https://i.ur.com/ULJhs6F.png Spoilerfree review Review in brief: Season 1 of Log Horizon presents a truly faithful rendition of the trapped in an MMO setting and provides an interesting story to go with it but suffers from slow progression and predictability. Your enjoyment will hinge on how well you stay immersed in the world of Elder Tale and while this anime does a good job of getting you to enter theres no guarantee that it will hold you in. Review in full: When it comes to engagement Log Horizon places heavy focus on just one aspect: immersion. It wants you to enter its world explore both its realms and gamelike mechanics experience the cultures of the preexisting NPCs and the newly trapped gamers and ultimately feel like youre on an adventure in the world of Elder Tale yourself. This is accomplished quite well. Right from the getgo the characters realize that they must use the mechanics of the game including classes cooldown abilities and nowtelepathic voice chat to thrive but they are all still gamers at heart and also start developing new strategies to handle everything from cooking to spellcasting. While this is going on there are bigger implications that are explored in a game world made real. What happens when NPCs are no longer just walking dialogue boxes but living breathing beings? Or when magic is no longer just game code and becomes a real form of energy? Even politics and the economy become major issues as time goes on. Being trapped in a video game isnt just a gimmick or plot device in Log Horizon its the very essence of everything it is and does. Together with the wellestablished setting which is continuously being fleshed out it creates the captivating sense that the story is much bigger than just what we see the characters going though. Even when Log Horizon wasnt enjoyable for me this sense gave me reason to believe that something more was just an episode away. https://i.ur.com/2jwQR1T.gif Maybe I just have a high tolerance for CG? I could see this being a video game. As far as production values go the animation does a great job of displaying both the world and the video game elements without either looking out of place. This is including the CG as even though it stands out compared to the animation at times it still feels like it belongs in the context of how its being used. The familiar yet fantastical designs of the environments and the characters also do a remarkable job of making it all feel like its own world as well as its own game cultivating strong visual immersion to complement its narrative immersion. Meanwhile the music sound effects and voicework I watched in Japanese is good but not great all around. It does its job and there isnt anything to complain about but not much of it is memorable either aside from the oddly catchy OP. Sadly beyond that Log Horizons presentation transforms the story from an intricate exercise in how a world can be built from the mechanics that drive it into a lazy shounen adventure adaptation where the premise is only used as a hook to get you to watch the next episode each week. Its as though the story is being held hostage by the producers demanding that you watch more than whats necessary to continue. This is largely due to the shows slow progression. Its not much of an issue early on since theres initially quite a bit that the anime has to and does explain but after the first third of the season it finds itself with too little to explain to justify the pace and starts spacing itself out instead. After the world is established each subsequent arc features a barrage of recaps which not only include the typical beginningoftheepisode refreshers but also many midepisode reminders cues and hints so many in fact that by the time each arc comes to a head so many hints have been dropped that you know how the arc ends before it even reaches a climax destroying the dramatic buildup of tension the intricate story naturally contains. Its like reading a good book next to an acquaintance who is constantly asking if youve reached the next big spoilery event with no attempt to mask the spoiler itself. These are then interlaced with so much shallow comedy especially with the pervert jokes and shipteases that youd have to be blind to not see coming and boring filler such as pointless side plots and clearly onesided battles that it all takes up more time than the serious moments that progress the plot. Everything that actually matters could have been covered in 13 episodes with room to spare but Log Horizon doesnt trust its viewers to understand or remember anything that takes more than two sentences to explain. 630https://i.ur.com/z3vlYmQ.png Beach episode? Check. Culture festival episode? Check. Wait what do you mean this isnt a school anime? In addition while Log Horizons characters are utilized well by the story the characters themselves are mostly nothing special. The majority of them fill a role perform that role and nothing more while most of the rest dont even manage that. Development and backstories beyond a few bulletpoints predictable clichs included are for but a select few characters. Youll likely find two or three of them to be particularly interesting but many of them are easily forgettable. There is even a plot development tied to the games XP system that offers a great opportunity to take a closer look at the characters in that moment before things change for them but nothing substantial was done with it and it passed with just a brief mention. It also doesnt help that theres very little that is able to challenge them. The fact that the trapped gamers are overpowered even becomes a plot point though again its merely stated rather than addressed. Regardless it doesnt help that few characters have any real reason to develop when all they have to do is listen to Shiroe for everything to turn out okay or if theyre one of the handful of cookiecutter villains wait for Shiroe to defeat them because they had no chance to win in the first place. Verdict: Log Horizons first season could have easily been great in fact it definitely was for the first third but its faults severely damage the majority of the show. Even then I could almost still say its good because underneath all of the mindless filler overused tropes lies an interesting concept quality production values and the beginnings of an amazing plot. Unfortunately the product as a whole just isnt entertaining or intricate enough to cope with its faults. I cant recommend Log Horizon to a general audience though if youre a big fan of isekai or anime about video games you may find enough to enjoy here to make it all worthwhile.