IS: Infinite Stratos 2 - World Purge-hen

Ichika is the most lucky guy in IS, well the only male exist in IS series. IS series comeback with the new OVA World Purge-hen which caught my eyes and try to enjoy the show. IS series never failed to deliver the harem theme with bit of action here and there. Story Score: 4 The story is predictably enough. A hero comes to save the princess in danger and then finish all the enemies. There is significant root of the story but very unclear unless you watch it for the 2nd time. Some part of the story was not evenly distributed and a bit rush. IS Purge Hen revealedwhat was all the heroins true desire and their dreams( all about the main protagonist, Ichika). Well I'm fine with that but houki scene was too short and not fair. I'm not a fan of any female character of IS series but but im looking forward for Tatenashi words in the end of the show. There is none off screen plot so far, but the ecchi theme seems on and off. Some part of the fanservice does censor and some are not (you can clearly see it). Few unecessary scene such as the interval between Ichika going to rescue all the girls. The fan service and this scene was absolutely uncessary. In addition, few new things you will gain from watching this one, the story will open new plot and build my curiosity (maybe) of Orimura Chifuyu and Laura Bodewig. Well at least there is something to look forward. Characters Score: 6 Most of the characters is the same except Chronicle Chloe, which the only recognizable enemy in this show.For an OVA, its too much uncessary scene and consider to reveal who is the enemy is at least a little. There is few characters development but very little such as Tatenashi, Laura and Orimura Chifuyu. Art Score: 7 The artworks of IS Purge Hen is almost similar to previous TV series. I have no problem with that. Enjoyment Score: 6 Enjoyment of watching IS Purge Hen is just moderate. Most of the fun coming from the Orimuras battle and Ichika's battle with the villians was very funny. Not to mention, the mediocre fanservice, ecchi is the best selling point of the series and the enjoyment sources. Overall Score : 5 As an OVA, I will give 5 . Im sure you will enjoy the ecchi theme and fanservice but not much on the story I guess.

Warning possible Spoilers What I really got from this is that it just felt like a need to really show off how sexy the girls in Ichika's harem can be and how it does that is by literally going into their minds. When a program called World Purge affects the academy the girls have to go into a machine to shut it down however this requires the girls to conquer their ultimate desire. For something that was only 44 minutes I thought it provided some entertainment even though it's mainly fanservice entertainment it was fine nonetheless. I thought it was fun seeing how the girls imagined Ichika in theirown way and I thought it was funny how Ichika spoke in the native language of each of the girls like with Laura he was German or with Cecillia he was British. Despite the fanservice parts there was another battle going on outside and even though we don't get to see the reason behind the attack on the Academy we do get to see pretty good action. The ending too gave me chills too since it was setting up for a season 3 that may never happen, but if it does it'll definitely be interesting. There isn't really any character development between the character's other than what their ultimate desires are, however I have to give Josh Grelle credit for trying to make the girls version's of Ichika sound like he's from their country, we also get to see Chifuyu kick some ass for once which just increased her badass level for me althought other than that there really wasn't much difference with the characters overall. When it comes to the artstyle I did like Chifuyu's suit even though it wasn't an IS unit it was still pretty badass and the settings where the girls illusions were despite looking like sexy encounter places they looked pretty detailed. The fanservice was off the scale this time and is pretty much the reason why this exists, but I didn't hate it in fact it was pretty good it definitely made some of the girls more sexy or cute like Laura in nothing but an apron or Cecillia getting washed in a bath, it was certainly a good site to see. Overall this was alright for an OVA, the only thing that really peeked for me was the ending that may have shown a possibility of a season 3 which I hope will happen cause considering what happened at the end it's got me pretty interested for the next chapter in this story.

Infinite Stratos, what happened to you? You used to be filled to the brim with potential for a great story with interesting characters and now, you end up doing this? Whatever. Let's just get this over with. There are spoilers, but come on, do you really care? Story Ichika has to go to a special facility to get his IS unit checked out while the girls enter some sort of virtual world to counter a cyber-attack into the IS Academy's network (trust me, I'm just as confused as you are). Meanwhile, the girls that don't enter the cyber-world have to confront a military group that attacks the academy,again for ill-defined reasons (doesn't this count as an act of war or something?). Something that really annoyed me from Infinite Stratos 2 is that the story played awfully, awfully, awfully coy with its long-running plotlines and World Purge continues that trend by not bothering to explaining what the fuck is going and instead indulges in more harem antics. Yes, the girls use the virtual world to live out the personal fantasies with Ichika. I thought this was gonna be one of those stories where the girls had to choose between fantasy and reality because that would give the story and the characters some degree of pathos, but instead Ichika has to save them all on his own. Never, not even once, do the girls wonder if this is all good to be true. Common sense is thrown away for the sake of harem antics and that's just sad. (3/10). Characters No matter how generic and rudimentary a story is, it can always be elevated by how much you connect and relate to the characters, but unfortunately, World Purge forgets that and doesn't bother trying to get us to make the characters relatable. Yes, the harem antics are fun at first glance, but then you realize they are fake and they don't really teach you anything new about the characters, only that they're in love with Ichika. The worst part I can say about World Purge is that the characters were painfully reactive this whole time. Nothing they do actually changes the course of events and when the story ends, the antagonist (wait, is Chloe an antagonist?) has already gained what she wanted, so the protagonists and the viewers are left wondering what the fuck what that all about. (4/10) Art One thing I can't fault World Purge about is the aesthetic values. The budget of the story really went into the fanservice and the action scenes, but they don't do much elevate the story. The action scenes involve secondary characters and the fanservice is distracting and doesn't compliment the story (other than showing that the girls are really into Ichika). (7/10). Sounds God bless the brave voice actors that partook in this steaming pile of garbage. Infinite Stratos doesn't deserve them. (8/10) Conclusion Infinite Stratos continues its downward spiral into mediocrity and obscurity with a story that didn't really add anything new to the grand scheme of things and when it does add something new, it's something obscure that will probably never be explained because we have no idea when season 3 will reach us. I'm telling you, Infinite Stratos is really showing its age in a time when anime is pushing boundaries of what the harem genre is really capable of. (5/10).