The protagonist is essentially a cocktail of a Halo Spartan, the Doom Slayer, and a Warhammer 40k Space Marine. While some might dismiss this as derivative, it is almost impossible to craft a sci-fi super-soldier today without echoing these genre titans. Fortunately, the author injects enough of their own originality to keep the character from feeling like a total copycat.
I stopped at about 25%. My rule is that if I don't have any interest by 25% I put the book away, so I did. The MC is a zero note personality character. The closest thing he has to a personality is deciding to not destroy the trees because he has been asked not to. You might say, "But he could develop a personality." True, but 1. At this point I don't care, and 2. No other character has more than a one point personality, so why bother. There is a plot and back story, so it has that. But character wise, nothing. Two star book, plus1 to account for the amazon algorithm, because it's not terrible or offensive. Tom out
Formally, this gets a four out of five, but informally it gets a 4.5, because my critiques are closer to nitpicks... This is Nivilack Werdrite debut novel, I believe, and it is an unbelievably strong start and greatly surprised me. When I first found the novel, I assumed it would be alright at best, with some fun ideas but nothing strong. However, the Prologue is easily one of the most gripping prologues I have read. This prologue tells you everything you need to know about our main man, Hoplite. The Prologue is a total power fantasy, pulling from some of my favorite pieces of Sci-Fi/Fantasy mediums like Warhammer 40K and DOOM, but there are plenty of sprinkles of Halo, World of Warcraft, Metal Gear Rising Revengence (I think) spread throughout the rest of the story. Hoplite's prologue, and generally the entire story, continues the Power Fantasy, but this doesn't mean that Hoplite is just some indomitable force that mows everything down without problem. Hoplite is generally tripped up by the smaller things that are normally written off as everyday occurrences in a High Fantasy setting, like fairies, fire magic, summons, and other things similar to that. I also think that what grounds Hoplite in reality is how he is so consistently written and grows naturally, and it makes you go from rooting for him because he's badass, to rooting for him because he's learning to be human again... although his badassery only continues to get your fists pumping for him. This is also balanced out well with his companions, Lance and later Michael, as they're two great balances to the rigid and cold Hoplite, and as he stays on Akhoolis more, he opens up more by talking to them and in flashback chapters. All together, the story flows incredibly naturally. Now, one thing I was mixed on was the locations used in the book. All together, I can only think of two major locations: the Faewood and the Feindwall. Granted, there are many smaller locations in these sprawling biomes, but as I was reading, I did get bored imagining the same locations over and over even though we were seeing new landmarks as they travelled. Granted, the story had no reason to adventure outside of these zones, and it would have honestly been a detour if we did, so hopefully in the sequel we see many more zones. Aside from that, I also want to congratulate the dialogue; everyone spoke so richly, but it never felt impossible to understand. This was also boosted by the POV changes every so often, as the there small changes I noticed in the narration that really sold that these were real characters that viewed the world differently. Lastly, there was one final thing I am mixed on, as this could pay off for better or for worse. WE learn later in the story that there is something about Hoplite's DNA that is native to Akhoolis, meaning that somehow the dimensions that these Sci-Fi and Fantasy characters come from have meshed together before. We get droplets of lore that seem to have implied this, but nothing concrete. I am mixed on this only because it makes some of Hoplite's feats feel cheated, as instead of being the raw military, bio-engineered power of being a hardened monster in the form of a Super soldier, it's not entirely natural either. That being said, with some of the feats Hoplite performs starting around midway, the only way you could naturally explain it is with supernatural magic. This, I will have to wait and see how it affects my view of the character whenever the next entry in the series is published, because I am absolutely going to be reading that when the second book drops...
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
This story is almost a three way between Halo, 40K, and a D&D-esque fantasy. It's incredibly well written in a show don't tell kind of way that drops enough hints for you to wind up with a pretty good sense of the scale and direction for the world building without ever falling into exposition. The MC is great example of 'super soldier' think Custodes level super man in their equivalent of a Terminator suit but his personality is way more subdued...until it starts to not be for plot reasons I won't discuss here.
The bad guy starts off as a halo style covenant alien mix then becomes demi gods and evil spawn once the fantasy world is introduced.
So far I really enjoy the hints at how the magic system will work with faith based powers, or building a 'house' to describe their internal magic constructs. All around can't wait for the continuation!
good story, MC needs to be deprogrammed and get a personality, book worth the read.
Good book has a few flaws, but an interesting story. If you like master chief, this character fits into that mold without the intellect. Need to see the character D programmed and get more of a personality. The book is worth reading. The side characters are interesting and there’s plenty of mystery abound. I always write in my reviews that the MC needs to be the main driver of the story, instead of hop lite this hop lite that the POV needs to be first person hopefully that will come with the MC deprogramming. I will read the next story to see how it progresses
I didn’t think a story about an isekai’d master chief would be boring? Yet somehow, it was.
Seriously? Hoplite 37? Spartan 117? Fanfiction is cool and all, but if you’re going to publish, modify it?
Intro to the book is pretty boring. The MC, Hoplite, muses a bunch on the Covenant(the enemy), sorry, the Last Kind, their ship blows up, and he’s killed by a truck that blasts him and the remains of their ship onto a giant eyeball world.
From there the hijinks get whackier!
Not nearly as fun as it sounds. Slogging through it gets you to the end though.
Дослушал с трудом. Написано, в целом, неплохо. Но никто из героев не цепляет. Легкий интерес разобраться в том, что тут вообще происходит есть, но совсем легкий и сомневаюсь, что буду ждать продолжение. Озвучка (Wayne Mitchell, Amy Hutchins) так себе. Сперва думал что диктор с орехами во рту разговаривает. Привык к более внятному и четкому произношению. И задумка с двумя голосами от меня ускользнула. Зачем это было надо если все равно было смешивание и один герой озвучивался разными голосами?
This is quite a fun premise, it's basically, what if a Warhammer 40k Space Marine got isekaied? I'm always a sucker for bullets vs magic. Some solid character growth, interesting world building. A bit slow at times with not enough happen in the latter fifth of the book and few too many perspective hops, but overall really solid book. Looking forward to the next one.
If you like one punch type superheroes then maybe this will be for you but the protagonist is just stupidly overpowered has bullets that can go through anything and armor that nothing can go through and it's just not enjoyable there's absolutely no challenge whatsoever and it's just very much not for me
Ever seen Warhammer 30,000 or Lord of the rings. Will this was the bloodletting your getting a quasi religious super solider battles his way threw fantasy town.
The story starts like any space opera In combat with misled and aliens trying to kill the humans and then it all Narnia time has fantasy meets flash destruction by bullets.
mildly interesting at first but then quite dull and repetitive. mc monologs a lot and refused to accept the obvious to the point of it becoming redeculess
Actually, rather interesting read! We can see emotional growth of Hopalight and the fight were so good to read! The ongoing relationships were also very good.