LitRPG Forum discussion

Hi everyone,

it's one of these days...
I run out of books to read and serching though tons of LitRPG books to find something good is tedious.

So i will start with my Top 5 LitRPG list here (limit: at least two books in a series are available) to give others some ideas.

5. Chaos Seeds: Aleron Kong
4. Way of the Shaman: Vasily Mahanenko
3. The Dragon's Wrath: Roth Brent (3 books but Author is sick, not sure if more books will be written)
2. Awaken Online: Travis Bagwell
1. The Dark Herbalist: Michael Atamanov

Honorable mentions: Ascend Online (only one book but oh boy, what a start, Book 2 will be out soon), Bushido Online #1 (good start and a bit different), You're not allowed to Die (also a really solid first book) and not really LitRPG but kind of levels and skills present, Cradle from Will Wight.

Cheers!

5. SpeedRunner What a surprise. Latest love. I can't wait for book 2!
4. Gamer for Life Book one was my jam and a delight to read. Book 2 wavered a bit and gave me less of what I loved, however, I hope for book 3 to be even bettah.
3. The Weirdest Noob The Weirdest Noob features all the beloved tropes mashed into one volume of LitRPG goodness.
2. Survival Quest Every book was great except for that ONE. Uh huh, everyone knows which one I'm talkin' about.
1. End Online: Volume 1 The series that took my LitRPG 🍒

Honorable mentions: Hero of Thera, Catharsis, Life in the North (for the shopping!), Ascend Online, Chronicle of the Eternal: Volume 1, Life Reset, Start the Game

I'm about 80 percent through what the LitRPG genre has to offer, so I have not read everything. And there are some books I won't touch because of the reviews or the blurb puts me to sleep. So, take this list with a grain of salt, and I hope you find as much enjoyment out of these books as I have.

Love these lists, thanks for the topic Mondragon <3

I won't give my top 5 because I'm not sure I've read 5 different LitRPG series yet. I will draw your attention to The Gam3 by Cosimo Yap. It meets your at least two criteria, though the second book is just meh.

Right now my list would look like:

4. The Game is Life (not sure this is really LitRPG though)
3. Survival Quest
2. The Gam3
1. Awaken Online

But again, that may be the complete list of series I've gotten through this far. Although there are several singletons, they have all been mentioned already, except Ready Player One (does that count).

Hi Chuck,

there is much for you to read ;)

Ready Player One is probably one the first book which could be characterized as LitRPG and it is imho one of the best single books in LitRPG out there.

Here are my 5. Though they all aren't Series.

5. Emerilia - Good if you like lots of crafting in game. And lots of books in the series which helps to take up time.
4. Survival Quest - Way of the Shaman - Ups and downs, but good overall.
3. The Game3 - Great start to a series
2. Chaos Seed - When is the next one coming out!
1. Awaken Online - My favorite so far, very good both in-game and out of the game story. Most of these type fall flat beside when they are in the game.

Ready Player one is also great as well as a single book :) as stated by Mondragon. Unless you hate the 80's then you may despise the book =P.

Thanks for the other lists, there are some I haven't read yet!

Here are my top 5

5. Realm of Nine Circles
4. Awaken Online
3. Alpha World
2. Viridian Gate Online
1. Last Horizon

Favorite top 5 singletons

5. Unbound Deathlord
4. Codename Freedom
3. Nigmus Online
2. Ascend Online book 1
1. Ready Player One

Ready Player One was my first and is still my favorite. I'm partial to it because I was teen in the 80's and played Pac man on the console.

Felicity wrote: "5. SpeedRunner What a surprise. Latest love. I can't wait for book 2!"

I have that one on my Kindle but somehow i didn't started reading it.
Sounds like i have missed something there and should give it a try soon ;)

I've read all the books mentioned in this thread, oh well.

I'm not one to rank books, but I do want to mention that RRL has some very interesting web novels that are actively being updated.

My favorite from there. I really recommend you check it out. It's not exactly conventional LitRPG, but it pulls off the game aspects very well.

Laurenz wrote: "I've read all the books mentioned in this thread, oh well.

I'm not one to rank books, but I do want to mention that RRL has some very interesting web novels that are actively being updated.

My fa..."

Might want to note that this becomes very NSFW in later chapters.

1 Daniel Black - E. William Brown
2 NPC's - Drew Hayes
3 Caverns and Creatures/Critical Failures - Robert Bevan
4 Awaken online - Travis Bagwell
4 Ascend online - Luke Chmilenko
5 The Weirdest Noob - Arthur Stone

Yes, i can count to five, you see?
I know the Daniel Black series is not an RPG per se, but still, i wanted to include it in my list.

If we are to speak of English-language lit-rpg-and-like books, mine are:
- Daniel Black by E.Willian Brown (not lit-rpg per se )
- Rules-free VRMMO and VRMMO:Life by Stuart Grosse
- Selfless hero trilogy by Williams D. Arand
- Ancient Dreams series by Halls of Power (not litrpg per se, it's 'dungeon core' series)
- Alpha Company by Daniel Schinhofen (not read 3rd one yet)


p.s.
No Russian translations in list because I read them in Russian. My separate Russian-litrpg-but-at-least-some-books-are-translated- list :
- AlterWorld by D Rus
- Valdira cycle (with all 3 subcycles) by Dem Mikhaylov
- Phantom Server / Neuro by Andrei Livadny
- Perimeter Defense / The Dark Herablist by Michael Atamanov
- The Weirdest Noob by Arthur Stone

Ive become a bit of a LitRPG junkie lately so just picking 5 will be hard. Lets see:

5. Awaken Online by Travis Bagwell
4. Ascend Online by Luke Chmilenko (Technically there are 2 books out... Sort of)
3. Chaos Seeds by Aleron Kong
2. Play to Live by D. Rus
1. Realm of Arkon by G. Akella (cant believe no one listed this one!)

That was harder than i thought. Heres a few notable others that i really liked:

- Ready Player One (a must read for anyone period!)
- The Gam3 Series by Cosimo Yap (Definitely in my top 10)
- Divine Dungeon by Dakota Krout (not technically LitRPG, but a great read non the less)
- Mirror World by Alexey Osadchuk (could maybe use a little but better translation, but still a good story)
- Unbound Deathlord by Edward Castle (only one book out yet, but i really enjoyed it)
- The Weirdest Noob by Arthur Stone (Third book ive read where the main character starts out an indentured miner. Still. I thoroughly enjoyed both books.)

I've read a few LitRPG and most of them are okay there only the odd few that stand out. There are a lot more books I wanted to add but other peoples list above all ready had them. (I know there more than 5)

Overlord, Vol. 1 (light novel): The Undead King
Resurgence
End Online: Volume 1
The Way of the Clan Book 1
Hero of Thera
Reboot
The Reborn

My 5 favorites are:

1. Ascend Online
2. Resurgence Online
3. Viridian Gate
4. NPC's
5. Speedrunner/Hero of Thera/Weirdest Noob