It was interesting feeling yes on one your have the high fantasy setting with the party being the typical adventuring party in such fantasy setting with a dungeon included. However, the mood felt like horror in terms of monster art style and tense emotional level akin to a sci-fi horror like "Blame".

The art in this book was so good and the world building was great. The I really liked the characters and this volume really did a good job setting up the characrters and the story without falling into info dumping the first volume to set it up.

A promising action packed fantasy manga. I love the BLAME! Manga series which is also from this author. I can really see some remnants of the art style of BLAME! on here especially on the 1 panel full landscape illustration and of course on the character design as well.

I'm obviously so hyped up for this one and hopefully we get to see more Dragons in the next volumes 🤞🏼 As always, thank you to Kodansha Comic 🩷

The first volume of Tower Dungeon, the new manga production by the same genius who gave us that cyberpunk masterpiece of Blame!, is an interesting take on the dungeon exploration fantasy in which the simplified style and the distinctive, direct lines, narration and worldbuilding creates maybe one of the most solid productions I have read these days. It takes obvious inspirations from a number of things, from Dark Souls to Berserk, from Shadow of the Colossus to Delicious in Dungeon, passing by Escher impossible illusions, giving us impossible architecture of a fractured, corrupted and forgotten kingdom, in a world slowly fading without anyone noticing it. Maybe the fact that the saviour of the situation is the classical country bumpkin which, I think, will have the rank up from zero to hero, is the only repetitive note I have found inside Tower Dungeon, a thing which make impossible for me to give it a perfect score, but the personality and uniqueness of this manga makes it aspire to a greater potential!

Thanks to NetGalleys and Kodansha Comics for giving me a copy in exchange for an honest review!

FINAL VERDICT: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Thanks to NetGalley for the advanced copy. 3.75 out of 5 (rounded up)

Tower Dungeon sets up an exciting fantasy premise with bold visuals and a rich dungeon setting that immediately grabs attention. The monster designs are imaginative, and the artwork adds depth to the medieval atmosphere. On the surface, it promises a thrilling journey.

Unfortunately, the story doesn’t quite keep pace with its presentation. The plot moves too quickly to build tension or emotional weight, making it hard to connect with the stakes or the characters. The protagonist, Yuva, lacks presence, and while there are hints of deeper potential, this first volume doesn’t offer much to get truly invested in him or the world.

Some of the core elements—like the structure of the tower and its challenges—remain vague, which leaves the story feeling a bit hollow. While it’s not the strategic, game-like adventure some might expect, it still offers a light, fast-paced fantasy experience. There’s room for growth, and readers curious about where it goes next might want to stick around for Volume 2.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC! I honestly thought this was great. The art was so good, especially the environments.
The plot reminded me a lot of a mix of Princess Arete and Dungeon Meshi, so I loved it. I thought it was a little fast paced though, but I don't mind at all. I can't wait to read more!

This was an interesting read. Definitely something you'd enjoy if you like dark, gritty dungeon-crawlers. The goal is to scale the huge tower floor by floor to rescue the princess, but as usual each floor is guarded by a variety of monsters. I think I'll keep an eye out for the next volume as I'm interested to see how the story goes!

Rating: ★★★★☆ (4 stars)
ARC provided by Kodansha via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Tower Dungeon Vol. 1 instantly pulled me in with its dark, intricate world and fast-paced story. As a fan of Tsutomu Nihei’s previous work, I was excited to dive into something new—and I wasn't disappointed.

Yuva is a standout protagonist—resilient, driven, and layered with so much potential. I was immediately drawn to his quiet strength and determination, and I'm genuinely excited to follow his journey deeper into the ever-shifting, dangerous world of the Tower Dungeon. There are strong themes of survival and identity already taking root, and I can't wait to see how Yuva evolves as the series progresses.

The artwork is gritty, atmospheric, and true to Nihei’s signature style—evoking a feeling of claustrophobic awe that suits the tower’s mysterious dangers. While the pacing was a little disorienting at first, I found myself quickly immersed in the action and intrigued by the hints of a larger, unfolding mystery.

This is definitely a promising start to a series that feels both classic Nihei and something entirely new. If you're a fan of dystopian survival stories with a psychological edge, Tower Dungeon is worth checking out. I’m already looking forward to Volume 2!

Nihei gets to go wild with overwhelming stone architecture, this time in a gothic style!! Interested to see where this goes

This was a fascinating first volume and I'm excited to read more! Yuva is a farm boy recruited into the army and sent to help rescue the princess while the kingdom is in decline. The scale of the architecture was so cool to see and makes the world feel unique.
I liked the characters and I'm interested to read more about them, though with the uniforms and similar hairstyles I sometimes found them hard to differentiate (other than Yuva).
My main gripe is that it's only two chapters and yet there are already two completely necessary mostly-nude shots of the only female characters :(

Tower Dungeon is a series that had been on my radar for a while. I had enjoyed some of the author previous works. From the beginning I liked Yuva as a character, he was a strong and dependable guy that sometimes stumbles into success. Those first shots of the tower were immediately attention grabbing and the overall art style is very fitting for this mystery journey where the unknown lurks around the corner. Finishing the first volume made me immediately want to continue and learn what was next.

*I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.*

The Review

Monsters. Dungeon Tower. Dragon Tower. Mages. Sounds all cool, right?

This read was very chaotic. It's only the first volume still so it isn't supposed to be extremely adventurous and mind-blowing yet, but that doesn't mean that the first volume shouldn't hook a reader. Since I wanted to read this manga, especially after I received a free chapter preview from Kodansha I decided to take the opportunity to read now the full first volume of that manga. I wouldn't say it was a waste, but I would also not say it was the best start in a series.

I want to start with the positive aspects. Even though the art style wasn't something I would call stunning or incredible beautiful, I saw how it worked good together with the drawings of the monsters and the tower building. The monsters looked eerie enough for a dungeon manga, not too excessive and also not too little than to look more innocent than evil.
Lastly, even though I have lots of aspects to complain about below, I still think that this manga has great potential, after all it's just the first volume of what could be hundreds. Maybe it was meant to be a bit slow on the battles and faster on walking the tower up.

From the beginning to the middle part, almost nothing really happened plot-wise. The reader just finds out that Yuva (who is a Master Bird-Feeder and a farmer) is send from his village to fight monsters in the dragon tower since the saying goes ‘When the Dragon Tower descends, doom follows’. Many others, not just Yuva, try to defeat Dracomorph (king of the dragon tower) to rescue Princess Ignelia.
The other characters are as followed:
Minsabelle (captain)
Lieutenant Rudeum (royal guard)
Calix
Eriquo (archer)
Lilicen (fire mage)
Fanro
Bazen

As you can see I don't have behind all of them something in brackets to elaborate what their power/abilities are as they weren't revealed (which is unusual for an adventurous battle manga). The tower has many different 'levels', which get more difficult to beat the higher one goes up. Only issue: Most moments are just skipped and the only real fight is kept pretty short. So far my impression is that the manga tries to be epic, have strong battles, but never really shows them. The monsters all looked cool, but we only saw one big fight (a couple of pages, but I still think pretty short) and one small fight that was only on two pages. Most pages just show the atmosphere while they walk around in the dungeon. I don't want to complain that the surroundings are boring and I just want to see the fights against the monsters. It's just that at some point it can get disappointing when one expects a great fight and it never arrives.

Here are all monsters who appeared in this volume (only one is shown for more than just two pages):

• Door guardian, speaking in a different language to tell them to leave before he attacks
• Crossbowman
• Giant slime (mucus monster)

That's it. No more. All other monsters are just being told to leave them alone before they see the characters and attack, but it's never explained what they really are.

Character-wise was this volume also not that awesome. I know we still need to get to know them all, I can't expect to get some deep stuff already after just reading one volume, but I feel like I know none of them at all. The main character seems stereotypical — Slay the dragon and marry the princess type of protagonist. That one girl that always hits him but actually really cares for him is stereotypical. I don't know, they all just don't feel special or anything to make me say: ‘I want to continue reading as I really like the personality of x character'. They have no personality.

As already mentioned above, since it's only the first volume there is still room to improve and maybe the first volume only wanted to show how great the artist can draw dungeons and the tower layout, but that doesn't mean that the other volumes will be bad too. I haven't found anything that was that much of an issue to completely drop it as I know I'm the wrong audience for it. The only thing I truly hope is that this manga will not become like all the other dungeon manga, but something greater, more unique. Something that I can look forward to.

Final thoughts

Thanks a lot to NetGalley and Kodansha Comics for the advanced reader copy of Tower Dungeon 1 by Tsutomu Nihei!

Started the book: 20. July 2025
Finished the book: 20. July 2025
Wrote the review: 20. July 2025

It is nice to see Tsutomu Nihei work on something that is a little more... playful? It feels less dark and oppressive than his work on BLAME and Noise; however, some fans of those series may be a little bit turned off by the art, which does seem quite a bit simpler and looks almost whimsical by comparison.

3.5
I have read the entire Aposimz series (BLAME! is on my TBR), so I'm fairly familiar with this author's work. This story is basically the exact same vibes as Aposimz, with the barren wastelands and post-apocalypse world, with little villages of people just trying to survive in this big empty world. But Tower Dungeon has a distinctly more Medieval vibe versus Aposimz, which was strictly Sci-Fi. Much like how it was when I was reading Aposimz, there were very interesting concepts being introduced, but also left you feeling lost within the story. It's just interesting enough to get you hooked, but somehow uninteresting enough that it's easy to lose you. This series also suffers from the "flat affect" issues that other Tsutomu Nihei characters suffer from. Characters never really seem to emote, but just have straight faces, so it feels like no one is feeling any emotions, even if the dialogue shows otherwise. The art, aside from the expressions, has improved since Aposimz. It's still the same sketchy style, but there's something a bit more polished to it. Super curious about where this story goes, but fingers crossed it doesn't follow the same trajectory as Aposimz did.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review!

Volume 1 consists of chapters 1-2, where we follow Yuva (a small town tribute) and a small group of Royal Guards as they go through a dungeon crawler sequence to save the captured princess.

Aside from Hunter x Hunter, Tower Dungeon is probably the only other manga I've read that follows an action themed story line. While it didn't actively pique my curiosity to immediately want to read the next volume, I am still interested to see how the next chapters will play out given the last turn of events. We follow a good amount of unique characters and I'd also love to see how they evolve and get more connected with each other.

With the art, you can definitely tell that there was a lot of care and hardwork put into drawing the towers and fight scene locations - almost every panel had lots of architectural details that make you appreciate and take notice of the story's setting.

Tower Dungeon is a lackluster start to a story that has potential to be great given the room to develop it's characters and world. Yuva is a farm boy with no experience in battle that is conscripted to go into the looming Dragon Tower to rescue the princess from a necromancer. The cast of characters around him has potential, but the story so far hasn't really developed them or their relationships enough to make the reader care about what happens. Despite the story's shortcomings this is a beautiful book with interesting character and monster designs. The designs for the Dragon Tower itself deserve a special shout out. If you care more about artwork than story I think it's worth checking out. Otherwise, I think waiting a few more volumes for the story to develop might be a better idea if the plot sounds interesting to you.

Weird, creepy, dark and scary--definitely a story from Tsutomu Nihei! The story has a fair amount of twists, while the artwork is bold and straight to the point. Would recommend to fans of Delicious in Dungeon.

When the princess of the realm is stolen away to a tall tower, the royal army tries to rescue her. But they failed. So a call was sent out for recruits from each village. Yuva was one of those recruits who made his way to the army and became part of a task force to infiltrate a small group in to rescue the princess when a large force fails. But problems keep popping up thwarting their progress. It will be interesting to see what they manage to get done in the next volume.

gave off tower of god x magical historical fantasy vibes. thank you so much for this manga arc! i really enjoyed it!

Thank you to netGalley and Kodansha for the eARC.

Tower Dungeon is the first volume about a dungeon crawl in a tower where Yuva must go with a team of people to help rescue the princess. I found the art interesting, and the author's love of architecture come through. The problem was more with the narrative, as it wasn't very compelling and I found it difficult to get through more than other mangas.