Tai-Ari deshita. Ojousama wa Kakutou Game nante Shinai

Disclaimer: my 1st rule for reviews is always compare manga to its adaptation without any story spoilers. My 2nd rule I'm extremely against prelim reviews... This is the only 1% where it counts, see.

Anime is literally MILES ABOVE its source I couldnt believe my eyes.

It's the best Street Fighter (SF) anime you going to see, period, because its played out and explained by pros itself. The way anime writers added distinct SF FRANCHISE history lore into the plot to adapt fighting chars from Manga that weren't SF by design (Juri) is honestly groundbreaking by how much thought were put into it. Girls stories ... as a players really shine, all casual situations you can easily relate to, be it console or arcade, online or offline fighting gaming. Even if you ain't familiar with SF that much, anime allows you to experience it the best way possible, it's not a marketing ploy by any means as it's fully supported with the gaming humor and vibes, all while staying competitive and character-driven in its core.

Same magic applies to the Girls romance / school section. Would honestly grade whoever worked on frames and storyboards as a genre academist at least. A lot of frames and directoral choices are straight out references to classic animeworks, if you check manga you'd appreciate that touch immediately, it's very pronounced and gives you all the spectre of girls emotions which is crucial even moreso cause mangaka is female.

To sum up: while manga was definitely true-in-nature to both FGC/non-FGC elements, anime octane-boosted it to make it all also HARDCORE ON EACH FRONT (SF6 Oki mentioned in the 2nd episode is not something you even expect to encounter at the story's beginning and indeed it's missing from manga because it's not SF at all there). GGWP, it's all pure hype coming right at you full speed before Street Fighter movie hits IMAX screens this October.

Don't forget to fully support creators (not only the mangaka and anime studio, but also Capcom, gaming equipment brands and SF6 proscene) and spread the word as much as you can so this success story of one-of-a-kind cooperation gets even bigger.

PS: All those words are coming from the dedicated Ryu+rushdown chars hater no less, so not even an inch of the usual gaming franchise and / or character favoritism - I recognize both soul and hard work where I see it ;) You'd meet much more knowledgeable SF folks than me in the show's discussion threads which is yet another seal of quality and community's approval as far as I'm (a dirty casual non-FGC noob who only watched Mainstage Evo a bit) concerned.

"I had fun. I got pissed off. I felt like murdering someone. But it was always fun"

One for the cult classic. It almost never happens that I find an anime that vibes with me on a spiritual level. But this one does. This is not only the best depiction of gaming on television screen, this is the best depiction of competitive gaming you will ever see in any media, period.

I was browsing through Crunchyroll new seasonal releases, noticed "fighting games" in the title, and thought to myself "New anime about video games, sounds cool, hopefully another Shangri-la Frontier", not knowing that this one will ... not only blow Shangri-la Frontier out of the water, it will blow myself straight across the Atlantic. My jaw dropped to the floor when what on my screen was literal Street Fighter gameplay, not CGI of some made-up fighting games that look kind of like Street Fighter, but a literal match of Street Fighter. If that was not enough, I noticed something: the gameplay is clearly done by good players, lo and behold, it was done by actual pro players. My jaw now dropped through multiple floors to the ground. Then I saw what Aya is using... Is that Razer??? My jaw now drilled through multiple kilometers of Earth. The game is real. The gameplay is real. The gaming gears are real. The LAN will probably be real too looking at you EVO. This level of dedication and effort going into making the anime authentic is unheard of! Whoever the Producers are, they absolutely know what they are doing!

All of that, is just the surface. What the anime gets the most right, is the answer to this question: "What kind of person is a competitive gamer?". I am not a fighting game player myself, but I was a high-ranked player in another competitive game. Competitive gamers are diverse. Some are childish, instinct-based with crazy mechanics like Mio, some are smart, calculated, enjoy abusing meta like Aya, some are happy-go-lucky who want to have fun, some are real asshats ... But they all have certain things in common: The Ego, The Tilt, The Endless Grinding, and most importantly, the Desire to Play and Win. I have been asked by other people "Why did you play competitive games, what is the point?". Just like Aya and Mio, I don't know, I just wanted to play and win. Yes, there was an endless amount of grinding, yes, it could be tilting at times, but I always had fun playing and winning.

The story itself is peak gaming. The author of source material and the writers of the shows all understand competitive gaming on a psychological level, therefore the story feels so real and authentic. The story itself progresses logically, with the characters acting true to themselves. For example, in a certain conflict in Episode 3, Aya tries to resolve it by logical reasoning, while Mio tries to solve it with the "fite me bitch" attitude and a "you chicken?" final blow to top it off. The humor is fun and it is even more fun if you are in the know (eg "I didn't do that!"). Peak gaming.

The characters are so endearing. If you are into competitive gaming, you will find them to be extremely relatable too. Trashtalking your opponents after they called you free win and still lost? Checked. Tilting due to enemy beating you with cheese, or just due to cheese in general? Checked. Thinking the whole day about how to improve? Checked. Some random noobs calling you out for 1v1? Checked. Grinding into early morning then sleeping for 2 hours before showing up to class? Checked. "I didn't do that!"? Checked. They are just like me, fr.

The direction is great. Pacing is tight, no wasted moment. Especially the matches shown. Every match has a story and character progression, not a single match is wasted or too long.

The art and animation are consistently great. I like both the overall clean art style and the CGDCT art style during a CGDCT moment.

The gameplay is done by actual pro players, who can complain? I noticed some small errors and inconsistencies (example, one time health bar goes from full to zero in one shot), but given the large number of people working in an anime, errors like this are not avoidable.

The music is great. The hard rock OP with cutesy female singing voice is the perfect representation of the contrast between hardcore gaming and the Ojou-sama All-Girls School.

Overall, this anime feels so real and authentic. If you are a gamer, do yourself a favor and just watch it.

To the haters of this anime: "GGEZ. Clearly skill issue, git gud scrub"

In the same vein as "Rock is a Lady's Modesty", Young Ladies don't play fighting games is a subversion of the classic Class S yuri.

It pays homage to some of its most iconic tropes while clearly still poking fun of some of them as it loudly proclaims how one of its main characters Mio, is annoyed by her classmates "seeing the world through yuri glasses". It is ultimately tongue-in-cheek, as this is a yuri after all. We start their first meeting with a literal kabedon after all.

It's very faithful to fighting games from what I've been told by my fighting game girlies. And ... it was nice of Capcom to authorise actual in-game footage, in the same vein they did with Hi Score Girl. Its nice they didn't discriminate just because it's a yuri. I'll leave the more in dept detail to a different reviewer as I'm not that into fighting games myself.

Mio is undoubtedly the star of the show for me so far with her no-nonsense attitude; I have been using the "I've listened to your cringe self-centred monologue" bit as a reaction image since the first episode came out. The ethereal princess-y girl thats actually a tell-it-as-it-is straight shooter that yells that shes bad at socialising at the top of her lungs is incredibly amusing. This anime is full of charm and has impeccable comedic timing and visual execution, especially with its random blood sports.

Animation is dynamic, and art style is crispy, theres this moment that stood out to me with Mio's dress because they paid so much attention to the cut and how it moves that truly made it look like something I would love to wear, which wouldn't have had the same effect if you couldn't tell that the animators clearly cared about this show.