M. Smith II

incredibly childish writing with no backstory

Revisado: 05-03-24

First of all, I want to say congrats to the author for writing a book. That being said, it seems to have been written with a chatbot AI and touched up by the author. If this is the case or not, I don't know. What I do know is that there is literally zero backstory given. At the end of the book, I am not sure what motivates the MC. Many things are not explained at all, including how people found the MC's livestream, a major plot point. I am not sure what the MC's name is. While they call him Jason, I think, it is never explained if this is a nickname, pseudonym, or his real name. The reason why this is an issue, is because many of the people the MC interacts with are on his livestream and use a pseudonym. There is no mention of if the MC has friends, family, significant other, etc. It never even made it clear if he was just visiting New York or actually lives there. What makes me think it is the former, is because he will just curl up and sleep wherever he finds himself instead of going to his home.

He is pushed into a life and death game, but does nothing to test the boundaries of his class. Further, leveling and the rewards that come with it seem arbitrary. There is nothing to indicate level progression such as it takes X amount of experience to get to level Y. We are just told he gains 1 level, he gains 2 levels, etc.

I have never felt 7 hours drag on longer than listening to this book. It took me about 2 weeks to finish this. The narrator makes it better, but there is only so much that can be done.

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very unlikeable MC

Revisado: 02-08-24

The MC is just unlikable. His main goal is to take revenge on those who wronged him. From the context clues we are given and his personality through the book, he completely deserves it. His actions have caused him to be forever banned from entering one town and his own actions have caused him to be exiled from the village he grew up in. He is such a deplorable person, that his own parents refused to speak up for him, as they knew what a trash person their son was. The MC knows his actions are bad and purposefully hides it from his new village under the pretense of making a brand new start. All the while, he is plotting revenge against his former village for his own misdeeds.

I am 50% of the way through this book, and it has been a nightmare to get through. The only reason why the MC is technically a good guy, is because the antagonists are even bigger scumbags. The book is needlessly vulgar. The vulgarity adds nothing to the story and does not move the plot along. The author could easily have shaved over an hour of vulgar content and nothing would change.

There is very little world building. I have a difficult time telling who is speaking sometimes, especially the male characters. This might just be me, but I am finding passively listening to this audiobook to be a chore more than anything.

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Unlikeable Main Character

Revisado: 06-07-23

The Main Character is super whiny and purposefully antagonizes everyone around him. He complains about everything in his life prior to being sent to a new world and then complains about everything after being transported. Max, the MC, purposefully gets on the bad side of a beholder creature who wants nothing to do with him. The Beholder creature even asks the MC on multiple occasions if he can just send the MC back home so he can find a better champion. This is with guarantees of no tricks and being sent home alive as a human. Max makes fun of the creature instead, then complains about the entire situation. Max does this throughout the entire story. I am almost done with the book, and will most likely not purchase the next in the series unless a miracle happens during the last hour left.

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Agonizingly slow.

Revisado: 06-07-23

If you are looking for a fast paced action story, best move on. The plot moves at a glacier speed. There is very little world building and next to no comedic elements to make the book more enjoyable. While the entire world is designed like a game with stats, levels, classes, etc., the entire story felt like Diet LitRPG if that makes any sense. Y Class makes someone better in X stat more so than others is about the best you get. This took me literal weeks to get through because I ended up talking myself into doing pretty much anything else besides listening to this book.

While the MC does become a Town Guard like the title says, it doesn't happen until about 1/2 way through the book. This being the case, I will not be getting the 2nd book in the series. There is nothing new or interesting to stand out apart from other books. The Plot is fairly predictable and you knew how things would turn out fairly early on.

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Not a LitRPG

Revisado: 12-06-22

I just want to say that the book was good, not great. I won't be getting the next book unless I am supremely bored. I feel like I was mislead with some of the genre tags for this book. I am an avid listener of LitRPG and sci-fi. This is what lead me to purchasing this audiobook. The only somewhat gamer thing that happened is the MC has an spacial inventory. That is it. Not once did I feel the audiobook even hint at something actually litrpg like.

I also had issues getting started. It just did not capture my attention and found myself having to go back a few minutes multiple times.

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unlikeable MC

Revisado: 07-28-22

Quite frankly, the MC is unlikeable. She whines and complains throughout the entire book. she gives little thought to what others think of her and just does what she wants. When it goes poorly or not as expected, she whines and complains about it. It is off putting. She is worse than a toddler. This is supposedly a grown woman but the mentality and entitlement for others to follow her whims is horrible. If this only happened once or twice, I could probably forgive the MC as she is in a new world. However, she constantly does this throughout the entire book. Even when she starts gaining success and a leg up in her new world, she doesn't get better. If anything, she gets worse. I had high hopes and did enjoy the plot. It was a nice change of pace from similar isekai books where they are heavily dependent on combat to push the plot. I have nothing against this and usually enjoy these types. Performance was okay, but the nasally voice for the MC is again, off putting. The MC understands she complains quite often and simply does not care. Because the MC has no desire to change or grow as an individual, I will not be purchasing book 2.

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Base building but not LitRPG

Revisado: 06-01-22

Overall, the story was mediocre at best. The tagline of this being a LitRPG apocalypse book was heavily misleading. The performance is the only somewhat saving grace of the entire experience. If you are looking for base-building Lit RPG apocalypse book like I was, you have come to the wrong place. While this story is very heavily rooted in base-building (this being the only driving force of the plot), the rpg theme is arbitrary and virtually non existent to the story. The ONLY time when stats showed even a modicum of importance to anything, is on the likelihood of a woman becoming pregnant. There is no leveling up or increasing personal stats at all through the book. Besides being mentioned when reading out an individuals stats determined by an unknown scale which nobody questions, stats are unimportant.

The characters are relatively unbelievable in how they react. Everyone and everything they ever know and love has been destroyed in 1 minute. The MC never expresses any form of sadness, regret, or grief for his loss. He never comments on how lucky he is for being on a jet ski at just the right time to save his life. The heroine of the story is the only person we see who had a legitimate reaction to what happened by going into shock and not being able to accept what happened. At least for the first few hours after what happened, then she is all gung-ho and lovey dovey with the MC. Nobody seems to have any form of PTSD, anxiety, depression or other issues with what happened to them.

While sex can definitely move the plot forward when used correctly, in this book it failed. There are nearly a 1/2 dozen graphically detailed scenes that had no point except as filler to make the story longer than it otherwise would have been. The book could have been shortened by about 45 minutes if this was taken out. The only thing that was added as a result of this, was to allow for the MC and others to find out an individuals chances of becoming pregnant and to show that the MC and main heroine are now a couple.

The girl on the cover is relatively unimportant to the story. She gets put into the role of extra side character with the foreknowledge she will only stick around for a short period of time. The only benefit she brings is to give the MC additional information he might not have been made aware of. Maybe this side character will have a more important role in the 2nd book, but who knows.

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More background of side characters

Revisado: 11-16-21

As of writing this review, I am 1/2 way through the book. That being said, only about an hour or so has actually been about Erin. Ryoka, as far as I can remember, has not had her own chapter by this point. Just like with the 3rd book in the series, this is primarily focused on the supporting characters. While I am all for the reader being able to understand and learn about the wants and dreams of other characters, there are times where I have been listening and tempted to skip a chapter or two, to get back to the plot of the story. While I understand that what happens during these chapters will most likely lead to something with Erin and Ryoka, these side stories just seem to drag.

I loved the first 2 books, thought the 3rd was pretty good, but the 4th book is losing me. I hope it picks up in the 2nd 1/2 of the book. If not, I might not purchase the 5th book.

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Good book until the very end

Revisado: 07-27-21

This was a pretty good book overall, especially if you enjoyed the first 2 in the series. However the story could use some help to take care of loose ends. There were some issues that I have with it that could have been explained away in the 2nd book which I just forgot. In the first 2 books, Slater made a big deal about increasing in strength to the point where he completely shut down a few times in order to proceed forward. In this book, he killed way more creatures than he ever did in the first 2 books combined but his core did not increase in power to any real degree. Also, we never learn the motivations of big bad enemy nor why it does what it does. Slater even comments that the enemy seemed to particularly dislike him above others. Why was this? This was never explained.

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Absolutely No Character Development So Far

Revisado: 04-12-21

I mean the title pretty much tells you my thoughts exactly. Over the course of 4 books, Alvin and Rebecca have not shown any growth or development as characters. They are both heavily flawed which is fine, but what many readers (in my opinion) like to see is at least some change in their characters whether that is for better or worse. Kuro, the dark elf girl introduced at the very end of the 3rd book, is the only person who shows any change in character over the course of the 4th book. She is a side character and not the main hero/heroine from the first few books. The plot wants us as readers to believe that Alvin and Rebecca complete each other and they are better for that. However, there has not been a single moment that has shown this to be true. Their personalities are exactly the same from when you first met them in book 1.

While there is a Disclaimer warning about the graphic sex scenes, it is completely unnecessary to the plot. If the sex scenes added any additional information or is the cause for change in any way, then I say go for it. However, this is not the case. What is close to a 14 hour book could be stripped down to about an 11 hour book if the sex scenes were taken out. I tried, I really did, to listen to these scenes in hope for something plot or character related, but it's just not there. This became clear when I started skipping through these entire sections of the book and I as a reader do not feel like I have missed anything by doing so. This issue has been prevalent through the series so far.

I do wish the author had access to a thesaurus. He keeps using the same words to describe things. This really stands out in the conversations between Jarvis and Alvin. Jarvis will use the word "droll" to describe Alvin at least once every conversation. Ex. 'How droll' or 'That's very droll'. It is also seen in how Alvin interacts with Rebecca. He always uses words to describe her as succubus, gothic temptress, or gothic succubus. On that note, why do all of the characters just accept that Rebecca is named Gothy or Alvin named Hero. These are clearly nicknames and very cringey to have other characters call them that.

With this said, I have enjoyed the narration. Was annoyed at first when the narrator changed between books 2 and 3, but that was a minor personal issue more than anything else. The story is fairly expansive and we as readers are made aware of exactly how much is happening that we don't see. There are multiple references to what other Players like Alvin are doing out in the world and how they are breaking the game as well. I did enjoy knowing that the world is not centered around Alvin and Rebecca which can happen in some books. That being said, I do wish for at least a few side stories to get caught up on what is happening in the settlements Alvin has started. Even if it is just 1 or 2 short chapters scattered throughout the book.

The plot and game mechanics make this for a well thought out book. The fact that game mechanics are constantly being adjusted is an interesting dynamic that forces Alvin to hold some of his game breaking stunts secret until absolutely necessary in case the moderators change the world once again. The fact that this all a game and the moderators are having to play catch-up is an interesting dynamic that is hardly ever seen it LitRPG books.

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