16bit sensation another layer

16bit Sensation: Another Layer is an anime adaptation of the manga series of the same name. It focuses on an aspiring bishojo game artist Konoha Akisato, who accidentally travels back in time and works for a company known as Alcohol Soft a video game company. She enjoys working as Alcohol Soft more than the modern Japanese game development, which is overshadowed by mobile phone games, gacha games of poor quality. The era of big franchises is now in decline especially since in the current year in anime is 2023 whereas the time travel section is set in the 90s.  

The time travel part is easy just open a game from the 90s and travel back in time.  

The anime makes use with a lot of notable pop culture references from the old time period which was pretty interesting. The anime makes references of notable series that still has a following to this day, from DoyusukkiKizuato, Pia Party comic party (I’ve actually remember reviewing the PSP version of Comic Party several years ago), Kanon and Rance, in addition to modern ones like Steins Gate which you can tell the anime takes notes from the otaku influence and time traveling world lines. 

The anime mentions Puffy as in Puffy Ami Yumi with their then single at the time True Asia; not the other one who is a horrific criminal thankfully in prison where he belongs. It also mentions the infamous Saori case where controversial games like Saori had to be censored just to get sold. (Also a favorite of the otaku killer by the way)  

The dialogue from the localization was really bad with the occasional use of internet slang when it is not necessary. The animation and art were decent. 

The music was ok. The characters were as average and tropey. Mammoru, one of the leads was very narrow minded and pig headed.  

The anime mentions that the Japanese games losing their authenticity and value as a result of western companies bringing their influence and sanitizing what made Japanese anime unique in the first place. It does also cover a what if scenario if instead of human beings doing video game development, Artificial Intelligence instead as the anime was set during the year the technology was starting to take off. This is not so far fetched as music are now being created by AI artists. 

Overall, it was a good anime.  

It gets 4 out of 5 stars.