An idea involving Genma's better parental instincts

[SpaceKnight of Chaos]

This idea came to mind after stumbling across the old Jumanji animated series on Youtube. Now, as most of you Ranma fans probably know, Genma gets a really bad reputation in fanfiction as a terrible parent. And, let's be honest, that's partially because he is a terrible parent. All too often his thoughtlessness and/or selfishness has hurt Ranma. Yet, despite this, he truly does love and care for his son - he just doesn't show it very well. So, the whim has come to me to do a rather unusual Ranma idea: showcasing that Genma does have a loving and protective father deep (deep, deep) down inside of him.

The basic setup I have is this. At a point early in Ranma's childhood, say around after the time with Ukyo, Genma buys his son a game. Precisely why and where I haven't figured out yet, though one possibility abuzzing in my head is that Genma is still feeling a trace of guilt over the trick he pulled with the Kuonjis and so he tries to assuage it by giving Ranma something to entertain himself on those occasions when he isn't training (after all, Ranma has enough social skills in canon that it's clear that training wasn't "24/7", even if he did do it a lot). As Ranma is quite enthusiastic about it, Genma leaves feeling a little better... until he hears Ranma screaming. When he races back, he discovers Ranma being drawn into the game in a whirl of light - and despite his best efforts, Genma can't save him. As he eventually discovers, the game is a sort of portal to a strange and dangerous world, and anyone who plays is sucked in.

Two potential outcomes come to mind from there, one more oneshot, one more serial. In the former, Genma immediately throws the dice and allows himself to be drawn into the game's world as well; his son is in there, and he needs to be saved. In the latter, Genma can't bring himself to roll the dice; he has no idea how or even if a person can escape from inside the game, and he instead abandons the training trip to ceaselessly spend the next decade searching for someone, anyone, who can help him save his little boy. Eventually, he wanders into Nerima, calling at the Tendo Dojo to rest up while he prepares his next quest to save Ranma. However, one or all of the girls finds the game in his belongings and, unaware of its true terrible nature, they start playing. Genma finds them too late to stop them, but can't bear to see the children of his friend fall to the same fate as Ranma. He at last throws the dice and falls into the game world, intending to save the girls and make his peace with Ranma... who he discovers has survived the last decade in this strange and alien place.

Well, that's pretty much the long and short of it. I'm ready to have it be ripped into shreds now.

[mondu_the_fat]

Genma buys his son a game. Precisely why and where I haven't figured out yet

Rather than Genma getting Ranma the game, why not just make Ranma play the game? Genma finds the game in some temple/dig/steals in from someplace/whatever, is warned of what it can do, but Ranma plays with it anyway when Genma isn't paying attention.

This solves two problems: 1) you don't have to figure out why Genma has the game 2) If Ranma disappears suddenly, Genma has an inkling that it is the game doing it, not some other influence and without having to make a leap of logic.

As for the idea itself, Ranma with little martial arts (since this is just a very young Ranma; probably not even half the skill of series start Ranma), no curses, no fiancees (or at least, Akane and Kodachi would be treated much differently), no amazons, and a Genma that's willing to risk his hide doesn't sound like Ranma 1/2 at all. Practically nothing of Ranma other than the names remain.

[Carmen Spamdiego]

Wasn't the game thrown into waterways a few times? Why not have Genma find the game and because of the obvious quality of it decide to pawn it off. That could make it so it would make sense finding it in the sand while digging for clams and other easy to obtain and cook fresh food. Then Genma could pawn the game while trying to find where "The boy" got off to.