Magical Girl Raising Project Volume 1

Magical Girl Raising Project Volume 1 by Asari Endou (translated by Alexander Keller-Nelson. Originally published by YenOn, June 2017. Approx 190 pages.

I'll just admit it outright: I unabashedly love Magical Girl animes. About 20 years ago, my main VCD/DVD-R supplier started offering some of the classic Pierrot Magical Girl shows - a bunch of episodes of Creamy Mami, Magical Emi, Pastel Yumi, and Magical Fairy Persia. I just couldn't get enough of them. I've seen a bunch of the shows over the years, and I'd say my top favorites are still Creamy Mami (luckily now streaming on Amazon), Minky Momo, Majokko Megu-chan, and Fancy Lala.

Over the past five decades, magical girl shows have been present. Naturally, every now and then, some titles appear which attempt to subvert the standard tropes. That's fine; the formula is good, and experimentation is good. Especially when it yields admirable results. A few years back, we were treated to the magnificent Madoka Magica (a spin-off is currently airing; haven't had a chance to check it out). Madoka Magica was an amazing show - it retained the purity and hope of classic magical girl shows, yet upped the ante on real danger, drama, and heart-breaking trauma.

However, cruising under the radar was another hard-edged spin on the classical magical girl formula. This one was more of a magical girl plus Battle Royale hybrid. A darker than expected - especially given the character designs - title, this one is known as Magical Girl Raising Project. I loved the 13 episode series - and so I decided to check out the light novels. Turns out, the first one is pretty damn good.

MGRP revolves around a titular mobile phone game - billed as absolutely free- which allows gamers to play as magical girls. Soon, a select few players find themselves receiving an irresistible offer - to become actual magical girls. As magical girls, they'll be expected to do good deeds, and earn the in-game version of currency, candies.

Of course, there's a bump in the road...at a certain point, it turns out the Magic Kingdom has spent too much mana recruiting these magical girls, and so a bit of pruning must be done. An elimination game is set in motion to weed out the least productive magical girls - of course, an in-game elimination results in a real-life one. And so, the game becomes a very real game of survival.

Like every game of survival worth its salt; tenuous alliances are formed, backs are stabbed, etc. And this is where MGRP excels. The character backstories are well done enough; but seem more curated to elicit an optimal emotional response when a magical girl is eliminated. The fight scenes and eliminations, in both the novel and the anime, are excellently done - bloody and brutal.

The characters are brought to vivid life via the ambitious designs of Marui-no. The artist has gone the extra step of creating kawaii 'avatar' style designs, as well as normal ones, used for the interior illustrations.The designs are evocative of the magical girls; effectively capturing the looks and special skills which are granted based upon the player's personality.

Speaking of characters, MGRP also features a devious in-game
mascot akin to that scumbag Kyubei from Madoka Magica (sorry, no better term for that piece of...work). This one's name is Fav; and while he's not as odious as Kyubei, he's still a devious, duplicitous villain.

Comparing the first volume to the anime; I'd have to give the edge to the anime. Unlike other shows, where each novel might correlate to 2-3 episodes, the entirety of the show's run covers the events of the first novel. This allows for a considerably larger margin of character growth; especially for our protagonist, Snow White. It also allows for more dedicated backstory for the other girls, granting a more poignant, visceral gut-punch when they are 'eliminated'.

But don't get me wrong, the writing here is very good. It's a bit simple at times, but the background world is painted effectively enough, and the fight scenes are where the author excels.

And, best of all, even though there was only one season of the anime, there are at least seven more light novels (so far). Keep an eye out for future write-ups on them.

Cover:
Not a bad cover, but not great. It's a beautiful pic of Snow White, and the black background is understandable for the dark tone of the work. However, the color palette used for Snow White is too muted, and ends up getting swallowed by the darkness she finds herself surrounded by. Oh wait, maybe this cover is actually genius....