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What's your own recipe for a good romance anime?

To me it's lovable characters, some comedies, more relationship development with lovey-dovey scenes and less pre-confession stories, and of course sprinkle it with a dash of drama. And to me Golden Time has just sort of nailed them all. This is a short review of the elements which made this anime IMO one of the best romance story ever.

Story (10/10)
First of all, almost 90% of romance animes i already watched were set up in high school and i have no complain or whatsoever that high school setting has a lot of potential for romantic stories that could ... be developed to an after story (i.e after graduation). Golden Time was some kind of novelty to me, because at last I found a romance anime that isn’t started and set up at high school. The story felt fresh like nothing I’ve seen before, no fragile school kids, no uniforms, no boring school festivals, no rubbish shoujo-ish kind of story, just one guy fell in love with a girl, confessed, lovey-dovey relationship, drama, solved, happily ever after, as simple as that.

Character (9,5/10)
This anime has one of the best written characters I’ve ever seen in the anime world. There’s only one character who’s annoying as hell, the “Ghost Banri". Other than him they’re all likeable characters.
Kaga Kouko – Yes, she’s the kind of “ojou-sama” here, a bit yandere-ish, obsessive, clingy, and insecure. But behind all that characters she’s a very loyal girl, dedicated to the person she loves, cheerful, straightforward, and down to earth as well. IRL I’d definitely choose a girl like her over a passive or tsundere-ish one.
Tada Banri – Yes, the MC who suffered from amnesia looked like a fragile guy, but no, he’s a very brave, very loyal, tolerant, and caring guy indeed. The relationship between him and Kouko is sometimes cheesy, but yet just a lot of fun and satisfying. This proved that the 2 of them are really a good match. If it wasn’t because of his amnesia and the “Ghost Banri” he would’ve been my absolute favorite romance MC ever.
The side characters are also great, especially 2D-kun who’s without a doubt the real MVP of this anime, Nana-senpai the best senpai and neighbor I’ve ever seen, and the 2nd main girl Linda, which I don’t hate despite being the “threat”, because it turns out she isn’t even trying to steal the MC from Kouko, instead she’s being supportive of them despite the fact she still has feelings for him.

Overall (9,8/10)
I wouldn’t say this anime is perfect because it still has a bit of downsides, but as a romance anime this felt really enjoyable and refreshing, definitely the best one I’ve ever watched. There are so many emotions you can get, heartwarming, cuteness, laugh, sadness, friendship, happiness, cheesiness, all of them are there. Everytime I’m bored with animes with same kind of plots and settings I always rewatch Golden Time because it is one of a kind, and everytime i did rewatch it, i always got hit by all the feels this anime delivers from the beginning until the end. If you’re a romance fan who’s looking for something different in a romance anime, look no further.

Oh, and the only complaint I have for this anime :

WHY TF DO PEOPLE IN THIS ANIME LIKE TO TALK IN A PITCH-DARK ROOM?!

So, at last the long story of one of the most gullible female MC in the world, Nogizaka Haruka, has meet its end. It wasn't indeed a smooth journey and as a romcom fan i rather like this anime, but of course there are still flaws.

The anime overall (Season 1 up to the end) was what i can say a downfall. Season 1 started very promising. The male MC was not as dense as i thought and Haruka was, despite her denseness, indeed very lovable as a character. There were lots of cute moments between the 2 and even with the absence of ... love confession from either of them i find their relationship already satisfying enough. Well of course to keep the relationship moves on either one of them has to confess their feeling, which i thought would happen in season 2. But no, season 2 got even more dragged along with lovey dovey moments from the 2 and with an addition of dramas and cliches at the end of it i wasn't sure that this anime is as good as it was in the first season anymore. Season 3 got us finally a conclusion, but again the cliches added to it was even worse than season 2 and i could almost feel cringe just like when i watched rubbish shoujo animes. And in at the last episode i was just like "Thats it? I watched all those seasons only for this one f*cking scene?", it was rather unsatisfying because i thought there would be at least a bit more after story development.

Overall this anime's recipe was pretty outdated for a romcom, but i still pretty much enjoyed it. The comedic and cute moments were all there. If it wasn't get dragged along too much with all those cliches it would've been a very good romcom anime series. 6/10

This is a review from someone who currently following Domestic Girlfriend (DG), it may also contained MINOR SPOILERS and COMPARISONS with DG


Story and Enjoyment (5/10)
Let's begin with the story. GE is a predecessor of DG which written by the same author, so if you currently reading DG you will definitely have the same feeling as you start reading GE. The story is a rollercoaster of feeling, same as DG, neither what i can say enjoyable nor hateful. In GE it feels really short and a bit rushed, so i'm not really satisfied with the ending. It also feels unrealistic and very predictable compared to DG. ...

Character (3/10)
Yes, this is probably the downside of GE if you compare it to DG. Surprisingly there are no characters in this manga that i could be attached to like in DG.
Seiji : The MC, or you can say the more lame version of Natsuo from DG, is very indecisive and have zero courage to do anything, always depends to other people in his surrounding.
Yuki : The "Rui" of GE, is IMO the least worse character in the manga, until she made a decision to break up with the MC just because of a stupid reason
Shou : The "Hina" of GE. Just for info i love Hina's character in DG, but Shou here is what i can say the "bad version" of Hina. She made a big mistake during the first half of the story and that's why i already knew from the very beginning things wouldn't go to her liking in the story.

Overall (4/10)
It is not the best manga for romance lovers like me, because it feels unrealistic, predictable, and isn't very satisfying in the end. The characters aren't very likeable. The rollercoaster of feeling and dramas are a bit too much for me, same as in DG, but as i said above, neither enjoyable nor hateful. But if you like those kind of things, this is absolutely the ideal manga to read while you're waiting every week for a new DG chapter.

This is probably one of the cutest romcom manga out there.

No drama BS, no stupid cliches, no massively dense character, no school romance, no NTR (so far) just about vanilla romance from day 1 with tons of sweet, cute, comedic, and heartwarming scenes. This is just the perfect manga for all romcom fans like me. Each chapter is just like a complete healing from stressful, lonely everyday life.
One thing i'm worrying is that the story might be going into fantasy-fictional direction in the future so i hope the writers won't ruin the slice of life elements in it.

Overall 8/10 from me so far.

This anime is one of the reason why i prefer romcom to pure romance anime. But since i saw it has good ratings i decided to give it a try.

It started off really bad. 2 MCs who were still in the middle school, timid, emotionally unstable, and hardly even talk to each other. The development was then very slow up until more than half the series where it went a bit better, but still with boring MC characters with the addition of a bit conflicts and dramas. The ending is still sweet though the timeline jump was rather massive.

Overall it's still a boring romance ... anime with a flat character development. 4/10 from me.