Young Ladies Don't Play Fighting Games Volumes 1-9 Manga Review

Aya Mitsuki has entered Kuromi Girls' Academy, where the order of the day is to become a graceful, accomplished lady. Aya's only real goal, however, is to play fighting games. When she meets Mio Yorue, the school's “Shirayuri-sama,” she finds another player even more obsessed than she is. Together they subvert the school's strict rules against computer gaming, even going so far as to fight in a streamed competition. Even in the face of the threat of expulsion, these girls are dedicated to beating the snot out of one another in their favorite game.

Young Ladies Don't Play Fighting Games is translated by Nicole Frasik and lettered by Vanessa Satone.

Aya Mitsuki has entered Kuromi Girls' Academy, where the order of the day is to become a graceful, accomplished lady. Aya's only real goal, however, is to play fighting games. When she meets Mio Yorue, the school's “Shirayuri-sama,” she finds another player even more obsessed than she is. Together they subvert the school's strict rules against computer gaming, even going so far as to fight in a streamed competition. Even in the face of the threat of expulsion, these girls are dedicated to beating the snot out of one another in their favorite game.

Young Ladies Don't Play Fighting Games is translated by Nicole Frasik and lettered by Vanessa Satone.

The first thing that impressed me right off the mark in Young Ladies Don't Play Fighting Games is the obvious love of Fighting Games. True, this is not an incredibly insightful remark, since the story is literally about girls who obsess over fighting games, but it goes so much deeper than just using a game as a vehicle for the manga's narrative. No, here, Ejima has created a fully formed game with characters, types, attacks, defenses, strengths, and weaknesses. This game, which is clearly based upon other fighting games, has its own mythos, updates, and patches before we ever encounter it. We merely enter into an already-existing world of Young Ladies Don't Play Fighting Games (known in-series as π4). When we step into the first volume.

And, with that first step, we are swept up into a non-stop fight. First, we meet Mio, a girl who has given up all other things just to play fighting games. When Aya and Mio's illicit gaming is discovered, they bring the seniors in the dormitory rules into their conspiracy. Eventually, they enter a major fighting game competition. One might think they'd lose quickly, but Mio and an elementary student's competition is so fierce that she becomes temporarily famous.

Aya can only watch, with a growing desire to be the one to bring Mio down. But her need to be Mio's true rival will have to wait…as they are caught, yet again.

This cycle will repeat over volumes. At risk of expulsion, they defeat the student council. Mio's mother, even a teacher-advisor who initially wants to destroy their nascent club, ends up setting them up as streamers. And over and over, they fight using π4 as their proxy for…everything.

The details with which the games are analyzed probably won't surprise anyone familiar with e-sports, but they are detailed enough to allow one to imagine playing this game that doesn't exist outside the pages of this manga. The anime adaptation, while true to the manga's characterization and plot, has swapped out the original game created by Ejima for the more instantly recognizable characters and skills of Street Fighter 6, since CAPCOM sponsors the anime. While more people will be able to follow the fighting with such well-known gameplay, I absolutely stand with the manga creator and the time and effort she put into creating an entirely original game for the characters.

With a story so embedded in the idea of “struggle”, and fighting against discrimination, at school and home, it would make sense that the larger world of e-sports would also be portrayed as a place where the girls are barely tolerated. They indeed face typical trash talk by lesser players, and therefore I am once again able to remind the reading audience that monkeys with smaller testicles scream louder to compensate, a fact I will always bring up in relation to gaming.

However, this manga is not about discrimination or acceptance. This is a manga of pure obsession, as we watch Mio, especially, fight against everything that keeps her from playing fighting games with equal dedication. Whether it is a school sempai holding her violations over her head, or her mother, who doesn't want Mio to lose herself, Mio's battle is never-ending.

The art here is magnificent. Every character has her specific look of gaming concentration, and the games are so dynamically drawn that you can hear and see the attacks as they are meant to be experienced. Ejima's notes are fascinating from an anthropological perspective, not just in her game-building, but in her own keyboard mods. I struggle to type with a full keyboard; the idea of using a 30-40% smaller keyboard hurts my brain.

My last note has to be the frisson of yuri that some folks have attached to this. This series, like any and every story that depicts two women with an intense relationship of any kind, is often perceived as yuri. You all know I have spent my life in pursuit of excellent yuri. Here we have yet another excellent example of a woman dedicated to being “seen” by another woman, to be her ideal. Aya's desire is not romantic; it is not familial; it is a drive to become Mio's perfect rival. If that reads yuri to you, enjoy. I'm not committing until we see what becomes of Aya and Mio.

If there is a single negative to the story, it is that there's only one real way to create a new arc – add an adversary. So we're seeing internal and external opponents step up, be fought, and be replaced by the next match with very little relief. As I read all nine existing volumes, it felt, not surprisingly, exhausting. Perhaps a weekly anime format would be a relief, as a serialized format for the manga. There's an unrelenting quality about the story all at once.

And yet…I would like to know what happens. As Volume 9 wraps up, COVID-19 has entered the field, bringing in-person competition to a halt. What does this mean for e-sports competitions? I actually have no idea, as I have paid them no attention in the real world.