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The Savage Realms Online #1
The Savage Realms
The Lord of the Rings meets The Matrix...When Allison Bowers loses her job, she joins the Savage Realms for a chance to win ten million in cryptocurrency, but this is more than a simple video game. The Savage Realms is no place for the feint of heart. Life in the Realms is cheap. Allison learns there are some fates worse than death, and losing in the Realms may just be one of them."A Breath taking adventure from start to finish!""One of the most original new fantasy books to come along since Ernest Cline's Ready Player One.""I couldn't put it down." The Savage Realms is a story about a virtual game world. It does NOT contain stats or leveling.
442 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 24, 2018
22 people are currently reading
21 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
November 21, 2023
I really enjoyed this. After a steady diet of Willard Black Redgar stories I wasn't anticipating quite this -- but it is grand storytelling filled with S&S adventuring, so all's well! Nicely fleshed out characters with pasts and motivations and fears and loves...and edged weapons, dangerous sorcery, and fearsome foes. A really fun S&S version of READY PLAYER ONE that's far more my style and frankly much better. My only wee nitpick is the label LitRPG that appeared at the end...I'm gonna say with no leveling up rigamarole just because it takes place in a game world doesn't make it so.
February 14, 2019
On the surface, this book appears to have a lot in common with Ready Player One. Both novels are about a quest to find a treasure in an immersive online gaming environment but the similarities aren’t really even skin deep. In Ready Player One the hunt is a mystery that has people acting both in the game world and the real word, but in The Savage Realms, after a brief set up, all the action takes place within the game and takes the form of a classic fantasy quest.
The Savage Realms game is an unusually realistic gaming environment—so much so that it seems to steal a lot of the fun from the fantasy gaming experience. There doesn’t appear to be character levels. People learn skills the way they do in the real world. Injury and death is as painful as in the real world. To log out you have to travel to specific ports that might take weeks or months of journeying to reach and pirates attempt to kidnap characters who have just logged in to abuse and enslave them. The treasures in the game can be converted to money in the real world and this is facilitated by a banking feature. Frankly, the whole premise fascinated me, but the only reason for most people to be in the game appears to be that crappy as their game experience might be it is better than what most people are experiencing in the real world.
That being said…the actual quest to find the money is well done. The people who make up Cinder’s adventuring party are well constructed and very important to the storyline. Their personalities matter and lead to a convincing and very exciting ending. Cinder herself has a moment of utter stupidity that was totally not believable and totally unnecessary to the plot (there were other ways for other gamers to find out that she thought she had the solution to the mystery of where the prize money is) but that being said, the story recovered and held my interest. Over all, I quite enjoyed this novel and would be interested in seeing more books set in The Savage Realms—especially if they would shine some more light on the connections between the lives of the players in the real world and the game.
If you liked this review, you can find more at www.gilbertstack.com/reviews.
The Savage Realms game is an unusually realistic gaming environment—so much so that it seems to steal a lot of the fun from the fantasy gaming experience. There doesn’t appear to be character levels. People learn skills the way they do in the real world. Injury and death is as painful as in the real world. To log out you have to travel to specific ports that might take weeks or months of journeying to reach and pirates attempt to kidnap characters who have just logged in to abuse and enslave them. The treasures in the game can be converted to money in the real world and this is facilitated by a banking feature. Frankly, the whole premise fascinated me, but the only reason for most people to be in the game appears to be that crappy as their game experience might be it is better than what most people are experiencing in the real world.
That being said…the actual quest to find the money is well done. The people who make up Cinder’s adventuring party are well constructed and very important to the storyline. Their personalities matter and lead to a convincing and very exciting ending. Cinder herself has a moment of utter stupidity that was totally not believable and totally unnecessary to the plot (there were other ways for other gamers to find out that she thought she had the solution to the mystery of where the prize money is) but that being said, the story recovered and held my interest. Over all, I quite enjoyed this novel and would be interested in seeing more books set in The Savage Realms—especially if they would shine some more light on the connections between the lives of the players in the real world and the game.
If you liked this review, you can find more at www.gilbertstack.com/reviews.
February 17, 2019
This was a surprisingly immersive story. I’m not a gamer, I always found the action too impersonal. The Savage Realms is a story that makes gaming so real that you can have a heart attack in real life due to what happens in the game. Its like being physically transported to another world its so real.
Many of the characters, including our main characters, are flawed and broken. Greed, jealousy, pride and revenge are constant companions throughout the story. There are also glimpses of light, compassion and generosity that shine through.
I really enjoyed this book. There is the odd grammatical error but nothing glaring. All in all a good book that I’m happy to recommend to others.
I received a complimentary copy from VRO in return for an honest review.
Many of the characters, including our main characters, are flawed and broken. Greed, jealousy, pride and revenge are constant companions throughout the story. There are also glimpses of light, compassion and generosity that shine through.
I really enjoyed this book. There is the odd grammatical error but nothing glaring. All in all a good book that I’m happy to recommend to others.
I received a complimentary copy from VRO in return for an honest review.
March 5, 2019
Very good book. Takes place in a gamers world where virtual money can be gained and used in the real world. A quest to find the biggest pot in the game ensues and the adventure begins for a set few who learn about its whereabouts.
January 30, 2019
One of the best books I have read in a long time, read it until I couldn't keep my eyes open any longer, picked it up again and finished it as soon as I woke up. It was a great adventure.
October 21, 2021
Decent enough story. It's a gamelit entry, (not a LitRPG one), but it's interesting enough regardless. I'd read more if I run across them.
February 26, 2025
Forget about the VR aspect
Very good story when you dismiss the VR aspect. Didn’t think the story would gain any real traction and the VR would take over.
Very good story when you dismiss the VR aspect. Didn’t think the story would gain any real traction and the VR would take over.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews