This review may contain spoilers
A Story about Loneliness, Familial Loss, Suicide, and Self-Love...all in a Dating Sim!
If there's one thing to take away from this show, it's the importance of having your own back, and understanding that you are all you can ever truly rely on.
I really enjoyed the story, it felt unique and fresh by BL standards. The story gets to a point in the second half of the season where it is supposed to feel kind of psychological and 'scary', which I think the show did to a decent effect. I have never read the manhwa, so I don't really know what kind of ideas they did or didn't get to explore in comparison. However, I found myself often wishing that some points would have been elaborated on, but due to the runtime limit for each episode, I feel that certain things weren't as impactful as they could be. Although, I didn't quite feel confused at any point necessarily, I did feel that some things did not meet their full potential. I honestly mostly wish that this series got even more experimental in it's thriller/horror elements. In the moments where the main character was glitching through the game, it felt very unsettling. The ending was really excellent as well, I felt it wasn't terribly rushed, and was mostly satisfying. But as I said, a lot of things could have been expanded upon more to make that final moment all the more impactful.
The side characters were fine, but they were not developed very well and didn't really have their own plots or anything, they were just kind of there to support the main characters. But I suppose that's justified considering they are literal NPCs. which by the way, whenever I felt myself getting really emotionally invested, I just kinda thought to myself "what makes this even more messed up is that none of these people are real (in the story) other than the main character. (until the plot twist at the end of course which implies that this is all just in Myung-Ha's head and the love interest is kind of just a representation of himself). This added a really interesting and complicated emotional element to the story for me.
I think that this story is heavily open to interpretation in terms of its meaning. There are a lot of themes here that are explored in a somewhat vague way that leaves the viewer wanting to think deeper about it, rather than leaving them just feeling confused. This was definitely another classic case of a much more profound storyline disguising itself as a "BL." I went into this expecting a cheesy high school BL, but I came out of it not even feeling like I watched a BL at all (despite the few kiss scenes here and there). Overall, I was thoroughly invested the whole time, and I honestly really liked the deeper elements that you kind of have to cut through the layers to get to. Also the casting was awesome, the actor for Yeo-Woon really stood out to me especially.
Edit: I've been reading around and I don't like the theory that Myung-Ha got a second chance at life after he woke up. I'm thinking of it more as the video game being like a purgatory type of place, and that when he wakes up after disappearing in the final episode and he's still in the video game world—but it's not acting like a video game anymore—I think he has basically ended up in his own version of 'heaven'. (cuz like the 'game master' guy must represent like either the grim reaper or god from how I see it). Also I feel like him getting a literal second chance at life would kind of defeat the purpose of the story.
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Updated Rewatch Review:
Just rewatched this after a little over a year or something and just wanted to update since my first review was a 7.5/10. Upon rewatch, this show is a lot better than I remember and I think I appreciate it a little more now for what it is. Everything I said before is pretty much the same, but I guess I just enjoyed it more this time around. I definitely stand with what I said about this not even feeling like I watched a BL—this feels like it has so much more to offer than the average BL series. But anyway, that is all, update complete!
8/10.
I really enjoyed the story, it felt unique and fresh by BL standards. The story gets to a point in the second half of the season where it is supposed to feel kind of psychological and 'scary', which I think the show did to a decent effect. I have never read the manhwa, so I don't really know what kind of ideas they did or didn't get to explore in comparison. However, I found myself often wishing that some points would have been elaborated on, but due to the runtime limit for each episode, I feel that certain things weren't as impactful as they could be. Although, I didn't quite feel confused at any point necessarily, I did feel that some things did not meet their full potential. I honestly mostly wish that this series got even more experimental in it's thriller/horror elements. In the moments where the main character was glitching through the game, it felt very unsettling. The ending was really excellent as well, I felt it wasn't terribly rushed, and was mostly satisfying. But as I said, a lot of things could have been expanded upon more to make that final moment all the more impactful.
The side characters were fine, but they were not developed very well and didn't really have their own plots or anything, they were just kind of there to support the main characters. But I suppose that's justified considering they are literal NPCs. which by the way, whenever I felt myself getting really emotionally invested, I just kinda thought to myself "what makes this even more messed up is that none of these people are real (in the story) other than the main character. (until the plot twist at the end of course which implies that this is all just in Myung-Ha's head and the love interest is kind of just a representation of himself). This added a really interesting and complicated emotional element to the story for me.
I think that this story is heavily open to interpretation in terms of its meaning. There are a lot of themes here that are explored in a somewhat vague way that leaves the viewer wanting to think deeper about it, rather than leaving them just feeling confused. This was definitely another classic case of a much more profound storyline disguising itself as a "BL." I went into this expecting a cheesy high school BL, but I came out of it not even feeling like I watched a BL at all (despite the few kiss scenes here and there). Overall, I was thoroughly invested the whole time, and I honestly really liked the deeper elements that you kind of have to cut through the layers to get to. Also the casting was awesome, the actor for Yeo-Woon really stood out to me especially.
Edit: I've been reading around and I don't like the theory that Myung-Ha got a second chance at life after he woke up. I'm thinking of it more as the video game being like a purgatory type of place, and that when he wakes up after disappearing in the final episode and he's still in the video game world—but it's not acting like a video game anymore—I think he has basically ended up in his own version of 'heaven'. (cuz like the 'game master' guy must represent like either the grim reaper or god from how I see it). Also I feel like him getting a literal second chance at life would kind of defeat the purpose of the story.
_____________________
Updated Rewatch Review:
Just rewatched this after a little over a year or something and just wanted to update since my first review was a 7.5/10. Upon rewatch, this show is a lot better than I remember and I think I appreciate it a little more now for what it is. Everything I said before is pretty much the same, but I guess I just enjoyed it more this time around. I definitely stand with what I said about this not even feeling like I watched a BL—this feels like it has so much more to offer than the average BL series. But anyway, that is all, update complete!
8/10.
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