The Spring 2025 Manga Guide

Minecraft the Manga

What's It About? 

Peaceful life in a perfectly constructed town bores ten-year-old Nico into mischief. Riding Creepers while they explode is fun and all, but what he really wants is to escape the blocky confines of his home and take his crafting skills on an adventure to the end of the world. Just how big is the world, anyway, and what could stand in his way?

Nico gets his chance to prove how strong he's become when zombies attack! After modding an innovative solution to repel the undead foes, Nico earns the right to go on the adventure he's always wanted. But right away, he runs into another zombie…and this one can talk!

Minecraft: The Manga has a story and art by Kazuyoshi Seto, with English translation by Mei Amaki. Richmond Torrefranca lettered this volume. Published by Viz Media (March 11, 2025). Rated Y.

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Is It Worth Reading?

Lauren Orsini
Rating:

I don't like the idea of supporting something that helps the racist and transphobic Minecraft creator make money, but I also don't want to rain on the collective parades of every kid in my five-year-old's class. Like it or not, the primary audience of Minecraft is too young to make jokes about Hatsune Miku being its real creator, or to know who that even is. To them, it's the fun block game where you get to pretend your whole world is made of Lego bricks. Minecraft: The Manga keeps this in mind. With a 10-year-old protagonist who will appeal to even younger readers, this easy but cliché read will appeal to Minecraft's grade school fans.

Nico is a textbook shonen manga hero, brave of heart and dumb of ass. He wants to adventure through the world of Minecraft for adventure's sake and he's especially equipped to do so. He has a special ability that works like a cheat code called a “mod” (since this is a video game, get it?) where he can craft whatever he wants without using a crafting table, like a Minecraft player would normally require. Through brute strength, creative crafting, and the stupidity not to realize when he's being snubbed, Nico acquires allies and triumphs over baddies as he makes his way to the mythic “end of the world,” which may not even exist. If you're a shonen manga fan, you've read this same storyline hundreds of times (complete with the same tired jokes), which means it'll have the biggest payoff with the least experienced readers. It's a game tie-in designed to make kids say, “Wow, this is just like my favorite video game!” and on that specific point it delivers.

In Minecraft, players can take basic, rudimentary blocks to create straight-up masterpieces like the entire map of Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild or a working clock. It's a shockingly sophisticated game behind its simplified, pixelated first impression, and it's not just for kids. Not so with this manga though. Adult Minecraft fans would be better off giving a copy of this book to the younger fans in their lives than trying to enjoy it themselves.