Back to Ranka-Nyan's Profile Ranka-Nyan's Profile

Shiny colors, probably the least known of idolmaster but actually the best one with the most fleshed out characters.
Developed as a browser idol sim game and released in 2018. Yet thanks to the community it's one of the few iM@S games to be able to play in english via it's fan patched web version.

The series is a stand alone and doesn't need any knowledge of previous iM@S series and can be a good starting point for the franchise. It takes all the aspects of the game and puts them nicely into motion. As an early fan of shiny, I can tell that it's a faithful ... adaptation of the game.
While the previous iM@S entries are more similar to each other and be bright, lively and even dramatic, shiny colors takes quite a different approach and is more laid back, slow and plays like a slice of life series.
The presented agency is smaller and less strict and tries to build newcomer idols. We have a laid back president who basically is kaiba by voice, us as producer and the cute easy-going secretary hazuki.
Unlike million live with 39 idols, we only have 16 idols, which makes it easier to remember the idols by face, voice and personality.
The focus here is more on the units and their interaction between each other and overall more on the daily lives of the idols. This always was the biggest appeal of shiny and combined with the slow progression, the idols are the most fleshed out of the entire franchise.

It may be a 3D CGI animation but the graphics are actually really nice, soft and clean and very faithful to the original design. It still retains a good 2D look. The characters look beautiful and they show unusually lots of small details in their expressions like eye movements, which is nice to see. Environments look good and the lighting often is very beautiful too, especially during sunset scenes or similar ones.
Animation can be sometimes slow with low fps, but with the slow tone, it's fitting and after a while you get used to it. Even with the fps in mind, the concert scenes still look amazing and well done. Here the 3D animation plays out it's pros too with nice close ups, fancy camera movements and good dance mocap, making the entire thing more lively and realistic as watching a real concert.
Overall shiny colors looks even better than million live too, as the film grain in ML was often too heavy, visuals too blurry and it somehow even had visible aliasing around the hair too unlike in shiny.

Story in shiny progresses slowly and it takes some time for things to develop. It's basically a slice of life series with idol as a theme. But it's cute and relaxing and sets up a nice atmosphere and mood in exchange for being slow, giving time for development. Scenes are often deep and thoughtful by the way it's presented, especially if you already know the idols. It sometimes plays out as a drama series as it focuses on the idols emotion. Yet it has less forced drama than the other entries and less annoying characters too, making it more enjoyable and easier to follow and pick a favorite character.

Sound is also good and has a beautiful calm and relaxing ost with slow tones and many piano sounds, fitting for it's slice of life style. Tracks may not be that recognizable and iconic, but they add much emotion and are a good accompany to the scenes and visuals. As for the idol songs, we have different genre for each unit. Ranging from classic idol pop, to more high energy music and even metal. An overall good range, which the game even expands on more. All the unit songs are actually from the game.
While the series has a sweet original opening, it actually lacks on an ending song and mostly uses the various unit songs as off vocal track or a piano outro. This could be because the series originally got a cinema release and rather has a more cinematic tone too. I personally liked the off vocal and piano outros as it gave more meaning and chance of reflecting to the watched scenes while the credits roll. A unique and nice change from the usual setup.

As a fan of iM@S and slice of life, shiny colors was really enjoyable thanks to it's deviation from the usual idol series formular, making it more unique and fresh. It's more calm and laid back, making it easier to jump in and follow and it has a nice touch of other healing series.
Visuals are beautiful and sound is a nice accompany. The characters are cute, individual, recognizable and there are no annoying characters either. While the game may go more in depth with the characters, the anime still represents them how they are in the game and even had various easter eggs from the game.
Overall it may be more of a treat for the already existing fans, but it's still worth for newcomers too, especially if you like slice of life and idols.

The series ratings honestly are unusually low in comparison to the other iM@S entries. It definitely deserves better than that. It could be because of the different setting and expectations though and especially the very different visuals, namely the 3D CGI. Yet shiny sure is a great example of very good 3D CGI animation. Even with that in mind, shiny deserves a watch and I enjoyed every aspect of it, especially as a fan of idolmaster and slice of life series.