Watched the film (subbed by Chihiro), and thought it was decent. My eyes almost exploded trying to tell the difference between the twins though... until the captain kindly pointed it out to me.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kakkou
It's actually the OP sequence of the game.
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Damn, I totally thought that was some preview for a sequel of the film too; such a tease for a non-game-player like me. In fact, I shouldn't even be surprised, since one of my deepest impressions of this whole thing is that it's supposed to be some massive promotional video for the Vesperia game.
Spoiler for The First Strike:
As serenade_beta mentioned, most of the characters, sans Flynn, Yuri, and the captain, were nearly untouched and undeveloped. The several who had "I Am An Important Character!" written across their forehead (e.g. the kid who studies aer, the guild leader's first subordinate, the princess, etc.) were seemingly being withheld from playing a large role in the plot. And sure enough, just from watching the game's OP I realized that they were just cameos in the film, not expected to even meet the main characters yet. Perhaps my biggest gripe in this department though is regarding the advisor dude at the end, who was revealed to be the last boss and then subsequently killed in literally five minutes, with no previous builtup for it whatsoever to boot. It almost felt like it was added to pad time, though now that I think about it, I have a sneaking suspicion that this maliciously researching blastia thing is somehow supposed to foreshadow something in the game as well.
What the movie does give half a rat's arse about doing however, it does it flawlessly. That, of course, includes animation and art (I want to say music too except I can't tell good music better than a toddler can, so orz). Barring the fact that concepts such as pissed-off golems spawning from nowhere don't make sense at all, the fight choreography during action scenes were just plain godly as expected of Production I.G. Going back to the game OP again (for the third time I know I know), the art resemblance between the film and the game was so close that I even got tricked into thinking they were made by the same studio. There's also the matter of the development of Flynn and Yuri - every little action of theirs is clear and natural as per their motivations. Flynn is a strict soldier who always tries to rigidly follow the rules because of his father's cause of death, a behavior finally rectified, or at least mitigated, by the realization that his father actually did the right thing. Yuri is a carefree guy who doesn't know responsibility until he observed the woe of the villagers, was forced to kill Repede's dad, and had to take care of Repede. For a prequel, I think the way the film handled these two boys really couldn't be better.
Either way, in the end The First Strike was still a very enjoyable movie for me so I'd gladly give it a 8.6/10. Now if only the entire Vesperia gets the OVA treatment like Symphonia did somewhere in the near future....
