Series Review – Uma Musume

In celebration of the recent English release of the Uma Musume: Pretty Derby mobile game, I’ve decided to move forward with the series’ own series review. Uma Musume is a multimedia series that focuses on a built-in universe where the equine species has risen up and joined the ranks of society as bipedal working members looking to bring joy to their human friends through the art of racing.

Uma Musume debuted with its own anime in 2018. Originally, the series was slated to have a mobile game release simultaneously at the same time; however, the game’s release was delayed until 2021. From then on, the series has gone on to have several anime seasons, each covering a different arc featuring different girls and their respective stories (based on real life horse racing careers).

The universe itself has quite a bit of built-in lore. I would highly recommend you look into the series directly if you wish to learn more. In a shortened summary, humans and horse girls have coexisted for millennia. Horse girls have always been a part of human history, especially with the art of horse racing. As such, humans have grown and lived alongside their friendly horse girls. In addition to horse racing, the horse girls also practice idol activities, often performing in horse concerts. Now, this may be a bit hard to swallow initially, but you have to keep in mind that everything above is commonly accepted in this horse girl centred society.

As for the anime series itself, Season One covers the story of Special Week and her entrance into the Tracen Academy, a fictional school where horse girls are trained to reach their full potential in the exhilarating horse racing cups. Season Two covers the story of Mejiro McQueen and Tokai Teio with their rivalry being the main focus. Season Three covers the rivalry and friendship of fellow horses Kitasan Black and Satono Diamond. There are also some mini-stories including Road to the Top that features Narita Top Road and company and that of Beginning of a New Era which is focused on Jungle Pocket. Cinderella Gray is another adaptation taking place in the same universe which features Oguri Cap and her story that is currently airing as of this post.

As for the game of Weiss Schwarz, Uma Musume came out in late June 2023 with two trial decks and a single booster. For the two trial decks, they were separated into two groups based upon different seasons of the anime series. The first trial deck featured Special Week and Silence Suzuka on the cover, likely a nod to the first anime season. The second trial deck featured Kitasan Black and Satono Diamond, likely a nod to the third anime season. The booster itself featured various game assets with a whole string of characters from the mobile game. The second booster, based upon Beginning of a New Era, came out in late September 2024, focused on the movie of the same name.

Uma Musume’s signature keyword mechanic is that of “Inheritance” (継承). How the mechanic works is when another character is played on stage, and you have a character on field with the keyword, you can tuck the card with the keyword underneath the new character. Usually, you would do this for cards that interact with the keyword which give additional effects or abilities.

As a gacha-themed series, the series itself, at least for the first booster, wasn’t akin to any particular builds or designs. There were some mini-synergies, such as that of 2/1 Mihono Bourbon and that of 3/2 Rice Shower, but for the most part, you were free to play and combine any combination of horses as you wished. For the rest of the post, I’ll be mostly going over some cool deck profiles I have made over the years and enjoyed and maybe sharing some upcoming ideas as well.

Daiwa Scarlet and Vodka are long time rivals (in real life as well). And they share a very cute effect where they can swap into each other at the start of climax phase to either heal or deal damage to your opponent. Normally, you’d have to play both at level three, but thanks to the magic of science and witchcraft, the crazy doctor event on the right allows you to potentially spawn a copy of either or onto the stage the moment you hit level two. The fun game of this deck is building around and arranging your deck to increase your odds of getting either or both Scarlet and Vodka onto the stage as early as you can and looking to run over your opponent with their swapping abilities.

As mentioned before, Rice Shower and Mihono Bourbon share a connection. For this deck profile, Rice Shower is the finisher looking to “shower” your opponent with death. Mihono Bourbon helps with this as she secures Rice’s attack, giving her protection from backups, refunding stock, and giving a sneaky check of your opponent’s top two cards of their deck. Together, the pair looks to finish your opponent and complete their run.

With the release of set two, the series headed into a different direction. Rather than focusing on the mobage, the set was focused more on Jungle Pocket’s story. One of the coolest decks to come out from that booster was the Jungle Pocket “Voltron” style deck. Essentially, you’d have to marker a bunch of cards underneath Jungle Pocket herself, and if you do, you’d get a phenomenal finishing effect. It’s quite fun and interesting to build around when there are a good number of cards that support Jungle Pocket herself.

This is Tokai Teio. I’ve only had Tokai Teio for a day and a half, but if anything happened to her, I would kill everyone in this room and then myself. Tokai Teio is the embodiment of perfection. Look at her perfect idol smile and her signature Teio step. There is nothing prettier and more beautiful than my horse daughter. I will take her to the park, to the ball game, take her out for carrots, and then give her a hour-long headpat session. Don’t you dare separate her from me. Tokai Teio is to be cherished, to be beloved, to be taken care for until your mortal corpse renders unusable and then even into the realm of eternity.