Ivan Susanin, a typical guy and unemployed techie, is initiated by the System and transported, together with a thousand other players, to an unknown location beyond Earth. Ivan has an interface, a spear, and basic weapon skills. All he has to do to return to Earth is complete a simple quest and reach the second level. But experience points are only awarded for kills in this game, and the clock is ticking. Whoever doesn’t score within 24 hours will remain in the location forever.
The game takes places in the ruins of a massive city, where the undead lurk in the central districts and the outskirts are raided by the descendants of past owners. The undead are strong, while the goblins rarely move around alone and aren’t worth much XP. The most valuable prey under these conditions are formal allies, i.e. the other players. If a player is capable of killing a fellow human, of course. Even if they aren’t planning to go against their own nature by murdering innocents, who said that they will have a choice? It’s kill or be killed!
Those who complete the quest will be returned to Earth, where they can rest and prepare for the next attempt. Beyond the local objective is also a global one. In the center of the city stands a temple to a fallen god, and until one of the players captures the Altar, the mission will be repeated again and again. But when all you’re holding is a spear, your allies can’t be trusted, and resurrection is nearly impossible, this isn’t much more than a delayed death sentence…
For the first seven players, who become the Earth Gods, this mission is a chance to rapidly gain power and take charge of a united Pantheon. A chance to escape death and protect our world from invasion. Although there is only one altar and the Gods make others do their work. Ivan must make a choice and decide whose pawn he will become. Or should he take a risk, refuse their patronage and keep his options open?
My Opinion: 328 pages, $3.99, Available On Kindle Unlimited
Full disclosure: I received an advanced copy for review. I purchased a copy when it became available.
This is a Russian translated novel that is most closely related to the RPG Apocalypse sub genre. It has a thousand people from earth transported to a different world where they get RPG powers and an interface and are given quests to survive and other objectives. Only the world isn’t empty and the main character (MC) has to survive the goblin hordes that are trying to kill all the humans. It’s kinda like an RPG Apocalypse, just not set on earth.
The scope of the story goes from the survival of the MC and him learning about this new system he’s gotten to large groups of humans trying to survive on this new world against an army of goblins. It doesn’t have a proper ending, instead it feels like a ‘part 1’ or a place a serial story was just paused to become a novel.
The game mechanics are an intricate part of the story and their exploration is a good bit of the early section of the novel. But there’s nothing too new with any many familiar elements like levels, stats, abilities that increase with practice, XP from killing. There is a loot system that is a little different with cards dropping from killed opponents that contain system equipment or more rarely skills.
Overall, this is an action focused story that has a good apocalypse survival vibe when the characters are on the goblin world. Aside from the abrupt ending, its pacing is pretty good, though I liked the solo journey section more than the later one.
Score: 7.6 out of 10