The Mass Diver epidemic has reached critical status and
now threatens to begin tearing down all of Gunpla Battle Nexus Online. In response, Kyoya and Rommel announce the
formation of a special Coalition specifically tasked with ending this threat to
GBN once and for all, and they want Team Build Divers to join them. It’s all out war with the very fate of GBN as
dozens of players both old and new face off against a nearly invincible
enemy. Riku heads right into the heart
of the battle, unaware that one of this closest teammates is hiding a dangerous
secret that could destroy their efforts to save GBN. Will Ayame’s secret destroy the Build Divers
just as they’re coming together?
For all the fun being had, it was only a matter of time
before Gundam Build Divers decided to get serious about the Mass Diver plague
sweeping GBN.
And while it never got
full on dour like a more traditional Gundam series, Build Divers still had its
fair share of emotionally gut punching moments but also an equal amount of
tremendous heart to push through this epic battle.
This set also showed some of the most glaring
and infuriating flaws in the series to date but they haven’t taken away my
complete enjoyment of Riku and Team Build Divers’ adventures.
This is basically the mid point of the show
so lets get into it shall we?
The prelude to the big showdown with the Mass Divers came
in a long awaited rematch between Riku and the two brothers he and Yuki clashed
with in their first couple of visits to GBN: Ogre and Doji.
Ogre is an interesting mix of charicatures
from G Gundam and Gundam 00, in that he has the battle hungry heart of a Gundam
Fighter and is borderline fixated on it to the point of an insastiable fetish
like Graham Acker (though he’s much more likeable).
He’s a good first rival for Riku and seeing
the two of them square off after Riku’s had time to level up was great.
Sadly, their duel was interrupted thanks to
Doji using a Break Decal to try and defeat Riku, who had soundly defeated him
in their first battle. We’ve seen instances of Players using Break Decals in
order to secure their standing in teams or level up quickly and some have realized
that they don’t know what kind of deadly tech theyre dealing with.
They can be sympathetic but I didn’t feel
that for Doji at all.
When we first met
him, he was bullying new players and trying to play it off to his big bro.
We haven’t spent anymore time with Doji
outside of sparce appearances and while we got some of his character
motivations in this episode, I just cant bring myself to feel bad for a player
abusing cheater.
Honestly, if it weren’t
for the fact that he’s his younger brother, Ogre might’ve kicked Doji out of
his Force altogether.
But for now, Ogre
conceded to Riku and put his Force on self imposed exile for the time
being.
Way to ruin it for everyone Doji
but props to Ogre for taking responsibility for his teammate/brothers despicable
performance.
Next, we got to meet someone who’s definitely my least
favorite character in the show so far: The Game Master.
In a scene that really lit a fire in me, we
saw Kyoya speak directly with the GM about the Mass Diver outbreak and why the
powers that be in GBN aren’t doing anything about it.
According to the GM…it’s because of a lack of
evidence.
FRAKING WHAT?!!! Even if Break
Decals can delete their data when destroyed and make it look like they never
existed, there’s still a crap ton of visual footage showing them in use by
other players and its creating clear game breaking glitches that are getting
increasingly worse.
And yet the GM and
Administration are like “eh not enough evidence”.
Yeah screw them, screw the GM, and that was
kind of Kyoya’s reaction too.
I don’t
care if the GM takes the form of an SD Jegan from Char’s Counterattack and F91,
and gives Kyoya a slight hand in the final battle.
He still let this mess carry on because, at
the end of the day, he’s too freaking lazy to do his job…I’d make a joke about
current video game developers…but I wont.
Anyway, with that rant done, Kyoya brought together a
coalition of Forces for a massive counterattack against the Mass Divers,
including all of the Veteran Players, the Build Divers and…the IRON MASKS…ok so
they didn’t do much but it was still so cool to see a team comprised of mask
wearing Char clones including Char Aznable, Rau Le Cruset from Gundam Seed,
Harry Ord from Turn A Gundam, Zechs Merquise from Gundam wing and Cazzaro Ronah
from F91, ironically his character is who the group is named after.
This led to what Gundam always does best:
super huge battle sequence in space and Build Divers did not disappoint.
You had tons of Gunpla smashing against one
another, regenerating enemies, even a Big Zam as the Final Boss of the entire
fight.
This might be a kids centric show
but it’s still Gundam and Build Divers hasn’t forgotten how to give us large
scale action sequences with a lot at stake.
Speaking of, Ayame.
Oh man, as a guy who has been part of gaming teams that have fallen
apart for various reasons, I sympathize with the cute Ninja girls
backstory.
Apparently, she was working
with the still unnamed Mastermind behind the Mass Divers in order to get back a
precious treasure that belonged to her all SD Gundam Force.
As I said, the finale dialed up the emotional
factor for two major sequences.
Seeing
Ayame’s crew rise through the ranks having fun, only to suffer such a meteoric
fall it destroys the teams morale and sends them their separate ways was
heartbreaking.
But on the opposite end, even
after all the hurt Ayame’s brought and suffered, Riku’s still willing to give
her a home to come back to in GBN and be there to shoulder her pain along with
her.
Plus you had Kyoya keeping the
fighting spirit alive with the Coalition, even with the odds so heavily stacked
against them was so great.
And nothing
beats the gorgeous visual of the 00 Diver Ace pulling out V2 Gundam Wings of
Light to inspire GBN to never give up.
This show has been heavy on the power of friendship and hope and it’s
kind of refreshing to see in a franchise that goes super hard on the “war is
hell” metaphor.
But as I say frequently,
this aint normal Gundam, so it’s ok to hope without witnessing a couple of
genocides.
Damn this show has so much
heart…I’m not crying, youre crying
The only other part where this mid series finale suffered
was the Mastermind.
We don’t have a name
and his motivation is beyond generic, in fact it isn’t even given a proper
explanation.
All we get is some whiny
troll who hates how sunny and happy GBN is and he keeps calling it a sham of a
world.
Whatever terrible experience he
had to drive him to this level of crazy is still unknown.
But we’ve seen lost players get brought back
to the light through people like Riku.
Is the real solution to this guys hangups just giving him a hug?
Either way, even though this entire storyline
could have wrapped the series altogether at just 12 episodes, we don’t get any
resolution for the Mastermind.
So is the
Mass Diver struggle really over if he’s still out there and could potentially
cause more problems?
Whatever happens,
there’s got to be more to this guy than “WAH WAH WAH I’M GONNA KEEP CRYING AND
BREAKING THE GAME UNTIL I FEEL BETTER”.
And yeah, I think that just about covers the conclusion
of the first half of Gundam Build Divers.
Like I said, this all could have been a mostly solid ending were the
show to stop here.
But now that the Mass
Divers are done, what now?
Well, to
quote Eric Cartman from the World of Warcraft episode of South Park, “What do
you mean?
Now we get to play the
game.”
Still, we’re far from done with
GBN as we head into the second half of Gundam Build Divers, starting Next
Monday right here at the Gundam Anime Corner.
No comments:
Post a Comment