Tuesday, July 22, 2014

MISC. MANGA, *Night Warriors: Darkstalkers' Revenge

Despite the title, this was the only full on Darkstalkers manga to get an English printing. Viz first released it as a 6-issue mini-series, and then as a collected trade paperback, unlike some of their other video game-based manga releases which were originally printed in Game On! magazine. There have been other manga based on the Darkstalkers games, including one of Vampire Savior(or Darkstalkers 3), plus a compilation of stories from this series and Red Earth titled Maleficarum was released in English. There were also two American mini-series created by Capcom Comics to coincide with their successful Street Fighter comics. This manga was on its own done by Run Ishida who had also worked on the Warrior Nun Areala one-shot comic. It was probably given the title of Night Warriors: Darkstalkers' Revenge instead of just Darkstalkers to coincide with Viz'a release of the OVA series of the same name, which they used to differentiate between the anime series and the American Darkstalkers cartoon.

This is set up in three sections all set in the same world where monsters are referred to as "Darkstalkers". The first one is a short one where the succubus Morrigan confronts the vampire lord Demitri. The next one is a 3-part story featuring the catwoman Felicia where she frees her "owner" from some kidnappers, teams up with the werewolf Jon Talbain, and the two of them then stop the zombie rocker Lord Raptor from stealing someone's soul. The last segment is another 3-parter about the Darkstalker hunter Donovan(who is half-Darkstalker himself)as he crusades to stop Morrigan from stealing the souls of innocent men.

This was a fair collection of stories that works better than the mish-mash that was the OVA series adaptation of the video games. If you were a big enough fan of the original Darkstalkers video game trilogy, than this is totally down your dark alley.

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