I would like an isekai story were a craftsperson gets isekai'd into a standard fantasy world with no extra powers but they create fascinating Magi Tech by combining magical components with modern technological knowledge.
Edited by Kiefen on Feb 6th 2019 at 10:18:25 AM
By the way, what were the manhua with all the cultivation and stuff? Sounds a lot like Tales of Demons and Gods and Star Martial God Technique, which seemed suspiciously similar in worldbuilding, magic systems, some plot devices and even character archetypes before I found out they're by the same author. Throne above I hate how he does OP characters...
"...in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."I don't really mind or care for power fantasies and harems in isekai, since the important part is always whether they're written well.
Harems are usually just a shortcut for adding a bunch of interesting characters. Which really isn't much different from creating an adventuring party or something like that of a similar size, only there's romance involved. Well, by definition, anyway, since they too often have to add stupid harem crap to it, rather than to develop the characters naturally. The fanservice that usually follows I'm fine with unless it's too stupid.
Power fantasies generally draw interest away from the MC, since the more powerful they get, the more the story has to focus on other things to remain interesting. Kumo understood that. If the MC is too powerful for meaningful conflict, it works a lot better with the MC as a secondary or background character. If you have great world building and/or characters (and focus on them), it doesn't really matter how powerful the MC is, since the story's interesting anyway.
While it's not specific to isekai, I think the overall hardest to read in general are the webcomic style ones with pages that are several screens long. They're more often than not oddly paced, so it just seems like they go on and on without any real high or low points. That can work if it's compelling enough to read, but this isn't particularly good quality checked medium to read stories in, so there's a lot of Sturgeon's Law around.
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The only wild west story I've read in recent years is Sheriff Evans, which isn't isekai.
After replaying Alice: Madness Returns I realized that there are barely any Isekai with bizarre Architecture and worlds. Most of it is just the same RPG-world with the same mechanics. The last Isekai I truly liked was 'Alice in Borderland'. Probably because it felt like it really challenged the MC instead of turning him into someone OP. I would really like it if there was an Isekai which could give me the 'strange, new world' feeling coupled with a 'lost' MC. Most MC's aren't even 'trapped' in another world anymore, they are 'reborn'in another world.
Edited by Madmous on Feb 6th 2019 at 12:47:12 PM
So your saying that he's the isekai version of Justy Ueki Tylor?
personally, i find that ONE handles overpowered protagonists the best, with One-Punch Man and Mob Psycho 100 both tackling the subject in very different ways
Bumbleby is best ship. busy spending time on r/RWBY and r/anime. Unapologetic SocialistI'm thinking a total mindset mismatch might be fun. Our MC is a hardcore gamebro with a specialty in first person shooters...who winds up in the Sugar Bowl world of a casual game where all disputes are settled using Match-3 puzzles. To make it worse, romance in this world doesn't run on harem comedy tropes, but Harlequin/Mills & Boone rules.
It's a trend in manhua. I think it's rooted in their culture or mythology or something, but almost every manhua I've ever read featured cultivation, meditation, and collecting weird, rare magical ingredients with long names in order to power up.
Also secret techniques with long names that somehow everyone knows so that they can exposit about how great and powerful this secret technique is from the sidelines.
I've seen Re:Zero; I liked it, but I felt it undermined the critique of Subaru's self-importance a bit by virtue of the fact that he *is* the big hero that he seems to think he is. It's just that he can't brute force his way through his problems and things don't get handed to him on a silver platter, he has to actually put some thought and effort into how to move forward, which to be fair is a big improvement from the norm.
Well, yes and no. The "environment" of Japan is if anything not criticized enough in my experience, what with the far right ultranationalist politics poisoning their society, destructive work conditions that make adult life oppressive and miserable, widespread casual sexism, and so on.
I get what you mean though. It's a message that's pretty much the opposite of self-indulgence, and stories like that tend to be more niche in japanese pop media.
...so I guess not really an isekai since what I'm describing is basically the opposite of Wish Fulfillment and more of a character piece/thought exercise.
Edited by Prime32 on Feb 6th 2019 at 7:17:30 PM
@Draghinazzo: Yeah, definitely true. I think I was just reminded of our talk a few pages ago about how isekai these days are always about falling over backwards to construct a world where the transported protagonist suddenly has more knowledge and power than anyone else, without changing an iota - it's usually the world that is wrong, except in the ways where it benefits him.
It's been fun.
That's a good point.
Thinking about what tropes I enjoy in other series.
I wish that more Isekai would do the whole "expanding world" better.
You know, having the main characters take time to learn how things work and differ from earth.
My favorite fantasy series, The Wheel of Time does this very well in the first two books. The Trails series which I've been playing recently also does a fantastic job at this.
The scale can also be a problem, although many recent series seem to be doing better on this account.
I could really dig an Isekai set at a point in somewhere between the usual power fantasy and Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash.
Where the main character's struggles and goals are important in the small scale. And the narrative treats it that way.
Like, a local Lord abusing his power and maybe working with a spy from another country.
So that could be the first plot arc. With the world expanding slowly, rather than meeting the more important setting characters in the first 3 chapters.
It strikes me that maybe I just want a D&D campaign in anime form.
The cultivation thing comes from Taoism, one of the few major religions that focuses more on personal than social improvement (China has the secular path of Confucianism for social harmony and cohesion). Here's a Wikipedia article on the subject.
Also check out Journey to the West, which is pretty much the ur-xianxia
and an interesting intersection between Buddhist and Taoist philosophy (it's pro-Buddhist and anti-Taoist, but still buys into the Taoist cultivation narrative on a certain level and specifically frames Buddhism as a superior path to immortality). For the record, if you want to try English-language xianxia by a fairly professional, competent fantasy author with most of the genre's gross bits filed off, Will Wight's Cradle series is a nice light, fun bunch of adventure stories.
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I'd recommend The Faraway Paladin for that. Maybe Mushoku Tensei?
Paladin, Kenja No Mago (getting an anime soon) and Maken No Daydreamer have heroes who are very powerful, but come across as mildly timid/sheltered Nice Guys who Don't Know Their Own Strength.
They're all Reincarnation stories, and spend at least one arc on the protagonist training and learning about the world before they're ready for action.
Edited by Prime32 on Feb 7th 2019 at 6:58:34 PM
Yeah I heard that about Word Master. I know that Word Master had the gag where the MC would always call the older Beast Man a lolicon any time he acted nice to the loli and I know there are loli characters which I'm ok with, but if it's them being sexualized constantly then yeah that's just...come on. I know Moshuko Tensei's manga was high on the ecchi a lot.
It was interesting? General dude reincarnated in another world, so he uses his adult intellect and regrets from his former life to basically become a wunderkind. Like, the lolicon stuff I mentioned comes from the fact that since he's like a 12 year old kid, when associating with girls his age, it seems super creepy considering he's got the mind of a 30 year old, and from a manga perspective it doesn't really matter what the context is, you know who it's pandering to.

You know i wonder if we'll one day get an isekai where the setting is a steampunk fantasy.