anime

Honestly, world end harem is a good example of this type of show for the sake of arguement

So that's my point, if we determine the bounds of what the characters relation needs to be to the new "world", for it to be an isekai

we can divorce an isekai from the need to explicitly change worlds

I think the character has to go somewhere, be it literally or metaphysically at a minimum

you cannot call a show where characters live in a world they have always lived in, that just so happens to be fantasy, an isekai

Otherwise the term isekai is meaningless

and is just synonymous with fantasy

so then we have two camps, isekais where the previous world is firmly established or known and native isekais, that predispose its characters to have the same relation to their world as an isekai would, but without their cannon knowledge of another world

the second one is a distinction without meaning though spooky

SAO is an isekai Danmachi is a native isekai

all shows are that

kaguya could be an isekai

they just don't know of the other world

steins;gate is actually an isekai thinking on the time travel thing (as a tangent since we've moved past that point)

I was thinking about time travel since that was brought up

I think the problem is spooky, you are predisposing that an isekai needs to be a fantasy world the person is isekai'd into, which is how danmachi has "Characters to have the same relation to their world as an isekai would"

You can isekai into a world that is basically the same as yours

I'm also thinking of classic isekais

like "soldier transported 2,000 years into the future" stories

I think isekais are more than "fish out of water stories"

it's the act of exploring a world from the vantage point of someone unaccustomed to it

and then you can take that in 1,000 different directions

Sure, that is a major element, but not the defining factor

it can't be the defining factor, because then any story that starts with someone being born (literally unaccustomed to the world), and growing (exploring an unknown world) is an isekai

which is silly

coming of age stories aren't isekais

That is correct

but a boy being swapped into the body of an adult would be

or "reincarnated" as an adult

The movie Big is an isekai?

ignoring the parallel world part of what you said, reincarnating into the same world as an adult is one of those borderline isekai/no isekai concepts

its a weird edge case

see

Was clifford an isekai

I agree with Pika here

I agree that edge cases like that and SAO are messy

but by strict definition, danmachi, goblin slayer, other fantasy shows are no where near that line

I think it's borderline when it's the same world, with some expectation that it's not "new"

like in Big

I think a good edge case is made in abyss

Home Alone: Lost in New York is an isekai

same world (technically), but they can't go back (abyss sickness) and its funtionally a different world when in the abyss

MiA is a non-isekai, in my opinion

I mean, they are all fantasy

isekai is usually a subgenre of fantasy

OH

you know what it is

AMQ TIME

lol

lol

no

man

I can't say this

you sure?

without spoiling

nvm

lol

look

I know people care about MiA

I can't believe they leave the abyss

what the fuck spooky

if I spoiled Smartphone isekai, no one would care

but MiA

I'd get lynched

You’d be

Missing in Action

good one gent

true good point rusp

ok but is phijkchu an isekai

given that you leave your human body and enter into some degenerate subform in a fucked up alternate world

idk

I briefly became Fire today

that was kind of an isekai

I think this summarises the issue I have with native isekai as a term

it seems to just apply to fantasy shows that are not isekais

when it would be more reasonable to call them fantasy, and maybe specify that they are not isekais

instead of saying native isekai

I like that chart

I think it's the same problem people have defining what is/isn't a Soulslike