1/7 no Mahoutsukai (1/7の魔法使い) Review

Liking niche stuff makes you feel superior. Same goes for visual novels.

That’s why I’ve always figured that compared to the tight, length-constrained assembly line of TV anime, visual novels have way more freedom when it comes to storytelling, and they just do it better. Plus, original anime is pretty rare—most adaptations come from light novels, manga, or visual novels. So at least in terms of originality, VNs should have a slight edge over TV anime…

But there’s always an exception…

I never thought a visual novel would actually choose to go the light novel route…

And a knockoff light novel route at that…

1/7 no Mahoutsukai came out in January. I checked the reviews back then and they were terrible. But considering I listen to its OP all the time, it felt wrong not to at least try it. And man, was I in for a shock—the whole time my brain was drowning in déjà vu.

Overall, the plot of 1/7 no Mahoutsukai is terrifyingly simple: the protagonist enrolls in a magic academy, meets a bunch of new classmates, and eventually wins a fighting tournament the school holds with his team.

The déjà vu starts right at enrollment. The uniforms—white and green, sharp blazer—made me feel like I’d seen this guy before. He’s even got a little sister calling him “Onii-sama” “Onii-sama” nonstop. Then after we get in, the teacher pops up and says:

“The school is divided into upper and lower classes depending on magic aptitude. You lot (points at protagonist) are all in the lower class.”

Oh fuck, isn’t this just my beloved Mahouka? Shouldn’t LiSA’s OP be kicking in right about now? And hey, while we’re at it, let’s just name the protagonist Shiba Tatsuya and be done with it. But soon I realized this game had more than just Mahouka elements.

Pretty soon the protagonist meets a whole bunch of lower-class classmates: a gentle girl with a longsword, a dude swinging a fire whip, someone with twin guns, and a guy hugging a doll who never talks and keeps using ventriloquism…

!@#*&!@^#, the attributes don’t matter. What matters is everyone looks familiar but I can’t put my finger on who they resemble.

Then the teacher announces a magic fighting tournament, and the protagonist decides to join. In the group stage, he shows off his “magic armor” form for the first time, and I fucking lost it…

Then in another route, I saw the protagonist’s sister’s magic armor form, and I lost it again…

Then in the longsword softie’s route, I saw her magic armor form, and at that point I had no words…

The game spends a massive amount of time on this magic tournament, but the content goes beyond boring. The feeling is familiar too—yeah, it’s just like a light novel adaptation anime: each small chapter is a character arc, the protagonist banters with a heroine, helps her get over her issues, unlocks her magic armor form, and then she randomly declares she’ll join the tournament too.

But you never said you weren’t joining in the first place? Makes zero sense…

And the battle descriptions have no excitement at all. The protagonist shouts, the enemy attacks, enemy attacks again, protagonist shouts. The presentation is garbage too, all over the place. Worth noting: the protagonist’s magic ability is basically a cheat—he can see the magic the opponent is about to cast, and he can pull dual swords from behind his back for a “Burst Meteor Slash” that also inflicts magic nullification.

How do I explain this? It’s Tatsuya Shiba’s magic insight, Kirito’s dual blades, and Kamijou Touma’s attack effect… ah~ what a great protagonist, a true amalgamation.

The individual routes just end with winning the tournament with each heroine, while the True End goes a bit further.

The game opens with a flashback: the protagonist and his childhood friend Ema promise to become great mages. And the grand declaration little protagonist makes is:

“I’m gonna be a mage who saves the world.”

Later, the protagonist enters the magic academy and sees Ema again, only to find she’s not only become a busted mage but also looks down on him:

“You and I are on different levels now. You’re not the person I knew. You’re too weak.”

After that, the protagonist uses his cheat powers to conquer Ema again, and then the plot suddenly swerves—someone tells him there are witches in this mage world. And Ema’s strength comes from a witch’s power inside her body.

Then Ema launches into a massive lore dump: apparently the world originally had two species, “humans” and “divine beings,” humans stole the divine beings’ magic which caused a war, and there’s a witch who’s the boss.

Then Ema says the witch has recently awakened and might be right next to us. And the very next day, a new transfer student shows up in the protagonist’s class.

Oh come on, this is literally slapping a label on the transfer student saying “I’m the witch.”

Then the plot meanders some more, the witch finally reveals herself, and the protagonist has to fight her. First time he brings Ema along and gets wrecked.

Second time he brings his whole harem and still can’t win.

Then the protagonist unleashes a verbal beatdown, enters forced badass mode, shouts about the magic of friendship, and finally crushes the witch, saving the world.

And then the game just ends…

How do I describe this plot structure? If you’ve watched enough light novel adaptations, you’ll notice this game’s story perfectly follows the LN adaptation playbook:

1. Introduce the protagonist enrolling and meeting various characters.
2. Then start the fixed one-character-per-episode chapters.
3. After character introductions, throw in a swimsuit or training camp episode to build relationships.
4. Around episode 10, pull some random conspiracy out of your ass and introduce a boss.
5. Episode 11: protagonist gets curbstomped by the boss and falls into crisis.
6. Episode 12: protagonist fucks up the boss and everyone lives happily ever after.

So playing through the whole thing, I was bored to sleep multiple times…

The only highlights are the fripSide OP and the game engine. The engine is insanely efficient, performs well, and controls like a dream. Too bad it’s all shiny on the outside with a pile of shit inside.

In my eyes, this game is a fusion of Blade Dance of the Elementalers + The Irregular at Magic High School + Sword Art Online + Trails of X. And the fusion is low-tier as hell—so low that I don’t even know what posture to use when trashing it. All I can say is, unless you’re bored out of your goddamn mind, stay away from this game.

Oh, and where’s the Trails of X element? Look at this screenshot—these are the magic squad staff:

Lloyd from Crossbell has gotten this old and is working as an orbment repairman now. Life is hard.