As he starts to unravel what has been hidden from him his entire life, he discovers that not only might he fit in better than ever, but he may be exactly what the world needs.

My Opinion: 868 pages, $6.99, Available On Kindle Unlimited

While I’ve read all the others in the series as ebooks, I got busy and picked this one up as an audiobook. I don’t know if it was just the stellar narrator or not but the audiobook version of the story was great. I’d rated the other stories in the series as really good, but the voice acting and especially the voice for Taika, just added such an enjoyable level of entertainment, it kicked it up to a great experience.

At the end of the last book the final state of the main character (MC) was a bit ambiguous and at the start of this one the MC finds himself having died and returned back to earth with some new potential powers, should he choose to accept them. Most of the story is him dealing with his return to earth, still with his abilities, levels, and skills and the change that means for him in a mostly mundane world. There’s his family to reconnect with, him figuring out what he wants to do and if he even wants to try to return to the magic world he was in or just stay on earth as kind of superman. Then he starts to discover that earth may not be as boring and mundane as he once thought and that becomes the mid-end story. There are other story threads that come up but I don’t want to spoil things.

There are some reviews that note that the story is dialogue heavy and action light compared to the other entries in the series. This is true, but again this may be because I listened to the audiobook version, but the dialogue was super funny and I didn’t mind that there was so much of it. I did miss the action adventure, but the world building and the relationship development with the MC and his family, including a resolution to that bit with his girlfriend marrying his brother, came to a fairly good resolution and made up for less action.

Overall, for me it was a great story and I might just end up only listening to the story from here on in.

Score: 8 out of 10

He Who Fights with Monsters 4: A LitRPG Adventure

https://amzn.to/3AoX7Qk

The Otherworlder, Exploring the Dungeon, Vol. 1 (light novel)

Ready for Anything—Except This

Strapped for cash, Souya signs up for a shady gig straight out of a video game: warp to a fantasy world with a team of experts and ascend a dungeon tower to make off with its spoils. However, an accident in the transfer process leaves him stranded there alone. Desperate for support, he recruits a host of adventurers—from elven sisters banished from their forest, to a Goddess of Deception and Secrecy partial to lazing about as a cat—to form a party that can brave the tower’s perils. Caught between corrupt nobles and merchants outside the dungeon and deadly monsters within, can this motley band rise to the challenge? Or will Souya’s adventure end before it even begins?

My Opinion: 330 pages, $8.99, Not available on Kindle Unlimited

First off, I’d hoped this was LitRPG based on the cover art and the slightly notification like thing there. But it’s not. At the end of the book, the author actually states that they went out of their way to minimize anything game-like. The best you get on that front is a familiar adventurer guild that dives the local dungeon for resources and profit, including a system that keeps track of a person’s skills and deific patron. Plus adventurers have a super healing ability, as long as they have a deity’s blessing, that is almost game-like in its function to heal any wound except sudden head trauma.

That being said, it’s a cute isekai (transported to another world) story with a small amount of dungeon diving, some nice world building, and an interesting premise that sets a normal guy with no inherent advantages besides a bit of earth tech trying to survive in this fantasy world. There’s not a lot of action, but it’s a light novel translated into English, so I wasn’t expecting a ton of it. The big draw for some readers will be the relationship development between the main character (MC) and the races of this world.

Overall, the story misses for me as someone that loves LitRPG, but the story never said it was that. It is similar enough that there’s some crossover but honestly the price of almost $9 for 330 pages is a bit much. If it was on kindle unlimited or just a bit less expensive, I could probably give this a low 7 score, but as it is it’s just a miss for me. But you may still like it.

Score: 6 out of 10

The Otherworlder, Exploring the Dungeon, Vol. 1 (light novel)

https://amzn.to/3KydBtJ

Aster Fall (Guardian of Aster Fall Book 2)

Book 2 of Guardian of Aster Fall!

Enchantments, runes, and ancient power.

These are what will determine whether Sam Hastern survives in his new life.

He and his father have fought their way out of the Abyssinian Plains and returned home stronger than before, but Aster Fall is never peaceful for long and the tiny village of Cliff’s End is no longer a place they can live.

Sam’s journey will take him to the distant city of Highfold, where trouble is stirring beneath the mountains known as the Three Crowns. There, ancient ruins are coming to life beneath the light of Aster Fall’s triple moons, promising either a route to power or an untimely grave.

Will Sam be able to protect his family from the dangers of Aster Fall and prevent the Breaking that was foretold, or will he fail in his most important duty?

Ice Sylphs, Outsiders, and strange powers abound in this second volume of the epic series!

My Opinion: 830 pages, $5.99, Available On Kindle Unlimited

This story improves in some respects but loses a little in others. While there are still a few perspective shifts, it mostly sticks to the main character (MC), which is a big improvement over book 1. Like the book 1, the monsters and adventuring take place in a single location and are sort of themed. In book 1, it was underground and this time it's ice/snow themed. The action-adventure and progression is all still there and very enjoyable. The MC continues to develop his unique class skills which are a combination of magic and crafting. Where the story loses a little, for me, is toward the end where the story started to feel a little repetitive with the fights and the antagonists.

Overall though, it is still a good story and I look forward to picking up book 3 when it comes out.

Score: 7.6 out of 10

Aster Fall (Guardian of Aster Fall Book 2)

https://amzn.to/33DADPr

Overgeared (webcomic)

Shin Youngwoo (a.k.a. Grid), an unlucky man in life and a low-level player in the popular VR game “Satisfy,” finds a powerful item that earns him a rare legendary class title: “Pagma’s Successor.” He’s now a skilled blacksmith who can forge unique weapons and equip the game’s most powerful gear. Grid resolves to use his new abilities to achieve fame and fortune, but as his very existence begins to stir up trouble in Satisfy, he realizes that life as a legend may be more than he bargained for….

My Opinion: 57 official chapters; over 100+ other sites, Pay for chapter, Official English Publisher - Tapas

This review is for the webcomic version. I’d sort of dismissed this one for a long time. The cover art and the name just didn’t appeal to me when I had a lot of other things to read. But boy is this good. I mean, the big thing I didn’t expect is that it would be a crafter story. The main character (MC) ends up in a rare quest chain and just as he’s about to get the rare loot he’s hoping to sell, he’s caught by some high level NPCs. So instead of just being killed and losing everything, he reads the rare tome he has and gets a class change to rare crafter class, but the downside is that he loses all 80 levels he’d worked for and then when he’s killed he’s -1 level. This sets up some reasonable advantages as the MMO gives stat points per level gained, if he can ever gain more levels in the high level area he ends up respawning in.

So the story, so far combines crafting with adventuring and the MC making some equipment that is very ‘overgeared’ to make up for his low levels compared to the challenges he faces in the game and the fame and associated problems that come with it.

Game mechanics are everywhere. There are lots of notifications, clear class stuff, and the MMO aspects like guilds, groups, and auction system are all aspects of the story.

The artwork for the webcomic is crisp with clean linework and vibrant colors that conveys action well. There are lots of notifications that bring the game aspects to life. Good stuff.

Overall, a great story that I’m glad I finally decided to read.

Score: 8.0 out of 10

Overgeared

https://tapas.io/series/overgeared/info

That’s it everyone! Thank you for watching/listening.

You can follow us on

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/litrpgpodcast/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/LitRPGPodcast

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3-eBvpm-g7IkjfVktObGAA

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/geekbytespodcast

Our Webpage: www.litrpgpodcast.com

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0rbgdut7cghvVBy572lG6o