Btooom!

Sakamoto, an unemployed young man, is one of the world's top players of an online fighting game called Btooom! One day, he wakes up on what appears to be a tropical island, although he doesn't remember how or why he got there.

Btooom! follows Ryota Sakamoto, a jobless, socially withdrawn young man who has spent years playing an online action game and is drawn into a deadly reality when he wakes on a remote island. He is one of a group of strangers forced to play a survival competition in which they must hunt each other with explosives and traps, with each player's life measured by a bomb-based system and rewards for kills. The tone is bloody, tense and frequently cynical, with stylized violence that doubles as satire of gamified cruelty and online detachment. Ryota's slow transformation from timid gamer into a calculating survivor drives the emotional core, as he confronts what he is willing to do to live and who he is willing to protect. The mood oscillates between adrenaline-fueled set pieces and quieter moments of paranoia, grief and unlikely loyalty. Watchers drawn to brutal survival stories, dark psychological tension and anime with strong action will find a compact, uncompromising single season that favors spectacle and moral unease over warmth. Its bittersweet close leaves the cost of survival clearly felt.

Reviewers see a single-season survival-game anime with strong bomb-based action and graphic violence, though its characterization is thin.

• Battle Royalesurvival game premise, lethal competition, gore and strategy
• Alice in Borderlandforced deadly games, survival among strangers, dark tone
• Future Diarylethal game structure, cruel contests, survival stakes

Release Date

2012-10-04

Episode runtime

24 min

Rating

7.0 / 10 (252)

What is Btooom! about?

A timid, socially withdrawn gamer is abducted to a remote island where strangers must hunt each other with explosives to survive.

What is Btooom! like to watch?

Ember's analysis rates the pacing of Btooom! as brisk, its intensity as strong and its storytelling as simple.

Is Btooom! violent?

Yes. Ember rates the violence in Btooom! as graphic.

What did critics think of Btooom!?

Reviewers see a single-season survival-game anime with strong bomb-based action and graphic violence, though its characterization is thin.

Which shows are like Btooom!?

Shows with a similar feel include Battle Royale, Alice in Borderland, and Future Diary.

How long is Btooom!?

Btooom!: 1 season, 10 episodes.

Is Btooom! still running?

No, Btooom! has ended.