The New Gate volume 1 greets readers with Shin fighting a monster, and the use of skills and HP/MP bars show that this encounter is taking place inside a video game aptly called The New Gate. After a tough battle, Shin sits down and celebrates that now he and everyone he’s met can now log out of the game.
Except, when he’s about to log out, a strange door appears with a blinding light. When he opens his eyes, Shin realizes he can still access his player menu as if he’s in the game, but the world is different from The New Gate he knows.
It’s this lack of information on Shin’s personal history that is The New Gate‘s greatest weakness. Since he’s been stuck in a video game, he must have an Earth life and a “stuck in a video game” life. As we can see from the people in his new guild, shopkeepers, and warriors he meets in this volume, Shin is a nice, casual, dependable guy (and with appreciation for beautiful females). It’s hard to believe he wouldn’t have had some close friends that would be missing him on Earth or would have assisted him in an attempt to free (tens of? hundreds? thousands?) people in the game. Based upon the info he gathers, Shin surmises he’s in the game world 500 years in the future. You’d think that would make him at least a bit melancholy for the people in his past, yet he just marches along like it’s no big deal.
The actual The New Gate game is only loosely explained, and how logging out was disabled is not at all. With the manga throwing readers right into Shin being transported, it feels a little like .hack or Sword Art Online fanfiction where the creator assumes you already know the story. Readers know from the very first pages that Shin is a powerful, high-level fighter, and his abilities have been long-lost in this future world. Even though he puts some limits on his powers, the many people he meets in this opening volume recognize that he is no ordinary rookie adventurer. Not that he’s doing that much to hide his true power despite his requests to keep his skills on the down low. One elf is ecstatic when Shin removes her curse, and the guildmaster finds himself on the losing end of physical challenge.
For now, while we get a taste of what problems are emerging in the world, these encounters are where The New Gate volume 1 spends most of its time. The manga opens with a character chart (a somewhat bizarre decision since it’d make more sense to have readers meet the cast when Shin does), so all of the friendly characters introduced here are likely to be around for the long term. Perhaps that will allow them room for development. Most of the cast so far falls into familiar tropes like the kind receptionists, old man in charge, and the loli animal-eared girl. The one that stood out to me was the evil-looking Wilhelm who helps out at the local orphanage. He could be a good best friend/rival for Shin.
I will add that while it seems Shin is in a future version of The New Gate, this appears to be the real world for the people living here. So the question of what this place is is not as simple as it may seem.
The art is fine; it has its weak and strong parts. Faces tend to be a little long, but I like the humanoid monsters Shin fights. You don’t often see demon-like creatures wielding a sword and shield, and the card-inspired rankings could be very interesting.
The New Gate volume 1 is a little different from most isekai since it’s basically an isekai of an isekai. (Isekai-ception?) It’s also very different since the protagonist is not too distressed or unfamiliar with this world, but that also makes it harder to form a strong connection with Shin. With the cast introduced, though, perhaps The New Gate can now spend its time on the world and character development.