Yumeria Volume 1 DVD Review

By sothis Published: September 28, 2005

PACKAGING AND MENU

0 / 10

Though this pre-release screener does have what appears to be full artwork for the case, I’m going to not rate it anyways in case the real packaging differs. No menu can be found as well, due to the same issue.

FEATURES

0 / 10

No features are present for this pre-screener.

VIDEO

10 / 10

The video was simply amazing. I really don't have anything to complain about, so I will discuss the good points. The colors all came across vibrantly. They were warm and soothing during the scenes that take place in Japan, and they were vivid and kind of creepy in the scenes on the alien world, which really helped the moods of the show. During playback I noticed no major aliasing, even during panning shots, and there were no artifacts or noise throughout.

AUDIO

9 / 10

Because this was a screener, all we could view was the English dub; however, the dub was fairly convincing and the 5.1 soundstage was used a lot. During the action scenes the sound was all over the place (in a good way), making you really feel like you were there, sprinkling effects across the soundstage. During calmer scenes the rear speakers were used for constant ambience and music, which really helps the sound seem full and immersive.

CONTENT

6.5 / 10

Having seen nothing about Yumeria before, I came into this viewing with a clean slate. So far, the three episodes on the screener seem decent enough to pique my interest. The story revolves around a fifteen year old boy named Mikuri. He falls asleep on his birthday and wakes up in a dream world where a young girl is fighting a robotic machine of sorts. Upon awakening he finds her… in his bed?! It seems Mikuri has the power to bring people and things in and out of his dreams. The first few episodes show Mikuri trying to figure out what’s going on, and dealing with meeting a few other girls who end up going into his dreams as well. It seems to have a mix of a few things such as harem aspects, comedy (the lolicon teacher is hilarious), and action in the dream world. Not very much ecchi yet, though I’ve heard it kicks in later (I hope not).

Animation is a little weird, with very dating-sim colors used everywhere. Bright pastels such as sea green and pink are used for hair, and the animation in general just looks like it came out of a game. Thjs is convenient since Yumeria is based on a game! Music was uninteresting and forgettable.

The characters seem like they might be a little shallow, but there are 9 more episodes to build them up, so who knows? I definitely didn’t like Mone at ALL, who just says “Mone Mone!” like a goddamn Pikachu. Very grating on the ears after awhile.

All in all, I have some hope for Yumeria. Though it didn’t suck me in and make me want to see more right away, the mix of styles and plot elements, combined with the lack of excessive ecchi (in these three episodes, at least) make for an interesting viewing.