The Ultimate Evolution

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I traverse along the pathway of darkness and imagination…

Entering the realm born by human imaginations…

Challenging Harry Potter’s magic, commanding the great Pirates of the Caribbean.

Terminating the Terminator’s strength, tearing apart the Matrix’s Hallucination.

Virus is my s*ave.

Endurance my inheritance.

Growing and hunting in the boundless universe.

Breaking through boundaries in a mysterious space.

Desiring evil, conspiracy and betrayer. Who can redeem what was already lost?

In a battle of demons, who can leave an immortal legacy?

A declining Trump card, Final evolution!

I’m… on a journey!

We are one!

Associated Names
One entry per line
TUE
最终进化
Related Series
Ace Evolution (Prequel)
The First Evolution (Sequel)
Recommendations
Terror Infinity (11)
Infinity Armament (6)
Arena (6)
Thriller Paradise (4)
Reincarnation Paradise (3)
Evolution Theory of the Hunter (3)
Recommendation Lists
  1. Novels that I have read
  2. Fanfiction
  3. Favourites
  4. Server Reccomendations #1
  5. Ln/Wn without any harem

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UncleOddball
UncleOddball rated it
December 11, 2016
Status: v4c78
I've picked up this one out of boredom, wich is quite frequent for me lately.

It. Was. Not. A. Mistake.

/|\ that's the short description for people who lack time and/or patience to bite my full review.
\|/ If you feel like reading some of my thought's regarding this novel, please do enjoy:

... more>> I've skimmed through various reviews on this novel, including indirect evaluement from other similar concepts. It pleases me to see this new sub-genre of novels to bloom one, after another. Off with the sidetracking.

There's a hidden challenge in reading the [Ultimate Evolution]. It requires you to crawl through first handful of chapters, wich are introducing the MC's background before he begins his [evolution]. And god bless my soul, it was awful, cringy, boring, bland and yuck. But I had struggled through it, and I do not regret. The story picks up it's pace after MC comes in contact with this mysterious and diabolical Nightmare Realm.

It makes me think of [GantZ], [Terror Infinity] and somewhat it has a similar taste to the [Evolution Theory of the Hunter].

Personally, I had dropped [TI] some time ago, and I do not think that I will return to reading it. I had seen some people comparing [UE] to [TI] favouring toward one or the other. In my humble opinion, comparing the two of them is similar to clashing [Log Horizon] against [SAO]. It won't work.

Both [TI] and [UE] are novels about a mysterious and devilish design of unknown origin, that's dragging people of our world into an everchanging, evertwisting and everbending carnival of violence, carnage, betrayal, greed and other intense emotions interwining with each other. They both show the ugly side of humanity, the darkness that dwells in those monsters that call themselves The Mankind. But, they do it differently.

Of those two novels I like [UE] more. It has a decent and fairly complex system carved deeply into the background. Nightmare Realm operates in ways that at first seem random and weird, but later are explained and some of them can be deduced by a reader earlier, if he/she pays enough attention.

It has greater diversity from [TI]. Our MC can and will get himself involved with so many different worlds, that I can't wait to see where it leads.
Below is a non-awful information about how many "movies" were done by the chapter mentioned in my review's status.
Spoiler

Currently the translation is at the point just after the third movie.

[collapse]

The loot system seems good. It has it's own charm and fairness.

Another refreshing point is the way the "movies" are balanced. [UE] places emphasis on the "weight" a character of the movie world have. Regular NPC are not a threat. Elite NPC are dangerous. Boss-class NPC are very powerful, and the Main Characters are simply dreadful. Also, each "setting" has it's own restrictions and they vary greatly, wich is another interesting fact.

There is a bit of info dump, but it did not rub me the wrong way. Actually, I find it an important part of this novel's charm. The notifications and battle logs that MC get's are like solid chains binding the story-telling aspect of the Nightmare Realm with it's game-like trait. It serves as a way to translate statistics we see from time to time into a reasonable proof of it's inner workings. What I dislike in most of the novels with [game elements] is their unreliability in this matter. You get some big numbers and capital letters for the ranks, but after a while you will crease your brows and think "bullshit". [UE] on the other hand seems more "well planed". Of course there will be some plot armor. MC is needed to survive all this shit. Duh.

But lemme' tell ya something. While reading this novel, you will not think about it. It's interesting enough to get immersed in it's coils, until you forget about everything else. Heck, I had started it recently as a way to kill time on the bus to my workplace, but I had found myself wasting an hour after a night shift, just to read a handful more, before going to sleep. Wich is why, I am giving it a full five star rating. Because it grabbed my attention with such a firm grip.

It has it's flaws, I won't tell you a lie that it's a perfect, or the best novel out there.
To all of those that had reached this bottom line, still unsure whether to spend an effort with this novel: It's worth a try. <<less
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drakiesan
drakiesan rated it
January 24, 2020
Status: c307
I don't know why the reviews are so good... It's really not that good and here is why:

  1. Tons of unnecessary infodumps - like a TONS!, often third to half of chapter is just pure infodump with height, weight etc. Or repeating why MC did this and that over and over again. And battle-logs are the worst, lot of math often wrongly counted, completely unnecessary. It's really disruptive. Especially in fight when you have battle-log, then paragraph of fight and then battle-log again. I doesn't even read battle-logs in games. I only need to know DPS and abilities of equipment.
  2. System - there is so many wrong things with this... first utility points, potential points, achievement points... all of it is just SO BORING!, MC is always with nothing left, it always feels like he gain nothing or he is in heavy deficit. He works his ass off for almost nothing (except as MC he has always LUCK to max). Second what the heck is explosive strenght? Like when he hits it explodes? Or is it like figuratively speaking? Why not fking use DPS (min - max), it would reduce infodumps at least for half. Because the emphasis on explosive strenght is HUGE! It's main core of every damage and it's heavily insubstantial. And there are not weak spots (like neck, eyes, mouth, heart, etc, just doesn't make sense). A lot of those system are half-assed and wrongly presented. A lot of it doesn't make sense.
  3. Fighting, adversaries - Every time he fights enemy he is like meat cannonball, takes hundreds of dmg and nothing happens to him (yea I know MC is MT) but it's always strange... MT wouldn't even have chance against proper damage-dealer. Especially with support. MC lacks decisive power, he is often weaker, but defeats his enemies with wits, even those who was in that world for years, knows it in and out, but when they are fighting MC their IQ drops by 50 points and became just living boxing bag. Literally, that s*upid they become.
  4. Unieqness of MT innate abilities - what the hell? Like MC is the only one out of 7 billion people on the world who has hardships. There are many who had it worse than him. Way way worse. Like those kids in cages, intentionaly infected. MTs are often in every game I played, they was never unique or rare and scarce... Supports and healers are rare and scarce in games, and often needed...
  5. Characters - Mogensha (or how) is fanatic who listens every word MC says, even though nobody knows why. There is lot of people like MC... it's just weird. Reef is hypocritical fanatic whose beliefs always killed his whole party (ALWAYS! except the MC one of course), he is annoying and serving only as meatshield. Other characters are just 2D classic supporting chars to elevate MC, often lacks any personality (his adoptive father and brother are scarce exceptions). Villains are the worst, they are often portayed as cunning, witty, smart, strong etc but when fights MC they personality and IQ drops drastically. It's just s*upid. (like that Metals professor... she basically commited su*cide by herself, so that her underling... why? doesn't makes sense a little bit)
  6. Story - could be good, except infodumps are destroying it, the whole system (nightmare realm) seems like some sort of training military camp for unknown purposes (to this chapter). Next is if I would read it as owner of Disney I would sue author. He is epitome of chinese thief and plagiator. It's just disgusting. He doesn't even tries to hide it, he blatantly use stories, names and setups from movies and games (StarCraft+Starship Troopers, or Harry Potter, LotR, and much more). Author lacks everything author needs... he is untalented prick.
  7. MC plot armor - thick as antinuclear bunker. When plotholes, insanty and s*upidity of author reach epitome... Doesn't make sense, especially with everyone who are there way longer than him... It's like everyone else is idiot.
  8. Well atleast there is not much of that insane patriotism and racism, so often in Chinese novels, even though author is taking extra precaution to not write anything detrimental about Chinese governement (du-uh!)
  9. Thanks to that infodump even though chapters are of average lenght, you realise that story is just half chapter... so it feels like fast paced, but it's actually super slow..
I really doesn't understand why it's so popular. It's really boring and s*upid, full of plotholes, infodumps and s*upidity. I am personally dropping it. Better read Devil's Cage...
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vilovito
vilovito rated it
April 1, 2017
Status: v5
Unpredictable, witty, descriptive, clear fight scenes, slightly slow pace but still interesting, calculated risk. Ultimate Evolution is definitely a great read. There may be certain questionable facts at time, but which novel doesn't have that? Volume 1 is the entire long prologue, and volume 2 is sort of introduction into the scene and building up the fundamental knowledge, so there's loads of explaining which is understandable given the mysterious place he is in. The story starts to show its brilliance from volume 3 onwards, which is amazing, you have to... more>> read it yourself. Anyway, don't judge merely based on 1 volume, which is the prologue. Lmao if all novels are judged on its prologue then bad novels can count as good, and good novels can be utter shit. Moreover, regarding that '70 meters pistol' incident, I was kinda interested and went back to take a look, apparently they revised it already, and I checked with raws as well. It's 7-8 meters so TL prolly made a mistake last time. <<less
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castiel101
castiel101 rated it
March 12, 2017
Status: v6c35
At first I was looking for similar series of terror Infinity and lots of people recommended Ultimate Evolution. After reading the description, I half understood the story's flow and was immediately became uninterested. I put off reading this series for along time and when I finally read it- it was SERIOUSLY AN AMAZING NOVEL. It was seriously amazing that I could not stop reading every chapters. Thankfully the translator translates this series regularly or else I would be in the process of UE withdrawal...

Now that aside, I will elaborate how... more>> good this novel is.. There are a lot so I would only mention some...

Firstly, the main lead is a cunning and wise (like Light from Death Note and Lelouch). Unlike the MC in Terror Infinity where he gradually raise his resolve to be the leader of the team, Sheyan already posses the quality to lead.

Lastly, the flow of the series is unpredictable. Every single part of the ln is exciting and unpredictable, you could not predict the mc's actions. This unpredictability is what I love the most in Ultimate Evolution.

I hope that I have conveyed how much I love Ultimate Evolution. It may start off slow and may be a bit boring, have a bit of patience because as the story flows it will become more interesting.<3 <<less
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Knightlight
Knightlight
August 25, 2016
Status: v2c28
mmmm, takes on a similar role to Terror Infinity, but MUCH more freedom really than terror infinity. Also you aren't working with people (unless you really really want to) and are completing your own objectives in the world (movies for all of them I assume, since we only JUST complete the first movie at the time of this review). Also only those who already have great potential are brought here, not random people who will ultimately just straight up die and are already super depressed with life. Sure some of... more>> them have sh*t situations, but everyone in Terror Infinity were just up and done with life in general. <<less
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kkgoh
kkgoh rated it
November 14, 2017
Status: c1100
It's genuinely entertaining with the interactions between the real world/movie world. Was great till Chapter 1000, then started going downhill when author made a huge pivot (and acknowledged it). Story ended shortly after around Chapter 1400+.

Not sure why it's rated under 4.0. Protagonist is smart adult (mid 20s?) who has to scheme to get ahead, not some dumb OP chuunibyou. It's definitely (and thankfully) NOT a shounen genre. MC is definitely in the grey area but has a strong sense of righteousness. It's already been tagged as "Mature". Reviewers clamoring... more>> for a pure good guy character should just go read kids novels like Shen Yin Wang Zuo or manga like One Piece or Sailormoon.

The battles are pretty EPIC, and it's hilarious when he interacts with/puts down the movie characters in a believable manner. Movie characters are how you'd imagine them to be if you meet them IRL, not necessarily the one-dimensional features that Hollywood movies portray them. Translations are quite well done, very few mistakes. Since I speak both Mandarin Chinese and English, I can reverse translate.

No, I haven't read Terror Infinity like a lot of reviewers have commented, but this novel should be evaluated on its own merit.

EDIT: So I went to check out Infinite Terror, read the first 3 volumes.
I get that Infinite Terror came first (2007) and maybe started the whole movie dimensional traveling genre. But I don't get why people would prefer it over Ultimate Evolution.
Fights are small scale and lame (at least from what I've read so far). MC is a 24 yr old that behaves like he's still a teenager. Basically a weak-willed guy like in Gantz. His love interest is a 15 yr old which automatically brings up issues of pedophilia. Although she seems somewhat mature and there was a historical connection, you have to ask yourself why the author (and so many reviewers) introduced that setting at all. I guess if you're into that crap then go read Terror Infinity. Else Ultimate Evolution is simply much better written. <<less
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Buffelephant
Buffelephant rated it
September 29, 2016
Status: v6c14
Not as good as terror infinity. The movie characters are treated as normal npcs by the players. They lack life. The MC will treat them as a friend one second then kill them for loot the next. Characters lack depth and are one dimensional. Maybe, later in the story more depth will be given, the plot might become richer, but at the moment the story is rushed with no meaning and random violence.

The thing that really bothers me about this novel is how it takes another work for the plot,... more>> then doesn't follow the lore of that work. It is presumptuous. I know the world better than the creator. It feels like the writer is saying something like "Lord of the rings has elves like this, the author never wrote about them but I will tell you the truth".

Spoiler

In the Lord of the rings world, he adds a type of elf that don't exist and says the movie never showed them. He names them twilight elves but ignores the fact that the name already exists in lord of the ring lore (twilight elves are a race of elves j.r.r. Tolkien wrote and gave them a rich history. They have lots of names like the sindar, gray elves, and elves of the twilight. Legolas and his group are some of these elves. The author thinks he made up this elf and said not even one has appeared in hundreds of years ignoring Tolkiens lore. Then the elf the MC interacts with magically becomes one when she fell in love with the MC. The author also ignores the lore regarding magic and make wizards like Chinese cultivators.


Harry Potter world is also deformed by the authors added knowledge. He makes up some goblin backstory, making goblins the greatest kingdom at one point in history. The gods despised their king and helped the world out by trapping the goblin king, who the goblins also hated, and sealed him. Gringots is the prison and the goblins are the wardens of this prison with only one prisoner. It turned into a bank recently. Then the author ruins hogwarts as a school. He randomly adds gang, drug, and s*x problems to hogwarts but then the MC never interacts with students so the author never ever shows any of these problems, he just randomly claims such.
Then in pirates of the Caribbean he makes up a super power family that doesn't exist. They control the greatest pirate haven and is equal to Davy johns. Actually the curse on the Flying Dutchman is because of this family. Not like how the movie had it with the God calypso. The author makes a cavaite saying because this happened before the movie you guys didn't know about it.
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Putrangos
Putrangos rated it
April 7, 2019
Status: c1157
After reading TI, The Ultimate Evolution feels like breath of fresh air. Especially the MC.

Here's my review:

The system : (4/5)

... more>> The Ultimate Evolution (TUE) is a chinesse infinity genre novel, and we comes along the story of Sheyan a crooked fisherman who got mugged by the local mafia and forced to enter the "nightmare realm" upon death, to play the game/movie of death and evolve.

Each player got his own random identity for each worlds, which they can be wathever they want. But generally have the sam fixed world quest of sort. There's side quest you can find literally everywhere; hidden quests which needs specific route, action, and items; and legendaries, which nobody knew and kinda TUE original (lore that deviates from the original source/movies but not that strange/unreasonable).

Here's what interesting, the mission can be completed by many or anymeans, it usually force player to choose sides, and it will not end until the system spesificially says it end/fail or compeleted. They it can be branced by how you did it or what the result. And each world behave naturally to each other

Spoiler

Items from terminator world can be worth more in the LoTR world or so

[collapse]

The character : (5/5)

The MC is Sheyan, the crooked and sly former fisherman. Who does anything to achive his goals. From deceit, extortion, backstabbing, and get hurt or nearly dead himself.

Every character (so far) have a degree of believeable characteristic (greed, honor, fear, disdain, etc.). Great abilities, and items. And not every enemies are s*upid muscle head, brainless, tr*sh, disgusting, geeedy crooks. You can make a series of itself out of each character.

And what I like the most about this novel is there're no suprise friend, only reasonable enemies. Enemy today, friend tomorrow, and enemy again. There's no telling who's gonna be besides our MC along the ride.

Items and abilies : (5/5)

Each contestant have initial skills when summoned to the nightmare realm. And sheyah have the most broken/useless skill ever. Every item/abilities have cost and maintenance for its uses. Every quest will gives the reward equivalent of the difficulty, the more immpossible the mission, the more broken the reward. The recurring trope of the series is "It's worth the danger". And Sheyan go along with that mentality at every turn.

Extra:

The ouside world : (3/5)

Every seconds of not dealing with death. Some side-stories revoling around sheyan and his fisherman 'families'. And some mild training, planning, etc. In the real world.

Spoiler

It explain many plot points, characters, abilities, and items. It's important in many ways

[collapse]

IT IS boring, but worth every shot.

Description box : (1/5)

Good lord it is long. Some of the chapter can consist only of abilities/items description. Its boring, but it makes the story consistent. You wont get 'the item's hidden skills activated' moments, but you can anticipate how many abilities to unlock. It's interesting in its own way.

Pacing and worlds : (3/5)

The pacing for each arc is very nice. Some of them start with a bang, some of them doing just planning and thinking. And the ending for each arc too is vary, from silent return to half dead getaway. I can't really say for each world lore good/bad, but the author try the best he can not to directly uses the original movie plot or mess with the lore (ex. The world contestant in 10 years before the original movie plot).

Spoiler

But of course it will mess with the plot here and there

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Translation : (5/5)

From the First 100 or so chapter when k first read it, the translation is very steady. I can't say about the words and grammars, but its readable at least.

Thats all what can I say about the series. In short, a believable, interesting and thrilling death game that always tease you at every corner. Not a tr*sh, far from masterpiece.

*English not my first language, sorry for bad english.

6 years in this website, this is my first ever I wrote a reviews. Hope I can contribite more to this community.

Thanks. <<less
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Ginko
Ginko rated it
April 13, 2018
Status: c700
Really ☆☆☆ - Score 3.1

Let me tell you, getting past those first 30 chapters was a struggle. While boring- semi-relevant in establishing a foundation later. It goes from bad to great to super mediocre.

This is a brighter & more realistic version of Terror Infinity.

Pretty much a story about dead contestants shuttled between present and fantasy worlds.

... more>>
Spoiler

The laws / rules of these worlds are fair and give contestants a chance to survive. It's possible to survive utilizing intelligence over brawn. The author designs scenarios for the MC to display his wits. The assumptions the MC makes are quite a stretch at times. But, it's better than the way many other authors try to say, rather prove their MC's intelligence.

I'll never understand why the MC's melee path can be considered a smart one... when by all means it's easy to die before ever even getting close targets. Like someone shooting you while backing up, or using force powers, etc. Anyways, if you can accept small kinks easily, this story might be acceptable for you.
If you can get over that first hump, it might turn into a fantasy you like later.

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IRainstorm
IRainstorm rated it
March 13, 2018
Status: c700
Frankly people are sleeping on this novel, MC get real struggles and rewards according to the difficulty, no heavenly treasure fallen from the sky at the foot of the MC, he need to work for every scenario, even the seemingly easy missions turn into bloody gore situations for every party involved, the Game want every participant to earn their due and MC isn't an expection.

Altho the author has some weird moments by times but if you're willing to accept the culture difference its a good read.
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famous35
famous35 rated it
January 29, 2018
Status: c659
The first few chapters were very rough due to the info dumps, but as the chapters went on, the writing got exceedingly better.

Pros: The author pays attention to the details as well as could be expected and also good comedic relief here and there.

Cons: Lack of immersion due the closeness of the plotline to existing movies and their characters.
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clowred
clowred rated it
September 15, 2017
Status: c288
Interesting, an alert pace with an almost awesome protagonist. But it has one huge problem that makes me somewhat less excited about reading this story, the huge info dump that occupies more than 30% of the story. Besides this the story is really interesting.

Pros:

+ World building that makes use of other stories in a very original and intriguing manner.

... more>> + A protagonist that is capable of evolving alongside the story

+ Side characters with their own story and feelings (not just plain enemies and allies)

+ Power upgrading system that is not acting favorably to the protagonist only to make him more OP.

Cons:

- The "real world" that is always full of coincidences and quite detrimental to the protagonist.

Neutral:

- The info dump which is useful and necessary but at some point tiring

- The freaking servant that is the culmination of greed.

Conclusion, give it a change, while I'm not in the mood to continue reading it right now I'm certainly going to read it once it is completely translated. The rating for this novel is bullshit, it deserves way more. <<less
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Mundi
Mundi rated it
August 26, 2017
Status: v8c17
I have read some of the comments and would like to address the 'issues' others have mentioned. But, if you don't really care about the negatives tgen please, I beg you, continue on past my two points and read from there.

Firstly, the prologue. Many have complained about it or even completely lost interest in the work because of it. I can't see it through their eyes, the prologue is one of the reasons I fell in love with this novel. It introduces Sheyan, our MC, and humanizes him. It clearly... more>> depicts a man, not some immortal, not some stereotypical op MC who even at the start is destined for greatness. Instead, the author gives you a man with real emotions, with a determination to protect those he loves, with a humble heart enough to sacrafice himself for those he loves. Those of you who have read into the series may, at this point, be raising your eyebrows and thinking, "humble, my ass, " but thats another lovely point to this novel; a character who actually grows and changes.

Lastly, we have a lot of complaints about over used punctuation and emphasis but is it really that big of a deal? Do you really need that punctuation to decide the tone at which you read? Disrefarding that, is punctuation really something that will separate you from the content of this novel? If so, then all I can say is I hope you have a wonderful life knowing that some of the best things in the world may be beyond your reach because the exclamation points turn you off!!!.

Now that we're past that, I'd like to talk about why you should read this novel, despite it's 'flaws'.

This novel may not have the most origional idea, may not follow all the guidelines of grammar, and may not be the most serious work but I promise you, it is at least twice as good as the average xianxia novel. It doesn't have some type of op MC who has some sudden luck at every incident, nore does it follow some 'get rich quick' scheme but with power. No, instead, the genius of Sheyan is the underpinning of the whole novel. This novel heavily focuses on the causation and all the tricks are extremely well thought out with reasoning and logic to support almost every action. Not only that but the tricks themselves stump me everynow and then and leaves me admiring how much thought was needed on the authors part.

I would like to conclude it here by stating: "If you can read my long ass comment, you can read the first volume, its much more entertaining anyways."

Goodbye eveyone, enjoy the read. <<less
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legasy
legasy
March 1, 2020
Status: Completed
Just finished it and I love it. Love the plot and how everything ties in together. I'm halfway through Terror Infinity so I can see the resemblance but I'm not complaining. I like how it ended as well ;). No spoilers. Enjoy the read.
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wo1verine
wo1verine rated it
June 5, 2018
Status: c569
First of all, the start of the novel is hideous to the point I dropped it after 2 chapterss the first time I came across this. Yet after reading nother review I made up my mind to push through the painful (worst kind of pinfull) 30 ish pages and come cross the actual plot line which was so unexpected yet as time passes the wastefull timeperiod is actually an attempt to give the MC a background to work with in his timeline.

anyhow regarding the story as it progress from... more>> a weak kid with nothing to his manifold scheming master phase is a totally enjoyable experience.

I truly recommend to read it, if hou hate the starting too much just skimp thru to the major plotlines to begin enjoying a truly good work of art.

hope this goes till the end.

Spoiler

Too many movie plots are in play so it would be bettter if you have watched the movies for a clearer grasp of things, yet isnt a mandatory requirement since the movie plots get explained as and when needed. The enemies who eye the MC gets their brains blown out literally almost every other time, yet it somehow feels enjoyable overtime, or maybe it's just me.

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nobodyimportant
nobodyimportant rated it
March 27, 2018
Status: c700
I give this story a 2 simply for being mildly entertaining and enjoyable to read, which I suppose is the most important part of a story, but dear god this author so many distracting flaws in his writing that I want to slap him for it.

If you're looking for a story to kill some (A LOT) of time with, then this story might be for you. Just be prepared for numerous plot holes in basically every single arc, long-winded fluff chapters (seriously, I went through a 50 chapter stretch in... more>> the jungle arc where I just read the first sentence of every paragraph and didn't miss anything important), tons of illogical details that are 100% wrong, impossible, or self-contradictory, and many more details that are approaching impossibility to the point of absurdity even though they might not technically be 100% impossible.

The entire plot is the author basically saying "this sounds cool so I'm going to write it" with little to no real effort to fact check, and he even changes his own plot points at times just to make it fit with the direction he wants the story to go. The fact he somehow makes the "this sounds cool so I'm going to write it" part work is why I give this 2 stars. Plus the characters are pretty interesting, and their actions and motivations generally make sense, which is more than I can say for a lot of CN novels. <<less
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smite2001
smite2001
February 10, 2017
Status: v4c2
I am writing this review after having read the first three volumes, so my rating may change in the future. The volumes are quite long (apart from the first one), so I already feel like I have a good feeling for the general style of the author already. There is something negative that bothers me, but I will start with some good points first.

This is definitely my favourite chinese novel. Thats because it lacks some of the usual "typical chinese-ish" flaws. There is no blatant racism (although I heard it's... more>> called "nationalism" nowadays). The main character is not overly arrogant and also not deliberately s*upid. I find him quite likeable and most of the time I can understand his decisions and think they are reasonable (that's a first among chinese novels tbh).

This is also my second favourite "Infinity" style novel, after "Arena". Explaining why would take too long, it is just subjective I think.

Now the worst thing about the novel: The author is really lazy in terms of researching stuff. Especially in the first arc, that has a lot of gun talk. I can not remember one chapter containing technical information that lacked obvious mistakes, to the point where I had to actively suppress facepalming. And I have never even touched a gun in real life. I will put some examples of this and other stuff in the spoiler.

Spoiler

- Silencers on a high caliber revolver are pointless. Even with a suppressor you should still use hearing protection
- the author thinks a shotgun shell (the red, plastic part) gets shot out of the barrel, then somehow opens in the air and releases 'hundreds' of projectiles
- a glock 17 does not have burst fire. Even a glock 18 doesnt (the 'full auto' version, which is fundamentally different in terms of internal parts, and had not even been released at the time when the relevent part of the story takes place). It also does not misfire if you drop it
- [...] (too much of similar examples to put here.)
- mid-sized pirate ships obviously did not have several hundreds of crewmembers. Even large ones only had 200, and that is already a streching it.
- alcohol that is not sold in really fancy bottles does not routinely fetch prices of several million dollars per bottle at auctions (maybe a few hundred thousands, and that is already unrealisticly high. even if it is an obscure chinese spirit from the last century)
- probably a bunch of other stuff that I have not read yet. Please Author-dono, use wikipedia sometimes, or at least youtube/youku

[collapse]

If you can bear with that, and the sometimes sub-optimal translation quality (on a still-better-than-many-other-novels level), the author makes a lot of things right. The story is genuinely unpredictable at times, not every item that is found/described will somehow be crucial in the next chapter. The MC makes understandable mistakes and does not have divine luck. The antagonists so far are not just stereotypical a**holes, not much worse than the MC in my opinion (they might be unsympathetic anyway). Even the parts of the story that are not taking place in the movie-worlds are kind of enjoyable to read.

So far, I can easily recommend this novel and will probaly read the remaining volumes in the near future myself. Just take every piece of real-world information with more than a grain of salt. It is "alternative knowledge" at best. <<less
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shizuyami
shizuyami rated it
October 10, 2016
Status: v3c66
First of all, if you liked terror infinity you will probably like this aswell. I would love to rate it 5 stars to give it more recognition and pull the ratings up but as with most novels, its not without any flaws so I will give it a fair review at 4 stars.

So far it is hard to talk about movie character development because so far the main character has only visited movies in timelines before the actual movies started. This means that he only met a few side characters... more>> or mainleads that have not really developed yet in the real movies, however it is very exciting to read and the characters the mainlead meets are very interesting and do have personality.

A thing I notice different right away between this and other similair works is that in this novel the people treat movie characters and just generally people in the movieworld as npcs/fake people etc. It is mostly about benefits really... does killing this person make my path to a milestone or objective easier? Then kill... is this person not beneficial anymore to me? Kill... People just kill their way to their objectives.

Personally however I do like this aspect. You should see it for how it is, its a fake movieworld so people are acting accordingly. Even though they can be cruel at times, atleast they aren't being dramatic because of every single kill and are very objective focused. <<less
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Aevum
Aevum rated it
September 10, 2016
Status: v3c18
In my opinion it isn't as good as terror infinity (since everyone brings it up) but it is still a good story. It is also different than terror infinity bringing it's own good points up. One good thing is that while infinite terror lies more to horror movies, this novel seems like it will have more variety and will be more fresh. Also it seems to lie more towards going more solo than with a team of contestants and the characters involved in the novel seem decent so far. Not... more>> going in with a full team every time he enters a world while being sadled with people being annoying/s*upid/suicidal/etc brings a different dynamic to the story as well, since it now gives more freedom if he wants to team up with someone or not (it's someone that bothers me later in the terror infinity, because the "newbies" are usually a waste of space and brings nothing to the table other than being a burden).

However, the one thing that bothers me most is the chaotic and confusing writing. The way things are explained is somewhat lacking and you have to go over things more often than not to figure things out.

The style of writing doesn't feel consistent for me, it keeps changing and I sometimes it loses me. I feel like a lot is left out in the world/character building, which is what bothers me the most since I feel like there is a lot that could be built upon it easily. We will probably get to know more later but it's already quite a bit in the story and I wonder when that will be.

Therefore I'm giving it 3 stars, would have been a 4 if things I'm bothered by would be resolved. <<less
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ththth12
ththth12 rated it
September 7, 2016
Status: v3c4
This is quite good story. It's similar to Terror Infinity, but different enough. They have more freedom, they don't have to team up if not willing and don't have follow the plot of the movie. The system is more gamelike and gives players much more info. The first 7 chapters are very long prologue, which feels unnecessary because it does not have much do with actual plot. MC will return to RL between movies, so it still has some meaning. Also, MC has no team or any friends, he does... more>> things mostly by himself. It's worth of reading if you can get past the prologue. One-star reviews are probably because people felt that it was too similar plot as TI. <<less
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