Btooom! is a manga by Junya Inoue and published by Yen Press. The story stars a young pro-gamer named Ryouta who is put in to a real version of his favorite game “Btooom!.” The game itself is a action strategy RPG. You along with your team must outmaneuver, out think and then kill the opposing team using bombs. Now Ryouta is trapped in an island where he must survive the game and achieve the proper goals in order to win and leave the island.
The story starts off with Ryouta Sakamoto playing with his team in the online game Btooom! against an opposing group. Ryouta manages to win the game for his team and has no problem letting them know that. Winning that game also puts Ryouta and his crew among the top ten teams in the world. While he’s one of the top players in the world in real life Ryouta is a bit of a loser and deadbeat with no job prospects other than his hopes to be hired by the game company Tyrannos who develops Btooom!. Ryouta is dead set on becoming an employee for Tyrannos and will not allow for any other options much to the dismay of his mother. He lives at her apartment and doing nothing but playing games. Ryouta’s mother tries her best to get him jobs but he always turns them down. Her insisting that he take a job makes him verbally abusive towards her.
But all this changes when he wakes up on an island with no memory of how he got there. All he has is his backpack and and an extra pack with some cubes. They turn out to be bombs. His hand also has an odd piece of tech surgically put in. He finally encounters another human being but this person isn’t friendly. He’s lobbing bombs at Ryouta. Eventually he finds out that his favorite game is now his reality. He must kill his enemies and take the device from their hands in order to win. But why was he chosen for the game? Who is behind it? And just how many people are playing?
It’s an interesting premise that reminds me in some ways of Battle Royal. There is just enough mystery to keep me hooked and the action is brutal. The art is decent but nothing that stands out too much for me. If you are a fan of the Battle Royal movie or manga you will be in good hands at least. The main character is kind of a jerk that is wasting his life which made me wonder if he was chosen to be on the island because of it. Then would it mean the others stuck on the island with Ryouta are more or less deserving to be there as well? Only time will tell. Personally Btooom! did not blow me away, but I’m still interested in finding out what happens next so my opinion on it may change in future volumes. If you are into crazy action and kill or be killed survival of the fittest type scenarios then Btooom! may be something you want to pick up.