Yuru Camp S3 is the sequel I have been the most thoroughly disappointed by this season. Like, sure there are shows like Hibike Euphonium that while still good don't live up the the first season but it definitely does to the second season or Tsukimichi that goes slower than the first season despite having more episodes, but Yuru Camp is suffering from the same thing as Date A Live which is both a combination of the source material getting weaker and changing to a shit studio. I mean, 8bit is doing another 2 anime this season besides Yuru Camp, and while those are shit so you don't expect anything from them, Yuru Camp is actually a very good series. I was extremely happy when I saw the announcement of a third season, it felt so weird to be so excited over an announcement, but then another announcement came and it was that the studio was changing to 8bit and that the director was also changing, that immediately was a punch towards my excitement, I mean, surely, there’s no way a studio can fuck up this series even if they aren’t working with the best material, right? Well, I’ll tell you that I was wrong and the first couple of trailers just confirmed my fear.

When I think about Yuru Camp, what I remember are all those moments that melted my heart, the ending of the first season is something that watered my eyes the first time I saw it and I still smile every time I watch it or remember it, things like Nadeshiko using her money to buy a gift for her sister comes to mind too, but when I try to think about something similar this season I cannot imagine something because those moments basically don't exist here, it's not like it didn't have fun moments like Chiaki's schizo camp, but that isn't the kind of things I'm referring to when I say something memorable, I clearly mean something that you can actually see and feel, something more real if you will, and while previous seasons had their fair share of moments, this season didn't quite reach that area.

The problem here clearly isn't even the change in character designs, because I could complain that Rin looks too different or that Aoi's tits basically disappeared, but that wouldn't cover the actual problem because other characters like Chiaki and Nadeshiko look almost the same despite the very clearly amateurish character design. I have always liked the backgrounds in Yuru Camp, because they take what the manga conveys and actually brings them to life, when you look at season 1 or even season 2 and then look at season 3 you will very clearly see the difference, in season 3 the backgrounds often almost look like pictures with a little filter and the terrible compositing makes the characters stand out so much that the background ends up looking even worse. I'm not saying that Yuru Camp didn't have photographic reference before, if my mind isn't failing, there was an episode where they used a Google Street View copyright notice, but there was a clear difference in what C-Station did and what 8bit is doing, because the backgrounds break the immersion so much this season that it hurts, just look at things like Nadeshiko walking into the store in episode 3 or Nadeshiko and her sister standing near the sakura tree in episode 10, and then I ask you to watch anything from season 1 and you will see the big difference.

Aside from that, even the source material was weaker after the chapters that the season 2 adapted, because it was in some weird transition period where it was looking more and more to be a tourism commercial, and I'm not saying Yuru Camp wasn't that before, but you can see the difference between how it was done at the start and how it is done now, because the balancing between the preparation, the camping and the tourism has completely shifted to focus more on the tourism. I remember perfectly in the first couple of episodes asking myself "where is the camping?" because they were doing a tourism across hanging bridges or dams and I know this series wasn't as blatant before because they mostly stayed into place to camp. The simplicity of just going outside and camping while explaining some camping tips is basically gone, and I remember there was a review complaining exactly about this the previous season, and while I would disagree that the change completely happened last season, it definitely turned into a snowball and went with full force throughout the entire beginning of this season.

Honestly speaking, I don't think this season is bad, but it is such a clear downgrade, if you were judging the manga and feel a part is weaker, you can just compliment it with what came before, but unlike the manga, I'm not taking what happened in season 1 and season 2 and making it part of this season at the same time here, I'm judging the third season, and the third season covers something much weaker than before. It is still good, I had many laughs, but I didn't get some of the most important things in this series to me, and those are memorable moments that you can really feel.

Thank you for reading.