English Dub Review: I Want to End This Love Game Season One
Overview:
For four years, childhood friends Yukiya Asagi and Miku Sakura have been playing something they call the “love game.” The rules are simple: they declare love to one another, and the first one to blush loses. Yukiya is set on winning against Miku, going as far as to read her favorite manga and change his appearance, but no matter what he does, Miku always seems to be one step ahead.
Our Take(Spoilers):
Another day, another romance anime finished up. Once again, it’s kind of hard to put into words how I feel about it. It was a good show, and it had some decent progress, but according to what I can find online, it’s still going, so I feel like I might have misinterpreted the ending. To me, it seemed like Miku and Yukiya became a couple at the end, but I might be wrong.
Nicholas Markgraf voices Yukiya, and Giovannie Cruz voices Miku. They’re both fairly new VAs from what I can tell, but I loved getting to hear them in lead roles in this show. I kept checking who the voices were because Nicholas sounds a lot like Micah Solusod to me. I could have sworn it was him, but nope, it’s a newbie. I’ve learned that can be a stepping stone of sorts for a new performer. Jonah Scott was someone who sounded a lot like Matthew Mercer and Troy Baker to me, and I’m sure that led to him getting more and more roles. Nicholas is going to have a great career if that’s anything to go by.
Giovannie Cruz is someone I’ve never heard before, and the way she voiced Miku drew me in. It’s going to sound bad at first, but I promise I loved her performance. She sounded kind of high-pitched and annoying, which I think fit the character archetype well. But instead of being high-pitched and annoying in a way that would hurt your ears, it was almost soothing somehow. By the end of the season, I wanted to hear Miku talk more than anyone, and I can’t wait to see what Giovannie does for other characters she might voice.
The story was rather predictable until the last couple of episodes. Yukiya and Miku try to get each other’s hearts to race so they can win their so-called “love game”. Near the end, when jealousy reared its ugly head, there was some progress, but for the most part this story went exactly like you would expect it to. It was a typical rom-com that was fun, but I would have liked to see more happen. This is one of those shows that I will probably not remember watching until a second season gets announced out of nowhere and I think to myself, “I remember watching that, surprised it’s getting a second season.” At the very least, it finished strongly, and you could watch it, and it feels complete, which is more than you can say for some shows. Fun but forgettable is how I would sum up I Want to End This Love Game.
