There is always aconstant influx of isekaiseries nowadays, whether this is through anime, Japanese manga, South Korean manhwa, Chinese manhua, webcomics, web novels,or even light novels.
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The genre has been at what seems to be peak popularity for years now and all that means is that brand-new series about characters getting whisked away to fantastical (or horrifying) new worlds have a lot to live up to and a lot to be disappointed by. So, let’s look at some of the best examples of ones that have started in 2022.
Updated February 4th, 2023 by Jacob Buchalter:Even early on in 2023, isekai fans have it good. There are series like Campfire Cooking In Another World With My Absurd Skills, Handyman Saitou in Another World, and even season 2 of By the Grace of the Gods representing isekai anime. Meanwhile, new manga/manhua/manwha are coming out (and coming to an end) all the time and light novels are being adapted into new series. So, let’s look again with fresh eyes at everything that started back in 2022 and pick out the best of the best.
12The Greatest Estate Developer
The Greatest Estate Developeris a series that falls into the category of ‘hyper-specific occupational worker is reincarnated in a fantasy world to use their specialized knowledge to great effect’. And, while this may sound like way too specific of a category, there are actually a ton of series that fall into it. Examples such asParallel World Pharmacy,A Veterinarian In Another World,Exterminator, and so many more.
The Greatest Estate Developeris another one of those stories, with the focus this time being on a civil engineering student by the name of Suho Kim. Suho Kim wakes up as Lloyd Frontera, a character in a fantasy novel he was reading who dies pretty early on. Not only does Suho have to work to avoid his character’s fate as a side-character drunkard, but he also needs to use his architectural and engineering knowledge to improve his reputation as well as the quality of life for people in this world. And, surprisingly, Suho (AKA Llyod) does it all while somehow playing the part of both a saintly hero and a demon king anti-hero when it comes to the comedy. Never mind the actual plot of this story (which is pretty good), the sheer absurdity of the situations, hilarious expressions the characters makethanks to its unique art style, and character interactions in general quickly propel this series to one of the all-time greats.
11Return of the SSS-Class Ranker
Return of the SSS-Class Rankeris yet another story about a gaming genius who either gets transported into their video game of choice or is sent back in time to start their gaming career from the beginning, but with knowledge of the future at their disposal. This story is more an example of the second option, as the main character ‘Rokan’ is tragically defeated while trying to take on a guild composed of the best of the best ‘The Lord’ VR gamers. After being defeated, Rokan wakes up, having suddenly regressed back to his early days of playing ‘The Lord’, and is now determined to get even stronger than before at a much faster pace so that he can get revenge on all those who looked down on him, with a player named ‘Odin’ being his primary focus.
The reason this series is so well worth a read is simply that Rokan plays a Berserker character, a class under-represented or poorly done way too much in these types of settings. So, it’s a blast to see a series focus on this type of DPS character and do it right. Not only that, but Rokan is basically a Berserker incarnate in both personality and problem-solving, so he’s not exactly going around helping people for the ‘sake of justice’ or anything like that. All-in-all, it’s a series about a bloodthirsty gamer playing an under-appreciated class and using his knowledge of the future to get everything he wants.
10Leveling With The Gods
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So, Kim YuWon goes back and uses the knowledge given to him by people like Sun Wukong or Chronos to take their boons for himself and become as overpowered as humanely possible, all for the sake of beating these unknown existences called ‘Outers’ before they doom the timeline once again. The story manages to blend characters and tropes from radically different types of stories in this genre altogether in new and inventive ways that follow the internal rules of the world the narrative sets. There are gods from all different cultures and religions, classic Murim settings/tropes, and tons of unique story elements.
9The Crow’s Prince
This next entry is actually part of an isekai sub-category, which are isekai stories about a protagonist (boy or girl) getting trapped in the world of some Otome-dating game they were playing. The most obvious comparable example of this sub-category isMy Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom, of course, but it isn’t alone in representing this niche subject, not by a long shot.The Crow’s Princeis a relatively similar setup, girl (named Reinel in this series) reincarnates in the world of her favorite romance game, only this time instead of taking on the villainess role, Reinel is quite literally just a crow.
From there, some things happen, and Reinel ends up eating a magical item called a ‘Kroban Rock’ while saving one of the most prominent male characters from the game. This rock gives her the ability to transform between a human and a crow form, which is all Reinel needs to start building a life for herself alongside Royal Prince Kamut (the man she saves).
Still, because Reinel is just some random crow and not the main heroine or even a prominent NPC from the game, she’s constantly thinking that the Royal Prince Kamut doesn’t “belong” with her. This isn’t the only problem going on, as there are a whole host of succession issues, noble drama problems, and even just general day-to-day issues Reinel has to work through constantly. It’s an incredibly interesting take on a hyper-specific concept, and watching Reinel slowly stumble into the happy life she deserves is so heartwarming to see.
8Player Who Returned 10,000 Years Later
Now, there has been plenty of isekai where the main character is sent to some ‘Hellscape’ and forced to adapt and survive there.Survival of a Sword King in a Fantasy Worldis likely the premiere example of this. But, what about a story focusing on someone who literally went to Hell, climbed up to the top of the ranks there, and came back to Earth? InPlayer Who Returned 10,000 Years Later, the protagonist (by the name of Oh Kang-woo) actually takes over all of Hell, devours the authority of all the Demons commonly seen in The Lesser Key of Solomon, and manages to use Hell’s magic to figure out a way back to Earth.
That’s the isekai part of the story, and it’s basically over by the second chapter. But, for the rest of the story, Kang-woo returns to Earth to find it very different from how he left it. From here, the story basically plays out like many other Dungeon-type Manwha, but when Kang-woo encounters scumbag hunters that try to take advantage of him or attack him, his response is a bit different from the usual isekai protagonist. Remember, Kang-woo beat everyone in hell, and the guy is more demon than pure human at this point (sort of adouble-agent type situation), so his ways of both solving his problems while also getting revenge on anyone messing with him are usually twisted and brutally effective. Not only that, but his growth rate is so fast compared to other isekai stories and it’s always fun to see him using new Authorities of different demons to see how the author translates that demon’s power.
7Marriage & Sword
Here’s one for romance lovers,Marriage and Sword. This story has both a Web Novel and a Webcomic so there are multiple ways to enjoy it. In it, a woman on Earth is born to a rich family and becomes incredibly skilled at fencing, but is sadly killed by a jealous colleague right before a big competition by getting pushed down the stairs. But, this isn’t the end of her story, as she is reincarnated in a fantasy world as Ergenes, the daughter of a world-renowned Sword Family, the Targaels. So, once again, she’s born to a rich family, only things don’t go so well during her upbringing.
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The family falls on hard times due to her brother lacking the natural sword talent customary of the men in her family, and Ergenes must use her sword skills while disguised as a man (AKA Elze) to earn money as a mercenary for her younger brother’s education and wellbeing. She does this for years and eventually retires to return back to noble life.But, when someone she used to fight alongside, a man by the name of Shan Kiraxus, is contracted to marry her and become the new Count of her family, the story suddenly becomes much more about how long she can keep him from recognizing her as well as resist his charms. Initially, it seems like a very twisted and self-serving relationship, but very quickly the story becomes much cuter, the characters act like adults, and it’s always funny to see just how smitten Shan is with Elze as well as Ergenes slowly realizing how much she cares for Shan.
6The Novel’s Extra
It’s one thing for characters to get transferred to a world just like a game they were playing or a story they were reading, but it’s another thing entirely to get transported into their own story. Just imagine someone getting transferred to the world of some short story they wrote for a school project and being forced to live there for years.
Well, this is exactly whatthe Novel’s Extradoes for its setting. But, in this story, the author isn’t transferred into the body of one of his story’s main characters or anything. Rather, he’s just a side character “extra” that never even existed in the original story.
From here,the shockingly intelligent author, now known as Kim Hajin, has to survive in his own story of Heroes, Demonic Humans, Monsters, and more, all while an outside third-party “co-author” constantly modifies and changes aspects of how the story originally progressed. So, Kim Hajin can’t even use his knowledge of the story he wrote to get too ahead in life, as the important events have a habit of changing due to the third-party co-author, and the more changes he makes the less his knowledge of the original story seems to apply.
5To Hell With Being A Saint, I’m A Doctor
Again, because the isekai genre is pretty oversaturated at this point, almost every story setting one could possibly think of has been tried (and likely executed exceptionally well) by now. For example, there are plenty of stories about a medical professional who is either transported or reincarnated in a fantasy world and uses their advanced/otherwordly knowledge to save lives on a greater scale.
Doctor’s Rebirthdoes it,A Veterinarian in Another Worlddoes it, and so doesTo Hell With Being A Saint, I’m A Doctor. And while each of these stories has its own appeal,To Hell With Being A Saint’sstory is extra appealing because it’s all about a guy trying to teach a world that only knows magic all about the wonders of medicine. Now there haven’t been any new chapters for this one in quite a while, but it’s on track to come back and there was a pretty dedicated fanbase before the end of the season.
4The World After The Fall
Anyone who reads a lot of stories about isekai settings, worlds where “gates” or “towers” suddenly appeared, or anything having to do with the “constellations” is likely familiar withOmniscient Reader’s Viewpoint.It’s one of the most popular Webcomics out there, and the quality of the writing obviously has a lot to do with that. Well,The World After The Fallis an earlier story written by the same author duo by the name Sing Shong, that only started being adapted as a Webcomic in 2022.
Now, compared toORV,tWatFis a lot more…cerebral, as a lot of the concepts in it are about what makes someone “human,” and sometimes the story puts more importance on this than on things making complete sense. But, even past that overly-conceptual nature the story has, this is just an incredibly beautiful comic visually and an all-around enjoyable read. Plus, this story has to have one of the most interesting takes on death,the undead (AKA Zombies), and the concept of individual ‘truth’ that the reader likely has ever seen. As time goes on and more chapters of this story come out, it somehow manages to become even more existential (in a sort ofOyasumi Pun-Puntype of way), while also pushing the story along. The quality has seemingly kept up so far (as of February 2023), though the pacing has slowed down quite a bit.
3Depths Of The Otherworldly Labyrinth
This next story is much more like the classic fantasy setting where a character is mysteriously dropped into another world and has to figure out how to survive. In this world, there are levels, skills, status screens, labyrinths,hints of harems, basically all the beloved tropes of the genre. But, while it starts out very tropey and seems like it’ll just be another by-the-books isekai story, it gets better and better as it goes on.
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The setting has fantastic world-building, the main character is calm and collected (though it’s not his choice at first), and the story is constantly introducing new elements that take the readers by surprise. As the story goes on, more and more aspects are introduced that propel the lead into the realm of the ‘overpowered MCs’, but each new benefit comes with its own slew of consequences as well.
