The key to the story is the “clan” and the “battle on the edge

出典 : Amazon.co.jp

A tiny clan to a clan that rules the game

Darwin’s Game” is the story of Kaname’s growth as well as the progress of her clan, the Sunset Ravens.

Kaname defeated Shuka, the “Undefeated Queen,” in her second match.
Through this battle, the two become friends who fight together, and Shuka suggests that they create a “clan” function in the game.
As advised, Kaname forms the clan “Sunset Ravens,” and starts activities with a total of five people, including three new members.
The clan is very small compared to other clans, as evidenced by the fact that powerful clans such as “Ais” are made up of dozens of people.

The driving force behind the success of Sunset Ravens was the privilege Kaname, the leader of the clan, received at an event held at Darwin’s Game just before the clan was formed.

In the Darwin’s Game, there are occasionally events in which randomly selected players are forced to participate.
In the “Treasure Hunt” event held in volume 5 of the book, Kaname was the only one to clear the event, thanks in part to the help of the players who had formed a temporary partnership with her, and as a bonus she received a “privilege” that could be activated in the game.

Kaname wanted the “winner-takes-all” privilege in poker.
This privilege allowed the Sunset Ravens to “bet all” their points in “clan games”.
For example, let’s say that Sunset Ravens has 100 points, and they bet the full amount and win.
If the losing clan has less than 100 points, such as 90, then all the points will go to Sunset Ravens.
In this game, losing all the points means death, and it is a terrible privilege that all the members of the opposing clan will die.
Sunset Ravens gained this very powerful privilege and became very influential in the whole game.

Before you know it, Liu Xuelan, the most powerful player in Darwin’s Game, has joined their ranks, and they have grown to be a presence that other players cannot ignore.
It is forbidden to play the game without permission, and any clan that tries to take the territory without permission will be punished.
In addition, the clan started to set up its own “hideout” and set up an “information analysis room”.
The clan became a powerful clan in both name and reality, and grew to become the leader of the game.

When the clan was first formed, it was just a small clan with the famous “Shuka” as a member, but the Sunset Ravens gained power at a great pace and became the dominant force in the game.
The growth of the clan is one of the major attractions of “Darwin’s Game”.

Tension portrayed in a last-minute battle

As I mentioned at the beginning, there is no I-TUEEE development, and no matter what the battle is, you will struggle and grow through constant last-minute battles and negotiations in “Darwin’s Game”.

For example, the sequence of events when welcoming the number one ranked player, Liu Xuelan, into the fold.
Initially, the question was, “Can we build a cooperative relationship with each other? So we set up a negotiation table with Liu Xuelan, but the negotiation broke down.
Liu Xuelan, who was only interested in Kaname, took a hard line, and in an instant, he came up behind Kaname and knocked her unconscious before she could fight back.
His clan mates were also present, but they hallucinated that they were dying in front of the tremendous killing power and collapsed on the spot, unable to move.
She collapsed on the spot, unable to move. There was nothing she could do, and Kaname was kidnapped.
Kaname and her clan mates are on the hero’s side, but they can be easily defeated by much stronger and more powerful opponents.

After that, they have to fight in a fierce car chase to rescue Kaname, who is being held captive in an enemy car.
Kaname, while being restrained, offers Liu Xuelan a match, saying, “If you can escape from Sunset Ravens without killing anyone, I’ll become your servant, son-in-law, or whatever.
They don’t even know who Sigil is, and the clan has only just been formed.
The clan has just been formed, so they have to fight the number one ranked clan without any coordination.

Rain, who is capable of perfect sniping, hit the tires of his opponent’s car, but the bulletproof design had no noticeable effect, and even with Shuka, he was tossed around as if he were playing with him.
I managed to catch up with him and run alongside him, and tried to attack him at close range with my submachine gun, but Rain’s “World Function (Laplace)” was so fast that I had no chance to predict it, and victory seemed far away.

However, he tactfully succeeded not in “winning” but in “disabling the opponent’s car”.
Everyone gets out of the car and confronts Liu Xuelan.
Even in this situation, Liu Xuelan was able to escape if she killed someone, but she was unable to fulfill Kaname’s condition of escaping without killing anyone.
Although he could not win, he succeeded in “making her give up”.
After that, Kaname was planning to form an alliance, but Liu Xuelan himself offered to join the clan.

In this work, the addition of just one companion is enough to unleash such a deadly battle.
Everything never progresses smoothly, and the “last minute situation” is always depicted, which makes the story tense and exciting to watch.

Setting up characters who are easy to empathize with, even if they are enemies

出典 : Amazon.co.jp

Many of the enemy characters in “Darwin’s Game” are well-developed and detailed.
Not only do they have a wide variety of different abilities (sigils), but many of them also have detailed motivations and backgrounds.

For example, there is an enemy character called “Hanaya” who appears in volume 5 of the book.
Using Sigil’s ability to manipulate plants at will, he transforms a huge building into a fortress.
He frames his enemies with traps set up around the building, and uses plants with narcotic ingredients to perform a kind of brainwashing.
He was a fearsome enemy who controlled his brainwashed players like a robot and attacked intruders while he himself watched the surveillance cameras from a monitor room.

As his name implies, he was a flower shop owner.
His life is closely tied to plants, so naturally he has a wealth of knowledge about them.
As a result, he was able to freely use the Sigil of manipulating plants, and was able to apply it to his fighting style, such as using strong plants as barricades.

This florist and Kaname and the others would later cooperate with each other.
Hanaya had been portrayed as a powerful and fearsome enemy character, but after he became a “friend”, his “inherent kindness” was fully portrayed.

In fact, the florist has a daughter who is battling an illness.
The florist’s daughter has a weak heart and needs a lot of money to be cured, so the florist was trying to win a lot of points in “Darwin’s Game”.

Although the florist ultimately sacrificed his own life, he left the large sum of money he obtained through the game for his daughter and arranged for it to be given to her.
The florist used plants to intervene in people’s minds, a warfare that could be called outrageous.
However, he was fighting with the sole intention of saving his beloved daughter.

In addition to the Hanaya, “Darwin’s Game” has several other instances of characters who were enemies joining the side.
Each time, all the characters change their impression from the time they were enemies.
After that, the characters are often given a chance to show off their skills, and the characters, including the enemies, are rarely disposable, making this a work in which many attractive characters are active.

Summary

As of September 2019, “Darwin’s Game” has not yet been given a broadcast date.
We don’t know when it will air, but we are looking forward to seeing it in action, including the story and the personalities of the characters.
We can expect a lot of things, from the drawings of the battle scenes to the voice actors of the characters.
New information about the anime version of “Darwin’s Game” will be announced in the future.
It’s a work that I can’t take my eyes off of, and one that I need to check out.