Koukaku no Regios

In a post-apocalyptic world overrun with mutated beasts called Limbeekoon or Filth Monsters, humanity is forced to live in large mobile cities called Regios and learn to use special weapons called Dite, by harnessing the power of Kei to defend themselves. In the Academy City of Zuellni, Layfon Alseif is hoping to start a new life and forget his past. However, his past has caught the attention of Karian Loss, the manipulative Student Council President and Nina Antalk, a Military Arts student and Captain of the 17th Military Arts Platoon, who instantly recognizes his abilities and decides he’s the perfect candidate to join her group. However, with a secret past that won’t leave him alone and unknown powers beyond normal, Layfon just might not take it.

Loss, Felli Main

Nakahara, Mai Japanese

Alseif, Layfon Main

Okamoto, Nobuhiko Japanese

Antalk, Nina Main

Takagaki, Ayahi Japanese

Elipton, Sharnid Main

Taniyama, Kishou Japanese

Marfes, Leerin Main

Takahashi, Mikako Japanese

Sutton, Harley Main

Sakaguchi, Daisuke Japanese

Luckens, Savaris Supporting

Suwabe, Junichi Japanese

Almonis, Alcheilla Supporting

Watanabe, Akeno Japanese

Gerni, Naruki Supporting

Ono, Fuyuka Japanese

Zuellni Supporting

Cook, Justin Producer

Takechi, Tsuneo Producer

Okamoto, Atsuyuki Producer

Suzuki, Tomoko Producer

Reviews

Jun 7, 2020

Tactician

Recommended

Chrome Shelled Regios is set in a world where cities are mobile. What makes them move are spirits. The spirits are often free to wander as they see fit and various things can happen based on what a city comes across in its travels. It could be another city, or a horde of monsters. The city at the center of the story is Zuellni.

The main character in all of this is Layfon. He has a bit of a troubled past and has left his original home looking to start fresh. He himself was hoping to leave the military behind which is why he came to ... Zuellni, a city that focuses more on growth through education and general knowledge rather than military prowess.

Layfon being a very gifted person in the field of military arts combined with his experiences growing up giving him various abilities like cooking, and being able to express himself pretty well compared to his fellow cast in his age group as well as a few other things lead to some unforeseen things.

The show itself actually has a few good characters in it and although Layfon is undeniably the center of attention there are some very strong supporting characters as well. I'll touch on the two I think did the most growing through the show. Nina goes through her own major trials but also has her strength in leading which Layfon admitted himself he is terrible at. Felli just has a lot going on...She's very shy and has trouble with her emotions. The show explains the reasons for that but she and Layfon clash on things because of the difference in viewpoints between them in the beginning.

Ultimately both Nina and Felli admire Layfon for what he has that they lack. Sometimes admiration can lead to attraction. This combined with May and her reason for admiring Layfon can make this show seem like a closet Harem but I really disliked when I saw that term thrown around before I decided to re-watch this recently. It really isn't like traditional Harem out there.

This show for me is amazing. While the setting is not so unique, because there are a ton of humans trying to survive in a monster ridden world plots... The characters and story around the civilization as well as the small complexities that are woven into them are great.

P.S.:
I thought much like my Hellsing re-watch that I'd overrated this show but I think even my novice self from back in 2010 when I first watched it got this one right. I'm sure not everyone will think this is 10 worthy but really this is one of those gems that I think deserves more eyes on it. It really saddens me to think that this one won't ever be continued. I really would like to get my hands on the visual novel to finish this...

Reviewer’s Rating: 10

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Oct 5, 2022

hexashadow13

Mixed Feelings

tl;dr: An anime where there’s potential in a lot of areas, but it doesn’t quite use it well.

Chrome Shelled Regios has a really interesting setting, wherein moving cities traverse an endless desolate plane full of monsters that could destroy them at any time. Despite that, within the cities themselves things proceed in a manner that is pretty relaxed. The majority of the anime is centered around a high school military training program where things proceed in a pretty typical battle academy format with battles between different teams within the school and occasional threats from outside. However, as the series progresses, the world building turned out ... to be a lot more complicated than I expected, and though a lot was left incredibly nebulous, what was there was still incredibly interesting.

I will note that I hate how a certain aspect of the world building was handled. Throughout the series there are random scenes in English that feel like they’re completely unrelated as they feature different characters in a complete different setting with a somewhat different art style. They also make very little sense. Ultimately they turn out to be pretty important to the plot, though as of the end of the season a lot is still left really ambiguous. The problem with them, is that it felt like they were randomly inserted at the worst times and completely threw off the sense of flow whenever they appeared. It would have been fine if they were always thrown in at the beginning or end, but it felt like they were inserted in the middle so as to be as annoying as possible.

The character’s felt like they had a lot of depth to them. Character arcs were more complex than I expected, and though that can feel like a drag at times because the progression isn’t strictly forward, with there being tangents and backtracking at times, ultimately most felt like they had good substance to them. The problem though, was that it didn’t feel like it was fleshing the development of characters enough, and because these aren’t straight forward character arcs that resulted in them feeling like they were moving in very haphazard manner at times. The same applies to the romantic development. There was definitely some interesting relationship development, and how it played into character development was also conceptually really good with some great moments, but in implementation it simply wasn’t fleshed out well enough, and thus largely wasn’t able to have as much of an impact as it could. The end result of this is that though there moments with characters that I liked a lot, it was hard to get attached to most of the cast, and really the only character I would say I really liked was Felli.

The plot was pretty good and in the end due to the world building I was incredibly interested in where it would go. However, the pacing was very bizarre at times. The parts that were lighthearted were handled pretty well as they were more character focused and had good comedy. The heavier portions on the other hand didn’t fair as well. During these segments it felt like it was spending too much time focusing explicitly on the characters and not enough on the plot and action. This is bad for two reasons. Spending too much time on the characters without providing enough substance to fill that time just results in dragging scenes on for longer than they need to be, which just results in things feeling over dramatic and not really adding anything of value, which results in the bizarre situation that characters get too much time spent on them despite them not feeling fleshed out enough. And furthermore, as a result the action and plot don’t have enough time to breath and feel like they’re rushed, often resulting in major events not having enough time which results in them feeling pretty anti-climatic and the action not being all that satisfying despite it logically feeling like it has all the elements of great fights. This is especially true in regards to the final episode which felt overtly rushed to the point it had almost no impact despite the plot itself feeling like a really strong point to end on.

The art and animation were okay, but not all that impressive. The art style I don’t dislike, but I can’t say I’m fond of it either. The same applies to the character designs, wherein I don’t really hate them, but I don’t really like most of them either outside of some side characters. The soundtrack I wasn’t all that fond of and I felt like it was weirdly distracting at times. The OP and EDs I thought had decent enough visuals, though the songs weren’t all that great.

Reviewer’s Rating: 7

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May 26, 2023

BladesArisen

Not Recommended

Chrome Shelled Regios
TV, 24 episodes, dubbed
Completed April 2023
Not recommended


>>>>>Well, Chrome Shelled Regios is certainly memorable, that’s for sure. Being memorable isn’t always a good thing, however, as this anime will certainly teach you.
>>>>>Is it sci-fi? Is it fantasy? Is it... Magic or future tech or what? In fact, what is even happening?

Such are the questions that every viewer of this anime will be asking before the end. Oh boy; this is gonna be a long one.
...

VISUALS [ 6 / 10 ]

>>>>>Regios certainly has a look, that’s for sure. Other than some excellently done character expressions and visual gags, however, there isn’t much separating this anime from everything else of the same era. The main strength of this production was clearly the background artists’ ability to portray really good, grounded atmosphere in certain shots and occasionally, even full episodes. There are plenty of genuinely beautiful locales on display in this anime.
>>>>>The issues arise as soon as screenplay or direction come into play, and wholly crap are there a lot of them. This production supposedly had three directors, which is hard to believe given the extreme lack of good direction seen anywhere in this anime. Most episodes are decidedly watchable, at least, albeit with extremely sporadic, borderline manic pacing and an almost comical lack of transitions between scenes or any kind of proper continuity.
>>>>>Fights range from tolerably average to disappointingly stiff and lackluster. Occasionally something might be animated for more than a couple frames, but don’t expect too much. Actual direction for these fights is almost universally mediocre, which is the real let down here, given this is a shounen anime. At the very least most characters are kept on-model and most individual scenes are at least watchable, which is better than can be said of many other dime-a-dozen light novel adaptations.

SOUND [ 8 / 10 ]

>>>>>Someone on this production was super passionate about Chrome Shelled Regios, which the viewer can immediately identify by this anime’s banger soundtrack. A bunch of superfans even got together and formed a band just for this anime adaptation, cosplay and all.
>>>>>Techno, EDM and softer electronica tracks are all heavily featured in this show, with the hyper-energetic action tracks being the most memorable. That’s not to say the OST is perfect by any means; there are a couple odd-sounding tracks meant to build suspense that have odd composition and just sound kinda weird.
>>>>>The already competent OST is backed by a surprisingly good dub that fits the show perfectly. I don’t recall hardly any of the classic bad english side character voice overs sometimes heard in older anime. There were a couple hiccups in the script here and there, mainly during the genre-standard arguments over ideologies that occurred in the middle of fight scenes. Overall the sound is solidly done.

SETTING AND PLOT [ 3 / 10 ]

>>>>>Welcome back to Generic Not-Really-Magical-City, Japan; specifically, Generic Somewhat-Magical-Academy, yaaaaay. I just cannot contain my bloody excitement. Somehow, the madman that wrote this setting managed to make it a Mad Max apocalypse as well, just because? That’s one way to do post-apocalyptic world building, but I can’t say I approve.
>>>>>A lot of the issues come from the adaptation itself, which clearly lacks a strong sense of direction from the studio. There are a few areas featured in the anime that could not physically fit inside the Regios cities that supposedly contain them under a big dome forcefield... thing. With Regios in the title, the viewer expects a reasonable amount of emphasis placed on said giant moving cities. Unfortunately, the various Regios, especially the titular Zuellni are consistently off-model, to the point where it’s impossible to tell what on-model is even supposed to be.
>>>>>The plot is too complex for the viewer to turn their brain off, so that’s no defense here; as if it ever was. This results in many, many minor plotholes opening up as the story progresses, of the open-ended variety. The viewer, whether they wanted to or not, will be forced to ask several obvious questions, such as ‘Why guns?’ ‘Why cernium mines?’ ‘Why is humanity even still alive with these ridiculous giant death laser bugs running around everywhere?’ ‘Why are there these random, short film noir scenes randomly thrown into every episode?’ And so on.
>>>>>Those questions are never answered, and the few that are tend to just open up even more plotholes. The viewer, if they’re paying attention and not completely numb from the millions of subplots being thrown around, will quickly realize they’ve already put more thought into the worldbuilding than the actual author probably did; and certainly far more than the production team did.
>>>>>The plot itself fares no better; far worse, in fact. The plot and its numerous surrounding subplots are a mess, in the most overcomplicated way imaginable. Regios is the anime I coined the term ‘deepest darkest web of light novel conspiracies’ from, if that gives any indication. Basically, there are too many subplots all happening at once and all competing for screen time and the viewers’ attention. Presumably the dense web of plotlines was written to be deep and engaging; in reality it’s like the messiest of Piccaso paintings. Even after doing my best to pay close attention, I still could not explain any of these ridiculously convoluted subplots.
>>>>>The main plot, if it even qualifies, is the typical Shounen anime style only worse. Story arcs just happen; they could be almost completely rearranged and the viewer probably wouldn’t notice. Much like the direction, there is very little tying the narrative as a whole together. The whole thing is loose, conceptual, and in desperate need of a concerned friend to talk the author out of doing quite so many drugs before writing his stories. Like most anime adaptations, the issues with the narrative should have been ironed out by the production team. Sometimes faithful adaptations aren’t the best idea; especially when excessively complex, directionless narratives are involved.

CHARACTERS [ 6 / 10 ]

>>>>>Regios has a huge cast, most of which never get proper introductions, much less any actual screen time. The early episodes of the anime are particularly guilty of barraging the viewer with unimportant, nameless side characters; to the point where they’re ‘non-introductions’ more than anything. The author certainly is not talentless, but most certainly wrote a cast far too ambitiously complex for his own good. In both the light novels and the anime itself, having such a huge cast serves no purpose but to confuse and often outright lose the viewer.

>>>>>There’s a major recurring problem in Regios; specifically with the way the narrative handles character development. Most characters at least develop, thankfully. Unfortunately it’s in a rather stiff and lopsided manner. Essentially only certain characters are given the spotlight while the rest of the cast goes completely static and becomes unchanging. The selected characters then experience all their development, all at once, and then get put on the back burner when the time comes for another character to develop instead. After Regios pulls this a few times it becomes obvious this is the only way any characters are written and the only way the author, studio, or both knew how to handle character development.
>>>>>The anime portrays it’s main cast well, on occasion anyway, which is probably the entire script’s only redeeming quality. Character interactions not centered around the protagonist are often surprisingly interesting. Miscellaneous gags, jokes and other forms of lighthearted anime nonsense are extremely hit or miss, so it is highly doubtful that every scene will be enjoyable, regardless of the viewer’s preferences. Regardless, an effort was made to flesh out the main cast and give them some actual personalities.
>>>>>Broadly speaking, characters are written fairly well, although not always with much depth. Nina, who takes on both leadership and action girl roles, was decent but ultimately felt like a wasted opportunity due to her very limited character development. Sharneid had the aforementioned lopsided character development, and so ends up in more or less the same situation as Nina; he was entertaining, decently interesting, but lacked proper development for most of the show. Speaking of the show; Felli steals it; the entire thing. I’m kidding of course, but she was incredibly amusing, endearing and easily earned best girl status by the end. She also had the strongest chemistry with Layfon and was the only girl that really felt like a proper girlfriend for him; you’ll understand what I mean if you actually watch their scenes together. Ah yes, and Harley; he got completely shafted in this adaptation. He’s supposed to be the heartfelt, gentle member of the squad but ultimately got like three scenes in the whole damn show; a shame, truly.
>>>>>It would take far too long to dig into the supporting cast, so just be aware that most side characters are either cliche, completely lack development, or both. Supporting characters are a major weakness of both the original novels and the anime adaptation.

>>>>>Layfon Alseif; if you are a named character and have a womb: congratulations, it now belongs to him. Please do not resist. In all seriousness, this is another anime that does the weird insta-harem thing. Main guy Layfon somehow has a harem going by the end of the first episode, for no real reason at all. Later on in the plot this actually causes issues with his character, since it makes no sense for him to be stringing all these women along; that's probably the worst thing about the characterization, surprisingly.
>>>>>Layfon’s character is full of little inconsistencies. In much the same way as many other generic shounen leads, Layfon constantly betrays his own morals and even motivations in order to serve as a self-insert for the viewer in addition to fulfilling his role, somewhat awkwardly, as the main character. He’s regularly dragged around by one or more of the female cast members, serving as both masculine protector and meek, easily manipulated boyfriend. Obviously this quickly wears on the viewer; especially if said viewer is bothered by weak willed protagonists. The problem with all of this is Layfon himself; he legitimately is a surprisingly deep and well-written character when he’s not being used as a surrogate for the audience. Layfon is too much of a distinct individual to work well as a self-insert, which puts him in an incredibly awkward, often questionable position in the narrative. Sadly Regios can’t help but constantly employ generic light novel tropes. The writing would be far better if the dumb anime bullshit was simply left behind; it’s clear that the author could have written his novels without using tropes as a crutch.

>>>>>None of this does any favors for the anime but at least the cast is likable for the most part, aside from the confusing, unexplained side characters that are mostly used as walking plot devices. Best to quit while you’re ahead when it comes to the characters in Regios; and by that I mean immediately tune out any weird unexplained nonsense or else risk giving yourself an aneurysm. Go read the source material if you’re crazy enough to try and decipher any of the aforementioned deepest darkest web.

PACING AND PRODUCTION [ 2 / 10 ]

>>>>>Where does one begin when breaking down one of the strangest, most poorly handled anime adaptations imaginable? After twenty-four episodes of sporadic, unhinged, messy direction, the viewer starts to forget what competence really looks like in stark contrast to the broken down nightmare of an anime this really is.
>>>>>From the beginning, poor transitions tear up what little continuity may have existed. Regios is one of those anime where the viewer can never tell how much time has passed, or even where locations are in relation to each other. The subtle confusion that slowly builds up over time is largely drowned out by the absolutely ridiculous flashback scenes that plague nearly every episode, hammering the viewer with almost entirely useless information that only worsens the confusing viewing experience. Even when flashbacks make sense they are placed terribly in the episode, crammed in wherever the directors thought they could get away with it.
>>>>>The issue only compounds when a second variety of even worse flashback begins rearing its ugly head, in the form of the film noir segments thrown in seemingly completely at random, absolutely slaughtering the pacing and then handing out little pieces of main timeline, recent flashback and ancient history flashback, sometimes with absolutely zero regard to continuity, clarity, or any other basic form of scene transition that’s supposed to be figured out in the storyboarding phase of the production; long before a single frame gets animated, in other words.
>>>>>No one can deny that the Chrome Shelled Regios anime has personality; the personality of a drunk old guy spouting out random nonsense in between fits of clarity. I’ve read tax forms that made more sense than most of the decisions the studio made for this adaptation. At one point there was even a bizarre sort-of lampshading gag, where the characters were apparently watching the film noir flashback scene on a weird pre-paid tv and were ‘wanting to see what happens next’ in exactly the same way the viewer does every single time one of those short scenes is randomly thrown into an episode. All the viewer can do is helplessly shrug the whole dumb scene off and try to figure out where in the main storyline the show is afterwards; it’s so bad it’s kind-of embarrassing.
>>>>>Obviously, with so much extra nonsense thrown in there’s no way in hell the anime needed a full twenty-four episodes to get through the modest amount of the main storyline that actually got adapted here. Honestly, that’s one of the worst parts about this production: it has no respect for your time or attention. The whole bloody production just feels so self-indulgent and half-assed, simultaneously. The viewer can be presented with a beautiful, painted background of a quiet street or a train car at night, only to be hit with an extremely scuffed action scene moments later.
>>>>>Sitting down after a few days and watching some properly directed, well-animated anime really made me realize just how messy this production really was. Things just happen in Regios; there’s no explanation, no build-up, no payoff, and absolutely zero thought put into the direction of most scenes. When a hit lands during a fight, it just does; at no point can the viewer tell who is winning or why; only that somebody probably is and if Layfon is involved he’s probably the one doing the winning. It’s exactly the kind of lazy fight choreography that drives action junkies like myself completely ballistic. A weapon gets knocked out of someone’s hand and in the next scene they’ve apparently fought off their opponent and retrieved it; entirely offscreen. I really wish I could sit those three incompetent directors down and show them what good fight scenes actually look like.

>>>>>If not for episodes eight through ten, this production would be entirely appalling. At least the viewer gets treated to one decent story arc of Chrome Shelled Regios. Unsurprisingly, that particular arc is completely different from the rest of the show; it’s almost devoid of all the major direction errors, so the viewer actually gets treated to some good dialogue scenes and interesting locales. The handful of good episodes really put the rest of the production into perspective, and more importantly prove that the studio genuinely could have done a lot better.


OVERALL [ 5 / 10 ]
- Good visuals hide a dark secret: the plot is absolutely terrible.
- Has an encyclopedia's worth of side stories that contribute nothing to the plot.
- The plot is difficult to follow even for attentive viewers.
- Worldbuilding is bare bones.
- Almost nothing is explained in any capacity.
- Incredibly messy, hectic script with zero regard for continuity.
- Terrible direction overall.
- Abysmal, chaotic, almost intolerably bad pacing.
- Unimpressive fights.
- Decent main cast of characters.
- Inconsistent characterization.
- Excellent english dub.
- Banger OST.
- Far too many side characters.
- One of the weirdest anime ever to exist; for better or worse.

For recommendations, look to Crest of the Stars for sci-fi with excellent world building and characters, Fate/Zero if you’re interested in fantasy anime with a crazy twisting narrative, and Heroic Age for a solidly written sci-fi with a complex and fascinating world and plot.
Pretty much any anime with complex, intricate writing will entertain fans of Regios. It can be difficult to differentiate between sci-fi anime, however, so I will tag all the sci-fi I’ve seen on my list and wish you good luck from there, as always.

Reviewer’s Rating: 5

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