I'm so disappointed in TasoHote anime... It's my favorite game of all time and it just wasn't adapted properly. The characters don't feel like the same characters in the game, almost all nuance is lost, and they even changed the ending. Neko's gray morality is hardly even shown, and Osoto is mostly portrayed to be dislikable, when he's one of the most complex, human characters in the game and is written to be sympathetic but not redeemable. Their friendship is presented more as a "what if" when they're supposed to already have that weird friendship in the hotel. Like, what's the point of adapting it if they're not gonna stick to the source? 😔
It's a decent anime on its own I guess, if you haven't played the game, but the game is just so extremely better that I can't in good faith recommend the anime over it. It's not the same story by Benoma Ray that I love so much.
My biggest gripe with the finale and the entire anime is how it ends, but also the important themes that were never built up and omitted. In the game, True End is supposed to end with Neko becoming friends with Atori again, becoming his junior coworker once again in a hotel in the real world.
It just doesn't make sense to me why in the anime, she ends up not befriending him again, especially after their promise in the hotel to meet each other again for Atori to play the saxophone. It was that promise that made him being taken to hell all the more tragic, and it's that promise that binds them together whether it's the hotel or real life. It also sort of throws away Atori's entire development of pursuing what he wants again, because now he doesn't remember anything and Neko isn't there to push him to try again like she does in the game. Their relationship in the game is SO significant to Atori.
A big theme in the original game is destiny. In Neko's final encounter with Osoto, she's supposed to think that he is her fate. "Love isn't always someone's destiny," she thinks to herself. "Someone who can change destiny is the right destiny. If so, my destiny is... Masaki Osoto."
On the other hand, I think her relationship with Atori is the direct contrast of that. Instead of being similar by chance like Neko and Osoto, Neko and Atori's friendship is so intentional that it is what makes it special. Her befriending Atori again in the real world is fate being rewritten for them to reunite and fulfill their promise, and it was such a fitting ending.
That's why I feel like Neko in the anime simply didn't act the way the Neko I know would have, and I find it to be the most out of character moment of all. Endings are very important, and it's the one thing I wished the anime would have done better.
It just leaves me wondering, what was the point of it all?
Please play the game/watch a playthrough of it instead if you're even a little interested in it. It's such a life-changing experience that I wish everyone could experience. Sadly, the anime did not even come close to living up to it.
