Rise of the rookie!
Creative Staff
Story/Art: Akira Itou
Translation: Satsuki and Shizuki Yamashita
What They Say
Aichi Sendou is a timid middle school teen. He is so shy that even conversing in class is a bit of a challenge. However, one thing that keeps him going through all his struggles – Vanguard. With his ultra-rare Blaster Blade card always by his side, he knows that at least in the gaming world he has a chance to be different.
Unfortunately for Aichi, his favorite card was stolen by a vengeful classmate. Furthermore, the Blaster Blade was later lost in a winner-takes-all competition to one of the best players around his community. Now to retrieve his priceless card, Aichi is going to have to break from his mold of shyness and win his property back by finally engaging someone, and in this case a local champ, in an actual Vanguard card-battle!
His first battle with Toshiki Kai is an eye opener. It’s part learning experience and part coming-of-age moment. And with that first battle and that unexpected first win, Aichi is now on his way towards fully immersing himself in the world of the card game!
Technical:
The cover here is a decent image of Aichi holding a Vanguard card, with Blaster Blade placed over top. It doesn’t look bad, but perhaps a simpler image with the card shown more clearly may have served the book better. The back cover contains a summary alongside an image of some of Aichi’s rival Vanguard players. In terms of extras, we get not only a few color pages up front, but also a significant section that explains how to play the game and some of the lore! It does expect to some degree that the reader picked up the special edition that comes with a deck, but even without the cards it still proves very helpful towards understanding the game. Text reads smoothly, honorifics aren’t used, paper quality feels solid, and sound effects are left in their original form with translations added.
The art in this book is decent, but absolutely nothing exceptional. Everything about it looks more than a little average, but it’s at least serviceable. Fortunately action and emotion come across well, and the characters all have distinct designs. The one noteworthy element is that the players themselves are actually overlapped with the cards they play, which is certainly a nice touch. Backgrounds appear when needed and have a decent amount of detail.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
In a future where card games have become a huge phenomenon, it’s the game Vanguard that stands atop them all. Though Aichi Sendou is a fan of the game with a rare card known as Blaster Blade, he’s actually a bit of a wuss who has yet to even play a game. Meanwhile, a local bully named Morikawa, having lost to a kid who just moved to town named Toshiki Kai, sets his sights on our hero. Having robbed a weakling, Morikawa then wagers his ill-gotten goods to refight Kai, only to lose yet again, this time to Kai’s buddy Miwa. Desperate to win his treasure back, Aichi follows to the scene at the local card shop, and ends up in a match against Kai! The battle acts as an introduction to the game for both our hero and the reader, and along the way we learn that Kai was actually the one who gave Aichi Blaster Blade in the first place. Amazingly, Aichi is able to pull out a win, earning him his card back in addition to some new friends.
The rest of the volume is spent on a handful of card fights that double as character introductions. First up is the cocky young boy Kamui Katsuragi, who uses some rather interesting robotic cards. Aichi’s next opponent is a girl named Misaki who works at the local card shop. Though she’s never played the game before she has a photographic memory and has observed plenty, allowing her to still prove an intimidating opponent. Finally, Aichi reaches out to Morikawa, and despite the bully brushing it off, ends up joining his cardfight research club at school.
As the volume closes a shadowy figure approaches the local card shop, threatening to put an end to Aichi’s good hearted fun.
In Summary
As someone with no real experience with the titular card game, this volume actually makes for a rather nice introduction. Even ignoring the supplementary material, the book makes it easy to learn alongside the main character by making him an absolute rookie. This of course also means for fans of the game this book may prove a little slow, as the strategy doesn’t really start to open up until midway through. The games played within also seem to have a bit of a rough flow, finishing rather quickly. In fact, it seems that most of the book’s attention is on setting up the characters and the rules of the game, more than actually showing off any kind of crazy plays. On the other hand, compared to card game manga such as the various Yugioh series, this book actually plays it surprisingly and satisfyingly safe. At least for now there are no overly specific cards, magical cheating, or ancient artifacts to interfere with the good old fashioned card games. Even the visual spectacle is provided by simple imagination rather than advanced technology. Hopefully the series will continue with this relaxed angle, but for now it at least makes for a nice, intriguing change of pace.
Content Grade: B
Art Grade: B
Packaging Grade: A-
Text/Translation Grade: B+
Age Rating: 10+
Released By: Vertical
Release Date: April 29th, 2014
MSRP: $10.95