Wasted potential. Author doesn't know anything about what he's talking about, the plot is boring, the setting is generic, and the worldbuilding is nonsensical. MC has a moderately interesting backstory, I guess, but doesn't actually go anywhere with it. 4/10 and dropped for me.
This is just a generic copycat of the incredibly bad tropes seen in other stories of the same genre. The story written by an author who very clearly doesn't play rpgs. The way things function in this game are nonsensical.
Lose a level on death? Usually in games the higher level the longer it takes to reach the next one. Losing a level when dying would make it impossible to advance past mid game, perhaps even early game. Perhaps achievements are how players really advance? Get hundreds of them with permeant boosts so losing levels doesn't matter?
Preventing logout: What if he had to leave for some reason, like to use the bathroom or some emergency? Isn't it basically holding people against their will? Questionable ethics and legality there.
Shouldn't he have disabled system assist by now if he can? System assist gets 50% accuracy but he has the talent to do much better.
How is he out damaging level 90 players when he's not even level 8? Wouldn't that make his class way overpowered, to the point of being game breaking?
Imagine if SAO met Moonlight Sculptor (or Closed Combat Mage) but with a ranged MC...
After reading all the 7 chapters available right now, these are my first impressions:
PROS:
- The main character is charismatic, with a background that will allow the author to develop it further in both real and virtual worlds.
- Stories where the main character has a physical disability is something rarely seen, so it can bring us some new and very interesting experiences (if adequately explored).
- It's hard to balance stories that explore alternative worlds, with one world being clearly favored by the author, while the other is neglected; here I noticed a fair balance between the two worlds (the virtual world is still the main point).
- If you were born in the 90s or 20s (or before that) and used to play MMORPGs during that days, this story will feel nostalgic.
CONS:
- The author strives to bring a certain realism into the game, from the operation of the musket used by the MC to the speed and the way that the monsters (that in the beginning are rabbits) move, however sometimes the realism is completely broken. Potential spoiler: E.g.:
In chapter 4, when the MC shots a rabbit with his musket, he barely scratches the rabbit's skin, but a few days later (chapter 6), with just one hit, he insta-kill an elite rabbit that a high-level party failed to defeat.
I feel that sometimes the author pushes it too far to create a comic timing that gets lost in the context.
- The beginning MC's story in the virtual world is extremely generic, to the point of being pathetic (something to the level of Bless Online). I may be mistaken here, but I feel that the quests in The Moonlight Sculptor were more elaborate.
- Still talking about the game: this shit is poorly balanced. Classes are extremely unbalanced, quests given to newbies are so difficult that they look like suicide missions and I'm not even naming the rewards of these "suicide missions"... For anyone who has ever played MMORPG in their lives, they will feel that the narrative is being pushed too hard here. If this were a game in our world, it would flop on day one. It may seem that I'm exaggerating here, but don't forget that the experience in the virtual world will be the bigger part of this story.
OVERALL:
I feel that this is a story with the potential to be something really good. Perhaps I say this out of sheer nostalgia, perhaps there's some logic in that thought. In any case, until then, this story failed to create a pleasant and credible virtual gaming environment, with several absurdities that most seem to have been written by someone with zero experience in online games. Some of these absurdities can be excused, others are very difficult to tolerate.
In any story, as well as in games, the way you set your world will determine how your work will develop, and – for now – the world-building here has proved to be very poor (or poorly adapted).
If you are a busy person, I do not recommend reading this story for now; if you have time to spend, it's worth reading until at least chapter 10-15. From there, you decide whether to continue reading or not.
I didn't talk about art because there is nothing special here. It's decent and fulfills its purpose.
@Archaron kind of nitpicking here but for the low damage earlier but 1 hit kill later i think he hits the rabbit with a grazing shot not fully connecting and later against the black rabbit he hits it with a special 1hit head shot type thing, which is elaborated on by the achievement pop ups after. Everything else is pretty fair/understandable : )
@Archaron I really like your peronal review and opinion of it, though the only thing I'd disagree with is the background of the MC being developed further down the line. I personally think that the writer completely disregarded his background and made him into a cliche Manhwa trope. For a supposed Spec-Ops Sniper, his personality falls really flat - and seems completely opposite to what you would think someone who has spent long enough in the military in order to be accepted into the Special Forces branch of the Korean Military.
The humor is a miss for me a majority of the time - but perhaps its because I don't like how he has such an interesting background but his character traits are reminiscent of a high-school boy. It turns me away from the potential of his story purely because of that :L
https://blog.naver.com/PostView.nhn?blogId=skatjddlqnzp&logNo=221455254096&parentCategoryNo=&categoryNo=10&viewDate=&isShowPopularPosts=true&from=search
if u want see main character
@Archaron I definitely agree that the potential this story has is large and I really, really hope the author develops his personality and his skillset further down the line cause I'd love to see what he could do once he gets something beside a musket (if he can).
@masataro This is cool! I can't read korean however, but from the images,
I'm assuming his weapon gets upgraded somehow and he's going to get a companion?
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