[GoldenXtreme]

I have something quite unusual to talk about today!



This is the crossover event Senki Zesshou Symphogear X Kamen Rider 555: Another Testament from the Japan-only mobile phone game Symphogear XD Unlimited. Though my Japanese skills are rather poor I still enjoy playing this game for the wide variety of strange scenarios. Normally I wouldn't post about something like this but, well...

1. I'm probably one of the only people in the entire English-speaking world who is qualified to talk about both Kamen Rider Faiz and Symphogear while also having enough madness to play a niche Japanese mobile game where they happened to have a crossover.
2. TOSHIKI INOUE HIMSELF WROTE THE SCRIPT.

As soon as I heard Inoue himself was writing I knew this was either going to be amazing or awful and that I would need to share my experience. I'll try my best to explain for those not in-the-know, so without further ado...


The story for this event is pretty much in the vein of a Heisei-era Kamen Rider movie, where it's in an independent universe almost entire disconnected from any existing Kamen Rider or Symphogear storylines. To run through the basics... Humanity has been pushed to the brink of extinction by Orphe-Noise (combining monsters from both series), which turn humans to ash but can also cause them to be reborn as an Orphenoch. However, a small group of humans are pursuing the Rider Gears that supposedly belonged to some saviors so they can fight back... Kanade from Symphogear dies in the struggle to obtain the belts but was unable to use it successfully, though Hibiki was able to use the Kaixa Gear (she probably died and become an Orphenoch but it isn't made explicit). Tsubasa is all torn up about it but get over it at lightspeed. The commander from Symphogear shows up as an Orphenoch and they have to kill him, but not before he regains his humanity and Tsubasa inherits the Delta Gear from him. They go to fight the Orphenoch King (who is Fudo Kazanari from Symphogear, bitter at humanity for rejecting him after trying to defend his country during wartime), have to fight Kanade who it turns out was reborn as an Orphenoch herself and is using the Faiz Gear. Snap her out of it, but can't beat the Orphenoch King who declares he was the one who spread the rumor about the belts being using by the saviors all along. Then some version of Takumi and Kusaka show up after being summoned from another universe (in probably the most amusing moment of the whole event, the Symphogear characters are rather taken aback by the Faiz cast's crass personalities) and together they beat down the Orphenoch King in a giant stadium and the world is saved.

So uh... let's not beat around the bush, this is basically a crappy rehash of elements from both Paradise Lost and Symphogear Season 1. I think the thing that got to me the most with this story was how thinly spread everything felt. The plot moved extremely rapidly and nothing was given enough attention for me to feel anything besides a vague sense of ennui. I know mobile game scenarios aren't exactly something Inoue is used to working with, but I got nothing out of this as a fan of either Faiz of Symphogear. Then we also run into the additional issue one often sees with Inoue. The man usually pretty terrible as writing characters that are not his own. XDU itself is already a secondary piece of media, which means it can feel "off" compared to the anime source material. But you can tell that many of the normal writers are serious fans of the series who delve into niche details (and even references to the original creator's other works) and are usually thoughtful about tone and characterization. Inoue feels like at BEST he watched the season 1 of Symphogear and wasn't too keen on it, even that might be giving him too much credit. Everything about it just felt "wrong", even with the alternate universe excuse.

I do feel like this kind of crossover could have worked, but honestly not with Inoue heading it. If anything I wish the scenario had just gone totally off the rails and had Hibiki get possessed by Kusaka's ghost and go around choking people and telling them to kill themselves and it turns out no one in Faiz could communicate because the Curse of Balal and we have to destroy the moon to Takumi can finally spit out what he wants to say. That being said... I do think it is EXTREMELY funny that this whole thing happened at all. I also think it's exceedingly amusing the gave Hibiki a Kaixa Gear (polar opposite personalities right there), a nod to Hibiki's birthday being Kaixa day along with the fact that her voice actor, Aoi Yuki, played child Mari in Faiz.