Ymarsakar

[NO Spoiler review] For a series that closes up with a final ending in 12 episodes, the plot and character development was pretty razor sharp.

This anime falls closer to a hybrid that has mystery and horror than the normal genre elements it would normally be placed under, which is high school battles. (Gargantia would be another hybrid, where you think you're watching Legend of the Galactic Heroes from episode 1, but you are not) It has everything a high school battle series would have, including a different world/timeline, weapons and powers which aren't conventional or are superior to military tech that we know of, and fighters who come from a Japanese high school hierarchy. This familiar landscape serves only to draw the user in and make the user let down their guard, to make the plot twist more interesting and impactful.

Many school battle themed anime are light novels or adapted from manga. So often times it becomes hard to adapt the character progression, since much of the progression and development is in little side comments that is never spoken as dialogue. Manga is easier to adopt since dialogue is all it can have, plus sound effects. In a light novel or manga, the perspective is usually on one main protagonist too. Many high school battle anime I've seen tends to have spurts of action and then episodes of sheer boredome, as if they are having problems connecting the different light novel volumes together. And the backstory and character insights of the main characters generally get shown at the beginning episodes, but then stop later on, thus they are frozen. Normally light novels can switch the perspective to an entirely different character to change things up, but an anime uses a kind of omnipresent third party narration. This series doesn't operate like the other ones I've seen. Once you get done with the first or two characters, in terms of their motivations and backstory, you get hit with either a plot twist or a plot twist as you switch focus to a new set of characters. It feels closer to reading first perspective narrative in a short story, that switches around, than anime's normal story board progression.

What makes this story different is that the six people you see on the cover? They're all main characters and share about equal episode time in terms of backstory, plot involvement, and giving the viewer a unique character view into the world and its events. 

Much like Chaos;Head or that high school zombie anime (the one without fan service), the mystery is part of the plot. It's not something you see in one episode and they do a good job of sprinkling hints, even starting from the first episode. They did a very subtle and good job of carrying out the mystery and unveiling the logic and clues, and the ending episode has a sufficient impact as a result.

This series is better watched in a marathon. Because the hints are subtle, people can easily forget about them in a few weeks, if they don't rewatch the early episodes. So I give the overall 10/10, because I don't see any flaws with the execution, it has a solid story, with no plot inconsistencies or story holes. They were able to execute the series by developing the characters in parallel with the plot. I also gave this 10/10 for characters, because there's a large variety of characters in this anime. Some are support, but for the majority, they're the main characters. They rotate through depending on which one is important, so the first one you see in the opening will sometimes "drop" off, which almost never happens to main characters in a manga. They're going into reserve or inactive status, and then are brought back later on, as if they were support characters now. Every single one of the six main characters in this anime is just a little bit different. Watching their interactions with each other, was half the fun of this anime for me. Lastly, I only give anime 10/10 ratings if I like rewatching them.