The hyper-violent classic is back in a new edition! Forty-two middle school students are forced to fight to the death until only one survivor!

Battle Royale Deluxe Edition has a story by Koushun Takami and art by Masayuki Taguchi. English translation is done by Kevin Gifford with lettering by Shirley Chen. Published by Yen Press (January 27, 2026).

Content Warning: Rape and Sexual Assault, VERY graphic violence

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Death games are kind of a dime a dozen. It feels like every year, there's a good handful of anime or manga that come out with this scenario, and they never really appealed to me personally. I think part of the reason is that it's very hard to craft a story where a majority of your cast is destined to die. Plus, those stories are usually just set up for severe shock value and killing for the sake of killing. Battle Royale definitely falls into those narrative trappings, but one thing I can definitely respect it for is how far it tries to go with them.

This could be indicative of the fact that this series is a bit on the older side. The character designs are very traditionally retro, with very angular-looking women and men with very sharp, muscular features. However, the series doesn't appear to be afraid to just show human beings being the worst possible versions of themselves. I understand that when being put in a life-or-death situation, you need to sort of rely on very primal instincts. But almost everybody in this series, except for a couple of our main recurring characters, goes out of their way to be terrible to the point where it almost feels cartoonishly unnecessary. That makes it difficult to understand if the story wants me to take it that seriously, because on the one hand, you have characters either being framed in a sort of cheesy righteousness, while others are just committing sex crimes for the sake of it. On the other hand, I feel like the drama and a lot of the deaths showcased in the series are supposed to have some emotional weight to them.

Some chapters were close to invoking an emotional response from me because of how well they worked in a self-contained setting. To the author's credit, almost every character has some type of story going on, and most of their ends are pretty tragic. But then there might be a moment immediately afterwards that just feels like the story is reveling in its debauchery. One chapter shows a couple going out in a sad double suicide to avoid being killers, and the next chapter could be about showcasing a decapitation in vivid detail.

I think there is a lot here that people will enjoy if they like reveling in the over-the-top violence, but for me, the story needed to offer a bit more than that for me to be fully invested in it. When it tries to offer something more, it sort of conflicts with its selling point, and while there were some characters I was able to appreciate by the end, that only made up for about 20% of the overall collection. Maybe grab this one if you could find it at a discount, or if you're looking for some good mutilation. Outside of that, I don't think you have to rush to go find this one on the shelves.