The first episode of Saekano: How To Raise A Boring Girlfriend premiered on Crunchyroll with Episode 0 titled “Fan Service of Love and Youth.” This is a prequel to the main storyline of the Saekano series. The story starts off at a hot spring inn with the members of Blessing Software talking about their first major project, which is to be presented and sold at the next upcoming Comiket aka “Comic Market.”
It starts off with Utaha and Sawamura arguing about an anime, which the former criticizes as being nothing more than a fan service to harem and the latter zealously defending it.
I find it interesting that this episode starts off as a fan service, which is typical in many anime and video game titles.
As an anime fan, I have no problem with fan service; in fact, I appreciate it.
Tomoya, the main protagonist, is revealed to be the one that invited everybody to the inn for a meeting.
He eavesdrop on the conversation, but not out of sexually perverted reasons. It is understandable that Tomoya is upset that they are having a crucial visual novel conversation without including him. This is one of those business situations that only antagonizes key people without because they weren’t included in the key talks and meetings.
Tomoya brought the girls with him to scout out locations for their upcoming new video game. It is apparent that Tomoya has neither skills nor the talent for game making, but he can still lead and handle the logistics.
Utaha, a talented young novelist that goes to school with Tomoya, is revealed to be the primary story writer for the upcoming game from Blessed Software. She wastes no time openly criticizing Tomoya for his inability to understand a story from the ground up.
Tomoya introduces Sawamura, his childhood friend, as the main illustrator for Blessed Software.
He then introduces his cousin Michiru, who is in charge of the musical score.
Tomoya leads by putting everything together. I found this episode to be interesting as it gets to the logistics behind breathing life into a visual novel. This is somewhat similar to producing an anime series let alone adapt it from a manga, light novel, or visual novel as the recently streamed 13th episode of Shirobako revealed.
Visual novels, like anime series, have many crucial parts to the production. There are similarities between an anime and a visual novel. The entire production suffers if at least one piece of the puzzle is not in sync with the rest.
Tomoya gets a crash course in everything, which includes story creation.
I found it funny to watch Utaha tease Tomoya, while asking for his assistance to create the beginning scenario for their game project. Tomoya learns that production is not easy when the production members do not initially get along with each other.
It was awesome to watch Michiru put Tomoya in a guillotine choke and then suplex him to the other side.
Things got funny when the girls got drunk off a box of chocolate liquors and sneaked inside Tomoya’s room, which put in an awkward position.
It comically turns into an interrogation of Tomoya and his intentions for the Blessed Software dojin circle.
Tomoya comically defends himself by saying all the talented people so far are girls, which explains the all-girl roster. His words fall upon deaf ears as Utaha, Michiru, and Sawamura are distracted by other “important” things.
He finds solace in Kato, who is the only other normal person of the group. She is the main focus of Saekano let alone Blessed Software’s upcoming first title. I felt Tomoya was selfish in laying “heroine” responsibilities on Kato, who has no idea of what she signed up for by joining Blessed Software.
This scene shows Kato being a normal and ordinary girl, which is not a bad thing.
I found the first episode of Saekano to be intellectually stimulating because it mirrors the story of Shirobako. If you can look beyond the fact that Saekano is an anime series, you can see that it tells a serious story.
You can check it out on Crunchyroll, but premium members get to watch it first and free members can watch it one week later.
