Called Game

Edit

What would you like to edit?

SynopsisBackgroundAlternative TitlesPictureChapters/VolumesPublishing DatesRelationsTypeExternal Links  

At first, I thought that this would be the typical fantasy manga with some palace intrigue and classical romance plot (I mean, even the countries are named after single letters), but I was pleasantly surprised. This is a GOOD politica manga.

First the story. I'm surprised by how many things have happened in the 10 chapters I've been able to find. Chapters are long and straight to the point. Character's actions have serious consecuences, and there are no lore dumps in the middle of it. Flashbacks resolved in one chapter, rarely more. Good rythm and exposition, what happens and why it's pretty clear. Don't expect much ... physical action tho, it's all conspiracy. Until now, at least.

About the art, it's somewhat basic for manga nowadays. It's mainly realistic, avoiding crazy hairs and dresses. It goes for the purely historical feel. Backgrounds are detailed, the drawing is clean and dynamic. Not much to say here. You won't be surprised nor disgusted. It's functional for the story they're telling.

Characters are well constructed. ALL of them flawed. You won't find OP main characters with saint-ish personalities here. Everybody watches and fears everybody else to certain point. The main characters, Aruna and the Prince, have both good and bad character traits and a nice relationship, and secondary characters are instantly recognizable. For such a restrained and "realistic" art, character design is plenty varied.

About the enjoyment, I'd give it an 8. I wanted to read some serious political - court intrigue manga and I was looking for something new. This is a good finding, if you like that kind of thing. I really want to read more about this story, but updates seem to take long. I'll keep an eye on it tho.

Overall I'd give it a 7 (Good, meaning GOOD), although I've thought of the 8. Had some doubts, I'll need to read some more to decide.

As recommendation (Not on this site), there are some manhua and manwha with similar themes (The fight amongst the queens, the court is a lethal game), like "Surviving as the Hero's wife" and "The lady with the Lamp". Shounen oujo is somewhat similar as well.

This series has yet to end, but I feel that at least on MAL, it seems to be underestimated.

Seldom, does Shoujo comics really give weight to its characters. It's fine and dandy to write a story about falling in love with a hunky king or prince, who has a "dark" side to them. It makes those characters mysterious and sexy, following the "bad guy" archetype. This is one of those few Shoujo comics that I think has that male appeal in it, and those rare specimens should be praised and promoted.

Since it only has a dozen chapters so that is available translated, I ... shall not discuss the plot too heavily. The story took some inspiration from Henry VIII court. Some characters are blatantly dropped from it. The main character seems to come from Brittany, which really don't make much sense, but you shall have to see it to get what I mean. It focused on the theme of court intrigued, role of women, strength, duty, determination and self worth. It's quite a pleasant read if you like a fun story. I think the word that I would use to describe it would be "cool". A lot of things don't make sense, or contrived, or even ridiculous, but it never ceases to diverge from its tone and purpose, nor did it not remain "cool". The author cleverly leaves a lot of logic at the door, focus on the emotional side, but not such frivolous emotions from the spawns of "isekai" into Otome games as a women, which simultaneously provides an intriguing story to be followed, as well as drawing a fantasy of meeting and falling in love with a person of great status and wealth, who loves you back.
However, while not extremely rare in the world of girl's comic, Cold Game has that edge that can be found in selected few works that don't treat female main character as self-insert, either of the author or the audience. No matter how much I love Higashimura's comics, her main characters usually do stray far away from being self-insert for low self-esteem ladies, and puts them in very fantastical scenarios. In Tokyo Tarareba Girls, I thought the male lead dropped some truth bombs into their world, but in the end it ended a little rosy, and the main character didn't change. It merely acknowledged the reality, but reality realisation did not make any changes in the characters, seemingly afraid of no longer being relatable. This is where Cold Game edged out Higashimura in term of character. The main character, acknowledged their own short coming, frustrated by the admission of weakness, actually changed and improved herself after having her pride hurts. She picked herself up and moves on, accepting the new reality. That's some heavy lesson that's almost completely absent from girl's comic, because it's uncomfortable and confrontational. I think it is note worthy for being one of the few girl's comic that dares to make their main female character grow, rather than being humiliated yet able to cling on some sort of mental victory.
Though, it needed to be said, that the court intrigues are rather simplistic, predictable and many of the things that happens are convenient. However, I love that it puts the main character through some serious trial and tribulation, while maintaining that girl's comic fantasy. That's very cool. I also love the male comic elements with execution, kidnapping, murder, death and combat. Ladies comic usually avoids dramatise violence, while men's works enjoy violence a little too much. This is a good balance. Death and violence are there to heighten the stake, drama, put weights into the characters actions. That's why I find the lame death in time rewind / reincarnation copy paste to be so nauseating. Death of characters should be respected, because it adds finality to character's action. Without it, why should we care if a character's is lured into an ambush?

About the art, I can see it being divisive. Personally, it looks good. The characters clothing and background in the castle are clearly researched. Though I do have qualms about historical accuracy, I can see that the author avoids that path, to allow for the element of "coolness" from history without being dragged through the court of history buffs. It's how GoT skirted around all the nonsense.

This is more of a "I hope these works get more attention" sort of forum post rather than a review. I hope the comic will carry on its momentum. If it is ever finished and translated, I will update this. Good works deserve attention.

So to start off, I did somewhat enjoy Cold Game, but still feel slightly conflicted about some parts of the series. Also, given that I only read up till Chapter 12 (the series is still ongoing), this review and rating might change in the future. Compared to a lot of other shojo manga, it definitely leans more on the darker side and I really like that. After all, the protagonist watched someone's head got chop off like around the first five chapters and people being hung by the neck.

Now, the positive part of the series:
1. The art is amazing! I wasn't confused by any ... of the character, and their design are very different from each other. Also, not a lot of stupid chibi moments given the darker fantasy settings.

2. Though the Kingdom name was a little bit hilarious, like Kingdom B and Kingdom E, the settings was intriguing. There's a lot of political drama, people backstabbing each other and clever planning plots. I did enjoy the villain in this series more than I thought.

3. The male lead and main love interest also had a really good tragic backstory. I really enjoy reading his chapters and learning about his childhood.

4. The side character, like the Hughes girl (Forgot her name) and even the fake queen Camille, and Sixth Queen was interesting and definitely had depth to their characters.

5. A lot of the dialogue was hilarious, and I enjoyed the banter between Arthur and Edward, as well as all the snide comments people in the Kingdom made to each other.

Now I wish I could stop here and said that I really love the series, and want to continue, but what throw me off the series quite a bit is the dynamic between Arthur and Aruna, and Aruna - the female lead's personal story so far.

1. Firstly, Aruna sometimes came off as a little bit Mary Sue ish. Her name is unique, she had amazing violet and silver hair. Everyone called her beautiful. Given that she is a female knight (which technically in the Middle Ages are something very unusual), that already draws a lot of attention. However, Aruna draw more attention to herself by loudly insulting people in the castle (cased being Arthur, the King's aide) and called him a peasant. That's a little bit stupid in my opinion, given that her task is to blend in and not draw attention, but she of course insult other nobles, pester Queen Catherine, got herself to become Queen Anne's enemy and even get herself kidnapped. Clearly, Aruna isn't really good of playing the Game of Thrones politics so far.

2. Aruna also managed to draw attention of 2 hot guys in the castle: Arthur and Edward. How convenient. When Aruna is in trouble, they stepped into save her. First time, I temporarily let it slide because technically Aruna was in a position of vulnerability and her fighting skill isn't good yet. The series rightly acknowledged this and push her into a training arc.

3. But in the next scene, when she fought with another enemy, and had to make a critical decision about killing him, she hesitated. Now again, instead of being punished for this mistake, Arthur swooped in to kill the enemy, claimed that all her burden is on him and all that jazz.

4. In the final scene, where she had to confront Edward, and challenged him to a swordfight, Arthur stepped in. Again. Now, the series is only 12 chapters by this point, but I really wish the author had allowed Aruna to play a more active role and being more 'dark'. Forced to leave the shell of being a morally-good character and make painful decisions would have make great character developments.

5. Also, I wish the relationship between Camilla and Aruna should have been developed a little bit more. When Camilla died, which I thought Aruna would feel a lot more pain and suffering, but the chapter conveniently ended with 'romance' and 'lovey dovey' moment between her and Arthur. I also feel that their relationship was rushed. He forcibly kissed her around Chapter 5, be her knight in shining armor around Chapter 8-9, and by Chapter 12 she's head over heels for him. Aruna herself even acknowledged that falling for Arthur is a bad idea because a) she is technically lying by pretending to be a knight. And technically, if this lies is discovered, perhaps this will worsen the political relationship between the 2 kingdoms, but I guess the power of shojo romance commanded this ship to sail.

Anyway, this reminds me of Snow White with the Red Hair (anime). It started out great in Season 1, but by Season 2 all the heroine did was waiting to be saved by the prince and let herself be kidnapped. I really hope the story will never devolve into this. Overall, Cold Game has a lot of brimming potential. Strangely, I was interested in all the other side characters and think they have more depth than Aruna. Perhaps the author will developed Aruna's character as the story went on to make her more jaded and cynical, so these cons part of the novel won't be a problem. But who know. Maybe I'm a little bit biased since I have read similar novel with better strong female lead in historical period (e.g Chang Ge Xing and Apothecary Diaries) where they focus more on playing the political games and survival and fighting than making lovey-dovey eye contact with the male lead. Maybe I'm a cold-hearted person. But it's definitely hard to strike the right balance between making a good historical, dark fantasy novel and trying to make it shojo-like. Usually, in the case of making it too shojo-y (like Snow White with the Red Hair, and Yona of the Dawn), it makes the dark part of the world settings less believable.

Overall this story was a 5/10 for me.