Brother: Final Fantasy XV is a five episode anime series created to promote the game. It is set at the same time as the events of the game but focuses upon the backstories of each character instead, thus there are a lot of flashbacks. Each episode is around 10-15 episodes long and was uploaded onto YouTube to be viewed for free. It starts off with the group of four (Noctis, Prompto, Gladiolus and Ignis) traveling in the car on the way to Altissa to see Lunafreya. The kingdom of Lucis has already fallen. At this point, it becomes clear that the anime assumes the audience is already somewhat familiar with the characters as well as the general prequel events of the story.
This is a 2D animation and it looks pretty sharp and clean. If you were expecting large scale fight scenes, then it will be disappointing as it focuses on the normal day-to-day stuff than combat. There are still some great battle sequences sprinkled here and there though. One thing to note is that the anime uses automatons as enemies which feels a bit cheap since they have the appearance of a human. This is purely for allowing the characters to violently destroy their enemies without making it a bloody affair (aka more kid friendly for a wider audience).
As you'd expect, not all of the backstories are interesting as some can be quite predictable. You get to see how close to reality the world of Final Fantasy XV is, with cars, digital cameras and other pieces of technology. In the end, it doesn't feel much like a fantasy at all at times. This is doubly so during Prompto's episode where it shows how he and Noctis met during a normal school of all places. Despite the group having great camaraderie, we are shown that this was not always the case. Due to Noctis being reclusive as a child, he was not always well liked by the people who would eventually become his most loyal comrades. Whereas most people are in awe of him, our protagonists are not exactly normal people and each was in a unique position to become close to Noctis.
Noctis doesn't do himself any favors though since he remains so cold throughout most of his interactions, both past and present. It doesn't help that we see him sleeping quite often too... and seemingly without a care. There is character development to defrost his demeanor but it is slow going. Despite the relative mundane-ness of the series, it ends with a bang in the final episode. The events were quite exciting with plenty of action and closure to one of Noctis' early traumas as a prince. Overall, while Brother: Final Fantasy XV s ultimately inconsequential, it gives more substance to the characters, especially now that we know what drives them and how they met up with Noctis. In particular, it does succeed in its job at making you eager to play the game.
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