Nobuyuki Fukumoto is a Japanese manga artist well known for his unique and original gambling ideas, deep psychological analyses of characters, and distinct artstyle. Yakuza and gambling are recurring themes in his manga. In English-speaking countries, he is known best as the author of Akagi, a mahjong-related manga. In 1998, he won the Kodansha Manga Award for Gambling Apocalypse: Kaiji. An onomatopoeia "zawa", meaning an uneasy atmosphere, appears frequently in his comics and is considered Fukumoto's trademark.
Career
Fukumoto was born in Kanagawa Prefecture and grew up reading Perman and other shōnen manga as a child, as well as studying karate and kickboxing due to wanting to get stronger. In high school, he went on to study architecture and got a job as a site foreman at a construction company after graduating, but found the work boring and decided to become a manga artist to try and get a big break in life. During this time, when he pitched a kendo manga to Kodansha, he was advised to work as an assistant to gain some experience first. He began working under Eiji Kazama, who was looking for assistants at the time, and quit the construction company after only 3 months of employment, with the reasoning that if he worked there long enough and obtained qualifications, he would not be able to quit. Despite being hired as an assistant, he was unable to draw skillfully, and was assigned solely to work odd jobs such as cooking. As a result, Fukumoto quit his job as an assistant after about a year and a half. In 1980, he made his debut with Yoroshiku! Junjō Daishō, published in Monthly Shōnen Champion. Since then, his work had not achieved large-scale success for a while, so he worked part-time at places like champon restaurants to earn a living while submitting his entries to Tetsuya Chiba Awards in the meantime. In 1983, his work Wani no Hatsukoi won the Outstanding Newcomer Award at the Tetsuya Chiba Awards. Despite having a good part-time job and earning a good amount of money, he chose to make do with manga alone, and quit at 24 years old. One of the pseudonyms he used at the time was Fukumoto Tobi. During his debut, he mainly drew human drama stories, but in the 1980s, the Japanese economy was booming and gambling-themed manga was thriving, so he began drawing gambling manga because it was easier to get work in that field. At the end of the 1980s, his mahjong gambling manga Ten began serialization in Kindai Mahjong Gold. It became Fukumoto's first popular work and established him as a well-known manga artist. In 1996, Fukumoto began serializing Kaiji in Weekly Young Magazine. The series has become a hit, publishing over 70 volumes and selling over 20 million copies, sealing his popularity as a manga artist. Fukumoto donated 30 million yen to the areas affected by the Great East Japan Earthquake that occurred on March 11, 2011, and has contributed a supportive illustration. He has also visited the affected areas to sign and draw illustrations for the victims.
