[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Originally Posted by Skye629

Off topic but is the story the same? And is the OVA a compilation? Or an alternate take/separate continuation?

I'll definitely check it out

Let me give you a synopsis and you can judge it for yourself:

Spoiler for Broken Blade synopsis:

It’s a story where most people have “magic power”. The “magic” here is the ability to control Quartz, a crystal that powered most of the technology in the civilization, in a setting where Khrishna kingdom is at war with the invading Athens kingdom. They use Quartz-powered Golems (the giant robot in this series) to wage the war. The world itself looks more like medieval-steampunk with the Quartz replacing the steam. Our MC, Rygart and his little brother, however, are a little different from others in that they were born without “magic” whatsoever, so their dad live with them in the outskirt to teach them how to live “manually” so that they can survive and take care of themselves. That’s pretty much the backstory of it.

Flash forward to when the Rygart has dropped out from academy and lives as a farmer, he was asked to help his friends Hodr & Sigyn, the young King and Queen of Khrisna, in the fight against the invading Athens. Hodr asked for the Rygart’s help as he has excavated what looks to be an ancient Golem buried deep beneath the ground but with futuristic interface resembling our own modern computers. It turns out the “ancient Golem” cannot be contolled by any “magicians” in the Kingdom, and by some accident, the no-magic Rygart is able to control it and then help Krishnan soldiers to fend off the Athens' golems. But the thing is, the young commander of the Athens squad is also a friend of Hodr, Sigyn & Rygart back in the academy. From there, the true conflict starts.

So there you have it, my synopsis for Broken Blade (the manga is titled Break Blade though). The OVA is actually the original version consist of 6 episodes with each one being about an hour. It was then aired on TV and divided into 12 episodes to match the TV format of 20-or-so minutes per episode. I myself prefer the OVAs because it’s has nicer flow and a more concise watch. Also, the OP & ED are better in the OVAs than the TV series . The TV series did manage to inject some small details but it's not really worth it. I do however recommend that you check out the manga and read from the beginning if you're interested in the story after you watched the anime as there are differences and more details left, and the story also continues in the manga where the anime stops after the defeat of a certain general (not really a spoiler as there are many generals in BB).