mahius

Weiss Survive is based on a real life card game going by the name of Weiss Schwarz (translates to white black in German). So in other words, this is another card game anime? The 16, very short episodes total roughly 40 minutes and the anime is of course themed on card battle, ecchi and comedy (at least it tries to). For 40 minutes, it seems to have a straightforward story, but is it worth that time? ...Eh, it's 40 minutes of not a funny, to the point plot with ecchi. Perhaps not. I hate the ecchi genre and that will affect this review.

Now to explain what I can about the game. This will be an extra section to this review, not normally present in my reviews. Weiss Schwarz is originally a Japanese card game (despite having a German name), which has been brought over to the west in recent years. The card sets themselves are based on actual Japanese anime and this anime represents this within the cards themselves. However due to possible copyright issues, the cards in this anime materialise in the shape of the user. In other words the magical avatars for the cards in this anime cosplay as the cards they are played from. For example a when a card displaying Yu Narukami from the Persona franchise is played, instead of Yu appearing on the battlefield, the player that played that card appears while copslaying as Yu. So its not exactly like other card game animes where the exact contents of the card show up on the battlefield. This might have been due to limited budget or problems with copyright.

The animation is pretty good for an anime of its time, though back then they were getting very close to the flawless animation quality of today. The animation style is average anime fair, though being colourful, using chibi characterisation and using ecchi in attempts to make the viewer laugh. The ecchi isn't as bad as it could be and I initially thought there would be no ecchi at all. I'm kinda right since there are no actual panty shots, but there is some other ecchi bullshit, moe shit, chicks wearing swimsuits and even a nude woman, who is obviously covered up. There is nothing amazing about the music and I didn't even notice there was music. Which can only mean they did a terrible job at it. At least it wasn't very bad or I would have noticed it for that reason.

There are only 2 main characters and due to the length of this anime, there isn't much to say about them. The main male character is Takeshi, a high school student who is getting help with studying from Michi, his childhood friend. He has never played Weiss Schwarz before and is apparently the chosen one. He is also a bit of a pervert, though he doesn't necessarily go out of his way for this, so it isn't that bad.

The main female character is Michi, who is the school idol highschool student and is also Takeshi's friend. She is a typical hot-headed tsundere character (ugh terrible anime trope) who is apparently good at Weiss Schwarz and remains unbeatable. She wishes for an opponent who could beat her.

The only other character worth mentioning is 'Old Man' (yes that is what he's called) due to his relatively large screentime. He is the typical energetic old-man pervert (another shit anime trope), who is the sort of keeper of a world known as 'Weiss Schwarz Battle Space' where battles occur. HE tends to be a bit shouty and got the closest to being funny.

The story is straightforward and there is arguably no filler because of the length of the anime. Unfortunately the story is somewhat predictable because of this though there is a twist or two. The second, arguably not a twist results in the plot of this anime being thrown out of the window. Of course the events don't really make sense.

This story isn't a reason to watch the anime for, but one can argue the length of the anime. 40 minutes? Hey at least it's got a point to it, unlike many other ecchi anime. It might be worth watching if you want a short story with little variation. Maybe one to watch drunk or when you're dead bored. Otherwise, I'm finding it hard to justify spending 40 minutes, even if it is that short, on this anime. This anime only gets a better score because of its short length.

Family-friendliness Rating: 4/5 Ecchi. Nuff said (lower is better)

Overall Rating: 4/10 (higher is better)