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It really has badass moments, great character payoffs... and maybe that's it.

In other hands this could be really worse. A very convoluted story that relied a lot on plot twists and entirely on shock value, asking for the reader to try to set up the story in a real world where you can't have a walking bypedal robot because physics become angry, so, why is every new chapter asking you to suspend the belief system the author is trying to set?

I don't think it's to surprise the reader. I think Urosawa was so in awe with whatever he came up with that tried to stretch the story to unnatural places. Powers that had no explanation whatsoever and that their extent were to serve the plot, a group of friends that increased in number just to serve a new character, some sort of virtual world that had no par in the real life opposite (people were using cassettes and radios and old TV sets), and the most unnerving thing is how the world comes to a stop so a bunch of character can do whatever they please with no signs of difficulty.

Really? placing not one but guerrilla fronts in the heart of the city and no one blinks and eye? I don't think it should be labeled impossible, but at least show a little bit of struggle.

That said, the final chapter was good. But undeserved. Kanna shouldn't be a teenager, she felt a toddler waiting there for the grown ups to deal with the stuff. Her whole arc became worthless.

And the 3 stars it's because in the midst of all, if Urosawa put this very same ending in the 2000 new year's eve, it would have worked perfectly because of how good it felt.