After fifteen years of warfare with the demon world, the Hero is unsatisfied with their advance and rushes forward to the Demon Queen’s Castle. There, he not only finds a beautiful woman that is the queen, but she needs his help.
To his surprise, she offers a way to not only help his country, but hers as well. Together, they join forces to make that dream a reality.
While it is a little lighter on the romance than the beginning makes it seem, Maoyu remains a great series for those who love watching worlds develop economically and politically. If you are looking for more anime recommendations like Maoyu – Archenemy and Hero, head on down below.
For Fans of Enemies Turned Allies
I’m Quitting Heroing
After using his immense power to save the world, Leo finds that there is no place for a powerful hero in a world at peace. Being too strong to remain in human kingdoms, he seeks a job in the Demon King’s Army, which he defeated and is in need of rebuilding.
While the army has many problems, Leo’s power is boundless, but he finds that the demon king who is actually a queen has kinder motives for world domination than he expected.
In their most basic premises, Maoyu and I’m Quitting Heroing are about a hero meant to defeat the demon lord actually joining up with them. However, while the hero is pleasantly convinced by the Demon Queen in Maoyu, the Hero is shunned by humanity after defeating the Demon Queen and goes to help rebuild her army.
The biggest difference between these anime series is the tone. Maoyu has its serious moments, but it is a relatively light-hearted anime about improving a fantasy world and ending a war with as little loss of life as possible. I’m Quitting Heroing acts rather light-hearted, but can be quite dark when it comes to some of the backstories.
Maoyu paints both sides as having good and bad people, but I’m Quitting Heroing is more about how nice the demon army is with its good motivations, while kind of painting humanity as jerks for shunning their greatest hero due to his power.
Our Last Crusade or the Rise of a New World
For years, war has raged between the Empire and the realm of witches, Nebulis. On the battlefield, a talented young knight is tasked with killing the princess of Nebulis, but he is taken by her beauty and she taken by his honor.
Two sides, both alike in dignity – Both Maoyu and Our Last Crusade lean into the star-crossed lover, Romeo and Juliet-sort of romance between two people on opposing sides.
In Maoyu, the Hero and Demon Queen fall in love while Our Last Crusade features love at first sight between a human knight and a witch, two people whose opposite factions are locked in war.
Both anime have romance as not the main focus of the show. The main focus is the conflicts, but you do really treasure the moments of romance because they are very cute.
The Devil is a Part-Timer
Just as he was on the cusp of conquering his world, Satan is thrown through a portal to Tokyo. Although he cannot use magic in this world, he is still motivated to conquer it, but first, he must get a job and pay his rent on time.
While The Devil is a Part-Timer is a reverse isekai and, at first, about the Demon Lord comically working a mundane part-time job in our world after being sent here, it grows as a series. It eventually explores the Demon Lord’s relationship with the Hero who chased him to our world and ends up becoming an office lady.
Both Maoyu and The Devil is a Part-Timer really lean into a pretty wholesome and sometimes comical relationship between the Demon Lord and the Hero that was once destined to defeat them.
I Couldn’t Become a Hero, So I Reluctantly Decided to Get a Job
Dreaming of becoming a hero, Raul joined the Hero Training program. Unfortunately, with the demon king defeated, there is no market for heroes anymore.
Instead, Raul gets a job at an electronics store. He soon finds out that his new co-worker is in fact the old demon king’s daughter.
In different ways, Maoyu and I Couldn’t Become a Hero are about guys who thought they would one day be the hero that would defeat a demon lord. However, they were wrong. They were the guys that would become friends with the demon lord.
Maoyu is about improving society through various economic and administrative improvements, while I Couldn’t Become a Hero is more of a workplace comedy in a magical-tinged modern fantasy world. Furthermore, Maoyu is a romance right away while I Couldn’t Become a Hero is a bit more of a tease with it.
Regardless, both series are great comedies that subvert the usual relationship between heroes and demon lords.
For Fans of Political and Economic Plots
Spice and Wolf
For generations, Holo was a revered wolf deity that helped the local wheat harvest in exchange for tribute. However, as the villagers become more self-sufficient, they no longer need or even believe in her anymore.
During her annual festival, she sneaks into the cart of Kraft, a visiting merchant, hoping he will let her hitch a ride home.
While both series take place in fantasy worlds and follow the relationship between an deity and a human, both Maoyu and Spice and Wolf do something you don’t really expect. They both commit themselves to being fairly detailed about economic strategies.
Maoyu touches on economics as part of the Demon Queen’s plan to stop the war and improve the lives of the people. Meanwhile, Spice and Wolf filled the swathes of wagon journeying by explaining the finer points of medieval economics.
In short, what Maoyu and Spice and Wolf have in common is that they are both more mature fantasy romances with an unexpected, but not unwelcome amount of detail into the economics of the world.
How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom
Kazuya Souma is summoned to another world rife with adventure. There, the king cedes his throne to the young hero and Souma finds himself saddled with a kingdom in decline.
Now, he shows the true might of his heroism by rehabilitating the country, not through adventure or war, but through rigorous economic administration.
Both Maoyu and How a Realist Hero Rebuilt The Kingdom are both about what one series clearly states in the title – rebuilding a kingdom.
Maoyu is about enhancing a kingdom for the benefit of its people to ultimately be able to stop a war whereas How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom is more about reviving a kingdom after years of poor administration.
While How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom is an isekai, both anime are rather low action and more about the economic aspects of a kingdom. Both series are also romances, but because Realist Hero is an isekai, it has kind of a “harem with a clear main girl” sort of romance.
The Twelve Kingdoms
In what started as a normal day as a normal high school student, Nakajima Youko has her reality shattered when a strange man named Keiki appears before her, swearing his allegiance.
When Youko and her friends are attacked by demons, they are pulled into a different world, one she has never known.
Separated from Keiki, Youko and her friends must do whatever they have to in order to survive this strange, harsh place.
You watch Maoyu – probably – more for the romance that was advertised, but what you get is also a pretty well-built world that is interestingly explored – The Twelve Kingdoms offers something similar.
While The Twelve Kingdoms isn’t a romance, it is one of the most detailed fantasy worlds that anime has to offer. You explore it with an isekai’d teen girl who is rather grating as a character at first, but grows into someone more likable over time. While she is enduring this character growth, you are exploring a vast and diverse world with a variety of people, cultures, and political systems.
In short, if you enjoyed Maoyu more for the world and didn’t necessarily need the romance, The Twelve Kingdoms employs fantastic worldbuilding.
The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt
With his father ailing and the responsibility for his small poor kingdom falling to him, genius prince Wein is ready to commit treason. He desires to auction off his kingdom and retire in luxury.
However, his treasonous schemes always conclude with dire consequences, for him, anyway. His plans to fail instead constantly succeed and his kingdom begins to flourish.
Similar to the aforementioned How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom, The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Our of Debt follows royalty revamping their kingdom, but this time, comically and accidentally.
Like Maoyu, The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt focuses on the improvement of a kingdom for its people. However, while Maoyu is doing it for noble reason, The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt is sort of a “failing upwards” situation. The prince wants to sell the kingdom, is trying to plausibly fail at things, but accidentally succeeds and improves the kingdom he is saddled with.
While Maoyu has fun moments of comedy, The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt is all comedy.
For Fans of The Intricacies of a World at War
Gate – Thus the JSDF Fought There
Japanese Self-Defense Force solider and otaku Youji Itami is in the Ginza district of Tokyo feeding his hobby one afternoon when a gate to another world opens and medieval soldiers flood modern day Japan.
While Itami, in conjunction with the local police, manage to save many civilian lives, his hero status forces him to go beyond the gate with his fellow soldiers to explore a mysterious new world filled with swords, magic, elves, and dragons.
While Gate is an isekai, it takes place in a fantasy world that is embroiled in various conflicts. Like in Maoyu, the goal in Gate is to end the violent conflicts and put down the groundwork for economic enhancements in the world.
While Maoyu handles skirmishes the usual way one would expect in a fantasy land, part of the charm in Gate is watching the Japanese Self Defense Force using modern military technology to quickly end medieval-level battles to restore peace.
Like Maoyu is an interesting shake up of the fantasy formula, Gate is a similarly interesting shake up of the isekai formula.
Overlord
As the final hour approaches in the life cycle of the MMO Yggdrasil, Momonga, a powerful wizard and leader of the dark guild Ainz Ooal Gown, is there to see it off.
However, to his surprise, the servers don’t go down and even stranger is that all the NPC characters have come alive with their own unique personalities.
Unlike Maoyu, Overlord is an isekai, but both series are about “evil” overlords who are actually trying to help in some ways. Overlord, as it goes on, embraces some evilness a little more, however. The main character starts off trying to do good, but things often spiral.
Despite different level of morality in the main characters, both Maoyu and Overlord focus on the development of the world. You explore a variety of regions and people while the main characters explore various means to get the outcomes in those regions that they want.
Lord Marksman and Vanadis
In fantasy Europe, war is brewing between the countries. One of the War Maidens known as Vanadis has recently launched an attack on neighboring rival, Brune.
Young archer and Earl in Brune, Tigre, has his army decimated at her hands. However in a twist of fate, she spares him and takes him on as a servant.
How do you stop a war once it has already started? Maoyu suggests that, since the war is propping up the economy, you need to first reform that before peace can be achieved. Marksman and Vanadis has a more straight-forward approach of using force.
Regardless, what these series have in common is that they explore their fantasy lands where a nice, very strong fighter, becomes close with a number of of girls. That said, Marksman and Vanadis does have a more harem vibe to it as he wins battles and usually recruits the girl he was fighting to his side.
Despite following worlds at war, both of these series are rather upbeat with only a spare few moments of serious drama.
Record of Grancrest War
After a tragedy that occurred at a wedding between the two nations of Fantasia Union and Factory Alliance, the continent of Atlatan is embroiled in war once again.
In this war, an Alliance mage is rescued by a young warrior named Theo that carries a mysterious crest. His strange crest is able to banish the corrupting chaos which is consuming the countryside, and she finds herself pulled into his epic quest.
Much of the charm of Maoyu was that it was a fantasy romance, but also had a robust plot that was driving the characters. This means things didn’t get too weighed down by endless gushing or forced to turn to romantic drama. Instead, it was broken up by battles or various issues in the world. Record of Grancrest War is of a similar nature.
While Maoyu is dedicated to improving its world, Grancrest War is often about “improving the world” by defeating the next powerful enemy the main character comes across. However, while he is traveling and trying to quell the conflict, he is also developing a nice romance with his companion.
This is definitely an anime for those that liked Maoyu’s relationship, but also wished there was more action.
Do you have more anime recommendations like Maoyu – Archenemy and Hero? Let fans know in the comments section below.
