Editing Isekai (section)

== Isekai and /tg/ ==
Although most isekai stories get panned on /tg/ for [[TVTropes|annoying meta-humor]], [[Double Cross|generic shonen bullshit]], [[Maid RPG|generic fanservice bullshit]], or [[Extra Heresy|a combination thereof]] (if not the characters being blatantly [[Mary Sue]]s, or presenting something even more absurd), a handful of series in the genre are decent enough to merit genuine approval. Or they're tolerated because they have [[monstergirls]]. Check our [[Approved anime|anime]] and [[manga]] pages for the current scoop.

While isekai is a distinctly Japanese form of [[Skub|cancer]], the basic idea of people from our world getting chucked into a fantastic world and forced to fend for themselves is practically universal and turns up moderately often in Western fantasy with the earliest example perhaps being ''"A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court"'' by Mark Twain which was published in 1889. Oddly, when this happens it tends to be rather less shit perhaps due to it being less common. L. Frank Baum's ''Oz'' series, ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' by Lewis Carroll, and Edgar Rice Burroughs' ''Barsoom'' (a.k.a., John Carter of Mars) novels are iconic examples of the core premise that predate cliche fantasy (with Barsoom being the closest of what can be described as "Western Isekai Wankfest" with Carter being ''very'' overpowered due to Earth's gravity he grew up with and his combat training), and C.S. Lewis ''The Chronicles of Narnia'' uses the plot for Christian allegory. ''The NeverEnding Story'' is the flagship modern German example, and right in the heart of the fantasy cliche storm, yet it is the purest anti-shit, either despite or because of this (if you don't count the 80s-tastic American movie). Or at least, it avoids being the self-indulgent wish-fulfillment for irredeemably unlikable losers that makes Isekai so widely hated<ref>The second half of the book, at least, reads like a full-on deconstruction of Isekai, before Isekai was a thing.</ref>. One could make the case that ''The Matrix'' is an isekai story (it basically reverses a couple of the key tropes), though classifying it as "less shit" may not be accurate for some people. Tangential to these are stories about modern militaries (or, in one odd series of novels, part of the US East Coast) being sent back in time—although it's possible that a movie from '79 called G.I. Samurai, where a JSDF unit accidentally travels back in time and fights their own Samurai ancestors, is secretly the true forgotten granddaddy of the isekai genre, or at least dreck like GATE. 

While contemporary Isekai (2010-present) are cut-and-pastes of the same old "die and reincarnate OP" themes, the plot device itself was present in a lot of Japanese shit before it. 

As mentioned above, older "isekai" stories aren't "reincarnation" stories, but are people being transported to another world to fulfill missions or destinies. Their mileages tended to vary, but there was one notable proto-Isekai called "God(?) Save Our King" which ran from 2000-2010 that subverted many tropes before they were even established. [[Gay|The series was basically Yaoi-lite, and had a straight, 15-year old Japanese boy transported to another world via toilet to become its "Demon King," where his every whim was catered to by a bunch of bishounen demons/elves (teenage girlbait).]] The show itself ran for an ungodly long time, and is actually quite ok if you're an irredeemable weeb with trash taste. 

The other isekai genre is "you're trapped in a video game and dying here means you die irl" Genre in the 2000s, such as Sword Art Online and .hack. They were everywhere  back when MMOs were still uber-popular and VR was still considered cool. This also technically makes Digimon an isekai.  This genre basically ended when [[Log Horizon]] showed everyone how it's done.

Isekai also has its influence on [[Old School Roleplaying]]; as stated above, there are plenty of pulp fantasy novels involving ordinary souls getting sucked into a strange, alien world and becoming heroic [[adventurer]]s as a result. A /tg/ example that (in hindsight anyway) fits the isekai mold well is [[GURPS]]' [[Banestorm|flagship fantasy setting]], which revolves around people from across the universe getting isekai'd to the planet of Yrth by an extradimensional "Banestorm" and proposes that players could [[Stat me|stat themselves]] and then play as themselves on Yrth after getting deposited there by the Banestorm. Hell, [[Greyhawk]] has several deities who actually originated on other worlds - [[Murlynd]], [[Saint Cuthbert]] and [[Mayaheine‎‎]] have all been implied to have come to Oerth from "real" Earth - whilst the [[Forgotten Realms]] was, once upon a time, hinted as being connected to Earth by various portals to different times and places; the not!Egyptian race was actually supposed to be peopled by real ancient Egyptians who had been summoned to the Realms en-masse by evil sorcerers as slave labor, only to break free of them. Then there's the [[D%26D_Cartoon|D&D Cartoon]], whose plot ''was'' D&D by way of Isekai. That being said, unless your DM was being really lazy, if you tried to talk in-universe about stats or levels or other meta game content like they do in Isekai stories, NPCs would and should treat you like a madman.

On a funny note some people at /tg/ has started to compare [[Roboute_Guilliman|Girlyman]]'s current timeline novels to an isekai series due how he now has to save a distant realm from the evil overlord(s), everyone is in awe of him and the blue-wonder even got a sort of harem.

Perhaps the ultimate sign of isekai's connection to /tg/ is that there exists an isekai series with its own official roleplaying sysem; [[KonoSuba]], which could very easily be adapted to your own homebrewed isekai setting.