Flame of Recca :: The W2N.net

Flame of Recca (烈火の炎 Rekka no Honō^?) is a manga series by Nobuyuki Anzai, which was adapted into an anime series spanning forty-two episodes by Studio Pierrot. The manga was originally serialized in Shōnen Sunday starting October 18, 1995, with the last chapter published April 18, 2002, and has been compiled into 33 tankōbon volumes by Shogakukan. Both the anime and manga were licensed for North American distribution in English by Viz Media. The series has also been adapted into two video games; Flame of Recca for the Game Boy Advance and Flame of Recca Final Burning for the PlayStation 2.

Plot

Flame of Recca follows the story of a teenage boy named Recca Hanabishi, who is interested in ninja and claims to be one himself. He often gets into fights because he made it publicly known that the person who manages to defeat him will earn his services as a loyal ninja. Despite this, he eventually pledges his loyalty and services as a ninja to Yanagi Sakoshita, a girl with the innate ability to heal any wound/injury, because of her kindess and compassion. Recca soon discovers that he possesses the innate ability to control/manipulate flames, and eventually learns that he is actually the son of the sixth generation leader of the Hokage, a ninja clan that was wiped out by Oda Nobunaga in 1576, roughly 400 years before the series' present day.¹

The Hokage ninjas wielded mystical objects called madōgu (魔導具^?), which are referred to as "psychic devices" or "elemental weapons" in the English versions of the series. Madōgu grant their users special abilities, such as allowing their users to manipulate certain elements (as in the case of the Fūjin, which allows its wielder to manipulate the element of wind) and enhancing their user's strength/skills (as in the case of the Dosei no Wa, which increases its user's physical strength and the Idaten, which increases its user's running speed). Oda Nobunaga had invaded the Hokage in 1576 for the purpose of acquiring these weapons, and the series' main antagonist, Kōran Mori, is searching for a madōgu that will grant him eternal life. Recca and his friends become entangled in Mori's quest for eternal life as he initially attempts to kidnap Yanagi, believing that her healing powers will help him achieve immortality. This leads them to join the Ura Butō Satsujin, a tournament wherein the warriors that wield madōgu gather to battle each other. After successfully winning the tournament, Recca and his teammates discover that Mori was on his way to acquire the Tendō Jigoku (天堂地獄 Heaven and Hell^?), a madōgu said to grant its user eternal life, and once again attempt to stop him.

Though initially following the same basic storyline, the Flame of Recca anime series ends right after the Ura Butō Satsujin ends, while the manga goes on to include the subplot involving the Tendō Jigoku. The anime also omits certain characters from the story,² and several of the characters' physical appearances are slightly different from the manga.³

Characters

The main characters of Flame of Recca as they appear on the cover of Flame of Recca Original Soundtrack Vol. 1. Clockwise from top-left: Fūko Kirisawa, Domon Ishijima, Kaoru Koganei, Yanagi Sakoshita, Recca Hanabishi, and Tokiya Mikagami

Production

Staff

Media

Manga

The Flame of Recca manga was originally serialized in Shōnen Sunday from October 18, 1995 – April 18, 2002, with a total of 329 chapters. The series was compiled into 33 tankōbon volumes and was published by Shogakukan. Shōnen Sunday also released the manga in 17 wideban volumes. Both the anime and manga were licensed for North American distribution in English by Viz Media and United Kingdom distribution in English by Gollancz Manga. The manga was also published in France by Editions Tonkam.

Viz did not censor nudity in their publications of the manga, but starting from volume 20, the female characters' nipples have been removed. Additionally, the manga series used to be published every other month, but Viz has begun to release the manga quarterly, starting with volume 25.

Anime

Flame of Recca was adapted into an anime series by Studio Pierrot, and aired from July 19, 1997 to July 10, 1998 on Fuji Television. The 42-episode series covers around volumes 1-16 of the manga. There are several notable differences between the anime and manga, such as the character design (e.g. Fūko has red-violet hair in the anime, but has brown hair in the manga) and in the storyline itself (e.g. In the anime, Yanagi's healing powers are first revealed when she heals Recca after he gets injured while protecting her and a child from being crushed under metal pipes,⁴ but in the manga, Yanagi heals Recca when he gets injured while protecting her from a group of male students who were forcing her to go with them⁵).

Music

The Flame of Recca anime series featured "Nanka Shiawase" (なんか幸せ^?) by The Oystars as its opening theme, and used "Love is Changing" by Hikaru Nishida and "Zutto Kimi no Soba de" (ずっと君の傍で^?) by Yuki Masuda as its ending themes (for episodes 1-32 and episodes 33-42 respectively). All the songs were released in singles, and all except "Zutto Kimi no Soba de" were included in the original soundtracks.

Soundtracks

Flame of Recca Original Soundtrack Vol. 1 was released by Pony Canyon on December 6, 1997, and features background music used in the series (composed by Yusuke Honma) as well as the series' opening song and first closing song.

Flame of Recca Original Soundtrack Vol. 2 was released by Pony Canyon on May 4, 1998. It includes more background music used in the series along with a special CD drama entitled Recca no Honō SPECIAL CD DRAMA: Daitōron Kai Tsuyoi No Wa Dareda?! (「烈火の炎」スペシャルCDドラマ: 火影大討論会強いのは誰だ?!^?, Translation: Flame of Recca Special CD Drama: The Great Debate, "Who is the Strongest?!"). The drama features the series' main characters (Recca, Yanagi, Fuuko, Domon, Mikagami, and Koganei) as well as the creator of the series, Nobuyuki Anzai.

Video games

Flame of Recca has been adapted into two games to date; Flame of Recca for the Game Boy Advance, and Flame of Recca FINAL BURNING for the PlayStation 2. The storylines in both games are based on the last five volumes of the Flame of Recca manga, and both have character designs more similar to the character designs in the manga than in the anime series.

Flame of Recca: The Game is a fighting game released by Konami on December 20, 2001 for the Game Boy Advance. In this game, the player selects a character and presses certain button in order to make them move, attack, dodge, and perform special moves. Apart from having an HP bar, the selected character a power bar which increases when the character deals damage and decreases when the character performs a special move. Each character has his/her own set of special moves that do greater damage than normal attacks, and one super move that deals a significant amount of damage. There are nine playable characters for this game, including the main characters of the series and Kurei, as well as characters that only appeared in the manga (Renge, Hiruko, and Kadotsu).

Flame of Recca: Final Burning is a adventure/fighting game released by Konami on June 10, 2004 for the PlayStation 2. A limited number of soundtrack CDs and sets of four bookmarks with character illustrations by Nobuyuki Anzai were given out along with the game CD.⁶ The game's graphics and FMVs are done in 2D animation. The game utilizes a split-screen format wherein players must press different button combinations to make their selected character perform specific moves. Certain cutscenes require the player to determine what the selected character will do next through choosing from a given set of options. An example of this would be when the player is required to choose if Koganei will dodge or stay put when the building he is staying in starts to collapse.

Flame of Recca: Final Burning features 24 playable characters, composed of the main characters, Kurei, and the following characters:

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