The New Gate

Untapped Potential “THE NEW GATE” starts with an intriguing premise, drawing inspiration from popular light novels like “OVERLORD” and “Sword Art Online.” However, despite its solid world-building and a likable protagonist in Shin, the anime fails to fully capitalize on its potential. Generic Isekai Appearance On the surface, it appears to be just another generic isekai story. Yet, the show manages to rise above clichés through well-executed storytelling. Unfortunately, this uniqueness doesn’t translate well to anime viewers due to pacing issues and low-budget animation. Competition and Disappointment In a competitive seasonal lineup, “THE NEW GATE” faces strong newcomers like “Kaiju 8” and a “Spice and Wolf” remake. While manga and light novel readers might find some enjoyment, they may ultimately be disappointed by this adaptation. Remember, opinions may vary, and mine is just one voice, but these are the key points to consider when evaluating “THE NEW GATE.”

Imagine SAO and Overlord mixed together, but much worse. That’s basically New Gate. Now, couple of disclaimers. For one, I liked this despite how unapologetically mid it was. For two, I’m sure the story is actually way better in the books since they’ve been going for over a decade, but this is going to be based on my impressions from the anime. Normally when I like a show I say that it’s impossible for it to not good, but New Gate is the first show I’ve enjoyed where I accept that it’s pretty ass. It’s got horrible animation, a generic “I’m going to hide my powers so that no one discovers who I am even though I’m strong enough to destroy the whole world if I wanted to” gimmick and a subpar story to boot. But goddamn it I still enjoyed watching it, if only for the waifus. The SAO and Overlord comparisons come from the fact that the MC was trapped in a death game, but after the death game is beat and everyone else got to go home, he’s stuck there. Now, while that sounds extremely unoriginal, keep in mind the New Gate LN has been running since 2013, so that concept was actually fresh back then. But still, in the anime I feel like they did nothing with that. There’s so many cool directions they could’ve taken this story in, but it just fell very flat. There’s nothing ever really on the horizon in terms of an overarching story goal. I mean, yea, the MC wants to go home and is looking for a way, but that feels secondary to the monster of the week style episodes. It just felt like an aimless experience at times. I did enjoy a couple of the episodes where the MC goes and finds his former party companions from the game, in fact one of them was quite emotional and I teared up a bit. But for the rest of the series, I was just like “what are we doing here”. In typical LN adaptation fashion, last two episodes give us a little hint of what’s to come, but the show was so mediocre I don’t know if anyone will even care to stick around. I mean just think, there’s been JRPG esque shows like this that have had mediocre plots and still ended up being good because of the production values. Shangrifra comes to mind. The characters in this actually do have some adorable and funny moments with the MC and the two elf waifus were two of my faves from the season, which was a big part of why I liked this so much. If you’re not a waifu enthusiast or someone who cares for fanservice, then yea this is a comfortable skip. You won’t be missing out on much of a story. Production wise, yea this was rough. Most of the show looks like a slideshow and even the character models are very bad in the second half. And I’m not talking about those blink and you miss it type of screenshots. Entire scenes just looked horrible. The fight scenes were hard to take seriously, anything that involved motion looked like something a Sega Genesis could’ve done.. it was rough. But hey, at least Rionne and Tierra boobs were nice, right? Despite its numerous flaws, New Gate wasn’t the worst thing in the world for me. I’m actually pretty fond of it. I would only recommend it to waifu enthusiasts and those looking to analyse what NOT to do animation wise. But personally, I enjoyed just seeing the character interactions. The New Gate gets 6 out of 10.

Just a quick heads up, I did a little digging into this anime... and, well, this anime was produced by the same studio/company involved with the infamous production troubles surrounding "Whisper Me a Love Song", where a significant number of animators allegedly left partway through production amid reports of a toxic working environment. And because apparently that wasn’t enough of a red flag, there have also been reports that young and inexperienced animators including alleged underage workers were brought in to help handle the latter half of the production. With that said, I'll give it this: episode 1 is fine. Episode 1 is the show putting on a nice shirt for the interview. Overpowered MC, cool title drop, shiny setup, I'm thinking "ok, maybe." Then as the story progress the budget just... leaves. Like someone in the studio said "we've spent the money on the first three episodes, good luck everyone". The pacing is also the same story. It sprints through arcs like it's late for a train, so nothing lands, nothing has weight, and our MC just kind of... wins. Every time. And the worst part is it's not even dumb fun. It's the bland kind. I could've forgiven a stupid, wild, overpowered power fantasy if it committed. But this anime keeps hinting at something deeper, like the game characters maybe being more than programmed NPCs, maybe having no free will in the old days, and then it just goes "anyway, here's another monster." And that's the part that really got me, because I've seen that exact idea done properly. In the Land of Leadale (which I've also made a review before) takes the "game world that became real, NPCs who are suddenly people" thing and actually sits with it. Cayna wakes up 200 years later, everyone she knew is gone or changed, and the show lets that hurt. It's slow, it's cozy, nobody's chasing a body count, and it still gave me way more emotional payoff in a quiet scene about an old guild hall than The New Gate gave me in an entire cour of "I am the strongest, lol." Leadale looks better, writes better, and understands why it's interesting. The New Gate looks at the same thing like it's a tutorial popup it skipped. I'd honestly would only recommend this if you have the specific craving for an overpowered MC, you've already burned through everything else and watch over 300+ anime, and you're okay with the animation getting progressively sadder like a houseplant nobody's watering. Otherwise just go watch Land of Leadale. Seriously. I'm not even joking. Leadale's the one that actually remembers the game world had people in it. Final rating is 4/10, maybe the real animation was the labor violations we encountered along the way.

If I were grading this show as a school project, the report card would read "Incomplete". It's your basic over-the-top power fantasy isekai, and in that category it works well enough. Characters and plot are mostly pretty good, and it doesn't rely on pointless fanservice as an appeal crutch, or on trope overuse as a script crutch, or on padding content with lots of mealtime and bath scenes (which has become a pet peeve of mine). On the other hand, there are some glaring weaknesses. It doesn't deliver a complete story; it leaves you hanging at the end by opening up new cans of worms very late, as if the point of the anime is to steer people to the manga. The individual arcs aren't all that coherent with each other, either, and don't flow naturally from one to the next. It does bog down into too many talking scenes in parts. There are some glaring art errors, especially in the last few episodes. If you're just going through the trash isekai catalog to see everything that's on offer, go ahead - it's not the worst thing to watch to burn some time. Just don't have high expectations, as this won't meet them in any category.

Ahh,another show fallen into the shadow realm of the isekai treatment. OF course sadly with this one,it's not really the only issue i've noticed in it's runtime. For people who only care about the final result... It's MID. hard mid. For those who care for the why,let's get into it: Let's first get the most obvious issue with the show.The animation.It's clearly the isekai treatment.The animation is just horrendous to look at. Plain and simple.The art itself is not really bad.But the animation is just low quality. Now,let's get in another rather obvious issue.Overpowered MC. While this guy's personality isn't as bland as the other guys you usually get,the fact he faces no real struggles at all is a pretty substantial drawback.No struggles means no stakes.No stakes means every piece of action is predictable and boring.Not that there were many fights to begin with...And the animation being bad... yeah. Characters... well, they are unique enough that they don't meld with one another,and that's more that can be said for most isekais.Although i couldn't help but designate Wilhelm as a budget Cú Chulainn from fate.Even though i liked Wilhelm. And Schnee.And i read some other review saying the female characters were hyper-sexualized...?? That's pure non-sense,the fanservice in this show is very rare and light.No clue what that guy was on about. The world feels rather barren and unpopulated though.I don't know how much it is due to the source material and how much it is due to the horrendous corner cutting animation. The plot... well it started out plenty intresting even with some cliche stuff all around,but it kinda got all wierd towards the end.It had.. or still has potential for a rebound though. Now on my biggest complaint(although a more personal one):MC's goal. Return home?To this world?Why would anyone EVER want that?Unless you're stinking rich and set for life in this world,i see absolutely no god damn reason to return.Instead of staying in a world where you can live at your own pace taking it easy,you'd return here to be a wage slave for the rest of your life?What sane self-respecting human would choose that?Especially so at the end when he finds out the woman he loves might be in that world with him. All in all,it's not the worst choice to pass the time(BELIEVE ME) but... it's not anything worth that much praise.Only giving it a seven because the plot and some good moments kept me invested,otherwise i'd rate it way lower,especially due to it's low effort animation.

An alright but generic story, plagued with awful animation but had moments of promise that will leave the viewers emotional. As someone who hasn’t read the light novels or manga this anime felt like it was generic average isekai boring garbage. That said there were a couple of moments which left me craving more the main being the interaction than subsequent fight between Shinya and Girard. The fight wasn’t done well animation wise however it actually was very effective in tugging on the emotions. Another story telling aspect I really liked was the passage of time, in a somewhat similar yet completely different method to Frieren (big difference in quality I know) seeing Shinya’s interaction with the current generation and his companions from the past proved intriguing. The harem adjacent aspects are incredibly annoying to watch through however that doesn’t make the characters annoying or bad, just incredible bland. The main character as well isn’t offensive just boring. Which gets to the point of this review, this anime could’ve been so much better, the foundation was there for a solid yet generic isekai story however such lack luster animation quality made it nearly impossible to do so. However that doesn’t make the emotional scenes any less impactful just their weight gets significantly lighter because of the poor animation quality. I sincerely hope that this never gets another series because this story doesn’t deserve to be butchered this badly and to this extent.

The New Gate tackes an interesting possibility regarding the existence of VR MMORPGs, where the game would somehow live on beyond what is intended, and the NPCs continue to live on their lives, naturally expanding the world with no/minimal player input. What it would be like to talk to NPCs that you used to know very well, but now they have gained sentience and have lived a life detached from the game designer's imaginations? There's definitely some good story moments that the anime pulls off with that theme, but it's still a trashy "I can't believe it's not Isekai!" wish fulfillment extravaganza for the most part. It basically ticks most boxes that you would expect for a story featuring overpowered MC with a harem, although it's not as fan service-y as most of its peers. At the very least the MC is actually likeable, and his companions are mostly fun to watch. But if you're looking for well animated action scenes, then you'll be quite disappointed; not the worst looking animations but it's very flat and boring. Granted there's not that many action scenes, but that only makes me wonder how limited the budget was. Nothing too exciting in the worldbuilding, setting and lore as well. Overall this an inoffensive and fun enough romp if you're in the mood for this sort of trashy story, although you can easily go for something better elsewhere.

Having watched this show, while it's fresh on my mind. There is alot going against this show. Based on my opinion, the negatives could be based on the fact that the animation could've been a lot better. I don't want Demon Slayer or Fate levels of animation, that would be a bit too much considering that this show has very few fight scenes. On top of that, the fight scenes themselves are rather short when they do happen. The story is another flavor of Isekai but those are bound to happen just about every season because Isekai Mangas/Light Novels are plentiful yet too boring due to the same formula. Trying to pay attention to the story, it feels like there is a hint of inspiration from Sword Art Online with the twist that the story starts the same way that "In the land of Leadale/Leadale no Daichi nite". I don't mind that, but Leadale does it's story better albeit the animation is far worse in that show but the story keeps bringing me back. Compared to the manga, it's obvious that The New Gate really tried to capture the feel but ultimately loses it's essence or spark that would bring me back the same way that Leadale does. On the positive side, I think that the story from the manga is adapted in an okay sense. The effort is there but there still isn't as much of a spark. Still, the story is well adapted despite it not being a 1-1 adaptation. The stopping point for the show is left off where there could be more, so that's a plus incase you enjoyed it like I did. The voice acting of the characters is projected decently(from a subtitled point of view). I know the negatives outweigh the positives, but I still stand by my 8/10 score due to the fact that the show's story is decently adapted compared to the manga. This is a big bias but I do enjoy reading the manga and despite the animation being mid, it's still something I would like to see adapted nonetheless.

This is one of those "the book was better" situations. I've been reading the manga since around 2020 and i was very hyped for this to come out. Sadly, this anime does not do justice to it's counterpart manga ( I can't speak to the LN) The manga is so much better in every way. The overall story beats, character growth, pacing, and most obvious the art style. All I could think while watching this was "how low was the budget for this?!" It's very unfortunate, but I must say, I do not reccomend you watch this anime. Or at least you should go read the first few chapters and the the first episode to compare. I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed.

The New Gate is a concept I subscribe to; however, its execution leaves one wanting (at times) mediocrity. For me, there is enough baked into the premise that held my interest. Similar to Sword Art Online, The New Gate has characters trapped in a video game in a life-or-death situation. After the main character beats the final boss - letting everyone leave the game and return to their homes - he is transported hundreds of years into the game's future. Simply put, the initial pitch of episode 1 resolves as "What would happen after SAO if the main character was still stuck in the game." Fascinating. Intrigued. Hopeful. Sadly, the rest of the show hardly achieves this level of promise. The first couple of episodes are good. I believe the character introductions are solid and the world-building the main character is slowly uncovering is interesting. He does meet up with past NPC partners in solid emotional reunions, but the series does struggle with side characters after introducing them. There is a point approaching the halfway mark where it starts to fall back on light novel isekai cliches when arriving in their fantasy world -- like signing up with an adventurer guild and taking your first missions -- that feels reductive to what has already been established. And then after those episodes you start to meet royalty, sort of speedrunning a 'dungeon,' and then you get to the final episode. I'm not a stickler when it comes to animation. I don't like to be mean to a medium I have no experience in, but my lord the final episode was a disaster. They put so much into it that the character models reminded me of early Dragon Ball Super discourse. It was truly astonishing watching the animation quality change right before my eyes all over the episode. The way they ended the series (I doubt we'll get more after this) made me rethink how much I enjoyed what little I did.

The anime, in general fine, is similar to Sword Art Online, and the story is good. However, the animation was disappointing. Before watching the anime, I had read the manga, which I found enjoyable, but the anime adaptation did not do it justice. The colors used were poor, and the animation quality was particularly bad, which was frustrating given the fantasy, isekai, and magic themes. In a genre that relies heavily on impressive visuals and animation, the subpar animation was a major letdown. The potential for a visually stunning and immersive experience was there, but it was ultimately undermined by the lackluster execution.

The New Gate is an utterly unimpressive video game isekai, yet is decent enough across the board to satisfy those who seek their regular dose of seasonal power fantasy. Animation / Art / General Visuals - 6/10 ----------------------------------------------- Art and detail is average, animations barely better than slideshows. Some magic effects are nice, most unimpressive. Sound / Music / Voice Acting - 7/10 ------------------------------------------ Pretty standard quality stuff. Unremarkable but thematically fitting short tunes during the show are nice. Story - 5/10 ------------- There really isn't much of a one. The story begins as a carbon copy of Sword Art Online, then does a minor twist and becomes a more standard power fantasy isekai. Essentially, some crazy new VR MMO launched, players got stuck in it, one dude trained really hard and beat the final boss. Everyone got to log out, except him who ended up 500 years in the future. Now, he explores the world trying to figure out what happened. And maybe get back to the real world. Maybe. He doesn't really care. The show doesn't really do much anything. The protagonist just wanders about, meets some old allies, some new friends. Does a bunch of random fantasy stuff and pretty much treats the entire thing like a vacation. Characters - 6/10 --------------------- Our protagonist is your average overpowered MC. Nice dude, competent, confident. Somewhat lacking knowledge and randomly way too cautious and easily surprised, but all in all, not particularly unlikeable. Secondary cast is basically a small harem. The girls are nice, have distinct if one dimensional personalities. Not much depth to any of the characters. --- Total - 6/10 --- The New Gate is a forgettable show, but doesn't really do anything wrong per se. Just very mediocre across the board. If you're a fan of the genre, you will find literally nothing that's new or interesting in any way, shape, or form. Give it a watch if you need your seasonal isekai fix, but don't expect much.

Overall, I think the plot had great potential in world building like Leadale, Slime Taoshite and other similar isekai. Although it got ruined mostly by the cloned SAO opening, It could've done better if the animation was given even just a bit more work. The fight scenes were done well for a non-mainstream series however, sometimes the way the faces are drawn are just... Anyways, this problem is shared by Konosuba but unlike this it had a lighter writing that goes down well and ages nicely. Even though this one didn't have the same potential in writing, this review may as well be separate to the LN since the scores was primarily pulled down by the animation and face presentation. An analogy to the issue could be better represented by Queen Bee animation vs. source materials

So what we have is a mix of SAO with some Death March and about every generic fantasy / computer game trope you can find. It started out OK, seemed unoriginal, but really picked up midway through. Decent character development and animation, great voice acting (I'm a sub fan) - but as the season progressed, the animation quality regressed. The final few episodes had some of the absolute worst animation I've ever seen. Not the entire thing - but several segments in each one. Flat faces lacking detail, nothing moving in a frame except someone's mouth (ever see the Conan Clutch-Cargo ripoffs? Same thing...) and total lack of any body reality - I swear some studios have a staff just for juggle. Not here - everything is stiff as a board. So basically, watch for the story - not the animation.