Legend of Himiko ends badly. It’s really just as simple as that. When it started, the show had promise. It fails to deliver. As you might recall, in my review of the first volume I had hope, and in the second I had less so. Well, now that the show is done and over, I sadly have none left. I can (and will) list the minor flaws in its characterization, structuring, and various other factors that contributed to that sour taste in my mouth as the end credits rolled on; but in complete honesty, Legend of Himiko mostly suffers from a problem that plagues far too many video game-to-anime conversions: the anime is too contented with a video game plot.

Let’s face it; as much as one might love video games (and I certainly do), it’s pretty much a lie to say that the majority of them have plots that are extraordinarily well crafted. I’m not saying that video games on the whole have terrible plots, because that’s not true either; but most of them do tend to sacrifice overly intricate plots to add space for the parts where the player actually, you know, plays. RPGs, dating sims, and a few of the more upper-tier action games sometimes focus on plot, but if you actually take them apart bit by bit I think you’ll see that a good lot of them are just hackneyed clichés that you only enjoyed because you were taking part in the experience. Himiko-den, as a RPG/dating sim, is no different. It offers stock characters whose personalities, to use the term so very, very loosely, are entirely distinguishable by their appearance, and the plot is a simple political MacGuffin used to draw you into the game. That is just fine for a game, because it ends up being awfully fun. However, complicating the story and drawing out the characters’ dimensions are necessary to make the game-to-anime translation a success.

How the writers of the animation did not realize this I do not know - perhaps this show really is (dare I think it?) just a cash-in on a popular franchise and not an actual attempt to make a worthwhile product. So, be the underlying reason ignorance or indifference, what we are left with is a tidy little wrap-up to an overly simplistic tales with paper-thin characters. Good wins out over evil, wrongs are righted, and everyone does exactly what they are supposed to do to carry the tale out to the predictable, happy conclusion. I swear, I kept expecting them all to walk off into the sunset holding hands and singing "Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah." - which, in hindsight, would have made for a much more enjoyable ending.

Along with the writers’ seemingly total refusal to add anything to the script of the video game, they also don’t seem to have much common sense of what to edit out. There are too many caricatures running around without a purpose in the main cast already, so who the hell thought it would be a good idea to stick in the entire roster of bad guys? Along with the Bid Bag Evil Priest Guy we have the four mini-villains, who seem to sprout personality traits and back stories whenever necessary. This would have worked fine in the video game - I can totally see each of these villains being bosses you fight at the end of a dungeon who just happen to be the master behind the current plot thread - but here they are far too extraneous. And from my intense and lengthy research (Google), I can’t find any major fanfare for the characters, so there isn’t any apparent reason of why they were left in. Also, where exactly were they going with the good bad guy bishounen/doomed love subplot? It was vaguely interesting in the beginning, because I was still all bright-eyed, bushytailed, and ignorant of the feebleness to come; but by the end I saw so little of it that its conclusion failed utterly at the intended effect (tugging of the heartstrings, naturally).

As for the cosmetics of the whole deal...sure, they’re nice. The character designs are still a lot of fun, though with the tone getting more serious towards the end I found it harder and harder not to gawk at the odd pink peacock feathers one of the villains wears - is it wrong I found her ensemble much more amusing than the show itself? No new character or setting was introduced this volume, so I can’t really comment on the visuals anymore than I already have. Likewise, the audio is just more of the same. In the case of the OP and ED, that’s a yay. In the case of the performances and BGM, well, that’s a nay. A strong nay.

I wish I’d played the video game before I saw the show. Maybe then I could have appreciated their inclusion of every single freaking character without their being at all relevant to the plot. Maybe then I just would have been amused to see my favorite characters move around in fluid motion and fun colors. Hell, if a Marl Oukoku anime series of this quality was put out I’m sure I’d give it a better score, but it’d be entirely because of my fondness for the original product and my joy. So I guess that’s what the makers of Himiko-den were going for: the fanbase. And if you’re a member of that fanbase then you’ll probably like this, or at least appreciate it. Too bad it’s just too blah for everyone else though.

Video Quality: A
Audio Quality: A
Presentation: B
Content: C+
Overall: B-