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jnwunder's review
2.0
Very entertaining but not well-written. LOADS of grammar and spelling issues. It seems it was self-published, so maybe could have just used more editing before it was published. Nonetheless, interesting and fun. First time I've read a litRPG.
smurf2416's review
2.0
Oh my gosh. So incredibly juvenile. Geared for 20 year olds who play video games and never read. 2 stars because the reader was fantastic, and the story was oddly interesting. Such juvenile writing though.
heatherjsco's review
3.0
My coworker has be BEGGING me to read this series.
It wasn't bad! I did enjoy parts of it. I feel like it takes some getting used to with the video game-like updates throughout the book. I listened to it so the reading of the charts got kind of tedious and made me want to skip it.
I can see how the series could get good. It took some time to get into the story and towards the end I definitely did. While the sense of humor of the main character isn't my cup of tea, it was easy enough to roll my eyes and continue on with the story.
I am not the biggest fan of the main character and the idea behind the word itself yet. It doesn't mean that the series can prove me wrong. It just made it harder to get into the book because I has a hard time understanding Richter's motives sometimes.
Will I continue with the series? I will give the next book a shot and see where we go from there.
It wasn't bad! I did enjoy parts of it. I feel like it takes some getting used to with the video game-like updates throughout the book. I listened to it so the reading of the charts got kind of tedious and made me want to skip it.
I can see how the series could get good. It took some time to get into the story and towards the end I definitely did. While the sense of humor of the main character isn't my cup of tea, it was easy enough to roll my eyes and continue on with the story.
I am not the biggest fan of the main character and the idea behind the word itself yet. It doesn't mean that the series can prove me wrong. It just made it harder to get into the book because I has a hard time understanding Richter's motives sometimes.
Will I continue with the series? I will give the next book a shot and see where we go from there.
ribbonquest's review
2.0
Richter is either a typical fantasy hero or an obnoxious gamer stereotype and rarely anywhere in between. Female characters are either maternal figures and quest givers or romantic interests. Richter's relationship with the sprite is the only really enjoyable character development of the book.
The game messages are very repeatitive and boring. Might not be so bad with a physical book, since you can skim past those, but the audiobook is painful.
The game messages are very repeatitive and boring. Might not be so bad with a physical book, since you can skim past those, but the audiobook is painful.
addy_rose's review
adventurous
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
tani's review
3.0
2.5 stars, rounded up because I may have shot myself in the foot on this one with my own reading style.
I started this one because I wanted a quick and light audiobook to burn through and hopefully get me out of my audio slump. I'd been wanting to try some LitRPG, since I really like isekai anime/manga, and they're basically the same thing. However. Here's where I ran into problems. I was listening to this primarily during my first trimester of pregnancy, and man, was I exhausted! Like clockwork, I would hit 1 or 2 o'clock in the afternoon, and just feel like going to bed. So, you can imagine that by the time I hit my normal reading time, at anywhere from 6-9 PM, my brain was not there for reading. At all.
Enter my brilliant idea. If I couldn't focus to read words to myself, what about listening to someone else read them? Maybe I could burn through a bunch of audiobooks and still feel accomplished. And I thought that The Land was the perfect candidate: nice, engaging narrator, moderately interesting plotline, pretty short...Lol, and here's the problem. I just kept falling asleep. Turns out, if I am listening to an audiobook and doing nothing else with my hands or eyes, I will inevitably fall asleep. Again, and again, and again. I cannot tell you how many times I had to backtrack and try to figure out where I had last listened to, or how frustrated that ended up making me. So, it's actually kind of hard for me to judge this book because of my own issues.
I did find the beginning quite engaging, and it had all the video game-like elements that I enjoy in isekai. I liked learning about the video game world, and although I won't say that I fell in love with any of the characters, I didn't find them completely obnoxious. The world-building wasn't complex, but there was certainly room for growth, which is mostly what I look for in a first book in a new series. And, as advertised, Nick Podehl is a really fun narrator, and I was enjoying his narration a lot. I also really like the village-building setup that takes shape throughout the story.
However. I will admit that the story began to wear thin quite quickly when Richter reached actual civilization. I knew ahead of time that descriptions of female characters were a weak point of this story, and I concur with that analysis. I understand that Richter is a guy in his 20s, but I still think that the obligatory mention of breasts could be omitted. (And honestly, past the initial mention, it's basically irrelevant, so it just felt like a useless and annoying narrative tic, rather than any kind of characterization of or commentary on Richter himself.)
Richter's tendency to make overblown statements of noble intentions annoyed me as well, mostly because his internal narration is just a shallow stream that doesn't support such a depth of sentiment. That mismatch made him feel disingenuous, and really just like a person playing a video game and doing what he thinks he should, rather than a real person with actual emotions. I think that this is also where the complaints of poor writing really penetrate the audio production. I didn't notice it anywhere else, for the most part, because I find listening to books to be a very different experience from physically reading them, but even the narration couldn't hide how very clunky some of the things that Richter says are.
My other main complaint is
In short, I found this an engaging enough premise, but very limited by the surface-level character work. Not sure if I'll continue on or not, but I'm certainly going to give it some time before I make my decision one way or the other.
I started this one because I wanted a quick and light audiobook to burn through and hopefully get me out of my audio slump. I'd been wanting to try some LitRPG, since I really like isekai anime/manga, and they're basically the same thing. However. Here's where I ran into problems. I was listening to this primarily during my first trimester of pregnancy, and man, was I exhausted! Like clockwork, I would hit 1 or 2 o'clock in the afternoon, and just feel like going to bed. So, you can imagine that by the time I hit my normal reading time, at anywhere from 6-9 PM, my brain was not there for reading. At all.
Enter my brilliant idea. If I couldn't focus to read words to myself, what about listening to someone else read them? Maybe I could burn through a bunch of audiobooks and still feel accomplished. And I thought that The Land was the perfect candidate: nice, engaging narrator, moderately interesting plotline, pretty short...Lol, and here's the problem. I just kept falling asleep. Turns out, if I am listening to an audiobook and doing nothing else with my hands or eyes, I will inevitably fall asleep. Again, and again, and again. I cannot tell you how many times I had to backtrack and try to figure out where I had last listened to, or how frustrated that ended up making me. So, it's actually kind of hard for me to judge this book because of my own issues.
I did find the beginning quite engaging, and it had all the video game-like elements that I enjoy in isekai. I liked learning about the video game world, and although I won't say that I fell in love with any of the characters, I didn't find them completely obnoxious. The world-building wasn't complex, but there was certainly room for growth, which is mostly what I look for in a first book in a new series. And, as advertised, Nick Podehl is a really fun narrator, and I was enjoying his narration a lot. I also really like the village-building setup that takes shape throughout the story.
However. I will admit that the story began to wear thin quite quickly when Richter reached actual civilization. I knew ahead of time that descriptions of female characters were a weak point of this story, and I concur with that analysis. I understand that Richter is a guy in his 20s, but I still think that the obligatory mention of breasts could be omitted. (And honestly, past the initial mention, it's basically irrelevant, so it just felt like a useless and annoying narrative tic, rather than any kind of characterization of or commentary on Richter himself.)
Richter's tendency to make overblown statements of noble intentions annoyed me as well, mostly because his internal narration is just a shallow stream that doesn't support such a depth of sentiment. That mismatch made him feel disingenuous, and really just like a person playing a video game and doing what he thinks he should, rather than a real person with actual emotions. I think that this is also where the complaints of poor writing really penetrate the audio production. I didn't notice it anywhere else, for the most part, because I find listening to books to be a very different experience from physically reading them, but even the narration couldn't hide how very clunky some of the things that Richter says are.
My other main complaint is
Spoiler
Richter's inability to die. It really takes away the gravity of every fight, knowing that he'll just respawn. What a way to lower the stakes! It does seem that all the other characters can die, which is good, but yeah. An invulnerable main character makes for a very lacking sense of danger.In short, I found this an engaging enough premise, but very limited by the surface-level character work. Not sure if I'll continue on or not, but I'm certainly going to give it some time before I make my decision one way or the other.
protomagistros's review
1.0
Very immature feeling at times, but has enough interesting aspects to continue. Does a well enough job supressing my lack of RPGs here