?). While the anime (and maybe the source) keep trying to push the "being the best" as the main reason, the predominant factor for the hype was "you a gamer, have no life skills (or no life, period), try to earn sht loads of money". And it worked because of said reasons. Why am I talking about all of this? Because it is relevant, its a core aspect regarding the anime and this review.
The eSports hype is based on the tournaments really. And those are about strategies and some flashy ultimates spectacle. If you wanna do a story involving that, kinda tough (if not impossible). Because you need to insert personal elements, to make the viewer/reader care about your character(s). Which they do nowadays on live transmissions of tournaments. The discussions in the booth, from the break, while at the hotel etc. All the stuff that a fan might want to know. And thats the main aspect of this: the fan. You MUST be someone who is already in that world, someone who will believe the "you also can be just like them!" thing. Again, it is relevant, its a core aspect regarding the anime and this review.

I guess I could talk about it. This anime is sht. Like I said, it preys on the fact that the people watching it are inclined to like said world. And like I said, it is about strategies and flashy spells. Here, those flashy spells go a step further, making the whole anime like its a big world happening inside a game, the avatars (he he) have feelings (like a real human), faces with expressions that change by the second (like a real human), walk and move (like a real human). Why is that? Because they are trying to trick you, stealing from other anime where the story happens INSIDE a VRMMORPG. It works there, its not working here, for the obvious reasons. So if you take it apart, without the visuals, you have an anime about some people typing on a keyboard. The avatars on their PC's screen aren't making faces other than what their programming make them do (and all the other avatars can do the exactly same ones), there are no flashy hand-changing weapon moves or grimace when u get nicked and some blood spurts out. In other words: its all an illusion to make you miss the fact that the story is sht. People are hitting the keyboard, wows about some moves, throw some generic lines and thats it. Yes, you can relate to the MC on some capacity, but there's no real character development, nothing special about it. And the story in itself is nothing special also. Yes, the general themes are about not giving up, starting over etc. But again: not in the way it is told. So, the story and the script are sht. And then you get lots and lots of characters (even more so in the last episodes) that make the story, the characters development and the pacing even more convoluted. Oh, and that exposition... Geez... Moving on.

The visuals are beautiful where it counts, with flashy action scenes and spells. But kinda generic and with some copy/paste scenes also (because same moves, I know, and thats the problem). The designs are a little meh, but thats ok. I was more impressed with the art's level involving nature (plants) or objects and the walls (for example). Very real-like. The colour palette is ok. Apart from visuals everything else is meh. The cinematography is meh, never making full use of its visuals. The audio is okish, the mixing felt at appropriate levels. The OP and ED are per this country's normal. If you usually like this time of songs, you'll also like these ones. The soundtrack is somewhat similar to SAO, that "lonely, sad" piano theme vibe. Which would've worked better if the story was a bit more about character and internal stuff. The VAs din ok-ish I think, the basic emotions were transmitted, but the nuanced ones were kinda lacking. Or maybe that was a fault from directing. The pacing is a little bit meh. At some points stuff starts happening almost without a breather. You get breaks on screen, but it doesn't feel like one. Well, it has nothing special as a story so the visuals must do the heavy-lifting, I get that, but for the non-fans it gets bothersome. What else? Character development. Nothing to see here. Some support cast gets somewhat of an idea of such thing, but the MC is lacking one so... Kinda like a 1-dimension characters all around (if any). And speaking of characters, too many for a first season. And after all the people that keep on popping up, as I've already mentioned about, we get a whole cast of nobodies in the last episodes, to give you even MORE info without context. Although they feel like some big-shots in some important guilds or something. I literally went "WTF, what now, who are they? Yeah, I wont remember all those names, forget it..."
To round it up, this anime is for you only if you like eSports. For those who care about a story and character development, ugh.... And just to make myself clear, because there's always someone who still can't make a difference: you can like/enjoy this anime. "I like this anime" and "this anime is good" ARE NOT the same thing! One is based on "feelings", on your state-of-mind while watching it (with someone dear next to you, or drunk, or thinking about some sht that happened while you at work etc). The other is based on the facts regarding the quality of acts in making said media (story, script, dialogue, pacing, directing, cinematography, acting, fight choreography, vfx, sound, character development etc etc etc). You can also enjoy bad media, hence the "my guilty pleasure" expression. There's nothing wrong with that, but know the difference. Pls.
I'm giving it a rating of 4, based on visuals and some meh of the rest (apart from story, thats sht). Not recommended if you're not a fan of eSports. Same applies for the re-watch value. I can't even recommend reading the source, because if you have a bland story and without the visuals to do all that heavy-lifting.... Yuck.
Have a lovely day.