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I was planning to watch Darwin's Game and I accidentally got into this anime, Ousama Game The Animation. When I realised, I checked the MAL for the score, and understood within 3 episodes why the score for this anime is just ~5.

Our MC -- Nobuaki Kanazawa transferred to a new school in the first episode. He shunned his classmates' warm welcoming because of his dark past -- he was a survivor of the King's Game in his previous school. Despite the apparently "traumatic experience" he had, he eventually warmed up to his new classmates in the sports festival. All was peaceful, until the text ... of a new King's Game started. Suddenly he becomes a saint who wants to save everyone, because "I carry the guilt of my dead ex-classmates therefore I gotta prevent this batch of classmates from dying." Oh and spoiler -- they all die anyways!

The whole anime was very chuunibyou-like, there's just a lot of screaming and the emotional tension are all quite high. It was too much. First 3 episodes had a lot of flashbacks to the first game our MC experienced. If not for the AWC challenge, I would have quitted due to the 3-episode rule. But it was better after I stayed.

The second game was much more brutal. We have a psycho -- Honda Natsuko who's representing the evil in the game. The one who claims she's "pushing everyone to the limit" and the sole reason why all of the classmates were dropping like flies. She took it personally in her hands to eliminate her opponents so that she could survive. I will not be getting philosophical and criticise what she have done, since she was written that way to push the storyline and I do not like to bring real-world standards into a fictional work. There was that one episode where they sat in a circle, deciding amongst themselves whether to break their fingers or not. This episode was utterly useless. I really couldn't understand the thought process of that one character.

Teruaki Nagata talked everyone into "ganging up" on Natsuko, or in Nobuaki words after, "show her how they could work together to beat the game". He broke all his fingers -- giving up his dream of becoming a stylist to pin 4 negative points on Natsuko. Yet Natsuko, being the psycho, couldn't break her fingers to save herself, and pinned her hope on her BFF, Murazawa Aimi instead. Very un-psycho like, but we can classify it as selfish. Aimi asked Teruaki to give her a negative point, in hopes to hear from the psycho that they are friends...? And even seeing Natsuko selfish statements of not even trying to break her finger to save "her BFF", Aimi half-agreed to let her live. Why the half, you asked. Natsuko just pinned her onto the grasspatch and smash 4 of her fingers to save herself. And then proceeded to breaking that one last finger to save Aimi, "to return the favour". Again, no words about how Natsuko act, but Aimi basically used Teruaki's fingers to prove their sisterly-bond, which I couldn't understand. Why, since Teruaki gonna break 4 of his fingers, might as well take the last one too? The game was supposed to take out the psycho but in the end the psycho has an extra lifeline (Aimi) to make sure she does not die.

After gaining experience from the first King's game, Nobuaki went to the village where the first King's game was held. The village had Honda's family, Chiemi (Nobuaki's dead GF) and Natsuko (the psycho) and their Dad, who committed suicide as an apology. There were questions whether Honda's Dad was also involved in the King's Game. My guess is he was -- and he was the winner of the game. There was a diary found in the village mentioning that a single alphabet appears every time a participant dies, which may be a clue to winning this sick game. In the very last episode, the psycho and ojou (Riona) pieced the words together and points to Bad ending, the only ending of this game, if there is a survivor the virus is carried on by them and the game will continue until all of humanity is destroyed. So recap, what is the one trait of our MC? A saint. And what happens to when the MC has literally no trait except for "being kind" and "self-sacrificial"? Yeah, everyone dies.

So happy ending all right? Humanity is saved? No. The game continues.
Until literally, no humanity is left in the world.

Overall, the anime had two characters of the extreme ends -- Nobuaki the extreme good, and Natsuko the extreme bad. Usually survival plots really wind up with characters siding the bad more than the good, because they live. What for to sacrifice themselves for "the greater good"? Ousama is the unusual storyline. Many, nearing the end of the series, started to sacrifice for others to live. Mainly for the Nobuaki though, for reasons like love or hope. There were a lot of high emotional parts, which didn't speak to me. And because of the constant shouting, my rating for this anime just drops as the episodes proceeds. This shouting gradually reduced over time, but because we started from a high emotional point, you wouldn't feel attachment to any characters. Not for me, anyways. They arranged an episode for Nobuaki to go to the village, finding a clue that was already shown previously, but not explaining why it started in the first place. Nothing was explained about Dad of Honda Chiemi's and Natsuko's. Useless, unfathomable scenes. Weird ways of killing a character. And you wished everything ended, but the cruel fact that it continues on.

The reason I gave a 3 was solely because the extremes were shown pretty clearly. It spoke gore, and has a storyline, though questionable. I do not understand how charismatic MC was for girls to fall for him left and right, for guys to treat him like a leader, I will classify as the MC's halo. It's a suitable anime if you think you got too much time, personally, I think it won't be worth your time, the you reading this should just go and watch something better. Since you have already clicked in a spoiler review and all.