Manga/Anime Reviews

Review 34: Devil Survivor 2: The Animation (Imagine if you saw yourself die)...

Review 34: Devil Survivor 2: The Animation (Imagine if you saw yourself die)??...

Imagine if you where on an on line site that you never signed up for..... You're at a train station.... a new video is uploaded to this mysterious site.... And before your eyes you see yourself die? Now how would you react? Would you discuss your death with your friend? Or would you run?
This new but insanely realised anime that has just hit our screen is already proving to be popular amongst the viewers of our generation.

So saving the world for superman alone seems tough? Right? Well in this anime we see three young high school students that only wanted to get the train back home...Until the strange app named dead face uploads a new video... This footage shows the two main characters of the anime being killed by the train that is just about to arrive...
Would you run??
Would you ignore it?
Or, would you accept you're fate?

In this brand new anime all decisions you make will count towards if you live or die.... A good decision could mean that you are actually the saviour of the world and you are the chosen one who will prevent us all from dying..... A bad decision could mean that within a week every life form on earth will be consumed...

The brand new anime based on the video game Devil Survivor 2, is based on the day that every life form on earth hopes will never arrive... Judgement day. The day where God himself decides who lives and who dies, the day where most people are chosen to go to hell and only a small few make it too heaven. This causes the Earth to plunge into complete chaos killing millions of people in just a few hours of the judgement day commencing. (If that even makes sense)....It all starts off with one of our main characters named Daichi logs on to a popular site with the young generation called Nicea. It's an extremely popular video delivery site that then delivers the videos of people dying. A bit extreme, I know, but this is the site that shows billions of peoples death; but only if they aren't natural occurrences. So let's say someone died in a car accident, Nicea would show a short video of the accident happening and then the dead persons face and where they are positioned.

When our two young characters are waiting for a train to arrive at the local station, a new "dead face" or should I say "A friend's dead face" had been uploaded. When they click on the link to the clip, the train that they are waiting for derails causing them and everyone else to be crushed to death. In the next few seconds of them discussing the clip a sudden earthquake occurs, thus causing the train to derail and killing them both.

But in death their given the choice.... The choice of weather they wish to accept their fate and die, or to live... Obviously both Daichi and Hibiki choose to live. When they come around and begin to wake up they see a few wolf like creatures devouring the other corpses lying on the floor; they also spot a young girl who goes to their school named Nitta screaming and running away from one of these creatures. Whilst running away she gets cornered by one of them, and then from holding up her arm in a way of defence she summons her demon. The demon summoning app was forcefully downloaded into NIttas', Daichis' and Hibikis' phone. Meaning that instead of running away they could actually fight off the demons and then leave so they could be safe instead of being hunted down.

Staring with a very event full first episode; it actually sets the mood for the rest of the anime and what is about to arrive next. It may seem a little rushed at the beginning with a lot of information to take in just from the first 5 minutes. But, it sets out the story quicker, we get to know the characters in which we will be following a lot quicker than in other animes, and, we can get the idea of what the anime is about and the art style that the creator has chosen.

There's not much to fill in for a character profile though; I see this as a huge downside to the review (and my grammar problems)..... All of the characters that we see in the anime follow the same sort of lines and the same attitudes towards the events that are taking place. None of them seem to have any mysterious pasts and troubles with their family which keeps on arising. This may be because the anime itself is actually based on the video game Devil Survivor 2, or just because the creator of the anime thought it would be much better to leave it this way so that the audience can keep on guessing what might b wrong with them, or, what might happen if two characters feel differently about a decision. The three main characters Nitta, Daichi and Hibiki choose to accept the disaster that is going to arrive upon the world whilst a few characters that we meet along the way of this epic journey, still stay in denial of what's going to happen. Did the creator of this anime/game make them seem this way because it's all too unreal to be true or happening... Or, did he do this so the audience can keep on guessing again. I'm going with the fact that it can keep the audience guessing; the best thing to do when making an anime or Manga is to keep on getting the audience involved. Make them use some of their imagination to add to the story; doing this is a key to a good anime, it keeps the audience involved and makes them want to watch that anime even more.

If the creator did do this on purpose than I've got to say he's a very clever man; especially with all of the twists he adds into the anime itself. If he did it all by accident because of the game and the way the game was planned out; than it was a clever mistake... I guess....

It's a brilliant watch from start to finish and is defiantly worth the time. The graphics and special effects are all up to date, it's got the futuristic aspect that we would expect from an anime with this sort of story line and most importantly the coolest demon summoning app I've ever seen.... But that's probably because I've never seen one before...... For me it has to be the best anime when it comes to introducing the futuristic twists, new items that no one has seen before and the coolest shaped phones I've ever seen. (I want one so bad). The characters all have their unique design which keeps them apart from the ones that we shouldn't even acknowledge.
But there is a very big down side that put me off completely; as a really cool character and his best friend died a few episodes in which I thought must have been the biggest mistake ever. Either because this is going to happen whenever they meet someone new on a different day to take down a huge demon, or, because of the design of that character and the fact that there is probably way more to that character than meets the eye; and most anime fans are going to want to know what that was/is.

So, All I can say.... IS WHY KILL OFF ALL OF THE COOL CHARACTERS!!!

Sunday 7th July.     9:37 AM    ~AmyXxx