½ Prince

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I rated this as a 9 not really because its the best made manga ever but because i enjoy it more than most manga i've read. This is probably my 2nd favorite story. I have only read the ending thorough once so far and really need to re-read those chapters because I struggled getting through them. The premise is much lighter than most of these vr game stories and the 12th night/gender bender comedy is generally kept pretty funny. The characters were charming, and even the antagonists, once we got to know them, were likeable and understandable. Its unusual for many ... stories to turn antagonists into protagonists, so it was very nice to see here. The art isn't amazing. the story isn't ground breaking, but the characters and the story together are just charming and delightful. It made the whole thing a feel good story way better than its peers.

I finally read the whole thing.
NOTE: 1/2 Prince's story changes drastically past Chapter 43.
Be aware that reviews made before Chapter 40 aren't accurate to the story as a whole.
** This review will contain marked spoilers **

1/2 Prince was a manhua I read while the series was first being translated. Back then, only about 35 chapters were out, and I thought the story was a silly, gender-bend romcom with some VR-MMO fantasy/drama elements. I forgot about the story until recently, so I decided to go back and read the whole story to completion now that it's finished.

The main premise of the story (during the first half) ... is indeed still a silly, fun, VR-MMO romantic comedy. The main character, Feng Lan, joins a game called "Second Life" (no relation to the real game by that same name.) Second Life is closer in style to World of Warcraft, and has a Medieval Fantasy MMORPG setting, while touting realistic pain and feeling sensations.

As a bonus for being the first player to log on, Feng Lan gets to cheat the character creation rules. Usually players of this game MUST base their avatar off their real body and real gender. But Feng Lan uses her log-on bonus to alter her in-game gender and become a boy. Thus starts her adventure as Prince, the male elf.

The story then follows Prince's video game adventures, as Prince gains allies (and enemies) by going on quests and doing whatever s/he feels like. The story is targeted to a female audience (bishie boys and BL pandering a-plenty!) and the plot isn't too deep. Events happen and characters appear out of nowhere. New characters will suddenly become blood rivals, or lifelong friends, or enemies, or lovers -- after maybe knowing each other for 5 minutes. You just have to nod and go along with it. But even with this breakneck fast pacing, the story is still enjoyable in its light-hearted, fun ways.

The characters are silly, but fun to watch. I caught myself cheering for some of the romances. At around Chapter 35 I thought the story would focus on Prince becoming a legend in the video game, all while trying to balance his/her social life. Feng Lan keeps running into people she knows from the game in her real life, and has to hide her true identity from them. This drama between Feng Lan's "virtual self" (a beautiful, brash male elf) and her "real self" (just a normal university girl) causes problems with her friendships, and adds drama to her love-triangle romance.

Alas. This is not the direction the story continued to go.

**SPOILERS FOR STORY ENDING BELOW**
** Spoilers end at next asterisk.

Instead of focusing on Prince/Feng Lan's relationships and social life, the story keeps adding TONS of new characters without expanding on any of them. The plot shifts to being about Prince conquering the video game continent (and also having an idol tour somewhere in there?) while ultimately not changing the status quo other than introducing more characters, so these arcs feel like filler.
Then, the author decides to pursue the plot idea of NPCs gaining self-awareness. The entire story changes from silly romantic-comedy, to an Action Sci-Fi Thriller...and not in a good way.
The romantic subplot is ignored in favor of an NPC Invasion where the game itself gains sentience. The story tries to make some broad statements about robotic awareness, and then forces everyone out of the game, where the plot then continues in the futuristic sci-fi reality. In real life, Feng Lan and her friends must now hunt down a terrorist who hacked the game. The terrorist is trying to merge with one of the game's sentient NPCs to give himself immortality since he's dying of a terminal illness. Said terrorist literally holds the government hostage during all this and sets of a nuke (with thousands of casualties) and no one really is bothered by this nuke or talks about it again. Feng Lan and friends, despite being normal civilians who have no right having anything to do with this, chase down the terrorist and have a REAL gunfight battle for the right for Second Life to continue with sentient NPCs still inside it.
Also im pretty sure there was a male pregnancy of virtual children somewhere in there.
I kind of checked out while reading the last few chapters because it made zero sense.

**END OF SPOILERS**

So TL;DR:
Silly gender-bend romcom with some early 2000s humor and values, mostly targeted towards teenage girls and featuring lots of pretty boys. About halfway through completely switches plot directions.

If the premise sounds interesting to you, the first 30 or so chapters are decent reading for fun. For me, the series ended right after Kenshin was introduced. Everything after that felt like someone else wrote it.
3/10 for what could have been.

THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS

So i finally finished 1/2 Prince.

It took an entire day. I would've finished it faster but hot damn it was bad for majority of the series. I liked the characters and the comedy was a hit or miss same with the action but it wasn't completely awful. Than the final fight scene happened and my score went from 5 to 6 because it was actually fun and i enjoyed it. But the series overall was still a lot worse than i expected for something so high fucking rated. But what really pushed me over the edge is when the FMC Impregnated her ... husband. What the actual fuck.... I'm fucking done with this series. But no only 10 chapters left only 2 volumes i can do this. AAAAAAAnd a 15 year old balckmails a 38 year old to marry him and there lovey dovey now.

Fuck this garbage ass manga. 1/10