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BTOOOM! #2
BTOOOM! 2
絶海の孤島で、自らがハマッていたネットゲーム『BTOOOM！』と同じリアルボンバーデスゲームを強いられた坂本は、爆弾による殺人ゲームには乗らずに島を脱出することを心に誓い、平清という中年男性と共闘することになる。しかし上空から投下される食料を巡り、プレイヤー達の殺し合いはますます激化し、坂本達もその渦に巻き込まれていく。そして彼らの前に現れた猟奇殺人犯の少年……、吉良康介と未知の爆弾に追い詰められていくことに!!
185 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 9, 2010
13 people are currently reading
142 people want to read
About the author
Junya Inoue
119 books25 followersKatakana いのうえ じゅんや、
Kanji 井上淳哉
AKA Joker JUN
Height 185cm
Blood Type B
Born 18 October 1971
Birthplace Shimanto, Kochi Prefecture, Japan
Occupation Character Designer
Workplace Toaplan
Gazelle
Cave
Years Active 1991 - Present
Website Official Website
Kanji 井上淳哉
AKA Joker JUN
Height 185cm
Blood Type B
Born 18 October 1971
Birthplace Shimanto, Kochi Prefecture, Japan
Occupation Character Designer
Workplace Toaplan
Gazelle
Cave
Years Active 1991 - Present
Website Official Website
Ratings & Reviews
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Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews
May 11, 2017
Battle Royale ... but with bombs!
🌴💥💀
And also ... less interesting characters!
🌴💥💀
And also ... less interesting characters!
November 8, 2017
Second book: We start of being introduced to Kira. I actually really like him as a character. Yes I believe that he is a messed up kid and i don't condone his actions if he existed outside the book, but as a fictional character he is interesting.
September 11, 2016
Err... So this volume is pretty horrific in regards to content, as that 14 year old kid is insane!
I feel like the old man has a secret agenda.
I feel like the old man has a secret agenda.
December 6, 2023
Review is the same as Book 1.
March 18, 2017
Note: This review covers the entire BTOOM! series, not only this volume. There are no spoilers.
My first impression upon reading the description of BTOOM! was, "Oh great, another Hunger Games/Battle Royale rip-off." The set-up is identical: a bunch of people, selected for reasons unknown to them, are sent to an island where they're meant to kill one another off until a winner emerges while the rest of the country/world watches the action on live-stream. Along the way, alliances are formed, enemies made, and as the survivor count dwindles, the days continue, and supplies begin to run low, paranoia sets in.
But BTOOM! somehow manages to overcome this "me too" syndrome and emerge as its own stand-alone story set in the modern world where ranked online gaming is basically a championship sport, and an entire generation of societal "drop-outs" (known as 'Neets', they're people who have decided to pour their energy into online interactions instead of in-person social activity) is changing Japan's cultural landscape.
BTOOM! is actually two games in one. The first BTOOM! is a massively-multiplayer online combat game set in a futuristic world where players adopt virtual avatars to deathmatch using weaponry called 'Bim'. Imagine Call of Duty or Halo, but where your main weapons are explosives with different types and usages. This is where our protagonist, Ryota Sakamoto, shines. As one of the ten highest-ranked BTOOM! players in the world, the 22-year old Ryota is a self-professed Neet who has turned his back on everyone (his job, his old school friends, his step-father, even his own mom) to maintain his skills and reputation as one of the best-of-the-best in this online world. He's even met Himiko, a female player who admires his skill, and the two have a puppy love cyber-relationship, even though they've never met in real life. As far as Ryota's concerned, this was the life he was always meant to live: a place where people all over the globe fear and revere him for his prowess.
As far as someone else was concerned though, this makes Ryota an ideal candidate for the other BTOOM!. The live-action, holy-shit-this-is-for-real game described in the first paragraph. Ryota's memories are hazy: last thing he remembered was playing BTOOM! on his Xbox 360, but now he's awake, dangling several feet up in the air from a parachute tangled in a tree, with a chip implanted in his hand and a container filled with real-life Bim. As the explosions start going off and he frantically tries to get his bearings, Ryota comes to the inescapable conclusion that not only is he playing BTOOM! for real, but other people on the island are as well.
BTOOM! is a solid, fast-paced action extravaganza with just enough to set it apart from other dystopian literature based around a similar premise. Like the best dystopian fiction, it uses an outlandish premise to reflect and offer commentary on current cultural, social, and political trends. "If you don't like what you see," mangaka Inoue tells us, "then start working to change things before they get to this point."
The manga offers some nicely-detailed back-story on all the participants, which unfold in flashback sequences explaining exactly who they are and what circumstances led to their inclusion in the game, and holds its story together very well over multiple volumes. Everything that happens is explained, though it may not be explained immediately. This is obvious from the first book, where Ryota stumbles across a series of bodies, including one in the process of being consumed by insects, and another guy who seemingly lost his pants, floating face-down in a lagoon. We eventually meet these people and learn how and why they met their fates, but only several chapters later. When Inoue shows us explosions off in the distance, or a quick flash of a combatant to whom we've not yet been introduced, you can trust everything will eventually be explained.
There's a minimal amount of fan service and light nudity in the books, but it's not anything over-the-top or even unrealistic, despite what the cover might lead one to believe. Even the violence is more subdued than what one might expect of a title where people are killing one another with miniature bombs. It's not a story for kids, but it's far less brutal than, say, the manga adaptation of 'Battle Royale', which, though awesome, relished its images of spilled intestines, gun-shot faces, and severed limbs a little too much in my opinion.
Highly recommended for anyone who enjoys social commentary with their dystopian future manga, BTOOM! is a great read from start to finish. Just when you think you know what's coming, Inoue hurls a wrench into the works and jerks you in a direction you couldn't have anticipated. What's more, when it looks like the end is in sight and our heroes will win the day, he throws the curve ball of all curve balls, splitting the main characters up and dropping them into an even worse scenario as the designers of the real-life BTOOM! work to fix the 'bugs' in their system and ramp up the mayhem to feverish levels to satisfy a blood-thirsty audience.
Go. Read. It. Now.
My first impression upon reading the description of BTOOM! was, "Oh great, another Hunger Games/Battle Royale rip-off." The set-up is identical: a bunch of people, selected for reasons unknown to them, are sent to an island where they're meant to kill one another off until a winner emerges while the rest of the country/world watches the action on live-stream. Along the way, alliances are formed, enemies made, and as the survivor count dwindles, the days continue, and supplies begin to run low, paranoia sets in.
But BTOOM! somehow manages to overcome this "me too" syndrome and emerge as its own stand-alone story set in the modern world where ranked online gaming is basically a championship sport, and an entire generation of societal "drop-outs" (known as 'Neets', they're people who have decided to pour their energy into online interactions instead of in-person social activity) is changing Japan's cultural landscape.
BTOOM! is actually two games in one. The first BTOOM! is a massively-multiplayer online combat game set in a futuristic world where players adopt virtual avatars to deathmatch using weaponry called 'Bim'. Imagine Call of Duty or Halo, but where your main weapons are explosives with different types and usages. This is where our protagonist, Ryota Sakamoto, shines. As one of the ten highest-ranked BTOOM! players in the world, the 22-year old Ryota is a self-professed Neet who has turned his back on everyone (his job, his old school friends, his step-father, even his own mom) to maintain his skills and reputation as one of the best-of-the-best in this online world. He's even met Himiko, a female player who admires his skill, and the two have a puppy love cyber-relationship, even though they've never met in real life. As far as Ryota's concerned, this was the life he was always meant to live: a place where people all over the globe fear and revere him for his prowess.
As far as someone else was concerned though, this makes Ryota an ideal candidate for the other BTOOM!. The live-action, holy-shit-this-is-for-real game described in the first paragraph. Ryota's memories are hazy: last thing he remembered was playing BTOOM! on his Xbox 360, but now he's awake, dangling several feet up in the air from a parachute tangled in a tree, with a chip implanted in his hand and a container filled with real-life Bim. As the explosions start going off and he frantically tries to get his bearings, Ryota comes to the inescapable conclusion that not only is he playing BTOOM! for real, but other people on the island are as well.
BTOOM! is a solid, fast-paced action extravaganza with just enough to set it apart from other dystopian literature based around a similar premise. Like the best dystopian fiction, it uses an outlandish premise to reflect and offer commentary on current cultural, social, and political trends. "If you don't like what you see," mangaka Inoue tells us, "then start working to change things before they get to this point."
The manga offers some nicely-detailed back-story on all the participants, which unfold in flashback sequences explaining exactly who they are and what circumstances led to their inclusion in the game, and holds its story together very well over multiple volumes. Everything that happens is explained, though it may not be explained immediately. This is obvious from the first book, where Ryota stumbles across a series of bodies, including one in the process of being consumed by insects, and another guy who seemingly lost his pants, floating face-down in a lagoon. We eventually meet these people and learn how and why they met their fates, but only several chapters later. When Inoue shows us explosions off in the distance, or a quick flash of a combatant to whom we've not yet been introduced, you can trust everything will eventually be explained.
There's a minimal amount of fan service and light nudity in the books, but it's not anything over-the-top or even unrealistic, despite what the cover might lead one to believe. Even the violence is more subdued than what one might expect of a title where people are killing one another with miniature bombs. It's not a story for kids, but it's far less brutal than, say, the manga adaptation of 'Battle Royale', which, though awesome, relished its images of spilled intestines, gun-shot faces, and severed limbs a little too much in my opinion.
Highly recommended for anyone who enjoys social commentary with their dystopian future manga, BTOOM! is a great read from start to finish. Just when you think you know what's coming, Inoue hurls a wrench into the works and jerks you in a direction you couldn't have anticipated. What's more, when it looks like the end is in sight and our heroes will win the day, he throws the curve ball of all curve balls, splitting the main characters up and dropping them into an even worse scenario as the designers of the real-life BTOOM! work to fix the 'bugs' in their system and ramp up the mayhem to feverish levels to satisfy a blood-thirsty audience.
Go. Read. It. Now.
June 29, 2019
This volume was a bit better than the last one, though much of the drama is dialed up to eleven. Like, or There are some interesting things at play here, such as hints that relatives to the "game's" participants knowing more about what's going on that it seems, and a feeling of real character growth (and conflict) within Ryouta. I don't trust Taira at all though, and I predict it's only a matter of time before he turns out to be a terrible person, too.
And man, the characters in BTOOOM! are awful people. I don't believe in trigger warnings, but holy crap, are there some dark things in this volume. Beyond the obvious murder inherent in a death game, there's child abuse, rape, animal abuse...people were making such a fuss over Goblin Slayer awhile back, but I was far more disturbed, reading this volume of BTOOOM!. And it looks like the next volume is going to double down on the rape, judging from the preview page at the end of this one. I get that this series is taking a GANTZ approach, where its primary argument is that humans are terrible, and most of them become more so when you back them into corners--but BTOOOM! lacks the common enemy to rally against, in the aliens/monsters of GANTZ. It's just man's inhumanity against man, with little in the way of reprieves--the potential redemption arc of Ryouta being the one example I can think of. I have no problem with dark material in my fiction, but this is borderline-oppressive.
I'll give it another volume, because there are elements to like here. It's just hard to read at times, because it's so repulsively bleak. I can deal with that, so long as the plot progresses at a decent enough pace to balance things out. Right now, it's just barely doing that, but I'm willing to give it a chance to tip the scales further toward plot development.
And man, the characters in BTOOOM! are awful people. I don't believe in trigger warnings, but holy crap, are there some dark things in this volume. Beyond the obvious murder inherent in a death game, there's child abuse, rape, animal abuse...people were making such a fuss over Goblin Slayer awhile back, but I was far more disturbed, reading this volume of BTOOOM!. And it looks like the next volume is going to double down on the rape, judging from the preview page at the end of this one. I get that this series is taking a GANTZ approach, where its primary argument is that humans are terrible, and most of them become more so when you back them into corners--but BTOOOM! lacks the common enemy to rally against, in the aliens/monsters of GANTZ. It's just man's inhumanity against man, with little in the way of reprieves--the potential redemption arc of Ryouta being the one example I can think of. I have no problem with dark material in my fiction, but this is borderline-oppressive.
I'll give it another volume, because there are elements to like here. It's just hard to read at times, because it's so repulsively bleak. I can deal with that, so long as the plot progresses at a decent enough pace to balance things out. Right now, it's just barely doing that, but I'm willing to give it a chance to tip the scales further toward plot development.
March 19, 2022
Nuestro protagonista empieza a darse cuenta de lo que está sucediendo. Aún no tengo mucho que comentar pues no han pasado grandes cosas o cosas que llamen mucho mi atención , más allá de que empiezan a desarrollarse los eventos.
De todas formas, aún no me engancha la trama pues no hay mucho conocimiento al respecto. Sin embargo, los dibujos y diseños me parecen muy buenos y la forma en la que van presentando algunos recuerdos previos con lo que sucede en la isla por momentos me pierde.
Por otro lado, me va gustando el formato del manga y como se va construyendo la historia en la isla. De a poco empieza a interesarme aunque aún no tanto 😂
De todas formas, aún no me engancha la trama pues no hay mucho conocimiento al respecto. Sin embargo, los dibujos y diseños me parecen muy buenos y la forma en la que van presentando algunos recuerdos previos con lo que sucede en la isla por momentos me pierde.
Por otro lado, me va gustando el formato del manga y como se va construyendo la historia en la isla. De a poco empieza a interesarme aunque aún no tanto 😂
January 9, 2022
Çok sert. Herkese göre değil. Asla çocuklara göre uygun değil. Minik spoiler ile devam edebilir.
İlk ciltte battle royal dünyası kurulmuştu. Burada yeni karakterlerle devam etti. Ama işlediği temalar ve bunu çok “pornografik” şekilde resmetmesi tahammül eden okur kitlesini sınırlandıracaktır. Pornografi derken sadece cinsellikten bahsetmiyorum. Şiddetin her türlüsünün resmedilişi de öyle. Aile içi şiddet, tecavüz (hele burada bir “çocuk” detayı var), intihar, beden bütünlüğünün çok bozulduğu ölüm sahneleri… Hepsi minicik bir cilde sığmış. Anne babaların dikkat etmesinde fayda olabilir.
İlk ciltte battle royal dünyası kurulmuştu. Burada yeni karakterlerle devam etti. Ama işlediği temalar ve bunu çok “pornografik” şekilde resmetmesi tahammül eden okur kitlesini sınırlandıracaktır. Pornografi derken sadece cinsellikten bahsetmiyorum. Şiddetin her türlüsünün resmedilişi de öyle. Aile içi şiddet, tecavüz (hele burada bir “çocuk” detayı var), intihar, beden bütünlüğünün çok bozulduğu ölüm sahneleri… Hepsi minicik bir cilde sığmış. Anne babaların dikkat etmesinde fayda olabilir.
July 8, 2018
Las aventuras de Ryota se vuelven más intensas. Los jugadores de la isla son despiadados, y tanto él como Taira tienen que hacer uso de su inteligencia para superar los retos que se acercan.
Me encantó. Está historia se está volviendo una de las más intensas que he leído, y los personajes son increíbles. Todos llenos de sorpresas e impredecibles a más no poder.
Me encantó. Está historia se está volviendo una de las más intensas que he leído, y los personajes son increíbles. Todos llenos de sorpresas e impredecibles a más no poder.
May 3, 2022
Love Taira, I always loved him. The only thing that always piss me off when I reread this series, is the fact that the mangaka only uses girls to obviously ecchi and male consumption, it’s kinda disgusting but well…
May 31, 2017
Entrete y super rápido de leer. Pero aún no engancho. Le daré una última oportunidad al tomo 3
December 25, 2019
Planteamiento del problema, ¿dónde?
September 6, 2020
Pretty Decent survival manga! Definitely not the best in the Genre, the art and action is pretty good but the story just drags on on just not good😴😁👌❤️
June 27, 2021
El hecho de humanos mandados a un videojuego es algo cliché, me gusta el tema del armamento de cada uno de allí. Por el momento no puedo decir mucho ya que recién comienzo el manga.
September 7, 2022
So far, this series continues to exceed my expectations. It is no doubt R or even X-rated, but it is a good story with serviceable artwork. There may even be a moral.
July 9, 2023
Uyyyy se está poniendo fuerteeeee
December 5, 2023
a lil exaggerated but ok .-.
January 20, 2015
Another detail I want to mention about this series is that the anime is also very good, but it does end on a cliffhanger, hence why I started the manga. It's even better than the anime though because it gives a lot more details about what's going on at home while everyone's on the island. I just love this series so much. The manga-ka is also a graphic director for video games, so that's pretty awesome.
March 25, 2016
Another interesting volume of Btooom!
The story is progressing nicely, with loads of action and character development.
The MC and his supporting cast are getting better as characters, and I can't wait to see where they go from here.
The story is progressing nicely, with loads of action and character development.
The MC and his supporting cast are getting better as characters, and I can't wait to see where they go from here.
May 6, 2016
Well this volume of Btoom! Is so epic, the story behind the kid is so awesome and disturbing, the way he is and how he kills without hesitate. Also in the end of the volume we met a new character a girl.
July 1, 2013
i can't believe how good the plot is in this series. the anime was fantastic and addictive. the twists and turns and shocking developments make this one of the best manga series ever!
August 5, 2013
This is a manga that's better than hunger games. Has more realistic events and tragedies. People die and dark things come to light not for the faint hearted. Good art style and characters.
November 14, 2013
Dios! Que miedo
April 22, 2014
Actually, it's good for its kind: but all those bowels and throwing up go a bit too far for me. Then again, it's supposed to happen in such a story.
July 20, 2016
4/10
Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews