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Does the Legendary Moonlight Sculptor improve after a while? I'm quite far into volume 2 but it just feels like there's something missing. The main character reads like he was written by a rich kid's idea of what it would be to be poor. The entire game-world seems to conspire to make him overpowered but the author really wishes to give the impression that it's actually all from Weed's willpower and perseverance and not at all through sheer luck. Every seemingly dumb decision ends up being unquestioningly validated by the game. It feels like if he'd decide to stand on his head for 10 days straight the game would decide that that's amazing and make him God Emperor of the whole universe because of ~willpower~ That just doesn't feel very satisfying. Unlike for example 'Kumo desu ga', where the main character does get increasingly overpowered, but the amount of thought, consideration, and effort going into everything makes it feel so much more earned, and there's some actual tension because the enemies are a constant threat. New powers aren't just 'I hit faster/stronger', but involve a lot of tactics and make combat fun to read. And insane monster girl's inner monologue is surprisingly amusing and cute. The same goes for a xianxia webnovel I've been reading called Xian Ni. The basic premise is similar to the others above (except that it's not in a game-world), with a powerless character growing up into a force to be reckoned with, largely through the help of world-defying powers and, yeah, perseverance, but the whole journey feels satisfying because the main character makes a smart effort to get stronger, actually develops as a person, and gets an appropriate amount of threats to deal with. It's hard to describe why I find this more satisfying than LMS, but a good example would be how the MC in LMS in volume 2 is described as having gained an insane amount of 'Fighting Spirit' stat, something like 4 times more than even the highest rare numbers, simply because he's amazing for having battled strong opponents. It's as if with every new mechanic that's introduced the basic starting point is 'MC is super-duper awesome', and the only artistic effort goes into describing how awesome exactly. That's starting to get old really fast because it's really predictable.
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Aug 14, 2015 13:06
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Serious Frolicking posted:Weed eventually starts actually achieving awesome poo poo (well, awesome for an mmo) instead of doing mundane stuff while the narration fellates him. But no, while LMS does get better (and then worse, and then better again, what with how absurdly long it is) it is always cheesy as hell. Cool, I think I'll keep on reading. Partly I'm just a sucker for level-up stories, but the greater story of the sculptor seems intriguing enough as well. And yeah, Xian Ni could've done away with most of the mystical cultivation stuff which sadly fills up a whole lot of chapters. But I like that there's almost zero romance in the chapters translated so far, and the pay-off with him finally turning into an utter murderous dick, cause the world he's in is a hella poo poo place, was very satisfying. Judging from your description of that other novel, the author is probably at his best when it's just immortals being assholes all around.
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Aug 14, 2015 14:49
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I finished reading the translated stuff of ISSTH up on wuxiaworld and that's a drat nice novel, thanks for the recommendation. The first volume actually read a lot like a proper, thick book, with a proper epic climax, finishing off an already fun read of butt-explosions and constant dickbaggery. For some reason, the MC screwing everyone over twice as hard after others were dicks to him just doesn't get old. And I love that the protagonist from 'Kumo desu ga' seems to currently be turning into some kind of discoball of evil eyes, engulfing everything in a jumble of negative status effects just by passing through. She's such a cute little ball of death and destruction. The first human she meets will probably be accidentally set on fire, doused with poison, halfway petrified, and turned into goop, while all the voices in her head apologize profusely, and she'll then eat it anyway because why waste meat, and how does human actually taste anyway?
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Aug 22, 2015 20:56
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DeafAsianQT posted:I'm surprised there isn't more talk and translations of legendary moonlight sculptor, isn't it really popular? Yes, let me rant about Legendary Moonlight Sculptor. I stopped reading after 8 volumes. Long before that point, everything became so predictable the whole thing seemed to write itself. Whenever the author introduces other people, they always misunderstand the MC's awesomeness, then either get killed by him or fawn on him for the rest of the story. Whenever the author introduces a difficulty for the MC to overcome, the MC always comes up with the perfect plan that never backfires or just wins because of being awesome. Whenever the author introduces a new statistic or mechanic, the MC already has way more of that statistic when compared to everyone else because of being awesome. If that doesn't somehow irk you, the author then also has the gall to make the MC continuously complain about being awesome, which really only gives the impression of a guy making $500k a year complain about being 'poor and destitute'. He is also awesome in real life and for some reason his sister probably wants to gently caress him or something. The whole thing reminded me of that anime about technical magic with the guy whose sister also wanted to gently caress him and he also was superduper awesome at everything and also in the military and also a famous magical thingamabob creator. For some reason I kept watching that train-wreck for far too long, but I can't even remember the title. Moonlight Sculptor would've been interesting if the MC's greed would actually bite him in the rear end more often. Like when crafting the tomb for the king, the MC basically turns into a corrupt contractor who uses subpar materials to safe costs, pocketing the rest of the money. I would've loved it if the drat tomb collapsed, killed the last king, or melted with the first rain. Hell, something other than 'oh god how amazing you build a tomb incredible, here have more rewards' 
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Aug 30, 2015 21:37
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Linnaeus posted:Why I don't know! I think I just kept reading hoping that the author would at some point get better and learn how to craft an engaging story, if only even by accident. It never happened. I stopped reading the moment the MC thought it would be a good idea to have a warrior hit him on purpose, and the author then pulls out of his rear end that the MC had all along gained huge amounts of fortitude, and had also gained a new stat that was even more overpowered, and of course nobody else could compare. I should've stopped reading the first time this exact same scenario happened somewhere around volume 1. Silver2195 posted:You're probably thinking of Mahouka. Yes, Mahouka. I'm glad I never read the novels of that show.
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Aug 30, 2015 22:01
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Well, I liked the game-world, when things were focused on crafting things, finding out new properties and skills, or advancing what apparently was the 'main story' of the sculptor class. And as long as the MC was just exploring poo poo on his own, there wasn't much opportunity for him to be eulogized by everybody else. The more things opened up, the worse that became. The whole thing could've been much more interesting if being a sculptor hadn't meant that he somehow turns out to be amazing at everything else as well, and that he'd actually have to compensate for being weak in some areas.
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Aug 30, 2015 23:19
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Part of me wants Kumoko to turn into a battleship-sized, hovering spider with multiple control centres and aerial bombardments. She's already pretty much got specialized targeting systems, magic systems, etc. The other parts of me are happy with where we're at. Algid posted:Also in the latest ISSTH Meng Hao demonstrates the five step exploding balls technique. Still loving ISSTH. It doesn't suffer so much from 'making poo poo up the further we get' like Xian Ni. Also been reading a lot of Douluo Dalu lately, which has more of a coherent overarching story. The MC is the typical special snowflake sure to be(come) more powerful than everyone else, but it doesn't bother me so much in this story, he's got personality outside of being powerful and there's usually a whole team of other decent characters to go along. The same can't be said for some of the same author's other work, like Shen Yin Wang Zou, which I've been trying to read but after Act 1 only gives me the impression that the author was trying to recreate what he had going with Douluo Dalu but fails. Instead, so far he's only succeeded in coming up with a needlessly complicated power-ranking system and a terribly bland MC who is instantly special with only good traits. I don't mind powerful MC's, but at least make them struggle and throw proportionate threats in their direction. Act 1 has been so uninteresting I'm not sure I want to continue. I've also tried reading Kuangshen by the same author and that one is equally not succeeding in convincing me.
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Sep 6, 2015 23:21
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Cynic Jester posted:Ze Tian Ji is awesome. It's a very atypical Chinese cultivation story, even more so than ISSTH. The main character still hasn't successfully cultivated. This is delightful. There's a strange quality to Ze Tian Ji that reminds me of other works I've read but always had difficulty describing. Soothing might be a good start though. Like painted in faded water colors. In a way this feels more daoist than pretty much every other xianxia I've read. The humor and emphasis on manners somehow reminds me of the novel Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. The conversations consisting of very short sentences, like at the end of the prologue and a few times later on, are just so simple, charming, but powerful. Fleve fucked around with this message at 15:01 on Sep 11, 2015 |
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Sep 11, 2015 14:42
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Does the Kumo author assume that we already know or understand what the hell is exactly going on with the take-over/eating mother thing? I feel like I missed a chapter or two somewhere, but as far as I remember the whole eating-thing was mentioned only twice and in passing. Hopefully the sidestory Remnants of the Nightmare will offer some more info.
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Sep 17, 2015 20:23
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I heartily concur with the ISSTH's recommendations. But I can't say the same for the last bunch of translated chapter's of the same author's Xian Ni. I haven't got a clue what the hell the story is up to. I seem to remember that there were a lot of plot lines left dangling ages ago, but rather than to actually do something with it like ISSTH, the author just makes up poo poo as he goes and that gives me the impression I'm reading filler or something. I really don't give a drat about endless descriptions of void creatures or taming devils. Against the Gods is getting too self-eulogizing for my taste. I know that gaining powerups, techniques, weapons and items is a staple of the xianxia genre, but an MC should have to put some work into it, there should be some tension, the formula shouldn't always be glorious victory against overwhelming odds, that gets boring fast. ATG's MC gains everything wherever he goes, in comparison ISSTH's Meng Hao often doesn't really gain anything at all from a lot of his adventures, but advances or adds plot instead, which is a lot more compelling. The current developments in ATG feel hamfisted, like a kid excitedly telling his buddy, 'and then he beat 100 enemies! but there were even more and he beat them too! and then 1000 enemies! 100.000! he's so strong!'. Now that I'm writing anyway. I'd prefer if Sevens dropped the whole harem thing and just focused on dungeoneering, skills and the I'm still enjoying Ze Tian Ji, King Shura, and Douluo Dalu, a lot. I only wish they'd be translated faster, especially the first two.
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Oct 7, 2015 12:18
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I probably should've voiced that somewhat differently. Yes, he's obtaining a lot of stuff, but often it's not just plain techniques or powerful items, sometimes it's questionable whether the gains are beneficial, and even when it's of great benefit it often comes with potential drawbacks. The powerups generally happen side-by-side to the plot developments, and the plot isn't just Meng Hao getting stronger and stronger. Gaining Ultimate Vexation will probably turn into some sort of benefit, but right now it's just a nuisance. But that kind of stuff is more interesting than gaining Ultimate Primordial Phoenix Something Something Kill Skill that does nothing but kill things, and apparently it ties in with the mirror from way back. Or a gain comes with a drawback, like being impervious to poisons while actually still being poisoned, which apparently also comes with a potential backstory. Or gaining a perfect foundation which comes with heavenly tribulations.
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Oct 7, 2015 14:13
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I've enjoyed going through the whole lot of Coiling Dragon up on Wuxiaworld. That's an impressively coherent world-story, though it got a bit repetitive when battle turned into a kind of triangle system and success depended on whether you did or didn't have certain artifacts. Still, I like how the story goes through multiple cycles of weak to strong over the course of a few millenia. There's obvious plot-armor and absurdly lucky power-ups, but at least the MC isn't always untouchable and had to rely on things other than strength every once in a while. Hows the rest of 'I Eat Tomatoes''s work? Anything to recommend in particular? Against the Gods I'm pretty close to either dropping or moving to a...'let's see how bad this can get' category. The first rape power-up was dumb and aggravating, but apparently the author has decided that that's how he's gonna roll and moves full steam into a similar setup. From some comments I can glimpse that that's where Martial God Asura already went in the past so I'm probably gonna avoid that one pre-emptively. ISSTH is still lotsa fun and I had kinda hoped Battle Through The Heavens would also scratch my alchemy itch, but there's not enough actual alchemy and way too much ATG-style combat.
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Nov 4, 2015 20:15
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I'm really bad at dropping something once I've started reading it. Like back when I read Moonlight Sculptor and meandered into volume 8. If an author writes a bit that's utter poo poo, I still wouldn't mind as long it's not the default. Coiling Dragon had a godawful chapter that had the author wonder whether it's wrong or not for a (self-proclaimed loving, but also cheating) husband to murder the extra-marital children of your wife once she ran away from their abusive relationship and found a guy who was less of an rear end (and kill that guy too, of course), literally questioning 'Who was right? Who was wrong?', as if there was somehow a moral dilemma involved. Misogyny seems to be endemic to Chinese webnovels, but apart from a few moments Coiling Dragon was ok. Other novels just seem to nosedive deep into the poo poo and then wallow there. I cannot understand how there are people actually defending any of that in comments.
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Nov 5, 2015 02:04
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Aw bollocks. Seems like Binggo&Corp dropped Ze Tian Ji? They were doing a great job at translating and Ze Tian Ji seems to be one of the few web/light novels that has writing worth a drat so the translation quality actually makes a difference. I was avoiding reading the pastebin translation cause it didn't seem all that great and hoping for something better but I guess there's no improved version coming up soon.
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Nov 27, 2015 09:37
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I'm not too impressed with Spice & Wolf's grasp of economic matters myself to be honest. The first book's entire silver thing is a load of nonsensical waffle that only in the end makes sortof sense. Same with most of the other centerpiece story devices, like the pyrite futures trade. But I guess the books aren't about trading. They're about a guy who meets a god-girl and has adventures while travelling. Hardly any of the trading parts hold up to scrutiny, they're just there to create scenarios for the characters to overcome. It's a shame, though, because the books rely a lot on a sort of economic murder mystery, with an introduction of potential profit or a tricky problem, and an ending reveal of plans and double-crosses. That all falls into the water when the mystery doesn't really follow any logic.
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Dec 25, 2015 00:13
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I love how everything is so ridiculous, outlandish and absurd in ISSTH. Yes, other xianxia novels have magical beasts and techniques and whatnot, but they usually don't have people flying around in giant meteors, flying spider armies that block out the sun, humongous sentient Discworld turtles as a Patriarch, or The Lord Fifth. The anime of Grimgal (Grimgar?) got me interested in its light novel version and, although I enjoyed reading what was translated, I feel like the anime is actually better. The light novel has far too much boob dialogue and Ranta is an infuriatingly annoying twat. Both of those elements seem to be toned down in the anime and it improves things a lot.
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Feb 6, 2016 22:05
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Algid posted:A lot of the terms are actually pretty generic fantasy terms, that's what makes it so great. It's like the written account of an eleven year old playing with his That sounds like what's currently translated as Greatfather, or perhaps Grand Elder, but Greatfather seems more likely. Do we keep getting these kind of story arcs where entirely new categories of skills are introduced? We've gone from demon sealing, to alchemy, to totems, and I love that most of what we've met earlier is still relevant. Hell, the mirror produced the parrot, that's a hell of a pay off. Arkeus posted:Ranta being an infuriatingly annoying twat is a huge plot point, though. As for the boob dialog, I had actually completely forgotten it and thought the anime did that more. That's true and I actually agreed with Ranta for a second, but then he went bonkers again. I hope it resolves soonish because the lengthy meaningless arguments over nothing aren't very gripping.
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Feb 7, 2016 01:58
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I'm totally ok with Patriarch Reliance being the size of the sun and leaving a sun-sized hole in another mega-planet upon departure. Well, perhaps not totally ok because things of that size would probably have severe gravity consequences, but I'd be fine with hand-waving that away with 'formations' or the magic-equivalent of cultivation. I started reading 'World of Cultivation'. Please tell me this is going to stay Zombie Farmville Xianxia for a significant amount of chapters. It's surprisingly fun to read about the farming adventures of an expressionless money-grubber. I also began reading Bringing The Farm To Live In Another World, but it seems a lot more shallow, probably more so because the translation is relying so much on machine translation and apparently very little on actually knowing the language.
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Feb 17, 2016 02:01
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FriggenJ posted:It gets even better. He remains a money grubbing farmer in a sword sect and his elders all get pissed off cause all he does is make money and chill. Hah! That is perfect. Well poo poo, there go my plans to do things other than reading xianxia.
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Feb 17, 2016 02:09
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Well, leaving those words untranslated isn't because they couldn't translate them, it's just a bad stylistic decision. You get used to it after enough chapters, but yeah it's cumbersome. The first chapter is the worst offender. If you can get through the initial terminology spagetthi, I think it's definitely worth reading. It's like a more low-key ISSTH with Meng Hao starting out as an outer sect magic grains farmer.
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Feb 18, 2016 12:47
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And in order to con more strong people he has to maintain his 9th Anima. It's concyclic.
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May 11, 2016 19:50
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Meng Hao tries honest work. Is disappointed. "This doesn’t compare at all to conning people.”
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May 14, 2016 00:28
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I liked Sevens but dropped it because of the constant harem nonsense. It seems to be my general experience with a lot of the Japanese novels I tried reading. First I get intrigued by the story, the world and the adventuring. Then the first girl enters into the harem and I think, yeah ok, gotta have a party member and perhaps some romance I guess. Some sort of weird animal gets picked up and inevitably turns into a little girl, a shitton of other girls flock to the party, they talk and fawn over the MC, none of them are interesting. The story disappears beneath a deluge of harem interaction, everything grinds to a glacial pace, and I drop it wondering why the hell I expected this one to turn out differently. As soon as there's enough girls in a harem, every novel seems to end up getting bogged down with monotonous waffle about trite topics, minor social conventions like dropping honorifics, meaningless misunderstandings, and the usual gratingly repetitive language like "Is that so...", "Is that how it is.", "So that's how it is.", "It is as you say.", or outright repeating entire sentence and paragraphs but with a question mark attached. Shield Hero, Sevens, The New Gate, and a bunch of others I can’t remember. If it wasn’t for the drat harems that inevitably progressed into a quagmire of tedium I'd have probably continued to read them. Edit: That said, Sevens was great especially at the start, and if it goes back to old form I might finish it. Dropped it around the volume they ended up getting the robo girl. Fleve fucked around with this message at 13:15 on Jun 7, 2016 |
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Jun 7, 2016 13:09
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I like medieval literature. It can be very direct and blunt and occasionally comes with an endearing kind of sarcasm. Like when Simon de Montfort died at the Siege of Toulouse during the Albigensian crusade, and a not-so-friendly southern author recalls the event: "…there was in the town a mangonel built by a carpenter and dragged with its platform from St Sermin. This was worked by noblewomen, by little girls and men’s wives, and now a stone arrived just where it was needed and struck Count Simon on his steel helmet, shattering his eyes, brains, back teeth, forehead and jaw. Bleeding and black, the count dropped dead on the ground. (...) How many knights and barons you would have heard lamenting, weeping under their helmets and crying out in anger! Aloud they exclaimed, “God, it is not right to let the count be killed! How stupid to serve you, to fight for you, when the daring count who was kind and daring, is killed by a stone like a criminal! Since you strike and slay your own servants, there’s no work for us here any more!"
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Aug 24, 2016 00:53
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Katamari Daoqi
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Aug 28, 2016 17:57
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| # ¿ May 16, 2024 11:42 |
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Yeah that's some Sesame street Count von Count poo poo right there. Except the Count would be done a hella lot faster and there'd be balloons and confetti. Ah-ah-ah. Edit: Also, now that we know that this Kịshịhbặbrbǡblựb dude had 120 meridians, there's an approximately 120% chance Meng Hao will open 120+N meridians. Fleve fucked around with this message at 14:05 on Sep 29, 2016 |
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Sep 29, 2016 13:53
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