Hello from Norway!

Hei / Hi

My name is Tommy Ueland, I am 44-year-old and work as a bureaucrat at the Norwegian directora... No, wait, this isn’t a dating site...

I am a writer, a professional procrastinator, a gamer, an avid reader and a published author. I write quirky short story series in the cozy mystery genre. I have a special place in my heart for games, and RPG’s in particular. I found this forum via Joanna Penn’s podcast, and it was like the RNG finally gave me a break.

For the last six months I have been playing around with an idea, a LitRPG I want to write this year. But since I never have written a LitRPG before, I need to pick some brains, and this forum seems like the perfect brain-picking place.

I start picking right away - Can you recommend a LitRPG book (preferably a series) that uses humor and is in a “WoW-like” world?

Thanks!

 

Thanks @Paul Bellow, that is true. The series is like a drug somehow.

@Tommy Ueland. Could you be more specific about the "WoW-like" world? There are many different settings that could work. If you want a very funny (stupid funny, but it gets me laughing every time) series where a group land in a DnD like game world is Caverns and Creatures.

Usually there are two types of games, either people are in an actual game world, or people are on earth and play videos games. The Land is an example where the person is in a game world.

 

Thank you very much, Paul. That is a great recommendation! I read the first book as an audiobook back in 2019, and I liked it - had forgotten about it and just downloaded book two I think that’s the only LitRPG book I actually have read, beside Scott Meyer’s Off To Be a Wizard - If that is defined as a LitRPG.

 

Thank you, Johan. Just downloaded Critical Failures. By the blurb it seems to be right up my ally Can’t wait to read it.

Yes, of course, and here shines my noobiness through with this genre. I have been a World of Warcraft player since the Burning Crusade, and it’s hard for me not to think about that setting. The story I am planning is going to have different themes in each book (a 10 book series - I know, ballsy) with different zones closely connected to the different themes. It will be a fantasy setting and will be an alternate reality with game mechanics.

 

The audio book version is also great. The narration is quite spot on.

Another series that I enjoyed is Eric Ugland's good guys series and the connected series of bad guys. The narration for both is also spot on, just like Aleron Kong.

I should note that Aleron Kongs series might be better to read instead of listened to (though great narration, but 1 was re-read by a new narrator). What I love and the Exiles love are various Stat sheet and windows. Most dedicated fans probably has a spreadsheet for that series, lots of math involved.

Both Eric and Alerons (chaos seeds) series are people being pulled from earth into a world with game mechanics. Both are funny or but not laugh at loud, few are.

I should say that most of the books in this genre are not actually role playing. A small amount of books have people talk in the role they are dropped in, always using earth common lingo and attitudes. So I suppose most books are not litrpg but just litG litgame or gamelit. Though I don't know if others think the same way on that. Usually people that are born in the game world will not have the same modern earth lingo.

Other styles seem to be Dungeon building or Dungeon core literature, there are also cultivation books too (where qi is common) where westerns styles will incorporate it into itself. Another aspect is how much sex there is in your book and if that is a major theme. The good guys series has a prude MC and so was Chaos seeds' MC until he discovered a viagra/birth control herb. Other books focuse on sex and are described as harem literature subtype.

 

So is your setting a person born into a game mechanism world (pop-ups and Stat sheets) or will they be dropped in from earth (or another world) into the game world, or will they be in an actual virtual video game (either stuck in the game or just playing it)?

 

Thank you, Johan. I bought Eric Ugland's book, and I think between King, Ugland, and Aleron, that's a good TBR before I start writing in April. So, again, thanks! I'm already deep into book two of The Land and I really enjoy it.

 

My character is a pretty A4 / boring person being thrown (involuntarily) into a game-world. I am unsure how to do it with the actual stat-increase stuff. I am not that keen on pop-ups and stat sheets, but I also understand it's an important part of the genre. I am thinking about alternative ways of doing, it, hoping the forementioned books will give me some inspiration

 

The cavern and creature series never show it, and barely talk about it. So there is not much need.