Bokutachi no Ikita Riyuu
Our Reason for Living

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Bokutachi no Ikita Riyuu is a hard one to review because I have a personal attachment to it, I was one of the few people actively reading it towards its run so I may be a little harder on it than most but I still feel this review needs to be made.

Story (4): The story is honestly abysmal it has a decent concept but eventually devolves into hide and seek with a monster, plot points are outright dropped before they have to be explained and characters always seem to actively not know what's going on even when it's obvious

Art (7): The artwork is very nice ... to look at, as with all Manga Box work the art is higher quality than the storytelling.

Characters (4): The characters are nothing more than one note, there are lots of betrayals and character motivations being revealed but they mostly fall flat, foreshadowing devolves into just showing you stuff and making you guess what it will mean later, in almost all cases I predicted who was going to betray who.

Overall/Enjoyment (5): Overall the series is a fairly fun ride from start to finish however it starts to dip towards the middle when it's mostly just running with little plot progression, however in the end I enjoyed it and I felt the story justified it's own existence by surprising me at the end.

A psychological horror type manga directed more towards kids than adults (as I'm sure you can pick up from the dialogue in the first chapter)

Story-
Middle school graduation day, boy goes to tell girl his true feelings, ends up waking up locked in his school with 11 other classmates, and the plot begins from there. I've watched/red plenty of students trapped in the school types, but this ones got just enough creativity to the plot to make it unique.
Art+Character-
The arts lovely, all the students are well drawn and have their own distinct design, instead of being the generic character types were all so used to (except ... the super religious girl, she's here, and as annoying as always)Through the 35 chapters I've read the characters also go through a lot of progression, changing the longer they go through the horrors in the school.Is it worth it to protect your friends?Who caused this to happen?Will violence solve my problems, or should I run and hide?
Enjoyment-
Although made for children, and being a bit bland with the horror scenes and dialogue, I read all available chapters in one sitting.(though they're kinda short)Each chapters leaves you with a cliff hanger wanting more each time.


Overall, it's a good manga to read in your leisure time if you're looking for something more fast paced and not too serious, but serious enough to keep you interested.

As a diehard horror manga fan, I felt optimistic when I started this manga but quickly became disappointed. What could have been a good story with interesting monsters is diminished by characters that read like a list of high school tropes and a story where the twists aren't all that surprising. I repeatedly kept going back to it with the dwindling expectation for something to come out of left field and suddenly change my mind about the series, but that never happened. I ended up dropping it because I eventually couldn't force myself to keep reading. If I had to compare it to a ... Western creation, it'd be on par with a mediocre scream queen B movie.