Richard Eisenbeis:
This year, anime that focus on games and game-related culture have been quite numerous. One of these, Btooom! (the onomatopoeic sound effect for a bomb exploding) ended its television run last week in Japan. Like Hunger Games and Battle Royale, Btooom! follows a group of people stranded away from civilization and forced to fight in a death game. And in a twist straight out of the The Last Star Fighter, the death game they are playing is based on the world's most popular game—in this case "Btooom!"a first-person bomber." But is this just another story of video game skills being used to save the day, or is there something deeper being done within this framework?
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