NYAN!
Most humans have strange things going on in their brain. And there are whole industries making a busy trade with that.
That is especially true for the Japanese manga and anime scene, that caters to a lot of fetishes. One of those is kemonomimi. The word literally means “animal ears”, but in most cases tails are also included. A kemonomimi is an animal that has mostly (except ears, tails and sometimes character traits) human characteristics.
They are often ultra-cute moe characters, albeit none is as cute as Maid-chan, of course.
The biggest group of kemonomimis are the catgirls. And unsurprisingly there are games or graphic novels about them, like the nekopara series.
Nekopara is short for neko (cat) and paradise. And that is an ample description of what the game is about: catgirls and their daily life.
In fact the Nekopara graphic novels series (there exists an age-free and a hentai version) was so successful that they Kickstarter-funded an 1-hour long anime, depicting how the major catgirls – Chocola and Vanilla – were found and how they ended up working in the bakery/cafe La Soleil.
And when Maid-chan writes “found”, she means “found”. As is so often happens, one day a nothing suspecting older brother (protagonist Minaduki Kashou) / younger sister pair found those two kittens in a box.
The two grew up, together with other cats the sister took in, and then comes the day when the brother, Chocola’s and Vanilla’s Master, moves away to realize his dream of his own bakery.
But of course the catgirls don’t like that and follow their master – hidden like a ninja.
If you could hear Maid-chan, you would now have heard a sigh. Yes, cats like small places, but hiding in a moving box and then be angry that the poor carriers called the boxes heavy? Really? The cats still have a lot to learn!
And yes, what they have to learn is part of what is shown in the OVA. In the end Chocola and Vanilla pass the catgirl test and earn their bells, showing that they are responsible cats. (Maid-chan thinks the testers should need to pass a test first.)
But of course the two cats (Vanilla is always where Chocola is) do not have to learn it alone. After all the Minaduki household has several cats that already have passed the test. And the little sister Shigure wants to help too.
(Maple, Cinnamon, Shigure, Azuki and Coconuts)
But this is not easy at all, cats being cats, and even the ones that already have their bells easily fall for the many traps that daily life can spring for the unsuspecting cat. But you can watch yourself which ones that are, Maid-chan thinks.
But in the end everything ends well and Chocola and Vanilla are allowed to not only stay together with their master but also work in the cafe.
Conclusion
There is no doubt that you will find a lot of nekomimi cuteness and this anime OVA.
But, and Maid-chan has reluctantly to admit it is a big BUT, the OVA just does not deliver. Somehow what works great as a “game” does not work in this OVA.
Maid-chan is not sure if it is the ever-smiling master that Maid-chan wants to hit with a spade just to see if his expression changes. Maybe it is the non-interactivity.
Of course in the graphic novels you can’t do much, but at least you can repeat the cat’s cute voices and the perspective as the master is different. The cats talk to you, not to statue-face on the screen.
And of course in the anime you can’t change the amount of breast bounciness. (Maid-chan should get paid for this line as ad-revenue. Male humans and a bouncing breast – product sold!)
The anime just does not get any tension across and the funny scenes are far worse then the ones from the game.
The graphic is high quality for a budget production and the voice acting is professional level. Maid-chan thinks the seiyuus had more fun than the watcher with their roles.
It is a real waste, but the OVA falls short of it’s game predecessor(s) and Maid-chan can only give it a 6/10 on the completely objective Maid-chan scale.
If you are interested, Maid-chan recommends to buy the 3,5 games for roughly the same price of the single OVA.
If you want to have a look at the first game, here is the Nekopara demo (Steam).
