Every anime season comes accompanied with a competitive sport. Last season, animation studio Madhouse stepped up to take on the challenge with a card game played exclusively in Japan. I don’t mean Yu-Gi-Oh; I’m talking about Karuta.

Karuta is a game where the goal is to choose out of an array of fifty cards the second verse of a poem being read. The first to touch the card gains possession. But unlike Magic: The Gathering, the first to diminish his twenty-five cards wins the game. The concept is hard for many to take seriously, especially me, but like many sports before, once it is animated it takes on a new level of astringent discipline which is hard for anyone, especially me, to ignore.

Chihayafuru follows high schooler Ayase Chihaya, who dreams of one day becoming the Queen of Karuta. Considering the subject matter, it does  not seem like there would be many obstacles. However, with each episode the viewers are exposed to Chihaya’s weakness and shortcomings; and over the course of the series the viewers must watch as she works hard to improve and overcome. I don’t feel like explaining more of the story, since that would be completely pointless. Why waste time reading a blog when you can just watch it yourself?

One of the best things about watching competitive play in anime is the emergence of distinct playing styles.

Ayase Chihaya

The heroine of the show Ayase Chihaya relies fully on animal instincts. She is shown to have an acute hearing, bordering on sixth sense, hearing the second syllable of words before they are even read. And for certain cards, specifically one of her namesake and one-syllable cards, she displays nearly unparalleled speed which shock even the most experienced veterans. However, speed is not everything in Karuta, and can lead to mistakes and penalties, which usually end up costing Chihaya the game.

Kanai Sakura

Kanai Sakura was the first one to demonstrate how Chihaya’s greatest strength was also her greatest weakness, by fully taking advantage of Chihaya’s speed and her penchant for making mistakes. After observing her opponent, Sakura will place her cards in an order that makes speed demons second guess themselves. Such as placing like-syllable cards in opposite corners of the mat, placing their favorite cards in the non-dominant side, i.e. left-hand side for right-handed people, etc. Sakura is well aware that she’s not as fast as her younger counterparts and has developed her strength appropriately.

Mashima Taichi

Mashima Taichi has an inferiority complex nurtured by his mother’s constant nagging to be the best. Due to his constant bad luck in tournaments, he feels as if he does not belong on the same stage as Chihaya. He is gifted with natural athletic ability and intellect which makes him a well-rounded adversary in karuta, but nothing bordering on the superhuman. To hold his own against raw talent and mind games, he uses his memorization skill to keep track of all cards that had been read. As the game goes on this helps him narrow down which card will be read next, allowing him to preemptively stage an attack. He can also use this knowledge for card placement, and which card to send over to his opponent’s side.

Wataya Arata

The anime has yet to show many Arata games, so it’s hard to pinpoint where his strengths and weaknesses lie. As a child, Arata’s love for Karuta was unmatched by anyone else at his age. He could memorize the layout of over fifty karuta cards in a few minutes, and didn’t require sight to know where they were. That is impressive for a child, but how about on the adult stage?

Arata’s grandfather was a seven-time title holder for Karuta, and thus Arata spent almost all his freetime practicing and studying Karuta. After his grandfather’s passing, Arata gave up Karuta for eighteen months, and his game seems to have suffered tremendously. Arata’s grandfather stressed card placement and memorization, and I assume Arata’s playing style is influenced by his grandfather, so we will have to see.

In my opinion, Arata’s strength doesn’t lie in raw talent or superhuman abilities, but rather his love for the game and constant practice. His near superhuman moments are due to his constant training of each of his five senses.

Wakamiya Shinobu

Wakamiya Shinobu is a testament to the statement, “Geniuses are made, not born.”

Her love for karuta borders on the creepy. She is always practicing alone. In the dark. Laughing.

Shinobu specializes in speed, minimal movements and accuracy. She may not be the first to hear the verse, but her training is reflected in the way she cuts out all unnecessary motion to grab her card before her opponents. While other players make wide swings,Shinobu’s hand heads directly toward the correct card. She can grab a card from the middle of a bunch of cards without disturbing any of the cards surrounding it. This means all of her grabs are calculated, using only just the right amount of pressure in the correct corner, to push the card away. She is by far one of the strongest characters in the anime.

Suou Hisashi

The current Meijin title holder for Karuta, Suou Hisashi. Unlike most karuta players, he doesn’t focus so much on the cards, as he does the reader. There are only ten officially sanctioned card readers for title games, and he is able to notice the nuances in their voice. This allows him to hear the second syllable before they are read. Even though there are only seven one-syllable cards in the game, according to this man there are twenty-eight. Considering one only has to win twenty-five cards to win, that’s a pretty good advantage. Combine this precognizance with speed, and you get the strongest player in history.

However, he must also be hiding some other talent, since this doesn’t guarantee victory. Out of a deck of one hundred cards, only fifty are played. Of the twenty-eight cards, seven of them are actual one-syllable cards that his opponent could grab. If Hisashi’s opponent is playing at 110%, and all these cards are out on the field then he is only guaranteed maybe twenty or so of these cards.

Chihayafuru has its flaws, like most shoujo series tend to have, but I do believe it’s worth watching.