Frame Arms Girl is a model kit introduced by Kotobukiya in 2014. It’s pretty much reminds me of Busou Shinki which was manufactured by Konami earlier. The design is a girl wearing some sorts of armors and weapons attached to their body. Although the two are different products, I can’t unseen the similarities.
Behind the character design of Frame Arms Girls or F.A.Girls in short is Shimada Fumikane. He is also one of several character designers of Busou Shinki. Can’t oversee that of course. Many of you might already know that Shimada Fumikane is also chara designer of Strike Witches series, Girls und Panzer, Sky Girls, and Mecha Musume. So, the character designer himself has already produced some famous works before this.
Now, let’s get into this anime. The studio behind the anime is Zexcs and Studio A-CAT. Zexcs is already a well-known studio but what the hell is Studio A-CAT? I am not sure myself. Not familiar with it. The anime itself was aired during Spring 2017 in total episode of 12. More precisely, from April 4, 2017 to June 20, 2017. I think the reception of the anime itself is not good enough. Perhaps because the direction of its storyline is not clear.
Story
The story focuses on Gennai Ao and her F.A. Girls. Ao received a package with an F.A. Girl inside. The F.A. Girl is Gourai, a new type of F.A. Girl developed by Factory Advanced, the maker of F.A. Girls in this anime. Ao teaches many things of life to Gennai, mainly about emotion. Following Gourai, other F.A Girls started to come Ao’s apartment. Stylet, Baselard, Materia sisters, Jinrai, Architect, and lastly the ultimate enemy, Hresvelgr.
Like I mentioned in the earlier paragraph, the direction of the storyline is rather unclear. Busou Shinki anime in 2012 chose the path of slice-of-life anime which told us a story of the Shinki(s) daily life. It wasn’t what people are looking for although I’d say I like it because of the peaceful and less problematic story. F.A. Girls however, try to make slice-of-life story with some fighting actions. It doesn’t work as well as Busou Shinki and I think its because the time is too short and the scenes mostly takes place in Ao’s room. So, it’s kinda boring from time to time.
Animation
No, it is not that kind of cinematic animation that you’ll get from this anime. However, it is still a very good one. A cheerful one I might say. Just like most part of the story. The F.A. Girls seems to be drawn in 3D Anime shader while the human are drawn in a more common 2D animation. I like it.
Sound and Music
The opening theme song is Tiny Tiny which is performed by Murakawa Rie, also known as Rieshon/Rietion. Surprisingly, Rieshon only performs the theme song and have no voice acting role here. The ending theme theme song is FULLSCRATCH LOVE performed by Kaho Narumi, Ayase Yuu, and Nagae Rika who are the seiyuus of Gourai, Stylet, and Baselard. The opening song is a good one and fits with opening animation nicely. The ending song is pretty so-so to my ears. The BGM and Sound Effects in the anime itself is good, but not something that my ears would caught as very good, let alone excellent. In general, the music is all good.
Characters
There are 8 main characters and 2 supporting characters in this anime. What I think makes this anime more interesting is the anime is filled with Shinjin Seiyuu (newbie voice actors), except Hikasa Youko and Yamamura Hibiku.
Main Characters
Gennai Ao
Voiced by: Hikasa Youko
Voice Acting Score : 10
Ao is a high school girl who received the packet of F.A. Girls Gourai and activated it (unintentionally). She has zero knowledge about F.A. Girls at first but her best friend, Bukiko teaches her about it. Ao teaches Gourai mostly about emotions and we can see Gourai appreciates it during the story. Ao lives in her apartment alone because her dad works as captain of cruise ship and her mother stays with her dad in work. Ao’s apartment is where most of the scenes in the anime happen.
Gourai
Voiced by: Kaho Narumi
Voice Acting Score : 8
Gourai is a Frame Arms Girl sent to Gennai Ao. Technically, Ao is her master. Gourai is a powerful F.A. Girl. Although she is just newly activated, she already has some knowledge within her about her surroundings. Gourai can win many fights easily even with Ao’s lack of knowledge. This basically means her A.I. is already very advanced in combat. Things that Gourai learned from Ao are mostly about emotions. Gourai speaks in formal Japanese most of the time.
Stylet
Voiced by: Ayase Yuu
Voice Acting Score : 8
Stylet is an F.A. Girl designed for air superiority. This means she can flight and is very agile. She comes to Ao’s place and challenge Gourai directly. She is a tsundere and the way she speaks to Ao is lacking of respect at first but later gets more friendly. Ao calls her Sty-ko. While she get mad at first, it appears that she doesn’t mind about it later. She is also object of teasing for Materia sisters, mainly because of her tsundere personality.
Baselard
Voiced by: Nagae Rika
Voice Acting Score : 8
Baselard is the shortest of all F.A. Girls appear in this anime. She has childish behavior and love shiny things. She is quite a troublemaker and sometimes cause trouble to the other F.A. Girls and Ao. Despite that, Baselard has quite a lot of knowledge to share when it comes to F.A. Girls. Baselard is also capable of flying and designed for aerial combat, just like Stylet.
Materia Kuro and Shiro
Voiced by: Yamazaki Erii
Voice Acting Score : 8
Materia sisters is a pair of F.A. Girls with sadistic personality. The two are the only F.A. Girls who wear no armor during combat. They always seems together and their teamwork is almost invincible. They like to tease the others a lot. Their victim is mostly Stylet but sometimes Ao too.
Jinrai
Voiced by: Kabamaya Minami
Voice Acting Score : 8
Jinrai is a Ninja F.A. Girls. She is expert in sneak attacks and close range fight. She is a harcore geek when it comes to Sengoku Jidai and traditional Japanese stuffs. While Jinrai is not as troublemaker as Baselard, her way thinking can be out of reason in modern Japanese.
Architect
Voiced by: Yamamura Hibiku
Voice Acting Score: 8
Architect was originally an F.A. Girls without body and appears randomly during fight. But not to long after Gourai and Jinrai encountered Architect in their fight, Ao received another package of F.A. Girls with Architect inside. Architect posseses no emotion, unlike the other F.A. Girls. However, she has the capability of searching information online which makes her like a walking dictionary for everything. She is capable to multiply herself or changes herself to another F.A. Girls during combat.
Supporting Characters
Kotobuki Bukiko
Voiced by: Izawa Kanomi
Voice Acting Score : 9
Bukiko is Ao’s best friend. She is hardcore maniac when it comes model kits hobby. She shares her knowledge Ao about F.A. Girls. She is even capable to design a weapon for Gourai. However, it is kinda weird because even though Bukiko is being a maniac, it doesn’t seem that she has any F.A. Girls.
Hresvelgr
Voiced by: Abe Rika
Voice Acting Score : 7
According to Abe Rike, Hresvelgr is a tomboy who loves fighting and beating others. She is a bully and a meanie. She has the ability to access any data sent to Factory Advance Database which makes practically know every strength and weakness of other F.A. Girls. She is capable of flying and she is also the deadliest F.A. Girls in combat.
Voice Acting
As you can see from the seiyuu list, Hikasa Youko is the most veteran seiyuu here. She clearly separates herself in voice acting quality. I would even say that the best part of this anime is Hikasa Youko’s voice acting as Gennai Ao. It stunts me to hear that she can do so many different characters. I simply didn’t expect she can do cheerful and innocent girl like Ao that sounds so natural. The rest of the casts, except Yamamura Hibiku are all shinjin seiyuu. Abe Rika said the senior, especially Hikasa Youko helped the shinjin seiyuu in doing their own role. The result is very good. You can see how their voice sticks with the personality of the characters. A few note though, Nagae Rika’s voice here sounds like Igarashi Hiromi when voicing specific characters. I mistook her voice as Igarashi Hiromi’s at first but realized at the moment I saw the ending credits. Here is the photo of Frame Arms Girls casts posted by Yamamura Hibiku on her twitter account.
Final Thoughts
I watched this anime because I already watched Busou Shinki. I got a feeling that the anime follow the same (wrong) step of Busou Shinki when it comes to the story. It didn’t really follow Busou Shinki’s direction. It packs some combats and and actions in the anime. However, it feels kinda rushed. In the end, I feel that combat is not satisfying enough. The slice of life part is also not quite there. Is it worth to watch? Yes, it is. But only when you don’t have anything else good enough to watch. It is not disappointing but also not quite satisfying.
| Story | 7 |
| Animation | 8 |
| Sounds & Musics | 7 |
| Characters | 8 |
| Voice Acting | 8 |
| Overall | 7 |
| Rated as | Good |
Pros :
(+) Hikasa Youko’s superb voice acting and very good voice acting even from Shinjin Seiyuu
(+) Gentle and Cool looking animation that fits both slice of life anime and its fighting scene
Cons :
(-) Not enough combat scene for action-themed anime
(-) Story direction needs to be clearer
Nippon Insider 