After Jebediah Trapper completed the Impossible Tutorial (by cheating), The vet's been in something of a slump, his PTSD gradually guiding him down the path of self harm. Crippled, stripped of his power and homeless, he's got no reason to keep breathing.

Until a little girl is in trouble.

My Opinion: 418 pages, $4.99, Available On Kindle Unlimited

This is the follow up to the hit story Apocalypse: Generic System and while some of the RPG game mechanics have been reduced, the story still delivers an entertaining punch from start to finish. The 2nd book in the series leaves the self contained pocket universe that humans went through for the system apocalypse trials and puts the main character (MC) fully in the normal universe where earth has been stitched into an alien world. It’s one part RPG fantasy world and part RPG apocalypse story. The MC, having had the powers he’d gained after the system trial has to figure out a new way to gain power so that he can survive in the harsh new world where humans are the minority species and have so little power they’re abused by everyone.

The story remains a slice of life, but book 2 definitely feels more planned out than book 1, as there’s lots of setup early for cool payoffs at the end. More, the pacing of the story is pretty fast with action, adventure, and loads of good world building done in just about every chapter. Personally, I really liked the smaller cast because it let the personality of the MC and his fairy companion really shine with great humorous dialogue and character development.

On the game mechanic side, things are a little muted. In book 1, the MC loses his access to the system but the author very cleverly restores a muted version of it and gives the MC access to a slower paced, but potentially more powerful growth system. It’s all done wonderfully and even turns into a good bit of secret world building lore. It’s enough to satisfy my thirst for RPG development without being a huge fuss for the author to track.

Overall, this story is great. I burned through it in a couple of sittings and am glad that there’s more to read online.

Score: 8 out of 10

Apocalypse: Fairy System (Systems of the Apocalypse Book 2)

https://amzn.to/3e2e8Vw

Goblin Summoner: A Deckbuilding LitRPG

Life and death decided by the draw of a card!

When an accident claims his life, Gareth finds himself reborn on Acamida. Dropped into a world where sorcerers draw magical power from a deck of cards, summoning monsters and flinging spells, Gareth must adapt to having arcane power at his fingertips. It’s just a shame he’s found himself with the weakest cards around—goblins!

Joined by a fallen goddess, a deposed demon king and surly local, Gareth sets out into Acamida. In a realm where experience points and levels are very real, Gareth must grow stronger if he intends to have his second life last longer than his first. With monsters around every corner and dungeons beneath his feet, Acamida is a dangerous place.

As Gareth finds new cards and grows in power, the rumbles of war stir in the west. If he’s going to survive Gareth will need to master his deck and find the strength hidden within his goblin allies.

My Opinion: 662 pages, $3.99, Available On Kindle Unlimited

This is a transported to a Fantasy RPG world story with card game mechanics used as the RPG progression and battle system. While I really appreciated the work that went into using a new kind of game system and thought the rules and system were implemented well, there were story issues that made this a less than entertaining read. To be frank, I got bored.

First the positives. The card game mechanics are well thought out and you could tell they were based on popular card games like: Hearthstone and Magic the Gathering. Each deck holder had a specific theme for the monsters and spells they could summon, clear costs and effects for those cards, and the ability to upgrade the decks and the deck holders feats and mana. There were such clearly thought out rules, that the author even had a formalized ruleset at the back of the book. While there wasn’t anything groundbreaking with the system, it was consistent and anyone that likes card games will recognize and appreciate the effort it took to create something custom like it.

Action, when not using the card game system, wasn’t half bad and the larger late story battles felt appropriately complex considering their scale.

The negatives. The story was frankly predictable. Nothing ever happened that I couldn’t see coming chapters away. I kept hoping there would be some great twist or an unexpected character death or some surprise, but nope.

Part of this has to do with an inherent conflict between the card game system and the kind of story told. For me, playing a good card game is part building a good deck with tricks and strategies. The other part is the luck of the draw that keeps an element of randomness and forces me as a player to make intelligent decisions to play the best I can with the hand I’m given. That random element is a fundamental part of the tension of the game. But in the story, that tension doesn’t really exist. Most of the card battles lacked any real tension because the main character (MC) couldn’t lose. I mean, there was no story mechanic for him to lose without being killed in battle, so he couldn’t lose and thus there was plenty of plot armor where he or another character was saved because they miraculously drew just the right card at the right time to win. Often these cards were never seen before or had such a low chance of being drawn, it rightly felt like a story cheat that they came up. This also made the action, when the card game was used, feel predetermined.

Now, these aspects could have been made up for if the characters in the story had been more interesting or if they were better world building or dialogue. But again, this fell flat for most of the story. The main characters felt a bit flat without complex motivations and for much of the story felt a bit like caricatures. Though there was a concerted effort to make the dialogue funny and bantering between characters, it often ended up feeling forced and artificial because the main characters in the story had almost no time to break down what should have been near insurmountable cultural differences. The three main characters: a man from our world reborn, a thousands year old goddess who sorted though souls, and a native lizard girl each had very very different life experiences, cultures, and languages. Yet, within moments of meeting each other, or at least not being enemies, they are joking and bantering like they all grew up together and have the same cultural references for each corny joke or pun. I get what the author was trying to do, create a fun group that would banter between fights and adventures, but it felt forced to me considering the character’s disparate backgrounds.

Overall, while I appreciate the effort to try a new game mechanic, it wasn’t enough to make the story entertaining. I didn’t dislike the story, but found it to be predictable and forced in several aspects and thus lost interest and got bored with it.

Score: 5 out of 10

Goblin Summoner: A Deckbuilding LitRPG

https://amzn.to/2RmKen8

Nullform (Book #1): RealRPG Series

In this world, everyone starts with no memory and no recollection of their past life. In this world, you have nothing — even your limbs are rented, and you'll have to pay up every day. In this world, you must complete tasks assigned to you by the System or be fined and stripped of everything, including your arms and legs. In this world, you're under unrelenting supervision. But in dark corners hidden from the System's watchful eye, violence, brutality, and lawlessness abound.

In this world, you're assigned a number. You're a volitional Nullform. Now it's up to you to adapt to this reality and try to survive without ending up crippled. Just don't mess up, or you'll be wishing you were dead as you dig yourself deeper into an endless pit of debt. This world will not take pity on you. You'll have to work tirelessly to earn the right to live another day…

Read the first book in a new series from the author who brought you Clan Dominance: The Sleepless Ones.

My Opinion: 350 pages, $3.99, Available On Kindle Unlimited

*Full disclosure: I received an advanced copy for review, I purchased a copy when it became available.

The promotional material from the publisher highlights this as ‘RealRPG’ and clearly credits the story as being among the first stories that lead to LitRPG even leading to the authors more popular LitRPG series. So, in that respect it makes sense that this is not LitRPG or even GameLit. There are no RPG aspects though so even calling it ‘RealRPG’ seems like a stretch.

The story is most closely related to post apocalyptic or maybe cyberpunk that takes place in a dystopian world where the main character (MC) wakes up with new arms and legs attached to him with no memory of who he is or where he is. The slice of life story follows the MC as he learns the rules of this world where every aspect of survival is provided, but at a cost, and if you can’t pay or go too far into debt the arms and legs you’re renting are taken back by force. It’s a pretty dark story that classifies workers into categories of usefulness which have slang terms like zombie, goblin, orc, halfing, but are only name and have no physiological connection to the fantasy races. The MC has to figure out a way to keep out of debt and that’s what the story is. Him experiencing this dark world, the AI driven system that runs things and assigns jobs, and the people that exist in it with the logical extrapolations would result from such a system.

The tag ‘RealRPG’ has been used by the publisher to describe LitRPG stories set in the real world, whether RPG apocalypse or just in a modern real world setting (ie: Level Up series).

Unfortunately, besides a very minor opportunity to play old games like chess or tic tac toe for extra money, there are no game aspects at all and certainly no RPG aspects. There are notifications, and a system that assigns jobs and tracks debts for things like food, medicine, and water. But nothing resembling an RPG progression system where the MC gets stronger by spending system points, or even tracks his stats, or a level up system.

While I can see how influences from the story may have inspired other authors to write LitRPG or add RPG systems, this is not LitRPG or GameLit story. That doesn’t make it a bad story. The dark dystopian setting and the allegory of an all encompassing system that’s supposed to provide necessities but ends up classifying workers and is full of holes people can take advantage of, is not badly written. It certainly is depressing and dark and it will appeal to readers that enjoy that. But, the story didn’t work for me since I was expecting some kind of LitRPG story or even a GameLit story.

Score: 6 out of 10

Nullform (Book #1): RealRPG Series

https://amzn.to/2PPltzH

SSS-Class Suicide Hunter

In the mysterious, RPG dungeon-like Tower, Confucius Kim lives a mundane existence, envying all the star hunters. One day, his wish for more is granted with a legendary skill to copy others’ abilities… at the cost of his life. Before he can make sense of it, he’s killed by the #1 hunter, the Flame Emperor! But this activates his skill and now he’s copied a new one, the ability to travel back in time upon death. How will Confucius use these skills to outplay the competition and rise to the top?

My Opinion: Ch 23 (officially) 33 (fan translations), Ch 1-3 free, English License - Tapas

This is a modern world LitRPG story where people with powers and levels beat up monsters in a tower climb to try and help humanity fight off the apocalypse and gain power for themselves. The main character (MC) has the power to copy others skills/abilities, including one that lets him go back in time after he dies. This adds a regressor aspect to the story where the MC uses future knowledge to change the time stream and even better as a tactical way to beat the enemies and monsters he faces. There’s lots of action and a bit of intrigue as the MC maneuvers his way through complex situations and power struggles. It’s one of my favorite weekly reads.

Score: 8 out of 10

SSS-Class Suicide Hunter

https://tapas.io/series/sss-class-revival-hunter/info

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