Will need to wait for subs to accurately judge how much of the info was kept, but all things considered it wasn't nearly as bad as I was expecting (based on the preview). There's only one scene I was REALLY upset to see ruined, while for the rest, well, couldn't exactly expect them to keep the depth of the VN, and all things considered I think they did well...
Spoiler for minireview:
-Ange standing up angrily over the happy Rosa and Maria was kept; I kinda expected the episode to just start straight out with the flashbacks so this was a nice transition.
-Lion Sakutaro walking towards Maria, "uryu, uryu, uryu, uryu", God I almost died of cuteness...scratch that, the whole Maria/Sakutaro 'pajama party' scene was adorable in general. That's a good thing,; considering the freak of nature DEEN turned Maria into with her FACES, it's good to see they're doing a nice job with EP4's cute Maria.
-Rosa's receipt scene was kept, but as Auria said, they made up way too fast. Not terrible, it makes Rosa's moodswings seem just as unstable, but it just feels...weird.
-Beatrice appearing before Ange? I don't remember that happening in the VN...am I forgetting things or did the Anime add that in?
-The signature beneath Beatrice's definitely says 'Warugiria'. Lolwow time paradox, since she doesn't take that name until she talks with Battler...makes the exact timing of these flashbacks seem very confusing.
-Shota nekomimi role is fulfilled - Anime Sakutaro is adorable. His voice feels even more appropriate now that he's in 'human' form.
-Ange summoned the stakes too easily. They could have at least made her face look a little more strained, to show just how difficult it was for her. Makes it look like Ange is naturally talented...
-I expected Mammon's voice to be a little deeper (not quite Belphegor deep though), but it's not bad.
-OHGOD BATTLER IN NORMAL CLOTHES!! I like that they kept the information about her hair clips, though, it was something I honestly expected to be cut completely.
-Saint Lucia scenes felt disjointed and all over the place, but they really butchered the scene where she denies the stakes. That, and the Maria convenience store scenes, were the flashback portions I really liked, so it kinda upsets me to see it reduced to a 2-second flashback within a flashback...I would have much rather seen this scene kept than the stakes glomping Sakutaro -_-
-Congrats, Witch Hunt, for the Anime shout-out!! I kinda liked this whole scene, actually, since I think the message bottle incidents are really important clues for solving the mystery. They spent just the right amount of time explaining it, so it didn't just come across as a footnote.
-And now the scene that really pissed me off. DEEN really must hate 34, because they seem to be Hell-bent on cutting down all of her scenes. And this was the scene I was looking forward to most from this episode, the one I was saying 'they're probably going to have to turn the flashbacks into a cliffnotes summary, but as long as they do Lambda's scene right, I'll be happy'...*sigh* No MirageCoordinator either, of course. Guess I've just been so content with DEEN's work in the past few episodes that I was expecting better. Scene didn't feel like the mind-breaking revelation it was supposed to be for 1998 Ange, nor have we seen Lambda's true crazy colors revealed in the Anime yet between this and EP3's tea party. Nnnngh...
Overall I expected a pretty boring episode, so it didn't betray my expectations too much. They did better than I thought on some of the flashbacks, and didn't really do worse on the ones I expected to be butchered either way, especially since none of the important stuff was cut altogether (though the stake denial scene may as well have been). Boring VN flashbacks overall, so naturally we'd get a pretty boring Anime episode out of them, but things will start to kick into gear next week, and that's what I'm looking forward to.
Not rating it until I see the subs, but I'll probably give it a 7, for being better than I expected.