Bus Gamer – 03

Episode 3 – Gamer Alone Again

Summary

This episode starts off with the trio going to their next battle.
This time, they are team AWAY. The stage? A roof top beer garden. And unlike the previous places, this area is filled with passerby everywhere. Customers drinking until they are drunk
There their battle starts. They fight and they win. And that is about it for Bus Gamer really.

After that scene it is basically a wrapping up.
Scenes on what happened to the police woman.
A wrap up between the relationship of those 3 main characters. (We see that Toki is starting to become friendlier towards Saitou.)
And the short live OVA ends there.

In ep 2 we saw the Police turning a blind eye to the events of dead gamers turning up. That gave hint to the fact that they were probably in on it or it was some big conspiracy thing. In this ep, we actually see the Chief of the police (i think he is the chief) appear in the aftermath of the game waiting to collect the disc from the players

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Overview

When the episode first started I was confuse as to where the police woman had dissapeared to. I mean, they were suppose to have been caught right? Anyway, it is explained later on in the episode.

While this OVA has room for a continuation, it also can be seen as the end of it at ep 3.

The whole OVA felt like a summary of what was going on. A big introduciton, but to the game and not necessarily to a deeper plot. The plot of the game is also weak.

By the end of the OVA the reasons for these guys wanting such a huge amount of cash and willing to risk their lives for it is never explained. It would be nice for there to be an extra episode or two just to explain everything and make it more…. complete.

Screen caps time.

What happened to the police woman? They did the most natural thing. They ran. XD

Toki looking cool.

And I know that a lot of people probably want to see Saitou get shot anyway.

This was during their battle. The fool Saitou decided to save the guy and got pulled over the edge of the roof. But his reasons for saving the guy was acceptable.

And a fun shot!! Look at those weird poses. I wonder if it is a new dance.

Anyway, that is it for the Bus Gamer OVA.

It was ok to watch, I did not hate it or anything, I just felt bored quite often.

I felt that it was quite draggy and the police woman scene was not really necessary for them to make her take up so much time.

Okay, as for Saitou, though I don’t hate him as much in the last ep, he is still an annoyance. Apparently he is suppose to be less annoying in the manga and somewhat of a computer genius. Well, the most that we see of his computer smarts is him twinkling with the lights in the ep 2 HOME battle.

While the characters and animation was fun to look at that was probably about it.
The incomplete storyline (typical of short series) and the not so exciting plot for the last episode made me quite bored.

Rating – 6/10

-ra out

Bus Gamer ep 1 & 2

I have always liked the art style of Kazuya Minekura ever since I saw Saiyuki. The way the characters were drawn and their personalities. I actually have a wall scroll of Saiyuki hanging on my room wall.

Alright, the plot of Bus Gamer.

It basically revolves around the lives of 3 guys – Kazuo Saito, Nobuto Nakajo and Toki Mishiba (Kenichi Suzumura (voice actor) ). They are total strangers who all have their own reasons as to why they wish to obtain a huge amount of cash. A way to accomplish that would be to join the game Bus Game. Soon enough you find out that it is not a game at all, and our heroes are fighting to keep their lives and fighting to obtain the disc that would allow them to enter the next level. As the level increases the amount of cash increases as well. These 3 people were put together in the team due to the fact that their reasons for wanting so much cash was not stated on their application form. All 3 character bear very different personalities.

You soon find out that this game is probably a form of conspiracy. Dead bodies start to turn up (dead bodies of the players who lost) and the police are turning a blind eye to it stating that it was all classified as an accident. However, after watching ep 2 you are introduce to a female police officer who is determine to get to the bottom of these cases.

The rules of the game is basically to obtain the disc that your opponent has, or to protect the disc that you are holding from your opponents. The groups are classified into ‘Home’ and ‘Away’. ‘Home’ being that you are at your base and you have to protect and ‘Away’ being that you are the outside team that needs to obtain the disc. At each level you are given a different task of being ‘Home’ or ‘Away’. And as the level increases the toughness of each team increases and the cash reward increases too.

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From the looks of things, 3 episodes is probably not able to complete the whole plot of this series and answer all the questions. Especially since in the second episode new characters are still being brought out.
I have a bad feeling that this would be one of those anime that just throw questions out one after another and never answers them.
I really cannot comprehend the meaning behind those anime, unless they wish to get the audience to buy the manga to read on and find out.
However, Bus Gamer’s manga was only a 1 book thing as well.

In the first ep the team is ‘Away’

At the end of the first ep Saito is in a big pinch and is being held at knife point. ^^

Of course, our dynamic trio clears the first stage safe and sound.

And they have to plan for the next level. This time they are ‘Home’

And at the end of the second ep, the police lady is bringing in our trio for questioning.

How did it get this way? Someone brought a gun in their school bag and it fell out and dropped right in front of her. lol.

Overall it kept me fairly entertained. It was quite a nice anime to watch. Nothing big or huge happening but it was not boring either.

I must say that Saito does get on my nerves sometimes though. Him making so much noise and being the weakest. But it is not something that can’t be tolerated.

It is a short series and a short fun plot. A tad bit of action, good looking characters, and some fun here and there. Nothing too serious or nothing too good either. The beginning of the series was draggy though, especially with Saito going on and on about being team mates. Seemed pointless. In addition to that, the sudden change in the attitudes of the characters were weird too. Like how suddenly they had manage to get all friendly and so on so forth.

Rating…. 6.5/10 for now.

-ra out

oh, and guess who makes a cameo as a game character!