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Mushibugyo Manga Changes New Character's Design, But Editors Deny Plagiarism
posted on by Egan Loo
The editors of Weekly Shonen Sunday magazine announced on Tuesday that the design for a new character in Hiroshi Fukuda's Jōjū Senjin!! Mushibugyō manga has been changed, after a Twitter post noted that this Mushibugyō character looks like one in the Chinese game app Girls' Frontline (Shōjo Zensen). However, the editors denied the accusations of plagiarism and said that Girls' Frontline is a "foreign game with a title that the author Hiroshi Fukuda had never even heard of."
"Phantania," a Twitter user self-described as a Chinese student working on Girls' Frontline's development while studying abroad in Australia, noted the similarities in a January 12 Twitter post. That post has since been deleted:
The design of Girls' Frontline's Moselle Kar98k character (shown at left) debuted on August 7, 2015, while the design of Mushibugyō's Onmyō Karakuri Shikigami character Iyo (shown at right) debuted in the manga on January 6, 2016.
The Weekly Shonen Sunday editors stated:
A few days ago, it had been pointed out to us that a new character in Mushibugyō manga bore some resemblance to a character in a foreign game with a title that the author Hiroshi Fukuda had never even heard of. It is not the intent of the author or the editors to promote unnecessary misunderstanding for this series' long-time fans, so as of the ninth issue, the character design has been changed.
Fukuda serialized the original Mushibugyō manga from 2009 to 2010, and Shogakukan compiled and published three book volumes. Fukuda launched his new Jōjū Senjin!! Mushibugyō manga, which revamps the basic story, in 2011. Shogakukan shipped the 22nd compiled volume earlier this month. The television anime adaptation premiered in 2013.
