Dungeon Engineer

The ADD Dungeon is a story about a dungeon that's ADD and can't keep focus on more than one task for one goddamn chapter. Five stars.

One of the best starts to a dungeon story i have read so far, if not the best!

The MC is just greatly written, him being a engineer in his past life just adds so much potentional to the dungeon setting and the story as a whole. He thinks of his environment in a scientific way, and that does reflect on his behavior and thoughts. Yet for all his intelligence, the MC is by no means flawless but considering the unfamiliar world with its strange laws that he has reincarnated into, he has handled the situation really well so far.

The author may say this story does get info-dumpy, but he has handled those really well so far, they are in fact not even boring to read. I personally like how the author has used various scientific topics and intregated them in this story, with going very in-depth with some of them, its also just great to learn new stuff while reading a really good and enjoyable story.

There are just so much directions the story could go in, from being just a standard Fantasy dungeon story with high detail, to being a really weird mix of Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Dungeon core at once.

The grammar used in this story is near flawless, barely any grammatical mistakes or typo's to be found, however they do exist even if very rare, and get corrected fast when pointed out.

The writing style is captivating and easy to read, even through all the infodumps, in fact the pace does not feel slow at all! The style is also very descriptive, and in some cases just beautifully written, chapter 5 is a great example of that. This is really well written for the author's first fiction.

This is just a fantastic story and i have no doubts, that if the author can keep up writing at this quality without dropping the story, that this story could be one of the great dungeon stories among the likes of 'Dungeon Heart' or 'No Epic Loot here, Only Puns'. So keep on writing this story!

Wait no more with starting to read this, its a great story in the making.

As the title says, this is not really a dungeon story. It is something better.

It is not a dungeon story in a sense that there are no blue boxes, no stats, and no restrictions that usually come with those things. If you have ever played Terraria, then you can say that the MC is something like a crossover between a dungeon (he still has a core) and a biome.

So, if you are the same as me and find yourself skipping most of the blue boxes in dungeon stories, the Dungeon Engineer should be something you enjoy.

The author likes details and as said on the front page, he explains processes a lot. The best thing, however, is that once some fact of the MC's powers or mana in general is mentioned, the author sticks by it. You will not find a loophole the next chapter, which makes the explanations actually relevant. Plus the explanations are easy to comprehend even if you do not know a damn about the subject.

The world building is being done progressively at a good pace. The author does not seem to rush it, though I would enjoy more show don't tell approach. I am not talking about the technical stuff, of course, as that would be quite hard if not impossoble.
As for character development, there has not been an impulse for big growth yet. That happened in the latest chapters so we will see how the MC will handle it.
There is no huge plot yet, but then again, we are still kinda at the beginning of the story and one sometimes cannot rush these things.

Starts out strong. (Number of chapters at the time of review is two). The writing is easy to read and captivating. Thankfully there are no glaring grammatical errors or misspellings. Well done indeed for a writers first fiction. 

I like how "real" everything feels so far. The dungeon feels like an organism i actually believe exists and i'm interested to learn more together with our protagonist.

I'm not sure how this story will progress from now on, but if you keep up your current streak i'm sure this will turn out to be great. 

Succes, and goodnight. 

-CC

P.s. Sorry for being lazy ; )

From a bookaholics perspective I really enjoyed the change of pace and the style of this there are far too many that just jump in the deep end and speed along the MC story,      nice to see good spelling and grammar too

(as of chapter 20)

An old space engineer (Ike) dies and is reborn as a dungeon core. Oh, how unusual, a dungeon core story, have you already stopped reading because you think you know what happens next? Well, yes and no, don't run away yet. The dungeon core indeed gains mana from living things and uses it to build tunnels and rooms and expand its domain. But the difference to the usual stories is that the science is much harder than usual, as indicated by the name 'Dungeon Engineer' (engineer stereotype: facts only, not creativity or fun allowed). No disintegrating of walls and bodies, no summoning of monsters and materials from thin air, all the matter has to go somewhere. This means the dungeon has to find a place for the excavated materials and the monsters (which so far are just modified animals) are born, not created. The other thing is that those stories usually have hordes of adventurers congregating on the young dungeons to slay and loot everything, breaking everything in the process; while here there are indeed humans building a settlement next to the dungeon, they are only there for the mana-rich environment and the strategic placement near the country's border, they haven't even noticed the dungeon yet. How long will that stay the same and what will happen then? DUN DUN DUUUN!

Style: The story is told in first-person limited style, most of it from the dungeon core's point of view. A tiny part (one scene showing one of the humans) is in third-person style. There are lots of detailed descriptions about the creatures, materials and surroundings the dungeon discovers, as well as explanations on various biological species and technical processes, that means you even learn new stuff while reading! Recurring references to the fourth wall give the reader the impression to be part of the story. The text is comfortable to read with great choice of words and a smooth flow of the sentences.

Story: As told above, there is much detail in building the dungeon and creating the monsters. This makes the start of the story rather slow, but helps the reader identify with Ike, in my opinion the pacing is fine. It's not too much of a spoiler if I tell you that the dungeon is NOT of the blood-thirsty sort, instead wanting to live a peaceful "life" playing with its creatures and creating interesting stuff.

Grammar: A few typos, but mostly very good.

Characters: Because the story is told by Ike himself, the reader is intimately familiar with his thoughts and discovers him to be a structured and precise, but still inventive character. Besides that there is not very much depth (yet) though. We haven't seen much of the humans yet, those few we met seem to be mostly standard but good-natured and non-exaggerated archetypes (scientist-type mage, opportunity-smelling honourable merchant).

In total, this dungeon core story is down-to-earth rather than over-the-top and physics-are-real rather than phantasm-alloyed handwavium. You can feel that it is a work of love. If you want battle and excitement and blood-splattering action, turn around and go elsewhere. But if you like realm-building in a friendly atmosphere, come in and take a home-grown cookie (the dungeon entrance is hidden but shhhh, look behind the "Start reading" button just over there).

I usually don't like Dungeon Core novels.  That said there are some really amazing books that use this narrative.

This one is one of those amazing novels.

The author must have either a background in the sciences, be a current student forced to take biology and physics, or really enjoys research.

He is well versed on Newton's theories, biological components for life, including enzymes and cellular division, and engineering concepts.

This well of knowledge allows him to craft a novel that takes place in a world of magic, but based on the Laws of science.

The character is well thought out,  and although pretty much isolated, conflict occurs.

Certainly worth reading as of Chapter 16, and added to my favorites and follow list.

Really, well done!

Aamoeba wizard
Mamoeba wizard
Oamoeba wizard
Eamoeba wizard
Bamoeba wizard
Aamoeba wizard

Wamoeba wizard
Iamoeba wizard
Zamoeba wizard
Aamoeba wizard
Ramoeba wizard
Damoeba wizard

-0.5 for lack of amoeba wizard

That's really the only shortcoming. I don't have any other complaints and I'm not going to praise the story to high heaven either, because the other top reviews already did that. Amoeba wizard.

I'm also not going to outline what the story is about, because:

- that's tiresome

- you don't give a shit about my opinion anyway

Dungeon core stories are so prolific on this site that, if you haven't read any of them yet, it doesn't matter because this one is a good place to start :')

edit: a tardigrade wizard is acceptable too

While this story does have a slower start and pacing and takes sometime for the first PoV to appear, chapter 8, it shines in how it goes about the concept of dungeon management.

As of chapter 26 there aren't any adventurers trying to loot the dungeon but there are groups of people stumbling upon it. But don't let this off put you as the true gem found in this story isn't adventurers but rather a very solid world building.

Everything is well explained at is own pace and the growth of the dungeon is very organic feeling despite its slower pace in comparison to other dungeon management stories. The ecosystem found in this story is complex and realistic.

Would recommend this story on its developed ecosystem alone!