The New Gate: Trapped in a Virtual World After Victory

The New Gate

Have you ever been in a tough situation where you had to do anything and everything to get out of it, only to find yourself in a much worse mess? Have you ever found yourself in a challenging situation where you exerted every effort to overcome it, only to end up in an even more challenging situation? Hopefully this isn’t a common occurrence, but it does happen. When it does, we often ask ourselves, “Why me?” Perhaps you already used up your entire armory, with nothing left to throw at your living or nonliving foes besides the kitchen sink. Some might say you’d be lucky to at least have access to the kitchen sink at this point, because honestly, how much worse can things get? Yet here we are, somehow still around with the kitchen intact…

“The New Gate” is a 12-episode TV anime series that aired from the 14th of April until the 30th of June in Spring 2024. Mainichi Broadcasting System, KlockWorx, King Records, MAGNET, CTW, AlphaPolis, and Studio Bus produced it, and it was brought to life by Studio Yokohama Animation Laboratory and Cloud Hearts. The main staff involved in the project are Aoi Hiroyuki, Ishiwatari Akihiro, and Ozawa Fumihiro as producers, and Oogami Yuuma as the episode director. Featuring the genres of action, adventure, and fantasy alongside the main theme of Isekai, each episode ran for 23 minutes and earned a rating of PG-13 for teenagers 13 years or older.

The anime is based on the light novel of the same title, which is the work of author Kazanami, Shinogi, and artist Makai no Juumin. The series began publication on the 19th of December 2013 and is still ongoing. The manga adaptation also goes by the same title, which began publication on the 11th of November 2014 and is also ongoing. Serialized in AlphaPolis, it is the work of author Kazanami Shinogi and artist Miwa Yoshiyuki. It was published in English via One Peace Books on the 16th of April 2020 and was also published digitally via AlphaPolis through Alpha Manga.

Protagonist Kiritani Shinya is merely one among the thousands of people who got trapped within a virtual reality game titled “The New Gate.” However, what distinguishes him from the others is his exceptional skill as an elite player, driven by an unwavering determination to overcome this game and safely return home. Owing to his incredible powers and skills, he manages to defeat the game’s final boss single-handedly and firmly believes he is out of the woods at this point. He surely did not expect to be transported into yet another world that is seemingly indistinguishable from the last! He soon learns that as long as the game menu and his skills remain unchanged, he has no chance of exiting this oddly familiar world. Now on a journey to learn and acquire the means of breaking out of this new dimensional prison, our MC has a fateful encounter with Tiera Lucent, a girl who is a hotel receptionist but also the protégée of Schnee Raizar. She is a glimmer of hope in the darkness for him, as Raizar was one of his former party members. With renewed resolve, he continues his journey with dreams of reuniting with Schnee and also unraveling the truth about The New Gate.

The story department is ruled by one thing and one thing only: convenience. As the plot progresses, viewers will be presented with plenty of questions, doubts, mysteries, conundrums, and head-scratchers. But the writers will give you the easiest, laziest, most boring answers. Worse, these solutions appear spontaneously, devoid of any reasoning or logic. For example, let’s say the monster of the week is immune to all traditional types of attacks; but would you believe our MC just happens to have in his arsenal that one spell in a million capable of taking it down? Afterwards, all that’s left is for him to one-shot the foe and save everyone with a sprinkle of magic pixie dust. Another point I would like to highlight is that when a sword breaks, we are abruptly informed that the MC is the greatest blacksmith in history and can easily fix it. How utterly convenient; logic and reasoning never stood a chance from the start. When a character's expertise is absolutely necessary, the show simply wills that character into existence to fill the minor gap. Either way, the MC is far too OP and perfect for anything in this show to be enjoyable, but just like your generic hero, he wants to keep his “awesomeness” under wraps.

In the character department, let’s talk about Lucent Tiera first. According to the LN, her personality is described as bubbly, cheeky, and mature. But in this version, she is a moe character, and her key dialogues and events were cut to advance the "plot." When it comes to Raizar Schnee, she is portrayed as someone who cannot properly express her longing for the MC and is overcome with sadness over the fact that he will leave someday. Also, they have apparently butchered the reunion between the two, which was supposed to be a truly heartfelt moment, but invoked right next to nothing in the anime. Essentially, all these "characters" serve as mere plot devices, with every moment that could have evoked empathy for them eliminated. Goodbye sentimentality, for the plot has deemed you worthless in this heavily rushed adaptation. I already spoke about the way-too-perfect MC, and the supporting cast is not even worth mentioning.

In the Art and Animation department, the thing that bugged me the most is how juvenile the entire cast looked. Everyone has rounded faces that make them look like children, which undermines the depth of these characters' personalities, with Tiera being a prime example. Needless to say, the bodies do not match the faces at all, and everyone appears far too young to be engaged in their respective activities. They also make for awkward-looking character dynamics and interactions, like the romance between the MC and Schnee. When it comes to animation, it is heavily lacking, especially for an action anime. They didn’t even get simple motions like running right, lazily using the same few frames in a loop where every step looked unnatural. As such, all the “action” scenes are clunky, lazily made, and boring to watch, but it’s not like anything of value is happening in these fights anyway.

Perhaps the Sounds and Music department redeems this show? Nope. The opening theme is "Sekai wo Yanuite" by Sou and the ending theme is "Kanataboshi" by Miho Okasaki, which are both bland and forgettable pieces that might as well just be white noise. I don't recall if this show had any OSTs, but they were probably all mediocre. While the general sound effects and voice acting were decent, they get drowned out by everything else, especially the terrible visuals.

Overall, “The New Gate” is just another sad attempt at bringing to life another OP male MC who’s trapped in a video game for mysterious reasons. I have seen good iterations of these tropes, but the current installment is clearly not one of them, even if the source material is supposedly decent. The plot primarily focuses on convenience; the characters exhibit a lack of depth; the show abandons sentimental moments that could have contributed significantly; the cheap visuals are appalling; and the audio is mediocre. There are hundreds of generic Isekai anime like this out there and this show doesn’t do a single thing to stand out in a positive light.

The LN is known to be a very nuanced piece of work that really builds up characters through a number of impactful moments, but unfortunately none of it made its way to this adaptation right. All the bittersweet, melancholic, and joyful moments the characters are supposed to share have been reduced to some terribly animated moe blobs just badly acting out scenes in a play. I do not recommend this show to anyone because it lacks substance and seems like the creators didn't invest effort into it. However, if you are a dedicated Isekai fan who relishes witnessing OP MCs effortlessly ruin everything and attracting a plethora of attractive girls, you may find this show somewhat entertaining.