With the world covered by a great snow sea, drinking water becoming scare, and livable land located at the feet of a few deteriorating orbital trees that extend into the sky, humanity has dwindled down to a few thousand.
According to legend, there is a sage that knows the secret to producing unlimited amounts of water, and Princess of Atland, Liliha, sets out from her war-threatened kingdom to find this sage in hopes of fostering peace.
She ends up floating to the top of an orbital tree where she finds Kaina, a young man part of a small village of elderly.
Although she couldn’t find the sage, Liliha takes Kaina with her back to her home where she hopes to find another route to peace or victory with the aggressive and technologically advanced mobile nation of Valghan that plagues the snow sea.
Despite its rather lackluster style of animation, Kaina of the Great Snow Sea offers a great world that you want to see the characters explore. If you are looking for more anime recommendations like Kaina of the Great Snow Sea, head on down below.
Anime Like Kaina of the Great Snow Sea
For Fans of Big, Wild Worlds
Made in Abyss
The Abyss is an enormous cave system and the only unexplored place in the world. No one knows how deep it goes, but generations of bold adventurers have descended into it.
In the town at the edge of The Abyss, an orphan named Rico dreams of raiding, as her mother did before her. One day while exploring the murky depths, she meets a boy, who turns out to be a robot, kicking off the start of her epic adventure.
Kaina of the Great Snow Sea actively creates a large world that is so wildly diverse from the one we know. While Made in Abyss isn’t that immediately, it very quickly grows to be that as well.
Both anime are great for people that like to see interesting anime worlds explored by the characters who are traversing them.
That said, the longer Made in Abyss goes on, the more traumatic it gets. Morals degrade in the deeper levels. The locations are still beautiful, but the events are haunting.
Drifting Dragons
Dragons rule the skies. While they are a threat to humanity, they are also a source of medicine, meat, and oil.
In order to procure these goods, outcasts called Drakers traverse the skies on giant airships. They have no home on land, but they live to hunt dragons as a dangerous and thankless profession.
As dragon populations and those who become Drakers dwindle, the airship Quin Zaza and her crew are one of the last teams to bring down these great beasts.
I think Polygon Pictures really just likes creating unique worlds in their anime, since Drifting Dragons and Kaina of the Great Snow Sea are both made by them and both feature stunningly beautiful scenery with jank CGI characters.
Both series follow characters on a journey. Kaina of the Great Snow Sea is about the solving the water crisis while Drifting Dragons is about hunting dragons, which are also in dwindling supply.
Interestingly enough, both worlds seem like they aren’t particularly advanced, but also have an array of complicated machinery, like the snowships in Kaina of the Great Snow Sea or the airships in Drifting Dragons.
Sakugan
The Labyrinth is an expansive space underground where humans live in colonies and many places remain unexplored. Due to the harsh conditions outside the colonies and the presence of large monsters, only brave individuals known as Markers explore the outside areas.
Memenpu is a genius child who dreams of becoming a Marker in order to reach a place that constantly plagues her dreams. Unfortunately for her, her father Gagumber is pretty vehemently against it, at least until a giant monster attacks inside the colony jump starts their adventure together.
Both Sakugan and Kaina of the Great Snow Sea have different sci-fi plots that send a pair of characters out into a wild, wonderfully designed world that you want to explore with them.
Sakugan, alongside following a father-daughter duo, also has energetic mecha action rather than Kaina’s tamer and brief action elements.
Both anime have interesting overall plots, but sometimes it feels like the world they built outshines the plot they are often following.
From the New World
After a small portion of humanity suddenly developed psychokinetic powers, the world underwent a rapid transformation.
After 1,000 years of turbulent history where regular humans struggled against those with powers, we focus in on Kamisu 66, a small town where 12-year-old Saki Watanabe finally awakened her powers. This awakening means she is finally able to join her friends at the Sage Academy. However, things in Saki’s life do not remain as simple as those precious days.
With missing children in the village, rebellious rumblings, and a world steeped in myth and mystery, Saki and her friends are about to face the shocking truths of their peaceful society.
There are moments in Kaina where they show things like signs from what looks like our civilization that makes you wonder if this strange world was Earth once. From the New World sparks that similar curiosity by showing an evolution starting in our world and then taking place 1,000 years after that.
While the world in From the New World isn’t that strange, you do definitely see changes to society and the creatures that live there. What From the New World does well that Kaina doesn’t is that it poses a vast number of questions about the world and keeps you invested in discovering the answers.
For Fans of Boy and Girl Adventuring Duos
Gargantia on the Verderous Planet
In the distant future, humanity has abandoned a ruined Earth and now lives in the furthest reaches of space fighting their eternal enemy, the Hideauze.
During one of their massive space battles, a young soldier named Ledo and his mecha Chamber are flung through a warp hole into space. He crash lands on a strange planet that is covered completely in water.
To his surprise, he finds that other humans also live there aboard massive fleets of boats. Found by the Gargantia fleet, Ledo must navigate this strange new world.
Both Kaina of the Great Snow Sea and Gargantia on the Verderous Planet take place on worlds where actual land is scarce if nonexistent. In Gargantia, the only way to live is on boats, but unlike Atland and Varghia, there isn’t any war. Conflict usually comes from smaller clashes.
While both anime have interesting worlds, Kaina begs to be explored while Gargantia is simply beautiful. As a water world, there isn’t too much to explore. However, what Gargantia lacks in a world to explore, it makes up for in absolutely stunning animation and visuals as well as very likable main characters.
Deca-Dence
Driven to the point of extinction by creatures known as the Gadoll, humanity now lives out of a large mobile fortress known as Deca-Dence.
Inside, the residents are separated into Gears, warriors that fight the Gadoll, and Tankers who maintain the fortress.
Natsume, a Tanker, has dreams of becoming a Gear, but is forced into armor repair where she meets a surly senpai named Kaburagi that has more skills than he lets on.
Both anime series take place in worlds where humanity is on its last leg. Whereas they turned to war over resources in Kaina of the Great Snow Sea, Deca-Dence keeps humanity safe in a large mobile fortress and fights monsters. However, you find out very quickly that things are not as straightforward as they seem in Deca-Dence.
Both series follow a veteran of the world and a bright-eyed hero that set off on an adventure that changes their whole world.
For Fans of Humanity’s Last Days
Knights of Sidonia
After Earth was destroyed by an alien race known as the Gauna, humanity fled across the galaxy in giant seed ships looking for a new home.
In the year 3394, a mysterious man named Nagate Tanikaze surfaced from the bowels of the ship Sidonia and breaks his lifelong seclusion in search of food.
After being discovered, he finds himself dragged into the military just in time for a Gauna attack and discovers that he may just be the hero that the Sidonia needs.
I mentioned above with Drifting Dragons that Polygon Pictures likes to make a certain sort of anime, and Knights of Sidonia continues to support that.
Both are anime where the main character came from a secluded place to help the few last remaining humans in their war.
The difference here is setting. Kaina of the Great Snow Sea takes place on a planet-like surface, Knights of Sidonia is set in spaceships and space. They fight people in Kaina while in Knights of Sidonia, they fight aliens bent on destroying humanity.
Even if Knights of Sidonia lacks a diverse world, it makes up for it in interesting characters.
86
For years, the Republic of San Magnolia has been at war with the Giadian Empire. They were constantly plagued by their hordes of unmanned drones until the government created an unmanned solution of their own, finally able to wage their war without casualties.
However, that is not quite the truth. The “unmanned” combat weapons are actually used by those of the 86th sector of the Republic, but they are not considered even human.
This is the tale of both Shin, an 86er and battle commander, and Lena, their sympathetic handler who remotely commands the detachment from inside the city.
Both Kaina of the Great Snow Sea and 86 follow humanity in their last days as a species. Both series are war-based anime where a threat is bent on wiping the remnants of civilization.
Whereas Kaina of the Great Snow Sea has people as the enemy, 86 follows self-replicating robots created by a human empire they then destroyed threaten the last bastions of civilization.
The difference to keep in mind is that 86 is a pretty emotional anime. People die, feelings are touched, relationships are built. Kaina of the Great Snow Sea tries, but often falls short of that same sort of emotional depth.
Girls’ Last Tour
With all civilization dead, only Chito and Yuuri remain. Together they decide to hop on their motorbike and wander aimlessly looking for their next meal and fuel.
Despite a bleak existence, they remain each other’s light in this dead world.
Kaina of the Great Snow Sea still has a thousand or so people left, in Girls’ Last Tour, it tells the story of a world where war has made it so there are like ten people left.
While Girls’ Last Tour is pretty melancholic, it does make sure to show you to take joy in the small pleasures of living. However, while both series focus on two characters on a journey, Kaina of the Great Snow Sea has more of a plot on that journey. There is no real goal in Girls’ Last Tour, just moving forward.
Do you have more anime recommendations like Kaina of the Great Snow Sea? Let fans know in the comments section below.
