PLOT Summary The story focuses around the Akabanes, a family of four buillt from online connections within the game PLANET. They get along well, with their only rule is to ever pry into each other's real lives. What they don't know is that, in real life, they are "family".

In PLANET, one can socialize with other players, form teams, make guilds and fight monsters - but the true end goal of PLANET is about its final boss, called the "Black Bird of Happiness", which boasts a reward of 300 million yen.

My Review
It definitely had an interesting premise, even with a premise as simple as that - it had a lot to unravel and things to be realized. It was enough to stand by own its own.

And then they added the Black Bird of Happiness, which only complicates things further.

Things becoming more complicated within the plot was decent and a given. I feel like it still would be as compelling even if it only kept the family drama in.

Interesting plot, bad executions sometimes.

SETTING/S Summary The story mostly takes place in PLANET... and certain places within it. Of course, it also shows us sometimes the household of the Arimas (real life surname of the Akabanes).

My Review
PLANET as the place (or game) where they meet was excellent, it perfectly does its job well (narratively) as an escapism for the family, as well as certain parts of it doing a good job of making the viewers confused as well as certain parts of PLANET being excellent in displaying moments of fear and urgency of the situation.

CHARACTER/S Summary I'm only going to list the family (and the most basic description) to avoid spoilers, especially since for the other characters - it seems better to let their characters unravel by itself.

Arima, Taichiro (MC) - A shut-in gaming addict and the eldest sibling in the family.

Arima, Asuma - The younger brother who dislikes Taichiro's lifestyle (gaming).

Arima, Kojiro - The father who Taichiro does not respect.

Arima, Miyabi - The mother who doesn't show up much.

My Review
The characters are certainly interesting in their own rights, and can stand on their own as a character with their own conflicts.

I feel like some were lacking in attention (the mom), however, some characters certainly were great and had interesting moments (a certain guildmaster).

DEVELOPMENT The story mostly shows the characters first before giving the explanation as to why they're like that, you can certainly see how they'd changed from the past - but I wouldn't say it explicitly showed us the literal development of a character besides some moments.RELATIONSHIP/S With how much it emphasized family, we didn't really get to see much of the mother unfortunately.

Still, the character dynamics are interesting, whether it'd be the Akabanes' avatars, the Arima brothers, a certain Granada duo, and the Pirates. All of them had their own weight and emotional values.

In my opinion, the Arima brothers had the most care in the way their relationship unravelled. The Granada duo also had their interesting moments, and Taichiro's relationship with his father had its own importance.

CONFLICT/S
There were definitely a lot of conflicts shown, they had all their unique charm, strengths and weaknesses to it. Whether it'd be the family's or as individual person.

I feel like most conflicts were given a decent conclusion, but there were some parts that missed too.

THEME/S
The themes were definitely engaging, and they constantly clashed with others - still, they remain to be firm in what theme it was presenting despite unravelling many plot points and themes.

SOUNDS The voice acting nailed it, the way Tachiro's emotions and eraticness (at some parts) were shown through his lines were excellent.

Other than that, nothing much stands out (though that could be just my opinion) but nothing felt off either, so I'd say it was decent.

I definitely liked the opening though.

VISUALS The art style is very pleasant to look at, it's simple in a unique way. The animation can sometimes be only decent, but sometimes it was extremely good - it usually depends on the moment in the story.

What I can say though is that did a great job at portraying the themes of the story (regardless if it was a good part or a bad part of the plot), it also enchanced the mood of the scene for me.

EXECUTION I feel like there could've been more to the worldbuilding of PLANET or the more Sci-fi elements, at least.

Though, in my opinion, they did manage to pull off the family drama pretty well - the characters' reasons, what they ended up as, and more are understandable (I can't say the same much about most stuff past Episode 6).

PERSONAL THOUGHTS I definitely enjoyed it, despite there being plot holes. At first, when I saw the trailer - as well as the dark elements happening in their "real life" and not just the game, I was quite skeptical, but it ended up being fine in the end.

IS THIS FOR YOU?
Personally, I'd recommend it (even more so if you're a beginner in anime who enjoys psychological elements and heavy themes). Although it was quite predictable at times, it certainly had interesting concepts.

CONCLUSION
Watch it with an open mind, and still end up confused about the ending like me (but it ended up being alright).