English Dub Review: Bofuri: I Don’t Want To Get Hurt, So I’ll Max Out My Defense “Defense and Reinforcements”

Overview (Spoilers Below)

This episode begins in the real world—at least, it’s the “real world” as far as Kaede and Risa perceive it. We come to learn that the seven-day event they completed only lasted one day IRL. This is after we were already told that a day is roughly two hours in real time. So am I supposed to believe these girls played for fourteen uninterrupted hours on a school night? Bollocks, I say!

 Risa informs her friend that the allure of VR is super powerful and if she’s not careful the matrix-reality will seep into her everyday life. Kaede laughs off her pal’s silly warnings and goes about her day. However, after lulling into a brief nap in the middle of class, she’s startled awake, leading her to shout out gaming terminology.

After school, she couldn’t be more embarrassed, and decides it might be a good idea to take some time off from the game. And thus ends a very strange cold open.

Following the crawl, three days have past, and Kaede/Maple rejoins the game. Sally has been picking up the slack while she was away, and even caught a glow-bug that will allow them to purchase an in-game house. Excited over the prospect of having a home base, the girls look for the perfect place. Unfortunately, most of the good ones have already been claimed by guilds.

So why not start a guild? That’s what they ask themselves, followed immediately by self-congratulations for coming up with such a solid idea. They first approach Kasumi and Kanade, the two competitors they met during the second event. They sign up in a cinch, happy to have a new home base and team to call their own. Next, the girls recruit Kuromu and Iz. The big shield guy doesn’t seem to hold any ill will after the girls sent his team to slaughter, and Iz is equally excited to join the Maple Tree Guild. They named the guild after their captain, Maple, and their clubhouse which was built entirely inside a giant tree.

The upcoming forth event is going to involve guild battles which will require the gang to enlist even more members. With the second level practically on lock-down, Maple and Sally venture back to level one to recruit. Maple chooses the sister team of Yui and May. They’re not very dexterous, charismatic, or fast, because, like Maple, they maxed out all their points—in their case they put everything into Attack.

And so, a team is born. You’ve got your: bandit warrior (Sally), shield-happy vitality hound (Maple), token guy (Kuromu), shop girl (Iz), sword chic Ronin (Kasumi), puzzler (Kanade), and a pair of strong but undisciplined blockheads (Yui and May). That sounds like an enjoyable band of misfits to me.

Our Take

The one thing we’ve been missing up until this moment is party play, and now we’re about to get it in spades. Throughout the first handful of episodes we’ve been introduced to a wide array of characters in various snippets. None of them stayed with our protagonists for too long, but managed to hang around their orbit long enough to make an impression. The ones who weren’t as personable have become members of competing guilds, while the ones that took the time to befriend our heroes, are awarded the privilege of being in the soon-to-be-coveted Maple Tree Guild.

It’s hard to believe this mysterious Payne character is already on level 60 when Maple and Sally have yet to crack level 30. What is this gentleman doing in his spare time? The girls have taken on and defeated some of the toughest bosses the game has to offer. In fact, they even took down a boss who was designed to never lose. I don’t know what those little bunny administrators are up to, but their scoring system is the suckiest suck to have ever sucked. Unless Payne is literally killing fools every second he’s logged into the system, there’s no way he should be twice as good as a pair of girls who, for all intents and purposes, are the best competitors in the entire game.

We’ll see how much of a boss this guy really is in the fourth event when the all-guild warfare erupts. I thought we were supposed to like Frederica, Dreg, and Dread (or is it, Dread and Dreg, I can never remember), but now that they’re paired with Payne, they don’t seem as approachable as they once were. It’s as if the game is intentionally pitting its strongest players against each other in an attempt to find out who reigns supreme. And if it’s up to those damn bunnies, they’ll do everything in their power to make sure Maple does not wind up on top.

How will the battles play out? Hopefully that will be answered in the next few episodes. But obviously, the Maple Tree Guild is going to be victorious—they’re the only ones with animal sidekicks. You can’t buy good luck like that!