In preparation for the XXV edition, enhanced by the poster designed by Jamie Hewlett, creator of Tank Girl and, with Damon Albarn, of the Gorillaz band, COMICON Napoli is organising four unforgettable festival days (1 – 4 May, Mostra d’Oltremare).
Coming to Italy for the first time, Yuji Horii, one of the most innovative and beloved game designers of all time, known for having created the legendary Portopia and Dragon Quest, the series of videogames that since the 1980s, with the collaboration of the unforgettable character designer Akira Toriyama, has been so successful as to become a cultural phenomenon. Considered the most influential RPG in the history of videogames, in 1984 Dragon Quest was the first title to bring the experience of role playing sgames into the world of gaming, and contributed to its development by engaging both the most inveterate video-gamers as well as millions of casual gamers. With his pioneering noir The Portopia Serial Murder Case, the first Japanese adventure game and first visual novel ever, in 1983 Horii inspired an entire generation of professionals, including the master Hideo Kojima or Eiji Aonuma, the producer of Zelda. In the 1990s, Horii created one of the most memorable titles in the history of videogames with Chrono Trigger, created in 1995 by what has been defined as the “Dream Team”, consisting of Horii with Hironobu Sakaguchi, creator of Final Fantasy, and with Akira Toriyama, the now-established author of Dragon Ball. In the course of his career Horii has won many acknowledgments, including the award from the Minister of the Economy, Trade and Industry at the Japan Game Awards 2010, the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 22nd Game Developers Choice Awards in 2022 and the Commissioner for Cultural Affairs award in 2024. In the 2000s, Horii also created the successful series Itadaki Street and, now four years after it was first announced, he is close to releasing the new chapter in his most beloved saga, Dragon Quest XII.
Also from Japan and also in Italy for the first time, Sensei Shin’ichi Sakamoto is one of the most award-winning masters of the contemporary manga in Japan, who has drawn comic art gems such as The Climber, Innocent and the most recent #DRCL midnight children, a majestic revisitation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
COMICON GOES GLOBAL
For this year’s edition, the 25th since the event’s opening, to celebrate the festival’s global opening, the lineup is packed with guests from all over the world. Among the confirmed guests: Jon J. Muth, the American author and illustrator, first known for some of the most innovative painterly works in comic art such as Moonshadow or Havok & Wolverine: Meltdown; Thomas Taylor, the illustrator and author of children’s books known for having created the book cover for the first British edition of Harry Potter. Thomas’s bestselling fiction series, The Eerie-on-Sea Mysteries, has been published in 20 territories, and sold more than 600,000 copies worldwide; Arthur de Pins, the multifaceted French artist and animator known for Péchés mignons, The March of the Crabs, Zombillénium; Paskim, the internationally renowned manhwa author known for her skillful blend of romantic and psychological drama, often exploring themes of identity and self-acceptance; Boichi the Korean mangaka, author of ‘Sun Ken Rock’, ‘Origin’ and artist of the bestselling ‘Dr.Stone’ manga, whose anime debuts with its fourth season in January 2025; Altan, one of the most beloved and esteemed comic artists and satirical cartoonists of all time, creator of ‘Pimpa‘, will be awarded the COMICON 2025 Special Award for Lifetime Achievement; Darick Robertson, the American comic artist and screenwriter has been on the scene for over 30 years. He is the co-creator of ‘Transmetropolitan‘ and the comic turned hit tv series ‘The Boys‘; Álvaro Martínez Bueno, the co-creator of the post-apocalyptic horror series ‘The Nice House on The Lake’, one of the most awarded comics series at the Eisner Awards and Angouleme’s festival awards in recent years; Tanino Liberatore, as the Magister COMICON artist will be the subject of a personal exhibition.
