BUILD DIVIDE: CODE BLACK

DESCRIPTION

CAST

ANIME ActionBuild Divide: Code White

REVIEWS

• 

  SpiritChaser

  90/100
  An incredible card game anime with a loveable and funny main character. I was surprised how good it was.

  Redemption. Master and teacher. Teacher and student. Finding your path. As banal as that all sounds, Build Divide: Code Black excelled in executing great story telling behind those ideas. Teruto is the loveable and fun main character whom the viewers can't help but constantly laugh at how awkward and funny his mannerisms are. He definitely became my favorite protagonist of the season. Having lost part of his memory and personality, all he can think about is the king and finding his path towards that. As a result, he has lost the ability to function as a normal human, and for whatever reason develops a hilarious obsession with bread as well. Blasted into a digital city, he wakes up and takes up shelter in a tent by a river, battling his way to the top to earn enough chips to fight the King. That's all he knows and strives for, and he could care less for anything else.

  (spoilers ahead) He meets Sakura along the way. A mysterious individual who appears to be partially glitching out of reality at times. She runs into him by fate, and pushes him by guiding the path for him. Though she appears sincere, she has a use for him that he isn't aware about. She is a part of Kikka, Teruto's sister, who, in her desperation to see Teruto, sent her out there to bring him back. The tragedy of Sakura is that she knows she is going to cease to exist and eventually become a part of Kikka again. Realizing this, and being somewhat advised by Ishinome behind the scenes, she ends up realizing to a certain extent what is going to happen. As a result, she stole the chips from Teruto and fought a battle against Kikka she knew she couldn't win I assume because she wanted to fuse back with her before Teruto got to her.

  Naomitsu is the 8th of several clones who is out to get revenge against Mario who happens to be his father. His father is looking for a powerful Build Divide player for a new body to take over, but it's unclear still what he means by wanting to reach a new dimension. Naomitsu wasn't that prominent in season 1, but I expect him and his father to be around a lot in season 2 since there isn't much known about them at the moment.

  Hiyori is an energetic, optimistic, kind, and clumsy girl that meets Teruto and convinces him to become her master. As her student, she hilariously doesn't learn anything from him as he can never commit to actually teaching her anything. For the rest of the season she becomes his cheerleader, until Teruto becomes the sacrifice at the end and passes the torch on to her, as she has now become the main character of season 2, at least assuming based on the reveal. Her character has a lot of room for development and I am sure she'll grow a lot.

  Ishinome is the most interesting character in the series besides Teruto. He wants to achieve his dream, whatever that is, and is often pulling strings behind the scenes. Despite being part of Mario's organization, he has an agenda of his own that Mario doesn't know about. Often, he manipulates the cast and uses his mysterious powers to alter events. As the battles go on, he often reacts to certain things that happen or that people say with either displeasement or amusement. I can't read him at all, and look forward to what he is going to do in the next season.

  The biggest resolve in the series is the redemption of Teruto. He grew up with Kikka, and taught her about Build Divide until she was able to surpass him. Raged with jealousy, he decided to neglect her, steal her cards, and even bury her deck outside. He didn't want to fight the King just to get to the top; ultimately he wanted to apologize for his actions. Kikka had gone mad after being hooked up to a CPU and losing part of herself after making Sakura, but was able to wake up from this after Teruto apologized. In the final battle, Teruto redeems himself and offers himself to save everyone in the end.

  The battles in Build Divide were mostly amazing. There is the rushed battle here and there, but ultimately they can be very epic such as the conclusion of the card professor battle. The directing was top shelf as Teruto and Sakura synchronized their lines, the music climaxes, and the professor gets exploded into a giant ball of chaos. I didn't know anything about the card game at all but this was a decent introduction to the rules and functions that I can somewhat understand as I learn along the episodes. The music is incredible, and does a great job adding mystery or intensity to the battles. The art is great and consistent throughout, and overall I have very little complaints about the series. The staff passionately crafted a beautiful and meaningful story. There is still a huge mystery as the world of Neo Tokyo became corrupted, and I can't wait for the return of this series in the Spring 2022 anime season.

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• 

  teqits

  85/100
  Build-Divide: for what it’s worth, easily my surprise of the season (spoilers ahead)

  Build-Divide: for what it’s worth, easily my surprise of the season (spoilers ahead)

  Build-Divide: Code Black is a tie-in anime for the brand new trading card game of the same name. However, as far as I can tell, the card game has no story, with the anime acting as a "hey watch this and maybe you'll play the real game" type of thing. While this might sound unimpressive (and probably why it isn't all that popular), allow me to convince you to give Build-Divide a shot - it's actually pretty good!

  First and foremost: please, at the very least, watch the opening. This is, very easily, up there for top 5 openings of this season.

  Now I don't know about you all, but I'm a sucker for openings following along with the song's beat, and my god can Egoist deliver.

  As for the card game aspect, I suspect a lot of people are afraid that they'll have to learn how to play or at least understand some moves. Worry not, as the first episode does talk about the basic rules during the first battle but basically sums it up as lose all your lives = loss - every battle afterwards is quite literally just an shonen fight but with cards - the magic of animation. Most of the characters do commentary on their actions, so you can easily forget about having to learn any rules.

  Summary
  Teruto awakens in virtual-like placed called Neo Kyoto, where everyone takes part in Build-Divide - a card game duel that is the main means of earning social and economic standing in this city, but also allows its winners to be granted any wish they want. At the same time, Sakura, another contestant, is introduced, and after bumping into each other, Teruto explains that he only just woke up and has no idea of who or where he is, but only remembers how to play the game. Sakura tells him that battling all the way to the top will allow him to meet the King, the top ranked Build-Divide player and ruler of Neo Kyoto, who might have the answer to his questions. While having forgotten much of his past, Sakura realizes that he is the real deal when it comes to playing Build-Divide and decides to join him for the journey on the path to the King.

  

  In one of the first big twist episodes, Teurto encounters a masked girl at a park who challenges him to a battle, one which he eventually loses. In the process, however, he discovers that this masked girl is not only the King herself, but while gaining some of his memories back, also remembers that this is his sister, Kikka, one who he had long abandoned once she had surpassed him in playing skill and as a part of his family as well: once Kikka beats Teruto, Build-Divide is no longer fun for him, and ignores her attempts to play again until family problems force the two to separate, ultimately breaking Kikka and shaping her to be the King, with her wish being to one day be able to play with her brother once more (while this is just a short summary of Kikka, episode 8 is the main reason why I wanted to write a review – it honestly caught me off guard just how good this episode was).

  

  Some time passes, and Teruto has reached enough chips to face the King. Sakura thanks Teruto for allowing her to join him in reaching the King, only to take the key in the pursuit of her own wish, leaving the gang behind while she goes to battle the King. We learn more about Sakura after this – just like Teruto, she woke up with no recollection of her past. However, it is revealed that Sakura was born from within Kikka, serving as a way for her soul to get closer to Teruto. Sakura is also aware that she can never have her own body – she is confined to always being part of the soul of Kikka herself. As she loses, Sakura accepts her defeat as punishment for betraying him, and with a final farewell, ceases to exist and merges back into Kikka.

  It is then revealed to Teruto that Neo Kyoto is a simulation, with the computational powers of its citizens being used to create a virtual world where they exist. Knowing this, Teruto decides to head back to the virtual world one more time to fight the King and win to rescue his sister. Teruto wins, and the system begins to break down, with Neo Kyoto glitching, pulling Kikka back into place and eventually freeing her, only for Teruto to act as her stand in as he begins to be pulled back into the system, promising to return them all to the world they came from. Neo Kyoto, on the verge of collapsing, is enclosed by a barrier, with Hiyori and one of the higher-ups at Build-Divide awakening outside of Neo Kyoto in the real world, before fading to white and revealing Code White, the name for the next half of the anime.

  

  Plot
  Build-Divide is quite simple, not daring to do anything over the top or super surprising. Yet, the simplicity of this show is also its beauty – while this might seem contradictory, it really is refreshing to see an anime land a great plot without overdoing itself and reaching for different strings to pull. At the same time, natural progression of the plot, including growth as every episode and event passes by, really helps to solidify the idea that this really is just the regular world for them, and once the plot twists are revealed, it simply makes sense in relation to the rest of the plot instead of trying to figure out just how or if there were any hints you might have missed. Speaking for myself, I would have never guessed that Neo Kyoto was a virtual city – it simply seemed like the future where everyone plays Build-Divide. Sakura reveals her past, along with some hints that there might be more to the city, and the curiosity of the truth behind the city grows until it is all revealed by Teruto towards the end – while this process takes about 5 episodes, it all just flows naturally, and while events happen in the meanwhile, Build-Divide keeps you hooked by keeping those ideas in the back of your mind, ultimately rewarding you by solving the questions in your mind at the end. While simplicity is usually treated as a bad thing, Build-Divide handles this in such a great way that is honestly refreshing to see – natural simplicity that serves to keep the viewer engaged yet still reward them with logical twists and turns.

  Characters
  While there aren't many characters, they feel complete - everyone has a role they play, and even though the character set can be pretty easily defined as chill, they all fit in nicely with the story. From Teruto and his stoic behavior in the beginning, slowly realizing more about his past and becoming more aware of his situation along with emotional; Hiyori and her energetic, sometimes clumsy nature; and Sakura acting as a balance between the two, everyone just feels…normal? No one is trying to pretend to be someone they aren’t and are simply friends coming along for the ride and wishing that Teruto’s wish be granted, adding to the rather simplistic yet well-executed nature of most of the anime itself.

  

  Everything Else
  Animation-wise, this one is pretty average. The character design is pretty well done, owning back to the nature of our characters just being regular people. There are certainly scenes that might look unnatural, and there are certainly some faces that just look off. The real star, however, is all the Build-Divide battles: think Black Clover opening animation budget meme. A lot of these battles are surprisingly well animated, with lots of emphasis on the card characters themselves. The soundtrack is well done also, with tracks being both somber in ambient but also upbeat. The world design is quite simple as well, but it all evens out when most of the focus is on the battles itself.

  Overall Thoughts
  While I came in thinking I'd drop this since I can't stand card games at all, it's weird that for an anime made to promote a real trading card game, quite frankly the highlight of this is the story itself, and even if you decide to pick up the card game, this story gets thrown out the window since this is simply an anime original! While I keep repeating this, the simplicity and natural nature of Build-Divide is the star of the show, with the twists the show presents being quite gratifying having experienced a natural flow of the story and the characters themselves. While Teruto is the central star of the anime, seeing the growth of Teruto from being quite stoic to eventually reaching out to save Sakura and sacrifice himself for the sake of the other characters was my most gratifying part of this, and quite frankly I would honestly rank him as the best MC of this season. I left pretty satisfied with the story and will remember Build-Divide as the simple "trading card" anime with a banger of an opening - take that as you will.

  (And best of all, don’t forget to watch the second part)
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