Did SAO invent the Isekai genre? Or was something else first?
Did SAO invent the Isekai genre? Or was something else first?
Nolan Jenkins
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Zachary Gomez
It definitely helped popularize if not kickstart the current trend, but isekai has been around in anime for ages. In the 2000s you had things like Kyo Kara Maoh and even in the 1990s you had stuff like Fushigi Yuugi.
Evan Jackson
yes, by not an isekai
Brayden Davis
>genre
based retard
Joshua Rivera
There's been at least 50 isekai anime before SAO.
I think the first Japanese isekai anime was Aura Battler Dunbine in 1983.
And the first isekai involving being stuck in a video game world was Knight Ramune in 1990.
And the first isekai revolving around a boring self-insert, his special powers and his generic harem was El Hazard in 1985.
Also, inb4 people cite Western "In Another World" stories as isekai.
Benjamin Diaz
El Hazard in 1995****
Oliver Taylor
Even without going Western you can still say the Japanese fairy tail of Urashima Taro inspired isekai. At the time of writing, going to a sea palace is considered the same thing as going to another world.
And, if we're going to stretch the definition that far, then The Odyssey qualifies for similar reasons. Sailing to a new yet undiscovered shore was going to a new world. That's why America was referred to as "the new world" for some time after its discovery.
Adam Ross
The reason why I consider it fucking dumb to conflate Isekai and Western "another world" stories into one umbrella is because isekai is a Japanese term and only started being used to describe a genre within the last decade to describe a specific style of Japanese storytelling. It would be like calling the Simpsons anime because anime means animation.
It also enables to smartasses who think they're clever by dropping Narnia or Alice in Wonderland when people ask about the history of isekai when they're obviously looking for Japanese answers.
Zachary Cooper
"isekai" didn't really exist before SAO, so you could say that. But there are older anime that would be now considered isekai, that predate it.
Angel Gonzalez
There was actually an isekai boom in the 90s, but back then it was primarily aimed at the shoujo demographic.