Isekai Tensei ni Kansha wo
This is a warmhearted isekai where an elderly gamer with diabetes and other health problems gets reincarnated while playing a full-dive VR game. In his new youthful body, he sets out to be an adventurer using the skills he purchased at the beginning of the game. In the process, his kind and wise nature draws in a lot of people and eventually results in his first romantic relationships in his life.
Overall, this story is easygoing and warm-hearted from beginning to end. A large reason for this is that the setting is one where the constant threat of monsters and the lesson of how monsters destroyed civilization when people got obsessed with fighting each other has pretty much ended nation vs nation warfare. For those with a fondness for fantasy adventure but don't want the political conflicts that are usually endemic to isekai, this is actually a pretty decent choice. The protagonist himself is a gentle and wise man, while having the strength of will to do what is necessary.
Fukushuu wa Tenbatsu o Yobi, Majutsushi wa Poyapoya o Tanoshimitai
https://ncode.syosetu.com/n8216dt/
This one is a bit of an oddball series. In this case, the protagonist, who just took revenge for his wife and daughter's death at the hands of a rich boy's hit and run, is about to turn himself into the police when a meteor falls on his head. His soul is ripped from his body and forced through the void, gaining power along the way until it accidentally enters the soulless body of a dying young boy named Ricardo.
A lot of this story is about the protagonist pursuing various lines of sorcerous research and teaching others with short periods of intense action. The protagonist was a teacher in his previous life, so he has a good deal of general knowledge (better than the average isekai protagonist) as well as the advantage of a growth ability that other people can't access. Throughout the first two-thirds of the story, I wouldn't call him overpowered, though some of the devices he develops are. However, late into the story he basically stops being on a human level and becomes more powerful than the rest of the human race.
There is mild romance (slow-burn romance with a younger woman), nepotism (the businesses he starts are mostly dropped in his family's hands), and lots of obsessive research into magic and magic devices.
All in all, it is a pretty balanced story, with no single aspect being given too much time. There are a few points where the story slows, but those periods are relatively rare (compared to other isekai that get over 100 chapters).
Kurono Senki, Isekai Ten'i shita Boku ga Saikyou nano wa Bed no Ue Dake no you desu
This one never got completed, so don't take this as a recommendation for it. Sadly, I can see why the author dropped it toward the end, as it drags on and there is a lot less insight into characters and character motivations as things go on, making it obvious he was just putting one foot in front of the other for large periods of the story.
Kurono, the protagonist, is a young man who gets transferred to another world that is full of war and is taken in by a former mercenary turned aristocrat with a military bent. Kurono himself has no real talent for the military, but he has the usual wide and shallow spread of modern knowledge from his high school education. At the beginning of the story, he fights a desperate battle after his superior ran off and left him in charge of the demi-human soldiers (who are considered disposable). He manages to achieve a costly victory and as a result becomes a noble in his own right, where he starts making reforms based on his knowledge of Earth.
He also takes a LOT of mistresses along the way, most of them elves and half-elves who were abused earlier in life. His taste for women only gets stronger as the story goes by, and it is probably the reason for the weird title. I will say that the periods where the action intensifies are first-rate, but the periods in between drag on for what feels like forever. There is far too much time spent on other perspectives and his sex life (I won't call it romance, because the only ones he seems to truly love from his heart are Layla the half-elf and the elf twins).
Overall, it is an interesting story that never really lives up to its potential because the author kept losing motivation in the middle.
First, I should note that this game suffers from what are likely budget constraints. I say this because some of the VA choices are... questionable. Ragou's VA in particular is something of a disaster, with a discordant mismatch between the voice and the characterization. This stands out even more because other choices like Kaen and Diran's male VAs are actually really awesome matches.
I failed to properly articulate what the music in this game resembles at most sometimes... and that would be Persona 5. Something about a number of the tracks resembles the ones seen in that game enough that, in combination with the horrible color choices, made me feel like something was off at a lot of points in the story.
Common Route
The common route of this game is not particularly long (the game as a whole is not nearly as long as any of Light's other games), but it does serve its purpose. In introduces the primary antagonists, the heroines, the side-characters, and the protagonist while setting the stage for future conflicts. It is functional, more than anything else, and if it weren't for the excellent characterization for Mizuri, Shion, Amane, and Tsubasa, it would be considered bland. Ragou and Kaien, for pure chaotic evil characters, are pretty amusing to watch, despite the fact that they are doing horrible things to people.
My complaint is that there is too much time spent on SOL for a Light game. Yes, there is a sense that you need to know what the characters are losing for it to be poignant when everyday life is disrupted, but the ratio is a bit skewed for this game, considered the golden ratio of SOL to plot and action in any good chuunige is 1:4:3.
Tsubasa
Tsubasa is a weird heroine... not the least of which because she is a TS heroine who was once a guy. However, in opposition to this, she tends to be the sexiest of the three heroines due to her characterization (it was intentional). She is also the most 'classic' onmyouji of the two human heroines, using some familiar onmyouji techniques and preferring the bow as her weapon of choice.
Her story is, at least in part, a confrontation with her past, and the primary conflict - for her, at least - is internal rather than external. While there is some buildup to a major confrontation toward the end, it needs to be said that the whimsical nature of the antagonists makes the shift to the final battle somewhat abrupt. In addition, it felt like this path didn't really have the sheer drama I'm familiar with from the company's usual works. It isn't a horrible path, but it does feel more like a Millie path than a Chitose path.
Amane
Amane is Hayato's adopted older sister who was raised by his grandfather with him. She is a total brocon and constantly clinging to Hayato when she is with him. However, the best way she can be described when she is away from him is 'cold and competent'. She is a master of kenjutsu and a 'power type' onmyouji, using techniques that fall into the 'open path' style of direct combat rather than the more roundabout styles like Houjutsu (which is basically a preparation is everything), Fuujutsu (the art of binding and sealing), or Injutsu (the art of curses and turning ties against an opponent). It makes sense, since the protagonist takes a lot of his inspiration from her.
Her path is more involved with Kaien, as opposed to the way Ragou was the prime antagonist for Tsubasa's path. You'll discover this during his first appearance, but Kaien is the kind of absolute evil that just deserves a good superhero punch to the face. He likes to make people suffer above all other things, and he finds the hatred people direct his way to be pleasurable. The irony is that, rather than the confrontation with him, Amane's inner conflict with her yandere nature is the bigger draw point of this path. To be blunt, if you played the common route, you'll have noticed the signs of yandere in her actions, and this path brings them out in a big way midway through. Uncharacteristic of Light's usual style, it isn't taken to its logical conclusion, instead being solved with the power of love *vomits*.
Shion
Shion's path is far more typical of Light's style, in that it is long, highly-detailed, and has a lot of twists and turns.
Now for some explanation. Amongst the Magatsu, there are thirteen called the Thirteen Demonic Generals, who both possess a humanoid shape and intellect, as well as the ability to touch on one of the Seven Aspects of Creation and use them in a spell that matches their desires. Shion, also known as Saikakou Nue, is one of these. In the distant past, she was sealed away by the founding onmyouji of the Isurugi bloodline (Hayato and Amane's ancestor) during the Heian era. Shion herself is one of the few of her kind that is capable of coexisting with the human race, for reasons that are only illuminated in her path. She is a contrary individual, being something of a tsundere combined with someone who puts on arrogant airs and brags about her abilities to any and all that will listen.
To be honest, I was a bit startled at the huge difference between Shion's path and the other two. While the first third is mostly SOL, almost the entirety of the remaining two-thirds is pure plot and action. There are plenty of good action scenes toward the end (the last two chapters of her path are almost entirely battle scenes), as well as background for Kaien (whose origin story is unbelievably sad) and Shion (whose origins are equally sad, which seems to be typical of most humanoid Magatsu). The ending itself is a tear-jerker, and I was somewhat annoyed at the very last part, for reasons that will be self-evident to anyone who dislikes Ragou.
Conclusion
I'd say this one is on the lower end in terms of quality for a Light VN, even if you don't include the minus points for the character design and VAs. It is ironic that even a low-quality Light game is still better than most of what the rest of the industry can produce, though, lol. Typical of my habits, I have been a bit harsh on this game, as it is in my favorite genre. It isn't going to become one of those chuunige I replay on a regular basis, either. However, it is still fine if you are starved for the genre.
Edit: If I have one thing I wish they would redo (other than some of the VAs and the artwork) it would be making the story somewhat less straightforward. Too many of the conflicts in the story are resolved too easily for a Light game, and there is no foreshadowing or long sides that give life to the characters' hidden sides. In particular, Ragou remains a two-dimensional character to the end, despite being the main antagonist. It is ironic that the nihilistic sadistic demonic priest Kaien has a more filled out character than him.
Before someone asks, I merely paused the other VN to start Magatsu Barai (and Xenoblade Chronicles 3). I will finish it (eventually).
Magatsu Barai is the first Light game to be made from beginning to end after the collapse of the company's original owners. As such, it is only natural (and unfortunate, at least to an extent) that some things will have changed.
To address the elephant in the room for anyone who has seen the cover or sample cgs... The coloring really is that awful. I mean, how could any cg artist think those colors wouldn't be eye cancer?
On the other hand, the music is an interesting set of contrasts. There are a lot of themes that have been slightly rearranged to seem like new ones but are actually just modified ones from the Silverio series. The rest are actually quite high-quality, but then, Light has never had any problem on that side of things.
For those unable to read the official website due to being Nihongo-disabled, I will explain the basic setting.
Essentially, it is a world where sorcery in Japan remained intertwined with politics and daily life right up to the modern day. In that sense, the setting is somewhat reminiscent of Tokyo Ravens. However, a vital difference is that there was no real magic left outside of Japan before WWII, when the atom bombs spread it over the world when they hit Nagasaki and Hiroshima. This resulted in the Japanese having a valuable service to provide the rest of the world... exorcists and sorcerers to counter the new laws of reality that made some of the habits the rest of the world had developed disastrous.
As an example of this, the 'magatsu' in this world setting essentially causes a magical reaction whenever enough harm is done to a feeling being (even an insect), and this effect magnifies the more this is done. At the beginning of the story, a news story comes up on the TV where, as the result of a country overusing pesticide against a plague of locusts, the locusts' spirits became a cloud of demonic insects that were even worse than the locusts in question.
Because this happens all over the place, it is a world where magic-users always have a role to play.
As such, I find the setting interesting... at least so far.
As for the heroines, I'd say the two magatsu heroines are the most interesting, with the protagonist's older sister entering one step behind and Tsubasa falling a few steps behind her. This is my tastes though, so others might feel differently. A huge positive is that there are no 'Victim A' heroines in this story. All the heroines are capable of protecting themselves (sometimes better than the protagonist is... actually all of them), so there is no sense that any of them is helpless, one of the most annoying chuunige tropes.
On the other hand, the protagonist is under the influence of one of the more annoying tropes of the genre... the talentless guy who nonetheless throws himself into things (think Emiya Shirou from Fate). While he does gain a power that lets him keep up, this is a power given to him by the true heroine, not a power of his own (which is another trope).
All in all, my opinion so far is that this is an interesting chuunige VN whose art is eye cancer.
https://kakuyomu.jp/works/1177354055057378382
This is a short and complete series about a guy who dies and is reincarnated in a parallel version of himself, where he could see his status and has a skill that rewards him for repetitive actions. Generally speaking, this story doesn't really have any complex elements. The protagonist is something of an idiot about things he isn't interested in while being highly effective at learning and mastering things he does have an interest in. He does a lot of hilariously stupid stuff like stuffing himself to the point of puking to take advantage of his 'super recovery' skill which lets him restore his body to full health by eating or learning how to manipulate mana only to use it to make his muscle training more effective.
He isn't the ambitious sort, he just enjoys training himself. The exception to his training obsession is Ichika, his first love from his first lifetime, who he adores utterly and never really forgot even when he was working himself to death.
This story takes a turn for the slightly more dramatic (his status is pretty ridiculous even at the beginning) when dungeons begin to pop up all over the place on Earth (the first couple he squished, the second one with Ichika). I say slightly more dramatic because he is so ridiculously powerful that there are never any real challenges to his ability. The trend of him getting more ridiculously powerful with every passing day continues to the very end of the story, which is where he finally gets up the nerve to marry Ichika (who is just as in love with him as he is with her). Overall, this is a funny story where the protagonist manages to avoid becoming a harem protag despite his immense power.
https://ncode.syosetu.com/n3581fh/
This series is the odd one out of my recent reviews. That is because it is a sci-fi story that contains a bit of Cowboy Bebop, a bit of Outlaw Star, and even a small dose of Tenchi Muyo(albeit a weak version with less mystic elements). The protagonist, Hiro, wakes up in the cockpit of his ship Krishna from the game he had been playing for the past few years. He has no memory of how it came to that, and his ship is floating around a random asteroid in a borderland star system of the Empire.
What starts as a simple journey to figure out what is going on quickly becomes a long story of him building a harem, getting rich by slaughtering space pirates, and an endless series of troubles that seem to come out of nowhere to haunt his journey. The harem is somewhat of a slow-burn thing after the first two (Mimi and Elma) join him, as it is over a hundred chapters until more or added. Hiro is something of a hot dog ace pilot, mostly because of his experiences in the game, which gives him a ridiculously wide amount of knowledge and combat experience dealing with various threats on a tactical and personal level.
Most of the series isn't terribly serious, because Hiro keeps snapping flags that might have made it so and because the writer pulls his punches on the series' dark-side, only hinting at some of the darker things that Hiro and the others come into contact with or referring to them indirectly without details.
Overall, this is a fun series to read, though I would call it a space adventure rather than a space opera.
This particular WN is the first I've read that isn't another world fantasy or isekai.
The first thing I found myself comparing this to was Devils Devel Concept. Why? There are a lot of reasons, but a lot of it is that the protagonist is a monster in human skin and most of the characters remind me of the characters from that VN.
The setting is based six hundred years after the near-destruction of civilization earth due to a massive war (basically WWIII), and humans have the option of using the Oracle system to find their perfect job. When Ibuki, the protagonist, activates the Oracle terminal, the perfect job for him is 'Daiyoukai' (great youkai), and he immediately is given an all-expenses paid trip to the mystic world that lies on the other side of reality.
One thing I have to note is that Ibuki is not a person who works hard or trains or any of that stuff. In his own words 'A great youkai is something you either are or you aren't. You can't work hard at becoming one.' He embodies his own words from beginning to end, easily awakening to his power because his unique psychological structure is perfectly suited for it. The heroine of the story (there is only one) is Tamamo no Mae/Daki, who is also his ancestor. She is pretty horrible as a person, manipulating those around her with every word, gesture, and even her rhythm of breathing. Ibuki, even as he lives with her, constantly comments that she is a 'dokufu' (poison pill of a woman), but this doesn't really effect how he feels about her, which just goes to show how much a monster he is as well.
I honestly loved this story (it is over), and Ibuki was an ideal protagonist from beginning to end. However, he is definitely a chaotic evil character who sometimes wavers into chaotic neutral. As he notes 'Daiyoukai, by their very nature, are poisonous to humans, as they contain a certain evil from the moment they come into being'. Ibuki, while he is often good to those he likes, is just as often a horrible influence that subtly - often without intention on his part - corrupts those around him.
Definitely a fun ride, at least for me.
https://ncode.syosetu.com/n2559fp/
https://ncode.syosetu.com/n6442ez/
This particular series is another reincarnation story, but it stands out because the entirety of the story so far is concentrated in his childhood, where he is constantly dealing with problems beyond his abilities, faced with situations where revealing his true abilities would harm his family, and generally trying to keep his yanderish little sister from being lonely. His name is Alto Cranepot, and he is the bastard son of a noble who married into an Earl's family with the man's mistress, Ryuushka. Al, as he is called most of the time, died of overwork in his previous life and is often described as having the atmosphere of a worn-out worker that is at odds with his beautiful features inherited from his mother. Due to the fact that he had to touch his sister's soul while in the womb to help her and his mother survive, his sister is totally obsessed with him from the moment she is born.
His teacher, Eibelle, is the series heroine, one of the two remaining ancestors of the elven race, the Arch Elves, her nickname being 'hametsu' (Ruin) for the fact that she was always the one to destroy threats in the previous ages (she is at least ten thousand years old, but as innocent in matters of romance as a girl can get). She is not only his love interest but his teacher of sorcery and easily the most adorable character in the series. It helps that Al loves her from almost the first time he meets her, and she shares that feeling.
The entirety of the seven hundred and so chapters that have come out so far has only resulted in him turning eight years old, as the author is cramming an immense amount of detail into every year of his life. As such, there is no way you can consider this to be a complete story. However, it is an immensely enjoyable read, as Al struggles to have a normal life while ruining those plans with his own hands and efforts.
Overall, this is a great choice for people who like isekai stories that are mostly daily life with a side of comedy and action/adventure. I don't recommend this to people who want fast-paced stories. I do recommend it for people who like their stories to have a lot of details.
This particular series follows a guy who dies after being trampled by an escaped horse as he is revived in another world and told to live freely. He is given two major growth cheats right up front (20 times experience gain, plus 1/20 experience to next level) and becomes immensely powerful in a relatively short time, while gathering a group of friends and lovers around him (he only has two lovers, which is pretty low compared to most isekai protagonists).
Throughout most of the story, he picks the jobs he wants to level up at random or based on his needs at the moment, so you can't really say he is an intelligent and far-sighted protagonist. In addition, he is highly reliant on the moral support of Haru and Kyaro (his lovers) to keep himself balanced. The theme of this story is very much a 'normal guy his given immense power but no purpose', and it is only toward the end that things become truly serious and he is forced to stand against fate.
Since the protagonist doesn't become morally defunct (something that happens to roughly half of the serious isekai protagonists I've seen so far), chapter for chapter, this isn't a bloody series. Nor is it graphic. The protagonist tends to try to save everyone he can while not endangering those close to him, but he doesn't have a hero complex. It is more a situation where the protagonist has the power to do something about it, so he does.
The story itself is fairly solid and internally consistent, even if it appears to go off on tangents regularly (the intermissions with the two idiots and their monster donkey are a perfect example of tangents turning out to be important). However, it is also a long story to read, and it gets off to a relatively slow start until the events that result in him buying Haru.
Overall, it is a complete series that never truly loses its shine from beginning to end, so it is worth reading for those who like isekai stories.
To be honest, Sairin Yuusha is one of the worst WNs I've ever read. I kept reading until it cut off because I thought it would eventually get good, but the protagonist is weak and there is never any real progress with the heroine. The story itself is a revenge story about a hero who is murdered by his own party right before he is about to fight the Demon King. Thirty years later, he is summoned again and starts on a journey of revenge, forming an alliance with a former demon queen and generally wreaking havoc on his enemies in a world that he feels betrayed him.
His revenge is pretty graphic - so those who like that kind of thing will probably get off on this - but, to be honest, he is so focused on the revenge part of his journey that he never really grows as a person until right before the author stopped posting it (literally in the last volume).
If the writer had included some softer moments to cushion the constant 'push forward and get revenge', I would have liked it more. I also would have liked it if the heroine's personality had fit her role in the story, but unfortunately, she often was the source of me being jerked out of my immersion in the story.
(Note: To be clear, this is an unfinished VN with over 500 chapters)
Hell Mode is the WN I recently began (and finished to the current point) reading. It is another reincarnation one, where the protagonist was a heavy gamer who is one of those types that loves high-difficulty setups, reveling in grinding, conquering dungeons, and generally indulging in his desire to see more. He goes to a website where he gets the choice of difficulty and his job, and he picks the hardest difficulty Hell Mode (where everything is 100x harder than Normal Mode) and the high-difficulty job, Summoner.
The world he ends up in is one where people see jobs as 'talents' and talent determines how far a person can go (if they aren't a noble) in life. However, it is also a world threatened by a demon lord, and much of the story past the first fifth of what has already been written is war against the demon king's forces.
The protagonist has terrible 'gamer's brain' and thinks of everything in terms of gaming, to the point where he examines every aspect of his skills, those of his companions, the tools at hands, the powers of his enemies, etc. One of the running jokes of the series is how he keeps dragging his friends into grinding in dungeons to gain levels and skill levels and their reactions to it when he passes certain limits.
Honestly, this one was a fun read, and I'm looking forward to him finishing the latest volume (probably sometime in September, judging by his writing speed and how fast his previous entries were completed). I have the feeling that there will be at least two more volumes after the one he is writing now, so give it a year to a year and a half, and this series will probably come to a conclusion.
One thing that might make people lose interest is that the protagonist has absolutely no interest in romance or the opposite (or same) sex in that way. While there are a lot of indications that girls around him are infatuated with him, he doesn't even notice one way or the other. So don't expect there to be any romance on his end or ecchi situations. This is a story about a guy who loves figuring out how the world works and making it work for him and gains great joy from difficult situations.
Edit: There are other elements that made it attractive for me. In particular, the existence of a friendly rival in the form of the hero Hermios, whose existence is oddly humorous despite the seriousness of the situations they meet in. In addition, the main antagonist (so far) Kyuber is a surprisingly decent villain character who gives off the proper aura of the shadow behind the throne with his own agenda you want to see in any similar situation.
A major downside I failed to mention is that the growth in the story is all grinding (as fits with the MMO-addict's methodology the protagonist loves), which sometimes made it a bit hard to follow the protagonist's gleeful heavy gamerism.
Niito Dakedo Hello Work ni ittara Isekai ni Tsuretakareta
This is a WN by Katsura Kasuga. An unemployed NEET named Masaru goes to Hello Work (the official Japanese employment agency) and signs a contract for what he thinks is playing a video game, and instead he gets dropped into a world about to be destroyed (or so he is told) and told to test Itou's (apparently that world's god) new skill system for twenty years (incidentally, the amount of time until the end of the world). If he survives the twenty years, he'll be sent back to Japan with twenty years worth of six-figure pay to arrive at the same time he left in his young body, if he dies he... dies.
The draw of this series is, as usual with Isekai these days, harem. The protagonist, Masaru, doesn't have any hesitation about building a harem, and after a bunch of semi-hilarious events early on, he actually manages to form one with four heroines (one cat-girl slave, a priestess, a mage, and a loli judge). The first half of what was written before the author dropped off the face of the earth is mostly SOL with adventurer everyday life. It is the second half where things start to expand into having a real story, where the harem becomes almost incidental to progressing the plot. Perhaps the most frustrating part is that the story cuts off in the middle of the final chapter...
Rettougan no Tensei Majutsushi
This one follows a similar plot to Shikkakumon no Saikyou Kenja and Shijou Saikyou Maou. The protagonist was a great sorcerer who defeated the demon lord with his friends, but because of his eyes, he suffered from persecution. As a result, he decided to use magic to reincarnate himself two hundred years later, where he was reborn in a body he designed from the ground up. This story, before it was cut off by the author's likely demise (given the fact that ALL his works stopped being released within a two-week period).
Honestly, given how high-paced this one was, I would have been happy to read it once it was complete, but the abrupt stop in the middle of things getting interesting pretty much killed any fondness I might have had.
Isekai Shihai no Skill Taker
This one is by the same writer as Rettougan and literally cuts off in the last volume (much to my frustration). However, as summoning isekai go, this one is notable for the protagonist being a pretty fascinating martial artist, as well as a kichiku character with a fondness for tentacles and beautiful women. I honestly enjoyed everything about the story, and while I nearly flew into a rage when I saw it cut off literally in the last part of the story, I can imagine what was likely to happen next fairly easily.
The protagonist of this one has a tendency to indulge in 'enlightened self-interest', which means he is generally selfish but realizes that the world doesn't revolve around him and he is willing to take action to make things better around him.
[Edit]
Maou to Ryuuou ni Sodaterareta Shounen wa Gakuen de Musou suru you desu
I started this WN last night and finished the ten volumes that have come out so far about ten minutes ago. It was too early for me to make a new post, so I chose to include this one in this post.
This story follows a young villager who gets trapped in the seal containing the Maou and Ryuuou from three hundred years before. Unlike them, he is not permanently trapped, so they decide to train him (despite his lack of talent), a task that takes several subjective centuries (time passes slower on the outside than it does on the inside, to the point where a year outside is three hundred inside). The villager, Ruisha, has an intense desire for power, which reaches the levels of madness at times, and as a result, he gladly spends the next three hundred years learning from his teachers (who become closer to surrogate mothers and wives to him as time goes by).
The above chapter is actually the first volume of the WN, and once it was over, he went back into the world and headed for the Kingdom, where he accidentally enrolls in the Magic Academy, where he pretty much does the same thing every op protagonist in this kind of story does... forms an accidental harem and turns the school castes upside down.
This story is incomplete and the writer has slowed down his releases significantly in recent months. However, what is there is fairly high quality. In particular, the quality of the romance/ichaicha is extremely high, as is that of the battle scenes.
To be honest, this is probably the best of the last six WNs I've read in the last month. It is also complete. This one is a 'same world, different protagonist' story from the same world as Elf Tensei kara no Cheat Kenkokuki, and the protagonist of that one is the father one of the two heroines. However, even if you haven't read the first story, this one stands on its own quite well.
The protagonist, Souji, was a player of a game on Earth that was insanely realistic, with time compression that allowed him to spend 168 years testing everything that world had to offer. The game had several unusual aspects. For one, it was single-player. For another, it had permadeath. One thing all the players noticed was that, no matter how hard they tried, no matter how long they lived, things always ended in tragedy. Souji in particular, lost his beloved Kuna over and over again, and one day when he was about to try to save her again, the end of service for the game was announced. As he was about to despair, he was offered a chance to go to a real world where he would have a chance to save Kuna for real. Naturally, he leaps at this chance and is reborn with all the built-up knowledge of that world's magic and crafting techniques he had put together over the 168 subjective years he spent in the game.
The protagonist is definitely a cheat character, but that doesn't mean there aren't struggles. In actuality, while he doesn't struggle with the day to day issues, dealing with the issues important to him is always a struggle, meaning this isn't just an overpowered protagonist dominating the arena (in fact, for most of the story he is merely overpowered for his rank, not overpowered compared to everyone around him). The romantic parts of the story are fairly cute, but the WN in general is pretty no-frills as a whole, with relatively little normal SOL and a ton of action and drama. Overall, it is a good story if you want something that more or less sticks to the plot for the entirety of the story, but it isn't something you'll enjoy if you want to see a lot of side-tracking and swimsuit scenes, lol.
To be blunt, this WN is a straight-out slave harem story in another world. The protagonist is a run-down salaryman who escaped a black company workplace only to end up summoned to a world where the king was raring to put his summoned heroes to work. Quite naturally, the protagonist wants nothing to do with this, so he arranges to get himself thrown out of the castle and goes off on his own.
The protagonist, like most summoned heroes, has a unique skill (typical of this kind of story). In his case, it allows him to take apart and restructure the skills of himself and his slaves (the first of which is the last Mazoku, Cecille). He makes a ton of weird skills during the story that are nonetheless incredibly effective (usually in an amusing way), making his slave wives ever more powerful while seeking to find a way to live the easy life without ever having to work.
This is a story about a guy who saves the world repeatedly by accident while doing his best to avoid becoming famous, getting involved with nobility or royalty, and take care of his adoring wives.
I will say that the story goes off on a tangent a lot, and there a ton of side-stories that break the flow of the story as a whole. While the harem ichaicha was generally good, I got pretty frustrated with the way it never really got serious, even at moments when it probably should have. A lot of it was because he kept creating skills that made his ever-growing harem more and more powerful whenever he got the least bit worried about where things were going (and usually ended up just overpowering the enemies without any real trouble).
Omake Tenseisha is the story of a girl who lived through hell on earth and had a new hell waiting for her when she was tossed aside by the gods and reincarnated again. For those who have read a Snake's Life or Kumo, this will be a story that is somewhat familiar. The protagonist is fairly similar to Kumoko (naturally ruthless, tends to think cheerfully most of the time, ends up eating everything that is her enemy, lol).
The story itself is one long 'driven out of a town', 'ate everything that got in my way', 'accidentally screwed up the gods' plans', etc. Basically, the protagonist's appearance (black hair, black eyes) makes her a cursed child in the eyes of her new world, and she is inevitably driven out of any town she tries to stay in. She also kills and eats anything she can without any real discrimination (especially after she learns how to transform matter into mana in her stomach), and gets ever more overpowered as the story goes along. She also knocks her fellow reincarnators' lives off the rails the gods put before them on a fairly regular basis (without them or her knowing it).
That brings me back to the gods... think of the gods of her new world as a bunch of sociopaths that think of the souls they reincarnate as characters in a reality tv show and you'll get the picture.
Generally a fun and hilarious read with a somewhat hyperactive writer.
This WN, also published in the West as Failure Frame, is a variant on the 'isekai summoning' genre where the summoner is malicious toward the summoned. This particular sub-genre has become more common of late (since the straight-up good people summon heroes out of desperation setup has gotten stale), but this one stands out to me for the sheer evil and brutality of the antagonist (the goddess) and the protagonist (who is probably the epitome of an anti-hero in its most brutal form).
One thing I liked about this story was that Mimori Touka (the protagonist) is extremely self-aware. He knows the blackness of his own heart and revels in it at times, without being malicious toward good people. Rather than calling him a hero, it would be more appropriate to call him a man who takes joy in brutalizing those he thinks are like himself (evil, cruel, brutal, etc). In contrast, he is quite kind - if not gentle - toward those of good heart, unwilling to bring harm to them even if it would bring him some kind of advantage.
This leads to most of the characters misunderstanding his motivations to one extent or another, as those close to him tend to interpret his actions in a positive way.
This story is incomplete, but it is approaching completion pretty rapidly. I estimate that it will probably be complete early next year, for those who prefer to not have to wait.
This series is a funny little one by the same author as Surviving in another world with Goshujinsama (not to my taste, as the protag is M and a bit of a hetare, but it is really popular in Japan). The protagonist of this story is randomly transported to another world by a mischievous evil god (Pretty sure her/his real name starts with Nyarl, like most evil gods of this type in otaku stories) and left to his own devices. Taking advantage of his high growth rate and ability to pick skills to grow (something the natives don't have), he tries to live freely... but life isn't going to let him be. Before he knows it, he ends up drugged and in bed with an aggressive but incompetent adventurer girl named Marl, and soon after, the country takes interest in him.
Generally speaking, this story is basically a power trip where the protagonist plays hero for a while before ending up as the lord of his own territory with a harem of women who control his life for the most part. It is funny, fun to read, and while the protagonist does struggle at key points, when it comes down to it it remains a power trip to the last. There are a few points in the story that would probably sicken people who don't like barbaric behavior (one particular incident in the first part), and some people won't like the way the women take over his life. However, I found it an amusing story, and it has the advantage of being complete and available on Shousetsuka ni Narou for free.
https://ncode.syosetu.com/n9814bu/
Oh and the protagonist has a really wide strike zone, lol.
This particular WN series falls into the set called 'transference', as opposed to summoning or reincarnation. The protagonist, Takatsuki Makoto and his classmates freeze to death in a bus buried in an avalanche, only to wake up in another world, inside the Temple of Water, where it is explained to them that they have been saved by the mercy of that world's gods. They all receive skills and are more powerful than the natives... except for Makoto, whose status doesn't rise when he levels and only three skills 'Beginner Water Magic' 'Mental Stability' and 'RPG Player'. Since he has almost no magical power and no way to grow through normal methods, he is seen as useless and weak. He is approached by the goddess Noa, who asks him to be her follower, only to find out she is an evil god who is only allowed to have a single follower at any given time.
This story, as you might think, is one about a guy overcoming a lot of obstacles through guts, sheer will, and dedication (well, and an incredible recklessness born of the latter two skills he gets at the beginning). One thing that I loved about this guy is that there is literally no point in the story where he isn't working his ass off with a smile on his face. Makoto is so dedicated to improving his magic (and his control gets ridiculous as the story goes on) that he is constantly startling those who get to know him.
Oh and there is a harem... but it is closer to the 'classic-style' harem where circumstances always converge to keep the protagonist and the girls from actually going all the way (it gets seriously ridiculous there towards the end). This is as opposed to the harem type that has become more common in recent years, where the protagonist is perfectly happy to partake in the pleasures of the flesh wherever he can get them.
The heroines of the story tend to be cheery on the surface while their love is a bit heavy if you look at it from an objective perspective (think more than a little bit of dependence, verging on near-yandere at times). The yandere-ism is hidden, but the girls who actually settle down as heroines all have reasons for becoming dependent on Makoto (and Makoto is your classic dense as lead harem protagonist most of the time, mostly because he finds training and adventuring more interesting than the female body 90% of the time).
Fortunately, this series recently completed the final arc of the WN, so it is possible to read it from beginning to end (as opposed to most, where it just goes on and on). Since it only finished the main story a week ago, it will probably be a while before the after-story becomes sufficiently large to satisfy, but that is a relatively minor downer considering how few series even get this far.
This particular WN falls into a particular sub-genre of isekai where the protagonist is cast out of a group of people summoned as heroes to another world. This particular genre began to become popular with Shield Hero, but it has evolved significantly since then.
In this WN, the protagonist is summoned along with eight hundred other people from the same school and is one of two people who are not granted a gift from the goddess. As a result, he is cast out of the castle and driven from the city... but that doesn't really bother him, because Shindou Jin is not your average guy in the first place. Instead of a blessing/gift, he has his own unique abilities that blossomed upon his arrival, each basically one of those overpowered cheats you would make any individual a monster on any world they ended up in. The most obvious of them are his ability to steal the stats and skills of others permanently and make them his own (to the point where a light breeze will kill them), his ability to see his own stats and those of others, and his ability to see the world from the point of view of an overhead map that has everything revealed from the beginning (no fog of war).
To be blunt, the author presents this story as one where the protagonist never really struggles with anything and one-sidedly slaughters anyone who gets in his way while following his whims (which really are whimsical).
Another thing is that Jin is lucky... and when I mean lucky, I mean that he naturally instigates trouble just by existing and then enjoys it thoroughly. He is also someone with an intensely strong desire for ownership and a collector/pack rat. The fact that he buys a few slave girls just because 'that's what isekai travelers do in stories' then gets addicted to shopping at slave trader shops (usually finding 'hidden bargains') says everything about how little he cares for common sense when it comes to himself (though he likes people who are on the straight and narrow and generally will treat them well). By the time I caught up with the author's writing, he had well over 30,000 slaves, most of which he had never met and were worshipping him (most of his 'slaves' are essentially Jin cultists, lol).
If you like stories where the protagonist does whatever the hell he wants at a given moment, this is an excellent read. If you like standard stories of heroism and kindness, this isn't your WN.
Edit: Oh and yes, I am an isekai junkie, if you guys hadn't figured it out. About 90% of what I'm reading is either isekai or fantasy, since non-anime Japanese sci-fi never feels as complex and interesting as western ones (to be blunt, I think part of that is once you've watched Legend of the Galactic Heroes, everything else feels pale and weak in comparison).
Now, Ruitomo is one of 'those legendary VNs', the first kamige written by the Akatsuki Works team. It is well-known and often discussed amongst vets of playing untranslated VNs, and you can see how this was the formative stage for a team that would go on to make numerous great games in the future, most of them chuunige.
First off, Ruitomo isn't a chuunige, at least in the classic sense. The protagonist is a trap who is bound by an inherited curse not to reveal his true gender, and the story begins with him encountering several others that also possess similar curses, as well as powers that he doesn't possess. Ruitomo is one of those games that doesn't easily fall into a genre or sub-genre, as it has elements of action, mystery, mindfuck, fantasy, and romance all wrapped into one big bundle. So, I just have to shrug and call it a 'story-focused VN', lol (as vague a term as moege or charage, haha).
One thing that you should know about all Hino Wataru-written Akatsuki Works VNs... in every one of them a version of Akaneko (the final heroine of this one) appears, with the same personality, similar habits, and the same voice actor (Akaneko, Eru from Hello, Lady, Yuki from Comyu). Similarly, there is always at least one 'straight-man' heroine who tends to prefer correctness over everything else (Iyo in Ruitomo, Saku in Hello, Lady, Benio in Comyu, etc)
I once read a crappy review that said this was a VN about friendship *spews laughter*. Sorry, but that was one reviewer who mistook one element of the story for the whole point of it. The real central theme of this VN is isolation, social ostracism, and moral relativity. Technically, all Akatsuki Works VNs indulge in moral relativity, so you can just ignore that one, since it is Hino Wataru's favorite dog to beat. The isolation and social ostracism elements are fairly obvious from the beginning. All the heroines and the protagonist are social outcasts by means of their curses. The protagonist is the most obvious example as it forces him to lie and distance others from himself, but others have their own issues. For instance, Rui's curse, the inability to make promises of any kind, is crippling in a modern world, where you have to be able to sign a contract just to find a place to live or 'promise' to be at work on time. To one extent or another, the others' curses hold them isolated and ostracized from society as well.
Tomo is driven by a strong desire to escape his curse, intensified as time goes on by his growing fondness for his fellow curse-bearers and the guilt for deceiving them. I honestly can't help but like Tomo... he is selfish enough to be human but selfless enough when it comes to his friends to give his all for them. A lot of people who hate Akihito from Comyu will probably find Tomo to be far more pleasant, as that other's less pleasant qualities are diluted and his more pleasant ones enhanced in Tomo. He lacks Akihito's female-directed philanthropic spirit, but he does have a strong generosity of spirit to him... without the somewhat indiscriminate sexual mores of Akihito.
One thing I think a lot of people who try to read this VN have trouble with, besides the somewhat complex turns of phrase that are endemic to all Hino Wataru works, is the way so much of the dialogue between the characters, even in the slice-of-life scenes, is... oblique, requiring reading between the lines to grasp the full content. A lot of this comes from the curses, both referencing them, avoiding referencing them, and avoiding activating them. However, at least some of it is simply an extension of how relatively easy with one another the group is in normal situations, despite their often conflicting personalities. These conversations are easier to follow if you get the characters' personalities and roles in the group, but if you have trouble with that kind of thing, you'll probably be left behind at times.
Ruitomo has a definite playing order, with you being forced to play Rui's path before reading Atori's, Koyori's, and Iyo's (preferably in that order, or at least with Iyo as the last of the second three) and completing those four opening up Akaneko's path (the true path). I'll be blunt when I say that grasping the whole of the story without reading the first four paths is virtually impossible, so 'cheaters' who use 100% save files to get the true end first will just be screwing themselves over, lol.
This VN's story starts out in the middle... one of Hino Wataru's questionable habits. For better or worse, he likes to thrust you into the middle of the prologue before dragging you back to the beginning of it, and Ruitomo is the VN that suffers the most for it, in my experience. To be blunt, it is really hard to figure out what is going on during the first scene, so about one-third of the people I've talked to that tried to read this VN dropped it or stalled within the first quarter of the prologue. However, as the VN goes on, its characters, their personalities, their troubles, and their experiences grow on you rapidly, until you can't help but be entranced.
One thing that I was seriously impressed about, coming back to play this through a second time, was the meticulous way Hino Wataru designed the common route and the paths... he made sure everything was perfectly consistent as a whole, even if it didn't seem like it at first, and every single scene had at least some meaning in the greater context of the game as a whole, even if it might have seemed irrelevant or secondary in the path in which it existed. This shows off the rather impressive capacity for 'management of the details' that a very few writers in the VN world manage to display. There is a good reason why creating a large-scale story-focused VN (whether chuunige or not) tends to be rare. Most writers simply can't manage to maintain the internal consistency that you see in a VN like this one.
Overall, I was actually more impressed this time around than I was the first time I played this. It is called a kamige for a reason... brilliance of design, emotional stimulation, intellectual stimulation, etc. The fact is that VNs on this level are exceedingly rare and always worth the price I pay to buy them.
PS: I'll play the fandisc soon, though I might or might not manage to replay it before I begin playing this month's releases.
Seija Musou, better known as the Great Cleric for its English release (which I haven't read), is an interesting story about an isekai reincarnator who becomes a cleric purely because he wants to die of old age this time around.
In a way, Luciel, the protagonist, is fairly similar to Satou, the protagonist of Death March, in that his goal isn't to save the world but he ends up doing it anyway. The biggest difference is that Luciel isn't all-powerful (well, at least not until VERY late in the story) but rather just an incredibly hard worker who puts his all into his primary goals of surviving (which translates into getting skilled and strong enough to survive any situation) and growing old with his family.
Unlike many isekai stories, this one isn't a harem, though there are a lot of hints that it could go that way in an instant. There is only the mildest of romance (a really slow-burn romance that starts near the beginning and only comes to its natural conclusion at the very end of the story). There is truly a ton of combat, training montages (if there was music and video), and Luciel being driven up the wall by events conspiring to show him he 'still isn't strong enough to survive' and shove him into saving the world.
A lot of the story's humor comes from Luciel's companions going behind his back to do things that are for his benefit but are particularly displeasing or unpleasant for him. There are also a lot of moments where Luciel's common sense (which is greatly divergent from most of those around him) stuns those around him.
To be clear, I haven't finished this particular WN series (at over 900 chapters, all of them of reasonable length, that would take a long time). I have gotten around halfway through the story, enough to get a solid impression of how this is going to go. Like most of the LNs/WNs I have been reading lately, it is an isekai story. This particular story has a different approach compared to the ones I've posted about so far. First, this story doesn't have a specific antagonist or group of antagonists to worry about. The protagonist is too whimsical to really be considered solidly on any side in particular (very much an amoral type, except when it comes to women) except his own and those of the people he likes at any given moment.
Shuuya, the protagonist, is, at first glance, your common isekai reincarnation protagonist. However, he quickly diverges from the classic style in that he neither clings to his Japanese mores nor does he become an amoral half-villain. Instead, he becomes a freedom-loving adventurer who pretty much does whatever he wants to. His partner, the black cat with tentacles, Rorodine, is an adorable mascot character who can be easily compared to her partner in terms of whimsical behavior (typical cat behavior a lot of the time). By the point of the story I'm at, Shuuya has a rather massive circle of allies, friends, and subordinates (as in triple digits), so one thing that most will have trouble with is keeping his list of lovers, wives, friends, and family straight. Actually, keeping them straight is pretty close to impossible, since he never seems to stop adding to it.
Because of his mercurial nature, you might think that Shuuya would be considered insincere, but he is the type that keeps a promise once made, no matter what it might require of him. Because he picked a half-vampire type of race, he doesn't need to worry about aging, so he naturally takes a long-term view on how life will turn out in the end, not hesitating to make friends and enemies along the way. There are a ton of actually well-written combat scenes (with an increasingly odd combat style as the story goes along) in this story, and that is one of the attractions, since Shuuya is always looking to improve himself along the way and loves nothing more than testing out his skills.
However, the very whimsical nature of Shuuya's behavior becomes more and more of an issue later on. The feeling that nothing is happening for chapters even though a lot of things are happening begins to press down on you, and I actually started to burn out on this story somewhere around the 200 chapters mark.
I have to say I apologize to those who voted for Minikui Mojika no Ko... my original instinct not to play this game at all was correct. This game feels too much like a dark rape nukige to allow me to play it anymore, so I had to drop it. Not to mention that I hate all the characters and think they should all be tossed into the nearest garbage dump.
Umm... I'm going to be honest with you. I'm not terribly fond of Astronauts' irregular ventures off into the lands of dark fantasy gameplay hybrids, and as a result, I chose not to play this one when it came out. My experiences with the original Demonion, which, while the story was decent, was incredibly tedious when it came to the gameplay, made me not want to have anything to do with this game.
I won't say that this game surprised me... the story is straightforward Astronauts-style (lots of sex, immorality, and violence) combined with the classic dungeon-crawler setup. I'll be straight with you... I think the resurrection of dungeon-crawlers is what killed the classic jrpg, so I automatically subtract points from any game that looks like or acts like a dungeon-crawler. I even felt the same way about Persona 3 and Persona 4, which tells you just how much I dislike the genre.
Why? Because I've never seen the point in a story centering around diving into the same dungeon over and over. Adventuring doesn't seem like fun to me (I got over that phase in middle school), and the stories tend to be ridiculously easy to predict, even for Japanese games.
Regalias focuses on the city of Ishgalia, which was built over a labyrinth made from the ruins of a floating magic city that fell to the ground a few centuries back. The former mercenary, Orias, enters the city with the hope of finding the secrets to his past deep within the labyrinth.
Now, let's set aside the craziness of monsters infinitely welling up from the depths of a ruined magical city. If I were to complain about that particular tired trope, we'd be here all day. I'll even set aside my need to question how the city wouldn't have been completely explored after decades of people going into its depths.
What I won't do is gloss over the way I began to feel by the end... which was tired of finding my way through a bland set of dungeons. I honestly recommend that this game be played in stages, as the dungeon is exhausting and the story sections are not quite frequent enough to break the experience off into manageable bits. Essentially, you form a party of five characters (from an eventual roster of nine), and the battles are classic-style turn-based, which most enemies and your characters having one action per turn (the exception being certain 'special' enemies and bosses). On normal, the beginning of the game was the single hardest part of the entire thing. For some reason, the special enemies early on can frequently one-shot you even if you are overleveled for the part of the dungeon you are in, which is ridiculous. Since the only resurrection option early on is to return to town, this is frustrating and irritating, since it isn't always possible to avoid the enemy.
On the other hand, in the late game, you'll most likely be faced with a distinct lack of challenges... or at least, I was. I had to go back to town every once in a while when I ran out of mp, but I rarely died or even had a character killed after the fourth chapter (there are ten, including the final one). Part of that is that Orias and Shizuku are overpowered when using the double-sword passive skill (believe me, this is great for both normal enemies and bosses). The other part of it was that I had the range of skills I needed to wipe out enemy parties in a single turn.
One thing I seriously hated about this game was the way it essentially forces to stick with your original party... because the other four girls are significantly less capable than the first four to join the party. Dora is almost as capable as Edna as a mage, but Nemu is half-assed (they obviously couldn't decide whether to make her a true attack mage or a healer... and it shows). The less said about Meriel and Zenobia, the better (think, 'magician who couldn't kill a fly' and 'swordswoman with a ridiculous number of support magic that verges on being useless late-game).
The characters in this game are actually pretty good... though you spend an inordinate amount of time with them naked (five or more non-rape h-scenes for all the female characters except Fortuna and Zenobia). They all have realistic motivations for their actions and background to explain their personalities... which isn't surprising from the company that produced Erect! which is notable for being my favorite borderline nukige in existence.
Story-wise... it is fairly predictable. Honestly, the presentation isn't bad... in fact, it is good. However, I found the lateness of certain revelations to be irritating (since they weren't really revelations by the time they came out and said them outright), and I found the antagonists less than inspiring...
The end of the main story was actually pretty decent, and a good happy ending overall. There are also plenty of post-game events for the 'finish everything' freaks, including hints at what the characters might do afterward. However, I was disappointed there wasn't a final epilogue...
These three I'm only going to introduce to yall because they were the most memorable of the Web Novels/LNs that I read through in the last month.
Chiyu Mahou
Chiyu Mahou has the protagonist, Usato Ken, being summoned by accident along with two heroes. Usato, being a kind-hearted young man to the core, isn't particularly annoyed or angered by this (Kazuki, one of the two heroes is more bothered by it than he is), but he has the misfortune to have a talent for healing magic, meaning he falls under the jurisdiction of the country's Lifesaving Squad. Taken to the Lifesaving Squad, he is put through the wringer in a way only a healer (who can heal himself) can be, to increasingly hilarious results (from the reader's perspective) even as he is prepared to save lives on the battlefield. This particular story is mostly enjoyable for the way the protagonist's common sense gets completely turned on its head (especially regarding his magic). So, what is the mistaken use of healing magic? 1) Using magic to repair your body during and after extreme training, 2) Using healing magic to make sure the people you punch aren't hurt, 3) Using healing magic like a martial artist would use chi.
To be honest, a great portion of the hilarity of this story comes from Usato himself becoming more and more of a 'muscle brain' as his solution to everything becomes 'punch it' or 'train myself'.
Magan to Dangan o Tsukatte Isekai o Buchnuku
This is the weakest of the three WN/LNs I picked up for this month. I say this because the concept is the most straightforward and it is one that most people will wince at. Essentially, the protagonist, Ataru, is offered a chance to reincarnate in a fantasy world full of violence, and he selects as his 'gifts' a gun that doesn't break, the ability to create various bullets, and a special eye. The best part of this story, unfortunately, is the early parts, where he is just getting used to the world and his relationship with Kyaro (a bunny-girl slave who he healed then eventually released). The worst part is how repetitive and predictable the story becomes as things continue. This is one of a number of isekai LNs where I simply couldn't find it in myself to put it down but didn't enjoy nearly as much as I would have liked.
Kage no Jitsuryokusha
First thing anyone should know about the protagonist of this story... he is a total and unashamed chuunibyou that works hard to make his chuunibyou into reality both on earth and in the world he gets reincarnated in. To give you an example, his source of despair on Earth was that he couldn't become strong enough to defeat a nuclear weapon, so he began trying to discover magical energy, and just when he was about to succeed, he died. His greatest desire is to be the mysterious powerful figure who lives in the shadows and appears to alter the field of battle at key points in the story. To that end, he creates an organization of girls he saves from a particular curse, Shadow Garden, unknowing that the goal he thought up out of nowhere (defeating a Diabolist organization that was working toward the resurrection of a Demon God that controls the church) is actually a real one and everyone else in the organization but him knows it. This results in some seriously hilarious situations as he believes they are creating scenarios for him to have his fun (as in his mind, there is no way they wouldn't see through him), even as his subordinates really are setting him against the organization in question.
Yondome wa Iyana Shizokusei Majutsushi
Yondome is a series that would probably be traumatic to watch but is ideal for reading. I say this because the things done to the protagonist and he does to others are pretty horrifying from an objective perspective. He spends most of his first reincarnation being tortured as an experimental subject, his magical energy drawn out to make convenient tools, and his second reincarnation has him cursed and living his life surrounded by undead of his own making.
However, for someone reading this story, it is surprisingly touching at times, with interesting and amusing characters. Yes, imagining a lot of the scenes is pretty guro and reminded me of Tokyo Necro. However, the story of Vandalieu has become quite dear to my heart. Most likely because of how ingenious the author's portrayal of Vandalieu's life is. It is proof positive that there are things you can get away with when writing that would only alienate people watching an anime.
Sacchi Sarenai Rule Breaker
Rule Breaker is your standard 'protagonist is overpowered and has an absolute advantage' series, with the twist that he has a solid girlfriend almost from the beginning. Hikaru is an unusual character type, in that he is someone who is a bit overly impressed with his own cleverness, but he is aware that this quality is a personality flaw. The story itself has Hikaru sorta-kinda reincarnating into the body of a guy who tasks him with avenging his death inside one hour by killing a local nobleman. Hikaru, in order to succeed, uses his new ability - the Soul Board - to specialize in stealth so he can get away with it.
This essentially begins a story where the protagonist essentially does amazing things because he is overspecialized to an insane degree in stealth and detection. Unlike a lot of stories of this type, where the protagonist is exceedingly capable in all areas, Hikaru is definitely a min-max character for most of the story. His personality is also one that some people will have trouble with, but on the flip side, he has a lot more foresight than the average isekai protagonist and actually manages to keep his public persona in the background, something few overpowered isekai protagonists can manage.
Kuro no Maou
There is only one phrase that sums up Kuro no Maou... 'Yandere Harem in another world'. The protagonist of the story, Kurono Maou (lol, yes his name is a pun) begins the story as a fierce-looking but kind-hearted high schooler... until he is summoned to another world to be experimented upon by a bunch of religious fanatics to turn him into a black magic using living weapon. Counter to tradition, he manages to break free only after losing a surprising amount of his humanity. By the time he gains his freedom, he has killed other people on numerous occasions, including other summoned Japanese people. He also loses the ability to hesitate when killing is needed, which cuts off one of the more annoying character tropes that tend to follow around isekai protagonists.
The author describes Kurono as a 'Yandere Seizouki' (a yandere-producing machine) because he is not only dense but somehow manages to say and do the right things to tip girls over the cliff into yandere-ism. While this is highly amusing, it also means that even the SOL toward the middle and end of the story is quite a bit more stressful than is common to fantasy and isekai. Moreover, his density is made worse by the fact that his magic mastery actually suppresses his sexual desires, meaning he mostly just fails to notice the girls are aiming for him for most of the story, despite them being rather obvious to people looking at the situation from the outside.
