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ecargmura · 1 year

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My Love Story With Yamada-kun At Lv 999 Is A Romance You Should Definitely Watch (Anime Review)

If there’s a studio that can capture romance well, it’d be Madhouse. The way they animate romantic scenes in anime is immaculate. I absolutely loved My Love Story!! And how romance was animated in Cardcaptor Sakura and Bibliophile Princess (which I still need to finish). My Love Story With Yamada-kun at Lv. 999 is a prime example of well-animated romantic scenes and fluffy, colorful animation.

My Love Story With Yamada-kun at Lv. 999 is a shoujo romance story between gamers. 20-year-old college student Akane Kinoshita gets dumped by her boyfriend one day as he fell for another girl over the internet. In an attempt to get him back, she attends a game event, trips and meets a handsome guy named Akito Yamada who picks up her shoe. Akane learns three things about him: 1. He’s Afro Yamada from FOS, the game she plays and the focus of the event she is attending; 2. He’s a well-known gamer that her ex-boyfriend ignores her when he sees them together; 3. Yamada is an 18-year-old high school student. Does that stop Akane from falling for him? Nope. She falls for him because that is the point of the story!

I’ll address the elephant in the room first. I’ve seen people on social media berate the age difference between the two leads because one is a college student and the other is a high school student. 18 and 20 isn’t a big gap, contrary to Twitter’s belief. A two year age difference is nothing special. There are a lot of pairs with a two year age difference. There’s no difference in maturity levels as both characters are mature in their own ways. There is nothing problematic with this story or the characters. If you think a two-year age gap is weird, then maybe you’re the weird one…

In all honesty, I really like the premise of having gamers fall in love. In today’s society, gaming is the trend, so it was clever of the author to ride on that and to make a romance out of it. I think the way this story was written is actually crafted well from a writer’s perspective. Akane isn’t shown to be a nerdy gamer; she plays games casually and is fashionable and pretty. It shows that anyone can play games and it shows in Episode 3 where Akane meets up with her guild members that aren’t Yamada in real life. They range from a handsome bespectacled 19-year-old college student Eita who catfishes as the guild master Rurihime, his gremlin younger sister Runa who’s in middle school and strawberry farmer Takezo Kamota who’s much older than all of them. It shows that anyone of all ages can enjoy games and that there’s no shame in doing so.

Sure, there are conflicts every now and then like Akane not being over her boyfriend, Runa getting jealous and protective over her circle of friends that she had to trick Akane, and Yamada’s classmate Tsubaki having a crush on him, but they all get resolved efficiently and without the need to drag out time. I actually like that! Sometimes, shoujo and romance animes can be hard because some conflict drag out and ruins the flow (I’m looking at you, Kimi ni Todoke with your Kento/miscommunication plot point).

The characters are all nicely written for a romance anime. Akane is a twenty-year-old girl and a college student. While she is the older one in her relationship with Yamada, that doesn’t mean she’s mature. She has problems and issues that most young girls face like not getting over rejection, being overly trusting and overthinking. People would think, “Oh, you’re an adult, you have to start acting like one”. Adulthood isn’t all sunshine and rainbows as people might expect and Akane proves that. College students are dumb and a mess; I would know because I was dumb and a mess at that age. I also like the fact that she does have dating experience. Akane, in general, is a fun character and a good shoujo lead; I think wasted/drunk Akane is the most hilarious thing ever. I love that she has different outfits! They’re all so cute and a few look like something I’d wear casually!

Yamada is rather mature for a high school boy. However, as a gamer, he’s rather unrealistic because most gamers I’ve seen are loud, constantly online, and probably lacks a love interest. How often do you see a tall, handsome gamer who treats women well? How often do you meet such a gamer guy outside of gaming? Despite his rather unrealistic qualities, I do think that he and Akane match well because of their personality differences and just how kind and respectful they are to each other. Yamada is only awkward with romance and girls because he had hurt someone in the past and doesn’t want to step out of his boundaries to hurt anyone again. I guess my only gripe with Yamada would be that he’s voiced by Kouki Uchiyama who’s voiced dozens of characters similar to him so it’s to be expected that he’d voice this guy too (this is the fourth anime I’ve seen that has him in the cast; three of them are the same character with black hair and one is a marmot); it’s not a bad thing to be typecasted since it is a job for voice actors. I do like Uchiyama a lot! I just feel like it’s to be expected in a way?

I do like how Eita has the qualities to be the second lead, but he’s not. He’s mainly in the story to be supportive and help our main duo get together. He’s a long time friend of Akito’s. Eita’s probably my favorite character in this anime because of how entertaining he is. When his identity as Rurihime is revealed, he goes on and on about his relationship with Rurihime (he just likes playing as a female character in general) and doesn’t think him being a catfisher is weird. Yeah, you do you, Eita! I do like how he’s a good big brother to Runa; he scolds her when she does something bad, but he is generally caring and supportive of her. He’s also somewhat of a big brother to Akito since he’s a year older than him. Eita is a vital character in this story because he’s the reason why Akane is in the guild and why Akane and Yamada eventually got together.

Runa looked to be a romantic rival at first, but she’s just a lonely girl with no friends. She’s protective of Yamada and such because she doesn’t want change in her life and just wants things to be the same. Although the prank she played on Akane was bad and dangerous, she does get Akane’s forgiveness by becoming her friend, which Runa enjoys and appreciates. She’s a definitive younger sister character with her snark and sassiness. She’s also a very timid character as she gets nervous easily. I’m glad that she is someone that I got to warm up to in the anime and that she doesn’t continuously play pranks on Akane to kick her out of the guild. My only gripe with Runa is that her game avatar doesn’t appear once in the anime. What does it look like? I want to know!

Kamota is the last of the major Chocorabbit guild members (before Tsubaki’s arrival) and is the oldest. He’s such an adorable character. I think the fact that he’s an older character, thus has so many connection makes realistic sense. If you don’t know, being an older Asian person means you know practically everyone in your community; my parents are like this as they practically know a lot of people in the Korean community where I live. He was yelling at the creepy suit guy in Episode 5 (voiced by OnoD) and telling him that he has a lawyer friend was peak. He’s also hilarious in the FOS world where his character is a tiny fuzzball, but when in battle, he grows ten times bigger and becomes the OP-est member. It’s a waste to not see what his avatar’s powered up self looks like.

Of the side characters, I think Momo is my favorite because she’s so supportive of Akane. While she does envy Akane at times, it’s more of a friendly kind. She’s always supportive of her and is her biggest emotional support when things look bad for her. I do hope she gets the boyfriend of her dreams.

Okamoto and Tsubaki are Yamada’s friends from school. Tsubaki’s role is that she has a crush on him, but is also a gamer. She joins Chocorabbit a bit later in the anime and does get along with Akane. Okamoto is comic relief. I do want to see more of his friends, honestly. They do seem like good people for Yamada to hang out with them constantly.

The voice acting is pretty good since they get a good mix of well-known voice actors in the cast. Inori Minase and Kouki Uchiyama play the leads while Natsuki Hanae, Ai Kakuma and Nobuo Tobita are the supporting cast. That’s pretty solid all around. I think the two most standout voice actors are Ai Kakuma and Nobuto Tobita. Kakuma has two roles in the anime: Rurihime and Runa. The fact that she voices both characters differently shows off her talent. Rurihime has a cute tone befitting an avatar while Runa is soft-spoken with a lot of snark and grouch. Tobita’s voice as Takezo is really good. He voices him adorably but when things get dire, he changes his tone to a deeper one. I really liked the way he voiced his avatar character the most.

The music in the anime’s good. The music used in the romantic scenes is so soothing and brings out the vibe so well. The opening and ending songs are good too! You can’t go wrong with Kana-boon!

There’s nothing I particularly disliked about this anime, which is good! I totally recommend this anime to anyone wanting to watch romance animes. Heck, this has become one of my favorite romances now. I’m glad I was able to watch it and enjoy it! I think there should be more college-themed romances or even gimmicky ones like gamers falling in love. This is the last of the Spring 2023 animes I’ve watched, so I’m glad to finally be able to review this. What are your thoughts on this anime if you have seen it?