Karen's Anime Blog

I enjoyed the first episode of Game Center Girl, but I am kind of bothered by the fact that Lily, our heroine, is twelve years old. My husband kindly reminded me that back in the day, Usagi of Sailor Moon was 12-13 when she started dating Mamoru, who was in college.

Darn it, those were different times! We didn’t know any better back then!

Ahem, anyway, Game Center Girl is about a British girl named Lily who starts frequenting an arcade staffed by Renji, a guy who’s nice enough to buy a UFO catcher toy for her when she struggles with the controls. There’s a miscommunication where Lily thinks Renji is asking her to be his girlfriend, but once he realizes her misunderstanding, he writes her a letter (in English) explaining what happened and how they are not going to be lovers.

Now wait, let’s think about that for a sec. There was a miscommunication, and the main character…cleared it up immediately? In writing? You mean, he didn’t try to clarify things, get flustered, yet only make it worse? Renji, you could teach a class for other male protagonists!

By the end of the episode, Lily is determined to make Renji fall in love with her, but it appears to be a one-sided crush; Renji is interested in Lily to some extent– in part because she’s an English-speaking foreigner and he can practice his English with her– but he doesn’t seem to have any romantic interest in her. Going back to the beginning of this post, I’m not thrilled with Lily being 12, but if they keep the romance to be totally one-sided on her part, then that’s okay; having a crush on an older guy is normal. Now if Renji starts to seriously reciprocate, that could ruin the show for me, but for now I’m going to give it the benefit of the doubt.

Audio-wise, the show is interesting because a lot of it is in English. Lily and her mother speak fairly well-pronounced English (though neither has a British accent), and Renji speaks heavily accented English when he speaks to Lily. I wonder if this is going to continue for the whole show, or if Lily is going to acclimate to Japan and start speaking the local language in her attempt to win Renji’s heart.

I like the Game Center setting, and it’s fun seeing the nods to various popular games. The show’s color palette is varied, and there’s a lot to like about the show’s visuals. The OP features a lot of girls who look about Lily’s age, so this is probably going to be more of a Cute Girls Doing Cute Things show than it is a romance, which I’m fine with.

This isn’t in the “everyone should be watching this” category like CITY, but it’s an enjoyable enough piece of fluff. Add it onto your list of seasonals to watch, unless your list is full to bursting already.