Definitely more time was needed for them to get certain scenes to have more of an impact.
I've been looking at the TIPS thread and piecing together some missing elements from the novel seeing if some alterations would have helped, but in this case, the series sorely needed more than 26 episodes. Or, they could have made 45 minute episodes and fit in just enough to seal the deal. Sometimes a little more goes a LONG way.
Overall i'm still enjoying myself, though my friends are just about to rip their hair out and invoke Oyashiro-sama's curse on me for scrambling their brains every anime meeting.
