Was he actually a boy without fear, or did he just have the same kinda brain defect that S.M...

Was he actually a boy without fear, or did he just have the same kinda brain defect that S.M., the woman who is suffering from the Urbach-Wiethe-disease that keeps her from feeling almost any fear at all?

Clearly neither, but especially not the 2nd one. If he couldn't feel fear, then he wouldn't have been able to detect situations which prompted it. But he actively sought them out.

Akagi sees fear as thrill and it affirms his existence. He loves extreme stakes, and the absolute destruction that follows afterward. What I'm curious about is, is if he was really just that confident and thought he could never lose, or if he was prepared to become the one who lost it all.

>or if he was prepared to become the one who lost it all.
He was ready to get gutted by some low level yakusa over a silly dice game, he was always down to losing everything himself.

But did he really think he could lose? Maybe he enjoys getting dangerously close to the edge and finding a way out, but never actually losing. I dunno, he did drive off of a cliff in the first episode.

He has lost many times, he says so in both Ten and akagi, he actually seeks defeat to balance things out

He is not suicidal, if there are ways to mitigate risks he will take them, like driving off the edge at full speed to avoid the rocks, but he was prepared to die if it did not work out.

>S.M.
Wow I never knew about this woman, that's super interesting. Seems like they share similar elements, but Akagi definitely knew what fear is cause he loved seeing it in his opponents.

Oh I see. Akagi really is an interesting character, it's a shame that how cryptic he is makes him both fascinating and so fucking difficult to understand.

Who's the smartest

me

he becomes way more understandable and human in Ten

Light Yagami

Akagi is not that smart (or at least has never shown it), he's just a gambling genius with a sixth sense that goes beyond human comprehension, he can only be beaten by dumb luck

I think seeing it in a person is much different in feeling it yourself. It's kinda like Schadenfreude, I guess - you could find it funny that somebody steps on a lego, but you wouldn't want that to happen to yourself.

It's weird, with Akagi. There's only a handful situations where he seems to show fear, for example when Ichikawa puts a gun to his head to play russian roulette, Akagi has that Anime-sweat™, but then he explains that he was awre of Ichikawa's bluff. Maybe that sweat was supposed to show surprise, more than fear?

Damn he swole.

...

But akagi fears death, he's just stoic about it

Akagi has at least 150 IQ. He's not at an inhuman level of genius like Lelouch but he's still a genius.

I don't know, what really differentiates him from others is him being able to basically feel the tile without turning it over, it's god mode

So I hear you're into Fukumoto-proportions

He's not just gambling on random luck. He's clearly able to manipulate people and do a godlike/demonlike reading on his opponents.

He's clearly a genius, but one that we only really see him apply in gambling situations.

but many, many people in fukumoto's other series reach his level, the thing that distinguishes him from others is his sixth sense which is basically cheating

>Akagi not a genius
Wot. If I write 6 stories about 6 geniuses that doesn't suddenly invalidate one of them

it shows that akagi is not a genius above all, Ten even shows that akagi is all about his sixth sense, in his first match with Ten he relies on a suu an kou hell wait and loses because he could not magically learn the tiles correctly with his senses since he wasn't as sharp as he was once, so that implies that his sixth sense is what rules his games, no genius is involved.
If you want to consider talent as being a genius then go ahead, but that would broaden the definition of genius too much, since every single sportsman would be a genius.
And it's clear that that guy meant IQ

Sportsman's abilities actually rely on something physical though, while the sixth sense doesn't actually exist and is much more likely to be a result of superior cognition.

Okay dude, you're clearly very adamant about your strange theory so I won't argue with you. But I think you're wrong.

Luck is very much an element in FKMT manga. But have you heard the expression that fortune favors the prepared? You keep saying his "sixth sense" but his sixth sense is basically incredible intuition, and intuition is birthed from logic and observation.

His genius is what allows this "god mode" that you new describing like a comic book superpower, when it in fact stems from his ridiculous insight.

This chapter was badass. Flipping the gaming table right in front of twenty angry yakuzas who already spilled some blood.

Yeah in Akagi the flow of luck actually exist which obviously isn't there in real life. His thought pattern and tactics actually revolve around him assuming what tile the enemy got dealt. He did it against Washizu a few times.

There is no insight in most of Ten from akagi, he can just feel the tile, how do you even know that you have 8 tiles in the dead wall that will make your hand get dora points? TEN SPOILERS or how at the end of Ten he just took the 1pin out of 18 without a doubt after getting shuffled (all this with advanced alzheimers)
If we take akagi from akagi you'd be right, but we cannot disregard Ten's Akagi

I forgot to add, when he discarded 2 10s at poker only to get 3 aces(or whatever that was i forgot), it was pure sixth sense that they'd come

Ten's Akagi is straightforward. Akagi's Akagi as well but you need to read the 5th and 6th hanchan, where he actually talks.

Right, I think of Ten Akagi as a slightly different character, since he was the first design after all. In Ten he kind of feels like a God of Luck, whereas in Akagi he still has that monstrous luck/foresight but observation and reasoning too. Also I'm sorry for being rude, I dunno why I did that.

By the way this is a tangent and might sound like total bullshit, which it probably is, but I've gambled time to time in the past and there were a few times I got incredibly lucky, and not out of strategy. And every single time it happened, the moment BEFORE the 1:50 chance took place, I swear to you I felt a peculiar sensation. And it wasn't just anticipation, it happened only when I actually got lucky. Really makes you think

That's just how our brain work. You should read about the science of luck it's actually pretty interesting.

What about baseball Akagi?

you weren't rude at all friendo
I understand how you feel about that sensation, i have it sometimes when playing mahjong, but it's usually in the worst way possible, like feeling that that tile you just discarded is going to either complete someone's hand or get drawn later on.
i remember once where i had two deck of cards and gave it to someone and told him to choose a card, then i guessed his card and got it right in one try, he was so shocked about it hahaha

He was always ready to lose it all because he didn't separate life from death.
Read Ten. It's fucking good.

He thinks that what people usually like in gambling and danger is the thrill of managing to survive, but that they also have a strong desire for their destruction. So while he didn't actively search for his demise, he didn't refuse or fear it. What he values most is his sense of self, and being able to meet his demise head on is how he could live as himself.

He manipulates people in insane ways too. First he's really perceptive and will notice any slight habit you have, but If you rewatch his match with Washizu you'll see that he can figure out how his opponents think and what they'll do to seek safety, to the point of being able to wait on the same tile as them.
Sure, he can feel the tiles before seeing them but he has the smarts to back this up. Pic related.

The first match in Ten also showed Akagi taking control of the table with a chanta tactic, no magic bullshit involved, only psychological and probability tricks. That's how he destroys his opponents later on too.

Reminder madhouse added smug where Akagi didn't even have it so you better read the manga if you care.

>Hiroyuki fails by faking a safe area
>Akagi succeeds by faking a danger area

I am not saying Akagi only does magic, but he relies a lot of it when against someone good or in a pinch (ten, that poker guy to show his abilities etc..., he says imself that he just feels the cards.
What would be the point of discarding two aces and keep two 10s when inside the deck there are still 2 aces and 10s? that's because he just magically feels the cards

He does rely on luck sometimes, like you said with that suu ankou changed into a San Ankou to rely on uradoras, but that's because mahjong is also a game of luck. Just like how Ten broke Akagi's ryanpeikou and turned it into a suu ankou without guarantees.
For FKMT characters, mahjong is divided between reasoning and guts feeling, and Akagi is very good at both, so he'll win most of his games through manipulating opponents and taking the right choices but when he's 30 000 points behind and needs to catch up in one round, he'll bet on coincidence and seek uradoras. That's not what he relies on, but that's something he can also do when he needs to.

Was he homo?

Gin has only done the raffle I dont' see him that sart.

Pariston has not shown anything.

Johan had dumb rivals.

Zero > Akagi > Kaiji

Conan has his moments

I mean, he had a gay lover after all.

>Zero > Akagi

>Zero > Akagi
What the fuck did you just say? He's not even the smartest of his own manga, Shirube maybe is close to Akagi but that's it, not fucking Zero

>inhuman level of genius like Lelouch
You must be underaged, fucking no one takes Lelouch even remotely seriously because he's a plothax character who wins through stupid bullshit just like NGNL's MCs. Not to mention everyone in CG being a retard

i can't fucking wait for zero part 3, the build up for the shirube vs zero showdown is so intense, and i want to know what happened to poor little shirube

These new covers are damn fine.

I like Harada.

Ten is not about Akagi.

How? Everything people remember about Ten is Akagi.

In that situation I think it was more a matter of pride in a way? Like that he'd concede only over his dead body.

me too user shame he doesn't get drawn a lot, 'cept by fujos

Near

>fujos
But that's most of the FKMT fanartists.

I'll still take it.

out of those it has to be Friend, his plan was so fucking convoluted it was absurd

>if he was prepared to become the one who lost it all.
He was prepared for everything, that's why he always won.

>You're going to have to die to save yourself

That doesn't matter. Ten showed the growth and experiences of Ten, not Akagi. Akagi is just the wise dad he learns from.

Episode 4 and a few others basically laid out his answer to that question. He simply wanted a real fight to the death.

>Ten showed the growth and experiences of Ten, not Akagi
??

Alright, now pretend I posted the hundreds of other pages that are about Ten.

It's not JUST about Ten, it's one of the few well written things that manages to give all its side characters some time too, but the majority of the comic is those characters interacting with Ten. Just because people remember Akagi more doesn't make it a comic about Akagi.

I'd understand a bit more if you called it a comic about Hiroyuki since the story is told from his perspective, but still. Ten and Hiroyuki barely get more screentime than Akagi, if at all, and it's mostly during the meaningless worst parts (the first volumes) and focused on mahjong more than Ten and Hiroyuki. Akagi spent 4 entire volumes talking nonstop, making him the most memorable character of the manga by far, so yeah one could say the manga is about Akagi.

There's another comic about Hiroyuki I think? His place in this story is how Ten and the experiences Ten and the rest of the better mahjong players put him though. Akagi spends a lot of time monologuing as a way to help give the other character arcs some closure. It's for them, not him. The page that was posted is pretty much the only realization/change that happens to him in the entire thing.

As for Hiroyuki, if I remember right he isn't even in the story for the first time Ten and Akagi meet and doesn't really appear again until they're putting the team together for the last mahjong arc. I don't think you can really say the entire story is from his perspective.

Maybe it's just a weird thing to think about, though. The more I think about it the more it really feels like the only "complete" series I've ever read, in that every major character really is equally important and gets treated that way. It's pretty cool, actually. You could say it's about Akagi, you could say it's about Hiroyuki, but I guess that would be just as wrong as me saying it's about Ten. It's about all of them.

baseball akagi isn't as good as mahjong akagi but his anime is better

When does Ten get good?

after time skip, but I'd also just read the match before time skip for more context.

Vol 4. It's more than worth it, though, since it's easily FKMT's best.

>Akagi spends a lot of time monologuing as a way to help give the other character arcs some closure. It's for them, not him.
It's for him too. Everything he says to them shows his life philosophy and expand his mentor role.

Ten isn't only about Akagi, but Ten is a lot about Akagi and Akagi is the guy making Ten work, along with Hiroyuki. Akagi is the mentor, Hiroyuki is the underdog who learns from Akagi and Ten. Ten teaches Hiroyuki and does a lot of stuff too, but for the most part it's mahjong, not a 4 volumes long speech.

nantoka nare