dungeon meshi is 100% my favorite traditional fantasy manga/anime (like, of the clear lotr d&d lineage) but it’s got some stiffer competition if you expand the definition some. like, is utena fantasy? it certainly plays in those spaces, given all the fairy tale theming and imagery surrounding princes and witches. i think it’s ultimately too much of a surrealist work for that, but there’s an argument to be made. is umineko fantasy? depends on which character you want to listen to, maybe it’s a mystery but maybe a witch did it and you should just stop trying to prove your family were murderers. but there’s no shame in losing to some of my favorite works of art of all time

i need a big budget crpg done in the world of dungeon meshi

though i started playing this ascii roguelike called crablike (you play as a crab exploring the ocean depths, fighting shrimp raiders and evil warlocks, but also just different fish that try to eat you) i found on itch recently and in that you can chose to eat any enemy you kill, and you have to monitor your hunger and remember which monsters are poisonous and which don’t actually feed you very well, and you can get a perk that lets you heal a little whenever you eat something. that’d probably be a good baseline to work on for a game based on dungeon meshi