Black Lagoon manga gets first in-browser video game

Japanese software company CTW announced on Tuesday, September 19, 2023, that it is developing a browser-based video game for the world-famous Black Lagoon manga series. Entitled Heaven’s Shot, the game will become available worldwide on CTW’s online platform G123 upon its eventual release.

While a release date for the upcoming video game based on author and illustrator Rei Hiroe’s Black Lagoon manga series has not been announced, pre-registration for the game is open. Details are generally sparse at this time, but CTW has confirmed that the first video game based on Hiroe’s manga will be a freemium game.

The Black Lagoon manga originally launched in 2002 under the Shogakukan publishing brand but has gone on hiatus and returned multiple times since 2010. Hiroe’s original story has spawned two spin-off manga series, as well as two different television anime series produced by Madhouse Studios and an OVA (original video animation).

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Black Lagoon manga’s first game set to be in a “gacha-like” style, but browser-based only

The latest

As mentioned above, information on the first video game based on the Black Lagoon manga series is relatively sparse at the time of writing. While a release date has yet to be announced, the fact that the game is open for pre-registration suggests that it will be released within the coming months. CTW describing the game as “freemium” also suggests a similar style of gameplay to “gacha” mobile games, only in a browser-exclusive format.

Hiroe first launched the manga in Shogakukan’s Monthly Sunday GX magazine in 2002. The series’ 12th compilation volume was originally released in Japan in August 2021, and was released in North America in August 2022. As mentioned above, the series first took a long-term hiatus in 2010, and like Yoshihiro Togashi’s Hunter x Hunter, it has come off and returned to hiatus several times since.

The franchise’s two spinoff manga series are entitled Sawyer the Cleaner - Dismemberment! Gore Gore Girl and Eda -initial stage-. The two series were released in September 2019 and April 2022, and are drawn by Tatsuhiro Ida and Hajime Yamamura, respectively. Both series are serialized in Shogakukan’s Monthly Sunday GX magazine.

The series was adapted into an anime in 2006 by Madhouse Studios and received two seasons and an OVA. The OVA, titled Roberta’s Blood Trail, was released in 2010. Geneon first released the series on DVD in North America in 2007–2008, with Funimation rereleasing the series on DVD and Blu-ray in 2012 and 2015.

Hiroe has also served as the original creator for the Re:CREATORS television anime series, providing original character designs and writing and overseeing scripts for the series. The series premiered in April 2017 and ran for 22 episodes.

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