Gamers! Review

Gamers! is an anime set in high school. It follows Keita Amano after the cutest girl in school, Karen Tendou, asks him to join her gaming club. Although he turns her down, it sparks a series of events that lead him to other gaming friends and potential romance.

This anime was not what I expected, in a good way. I thought it was about a high school gaming club, and that most of the episodes would be about their experiences in the club. However, it ended up being more about Keita and his classmates, most of which are gamers, but aren’t even in the club at all.

Still, I found it very enjoyable to watch and very funny. The comedy mostly evolves around misunderstandings, because all his friends are terrible at communicating. And I know what you’re thinking, usually miscommunication in anime can get really annoying. But in this case, it is genuinely very funny.

I found myself laughing out laugh quite a bit. But I do think it’s funnier to me because I’m a gamer as well. Though, I don’t necessarily think you need to be a heavy gamer to find the anime funny. I do think it would help because then you would understand the concepts a little more. But since the comedy is more about how inept Keita and his friends are at normal social interaction, it isn’t that hard for average people to understand.

All the characters are very likable. Though sometimes you wish they would be better at explaining things, you’re still invested in their story and their relationships. Particularly, I found Aguri Sakurano to be one of my favorites, even though she isn’t one of the gamers other than enjoying claw games.

I was pleasantly surprised to find a lot of romance in this anime. I expected it to just be pure comedy, but it turns out that their relationships is a very prominent topic. It doesn’t feel like a rom com though. It’s a to funnier and random than the typical romance genre. So, even if you’re not really a fan of romance anime, you’ll probably still enjoy it.

The pacing feels right. And although the anime relies heavily on misunderstands and does sometimes have the same ones loop back around, it doesn’t feel repetitive or stale. I also think they did a good job pacing the romance.

One of my only complaints is that the anime feels like it ends on episode 11 rather than episode 12. Episode 11 felt like a good place to end and even had the credits role within the episode like most endings do. However, there was still one more episode after that.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I like that there was still another episode. But the 12th episode felt a lot like an OVA than the last episode of a series. The story for that particular episode felt very random.

Although I don’t like giving spoilers, it’s a bit hard to explain without stating the basis of the episode. Basically, the characters spend the whole time discussing video games and downloadable content. There’s also some surprise fan service, since they stop at a hot spring, that felt very unnecessary and completely out of the blue since the series hadn’t really added that in anywhere else.

But still, I didn’t mind the random episode because at least it showed that these characters will continue to be themselves and do what they do, even if the series has ended. It feels like a pretty good way to end an anime series that technically really doesn’t have an ending since there’s no solid story arc that needed resolving.

I enjoyed watching Gamers! and I think a lot of anime fans and other gamers would enjoy it too. It’s funny, with likeable characters, and decent pacing. I was surprised by how much romance ended up in it, but since romance is one of my favorite genres, I was happy about that. If you’re looking for a lighthearted series with some laughs and romance, definitely give this one a try.

• Watch on Crunchyroll

Check out my other anime reviews.

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