STEAM DETECTIVES
By Kia Asamiya

The setting is London - but it's a London that never was, a fantasy metropolis of industrial-revolution science. In this world, trenchcoat-clad Narutaki is the mighty city's greatest detective, and it is his duty to protect its citizens from the astonishing range of outrageous villains and myriad steam-powered mecha menacing the city. Special otaku note: there are more than a few anime in-jokes to be found in the series (see if you can find them)! Story and art for Steam Detectives is by Kia Asamiya, creator of Silent Möbius, Compiler and Dark Angel. Asamiya's most famous manga, at least in America, would definitely be Silent Möbius, a Bubblegum Crisis-like story of a group of female investigators of the supernatural - a sort of anime X-Files. Asamiya's clean-lined style is a natural for animation - Silent Möbius has been animated for two theatrical features and a TV series, his manga Compiler has also been animated, and the anime version of Asamiya's steampunk adventure Steam Detectives that began airing in Japan on 26 September, 1998. A guest at the 1998 San Diego Comic-Con, Asamiya brought promo footage of the Steam Detectives TV series with him, giving the audience at his panel a sneak preview of a series even the Japanese fans hadn't yet seen. (We'll keep you posted on any news we hear about the animation coming to the U.S.) In 1999, Asamiya premiered his new series, Corrector Yui, to San Diego audiences, and gave hints about what's coming up in the Silent Möbius series. The Steam Detectives manga picked up in Animerica Extra where it left off from its serialization in Manga Vizion magazine - two books of the story are now available in graphic novel format.