about kodama

Hi everyone, this is the Kodama team!

We’re currently writing this from our office in LA on a very sunny August 28, 2025, day. There are five of us here, plus Figgy, our cat boss, and our two head honchos in Japan, who unfortunately aren’t here with us to write this letter. At the time of writing this, we’re working hard to prepare for the release of Baki and some other titles we’re excited to announce, but we wanted to take a moment to introduce ourselves to you guys.

The one writing down everyone’s thoughts here is me, Haize, one of the editors and your resident sleep-deprived raidlogger and mahjong enthusiast (unfortunately, you guys don’t get to hear the jokes and memes I’m having to filter out right now…). Our other editor, Michael, who’s on voice call for this, would have written this letter, but he’s too busy having his life consumed by Baki (have you seen the release schedule for it?). He’s so busy, he says he hasn’t even been able to finish the new Donkey Kong game. Seb, who’s currently in front of me, is our marketing manager and undisputed #1 lover of all things in the Chiikawa universe. Anytime you interact with Kodama on Twitter, surprise, you’re talking to them! On the far side of me is Jennie, our production manager and undisputed #1 boss designer who has the patience of a saint even when we have 10,000 design questions for her. She didn’t know what she wanted to include here, so I’ll take this chance to tell you that she’s secretly the one holding us all together (we almost fell apart when she went on vacation, haha…). To the left of me is Kashu, our director of operations, who’s currently busy tending to our boss cat’s needs and just wants me to tell you something about Figgy. (What am I supposed to write for that? Well, here’s a fun fact: Apparently the rest of us in the office lost the custody battle for Figgy because he hardly brings him to the office anymore! /ᐠ ╥ ˕ ╥マ)

As you can imagine, we’re all big fans of manga ourselves, and at our core, we just want to bring you manga localized in a way that we would like to see it done as readers. Surprisingly, that alone comes with a ton of challenges, but we appreciate everyone’s support so far. We’ve got an amazing lineup at the time of writing this, and we’re super excited to share it with you guys…or for you to find out about them through retailer leaks (pls don’t leak, we have a collective heart attack when that happens).

Our dream is to keep growing and keep bringing you guys the coolest manga, maybe some that you never imagined would get localized. Thank you so much for your support, thank you to all our goated freelancers who help bring every volume to life, and thank you for reading this letter!