Review of Blue Archive the Animation

I'd love to call this an anime made for fans of the game and not for the average viewer, but honestly half the time I was watching this it didn't even feel like that. That being said, if you like the game, sure, give it a shot. The weakest volume getting the weakest adaptation definitely suits, and if there's ever another season I feel like it would look much better than this due to the overall better quality of the story and fights. The visuals were alright, nothing amazing but nothing horrendous. The lineart for characters was pretty thick/blurry rather than the thin and crisp styleI'd grown used to in the PV trailers. Compositing/lighting was pretty good and didn't seem too flat.

Overall animation was pretty clunky and rigid, however some fight scenes (especially in the second half) started to move towards being more fluid. but even then non-fight animation was either non-existent or just... meh. You can definitely tell which cuts were done first, for example a certain cut in a scene in episode 11 (NOT what you're thinking of...) was really fluid compared to the rest of the scene, most likely because it was done at the beginning of production.

The opening and ending sequence really shows what the studio/s are capable of though, as the visuals are amazing and everything feels more like the PVs. The jump between those and the main show is quite jarring, lol.

I'm no expert in guns so I can't comment if the sfx were realistic or not, but overall the sound design was your average anime sfx. Nothing bad but you're not watching the next Yasumasa Koyama or Rei Ueno show. Voice acting was good too.

I liked all the cameos we got! It was nice to see characters that weren't a part of this volume be included in a scene or two.

Characters designs felt a bit off for a couple characters. I think Yuuka's was a bit weird-looking, but since she was a cameo and not a main character I didn't mind too much since she only had like 1 scene lol

There was a lot cut, such and worldbuilding and stuff, so whilst the main story flowed alright, it still felt a bit weird at times. Again, this didn't seen like it was intended to be viewed by an audience that hasn't played the game, so cutting out parts that fans like is a weird choice. I do get the episode limitations and all of that though.

Overall, I wouldn't watch this if you haven't played the game. And if you have played the game, I would only watch this if you LOVE the Foreclosure Task Force volume or just have some free time. I would still recommend this to Blue Archive players, but not excessively.