Game promotional art of the girls from Millennium School’s Cleaning and Clearing (featuring the two top girls Asuna and Karin) on their iconic bunny suit mission or module. It’s labelled Fankit 007 on the fan wiki.
TOP 10 GIRLS OF BLUE ARCHIVE
“Wait – it’s all Asuna and Karin?”
“Always has been”
Well, mostly – hence my Top 10 Girls of Blue Archive, although no prizes for guessing my top two entries.
Blue Archive – yet another game recruiting literal teams of girls for combat or similar missions, seemingly from “schools” addressing you as sensei or teacher.
“You awake as a “sensei”, after seeing an unknown yet familiar girl in your dreams. You are tasked by the Vice President of the General Student Council of the sprawling academic city of Kivotos to find the GSC’s missing president”.
Given it’s a “sprawling academic city”, there’s about eleven “schools” and each school has a host of “students” to choose from, so there’s a lot of potential entries for this top ten but as per TV Tropes, Asuna and Karin are “Blue Archive’s poster girls for it being fetish fuel best known for the fanservice”. Of course, their variant bunny costumes help so much – not least ranking Asuna in fourth place in my Top 10 Girls of Video Games.
ART & COSPLAY
But first my usual note on the visual images used in this top ten. Given the copyright in such images, I only use a visual image as fair use for the purposes of comment and review in each entry – an iconic feature image to identify the character, either in general or in their most iconic version as I review it to be (or both), usually sourced from the game’s promotional art for the characters.
Where applicable, I also include a special section in each entry under the subtitle of art and cosplay – not for any actual art and cosplay as such but instead where I nominate my favorite artists and cosplay models depicting the character, which you can look up for yourself. For art, I award a special ranking for any art by my two favorite artists – the two freelance digital artists Sciamano and Dandonfuga. For cosplay, I award a special ranking for any cosplay by my holy trinity of models – my favorite model Yummychiyo with her insane figure in top spot, followed by Hane Ame and Helly Valentine.
As for the iconic feature image for this top ten, there could only be one choice – the game’s own promotional art or “fankit” for the girls of Millennium School’s Cleaning and Clearing group, featuring the two top girls Asuna and Karin (you’ll know which ones they are just by sight) in their iconic bunny suit mission. And yes – that was the game’s own official promotional art – if anything, I edited it slightly at the bottom to tone down Karin’s bunny-tailed posterior.
S-TIER (GODDESS TIER)
(1) ASUNA (ASUNA ICHINOSE) – MILLENNIUM SCHOOL: CLEANING & CLEARING
No surprises here – top girl of Blue Archive was always going to be Asuna, one of the two signature girls of the game and “Blue Archive’s poster girl for it being fetish fuel best known for the fanservice”. Of course, the variant bunny costume helps so much.
She’s even assigned number 1 within her school “club” of Cleaning and Clearing. She’s also fourth place in my Top 10 Girls of Video Games – and as I said in that entry, Asuna is a buxom blue-eyed blond, typically with hair over one eye and a blue theme to her, including her “halo” (featured for all girls of Blue Archive). Essentially, she’s carefree and ditzy, but lucky.
ART & COSPLAY
Since I featured her bunny girl variant for her place entry in my Top 10 Girls of Video Games, I featured her iconic school outfit from the game’s own promotional art. As for her other art and cosplay, I refer to that in her Top 10 Girls of Video Games entry.
A-TIER (TOP TIER)
(2) KARIN (KARIN KAKUDATE) – MILLENNIUM SCHOOL: CLEANING & CLEARING
Now there’s a Karin we all like to see, albeit spelt differently from the memetic Karen.
No surprises here again with Karin as second top girl of Blue Archive – literally second only to Asuna, albeit that literal sense is how they are numbered in Millennium’s Cleaning and Clearing as Asuna is assigned number 1 and Karin is assigned number 2. She and Asuna are the signature duo of the game – “Blue Archive’s poster girls”. And like Asuna, she has a variant bunny costume, which is a large part of why they are the game’s leading duo.
She’s equally as buxom as Asuna but is the dark-skinned golden-eyed brunette counterpart to Asuna’s light-skinned blue-eyed blonde – which only adds to the iconic status of them as duo. Where Asuna is carefree and ditzy, Karin is the cool-headed, stoic sniper of Cleaning and Clearing. She does occasionally crack a smile but rarely shows emotion.
ART & COSPLAY
There could only be one choice for iconic feature image of Karin and it’s obviously that variant bunny costume.
ART – SCIAMANO & DANDONFUGA
Interestingly, there’s something about Karin as opposed to Asuna when it comes to my favorite artists, as Karin scores both Sciamano and Dandonfuga rankings for their art of her. Of course, once again, that variant bunny costume helps so much as it’s the one that they both depicted.
She’s also a favorite of recurring Blue Archive (and Azur Lane) artist Dishwasher1910.
COSPLAY – HANE
No Yummychiyo ranking but Karin scores a Hane ranking for cosplay of her by Hane Ame. It comes close to outranking Hane Ame’s cosplay of Asuna and is a serious contender for my Top 10 Hane Ame cosplays.
B-TIER (HIGH TIER)
(3) RIO (RIO TSUKATSUKI) – MILLENNIUM SCHOOL: SEMINAR
Well, she doesn’t outrank them in these rankings but technically Rio outranks Asuna and Karin in-game as well as everyone else at Millenniun School – as the aloof, cool, and calculating president of Seminar, the student council of Millennium School.
And despite my astronaut meme for Karin and Asuna as the girls of Blue Archive, Rio comes very close to them – indeed, arguably she outranks Asuna herself in art (scoring a Sciamano ranking) and Karin in cosplay. I mean, just look at her uniform – the best school uniform design in the game. If she had a bunny skin…
ART & COSPLAY
There could be only one choice for iconic feature image – her uniform design (from the fan wiki). She does have a winter skin or design – it’s essentially a longcoat version of her uniform.
ART – SCIAMANO
Yes – she scores a Sciamano ranking, one of my favorite pieces of Sciamano art.
COSPLAY – HANE
Saddly no Yummychiyo ranking as she would have rocked Rio cosplay – but Rio scores a Hane ranking for cosplay by Hane Ame.
Other cosplay of Rio by my favorite models includes Uri, By0ru, Biya, Miu, and Fufukowa.
(4) HASUMI (HASUMI HANEKAWA) – TRINITY SCHOOL: JUSTICE TASK FORCE
My Top 10 Girls of Blue Archive moves beyond Millennium School to the top girl of Trinity School, essentially the “angelic” school of the game. Labelled by TV Tropes as a Ms Fanservice of the game, TV Tropes also provides the following character description – “The voluptuous vice president of the Justice Task Force…the brains behind the Justice Task Force”.
What can I say? She’s earned those angel wings!
ART & COSPLAY
In addition to her standard uniform design, she also has a gym uniform design into which she barely squeezes, at least, ahem, on top. Funny – you don’t notice it as much in her black standard uniform.
COSPLAY – HANE
Sadly, no art from my favorite artists but she does score a Hane ranking for Hane Ame’s cosplay of her.
(5) HANAKO (HANAKO URAWA) – TRINITY SCHOOL: MAKE-UP WORK CLUB
Next up from Trinity School, Hanako hides her true intellect behind a ditzy exterior and the modest after-school study club
And everyone’s here for her iconic swimsuit skin with hose as accessory – which gets all the art and cosplay. Speaking of which…
COSPLAY – YUMMYCHIYO
Yay – she scores a Yummychiyo ranking, the only other girl in this top ten to do so after top girl Asuna. She’s also been done in cosplay by By0ru.
(6) HINATA (HINATA WAKABA) – TRINITY SCHOOL: THE SISTERHOOD
Hello, Sister!
Another student from – where else? – the Trinity School. It’s essentially all angels and nuns!
(7) MAKOTO (MAKOTO HANUMA) – GEHENNA ACADEMY: PANDEMONIUM SOCIETY
We move on to Gehenna Academy, not surprisingly the rival to Trinity School – what with the devil girl theme and all, not to mention the Pandemonium Society of which the girl in this entry is leader.
(8) SATSUKI (SATSUKI KYOGOKU) – GEHENNA ACADEMY: PANDEMONIUM SOCIETY
Gehenna Academy’s similarly voluptuous counterpart to Trinity’s Hasumi and head of Pandemonium Society’s Intelligence Department. Also dabbles in hypnotic techniques, usually unsuccessfully.
(9) SHUN (SHUN SUNOHARA) – SHANHAIJING SCHOOL: PLUM BLOSSOM GARDEN
And now we move to the more minor schools within the game, with Shanhaijing’s Shun – one of the older students in the game and some sort of de facto teacher (or tutor) to the other students. Hence, her “hot teacher” trope in TV Tropes – a “shapely lady dressed in a qipao baring her large cleavage and its sides, and a huge slit further down that gives way to her length of legs”.
(10) PINA (PINA ASAHINA) – HYAKKIYAKO ALLIANCE ACADEMY: FESTIVAL OPERATIONS DEPARTMENT
Wrapping up my Top 10 Girls of Blue Archive with recent tour guide skin for Pina, hailing from Hyakkiyako Alliance Academy.