Mana System - Hello, World! [Complete]

First things first, be it author or mod, this review can be deleted after author sees it as it's more of an opinion on how story develops at chapter 36 that and massive criticism at slavery system that is totally broken. Mostly just so that author can see the system criticism. Otherwise until that point story was actually really good for me.

I don't like reading about someone being slave, mutilated and tortured. Especially how mc got himself into that situation was just so sudden and stupid. It took like an second :D

Second is that slave system, 65% of xp from slave at any distance is transferred to owner. And it seems like "slave", more like puppet with mind has to abolutely obey any commands. This is so ridiculous cheat in so many ways. You can have tons of slaves grinding xp in wilderness, people or dungeons. And because you get xp countless times faster than anyone else, you can always get more powerful slaves as addation or replacement. You can easily cut off any means of escape by simple commands like do not escape, do not ask for help, do not try to remove collar, and fight to death anyone who tries to remove it. With these simple things you could dominate everyone personally while also getting some nice puppets to do your bidding, and very effective puppets as they have mind.

I mean it seems like they have literally sect that practices slavery so they should be already really proficient at it. With rules of slavery story gives us they should be the absolute dominant force with no opponets unless it's another slave sect. I would either pick up slavery myself if I knew about how slavery works, or kill myself on spot as it would be impossible to surprass them. But honestly it's mostly just who starts the slavery first as long as they have some braincells to know how to use slaves for xp.

Even 1% xp leech with collars would make it ridiculously overpowered as all you need is to make or buy them. Even if there's some limit to number of slaves, you could just make an pyramid structure. It's just exponental xp and strength. Keep in mind that while slower than normal, slaves still level so their value increases as they gain you more levels ><, I mean can you get any more unfair?? I can't even :D:D:D I'm dying :D I can't even get anxious about the mc's development because slavery system is so broken xD

I will make new review when this issue is fixed.

Well I was enjoying it for the most part but then he decided to hit us with a twist and have us go from a high to the lowest of the lows. Can he claw the story back from that and make it interesting again? Who knows but I certainly won't be sticking around to find out.  

I think i would have rated this story differently - more fairly certainly - if I didn't feel so very misled. The extensive content of the second book/volume matches neither the description nor the tags. As long as the author chooses to trap readers with tags like Comedy and leaves out some others such as Grim Dark or Tragedy, these kinds of reviews are the logical consequence.

Until the end of the first book, the main character was interesting enough (if only just) to keep on exploring more of the new world these people find themselves in. By the time I'm writing this review, the protagonist has zero personality left and there is nothing left for me to care for in this tale. The sad thing is that none of this was written badly from a technical point of view, because the changes in the protagonist are understandable, but it's not for me.

Finally the warning to everyone who catches this review: if you like how a group of powerful businessmen get their sociopathy on and enact a year-long if not decade-long plan to enslave all of humanity, then this is the tale for you. If you can get your rocks off from reading the protagonist's personality being crushed and destroyed under guilt, sorrow and failure, then keep on reading, because that's what you'll get. If you're anything like me, then save yourself the trouble and avoid this tale.

Okay first of all one of the main character's character traits is that he makes jokes when he's nervous..... but he's never nervous, he just keeps on spewing drunk frat boy jokes over and over.... and over again.

When he finds the ripped apart and eaten remains of another human being....and he's perfectly okay with it (he's so coool(really, he's so cool(really really cool (no I mean it  he is so cool(so so cool))))) after all he went in and then identified the patched and cleaned up remains of his family (ouch I feel pain a in my chest is that heartache, no that's just the author poking me with a stick that has sign taped to it that says feel sympathetic and he's so cool), after all remains that tell you that all things must come to an end is so similar to remains that tell you that any second now your about to be ripped to pieces and eating and become some animals contribution gift of fertilizer to the forest...so the same thing, when he finds the culprit of said mutilation and gestation is a massive super bear with metallic fur and could probably rip through trees and gouge rocks, but do not worry after all he has a magical class user so that obviously means he's become super good at melee so he precedes to use a stick he picked off the ground and to beat the bear on conscious.

I don't think plot armor fits the description anymore this feels like two stories one the main story one what ever the main characters going through (and no I do not know the main character's name I got to chapter 4 so all of those bad joke liners got crammed in my head and kind a push that out)

The Mc needs a lot of work. Constant remarks about how smart he is get old fast. 25 chapters in and I cant think of one truly good idea or move the Mc has made. He trusts people for no reason and then is distrustful of the people he should trust. again for no reason at all. This story does have potential because the main plot is good. One thing that really got me was that the available classes for people were supposed to be classes "known" to humans but he chooses one that is made up specifically for the story. Hundreds of classes available and he chooses the one with limited survivability and limited offensive ability.... sigh. A good thing the plot armor is so thick.

(as of chapter 115)

While my rating might look bad from the amount of stars I gave, this doesn't mean that the story is trash. I read more than a hundred chapters, after all. But there are some really negative parts that drag down the score. The stars are a mix of the technical aspects of writing, the premise/plot/ideas and how much I like the story; the subscore ratings are weighted for the later parts.

It's a system apocalypse LitRPG story, Paul is alone in the wilderness when it happens. He chooses his class smartly (conditions: melee fighting + magic + healing + survivability), then has some solo adventures. This works out for the MC and makes this a not overly special but okay read until it suddenly isn't. Because there is a slavery arc, which went on for much too long and was filled with horrible torture that made no sense except to show how inhumanly sick the enslaving group was. And it wasn't just one evil person or group, there are many interactions with needlessly cruel and sadistic sociopaths in various locations and situations; there are more heartless monsters in the story than friendly or even normal people, if you ignore the nameless masses only shown in the background. The MC's situation gets better later (that's not really a spoiler) but the damage is done. (Story: 4 stars at the beginning and in the later parts, but 1 star for the slavery arc)

The writing style was rather simple and bumpy in the beginning, it got better later but is still not great. Grammar is better too and the spelling has improved greatly (from "lots of errors" to "less than one per chapter") (Style: 2.5 stars early -> 3.5 later; Grammar 2 stars early -> 4.5 later). Many characters are, as I wrote above, not realistic in how evil they are; the others are often rather one-dimensional. Paul makes some strange decisions as well. 

But there are also good parts that kept me from dropping the story: The plotline and world-building have some great ideas and I like the crafting. Paul makes awesome stuff and uses it well. 

Was fine until chapter 36. Completely out of character behavior and doesn't make sense. The character has been built up as someone who reasons and has trust issues. The motivation for his actions at the end is weak and the loophole is far too obvious for him to accept even if the motivation made sense.

It's a bad shift that feels like the character had a personality switch.

The MC must be in the state of disbelief, or the system done something to his brain, at least until this chapter. Because he acts like a 'player' more than a 'character' .

And the story pretty boring.

Old 1 Star Review: If someone tries to kill you, don't risk your life trying to save them. You don't trust them in any way, because they tried to murder you.

New Post Revision Review: It overcorrects in some chapters, but beyond that goes back to being a fairly average story for the genre.

Be aware possible spoilers ahead!

Hello fellows,

first at all im not a native speaker while im try my best for that review. So what kind of story we have? 

This story follows a big bunch of post apocalyptic system stories which fill the room of these kind of stories. The system itself have some interesting parts and everyone which is interested in something that went deeper than 90% of the stories will have a nice time with this work. 

I would say out there are three kind of stories, first at all the story which is like the name told before, then the story that are better than his trashy name and at least the story which is more trashy than his name will made us believe! 

I think these story could be the second kind of story where the name of it is more trashy than the story itself. 

Lets go ahead and talk about what made this story interesting. Our MC starts with the lone wolf setting and figure out what he want to be in this new world. While Chapter one deliever us an interesting start into this system that seems some different from other systems the author didnt use all things equaly he added at the beginning. 

His first contacts gave us a nice intro what could happen with the world while he find back his way into the civilization or what stills remains of it. Here starts his adventure around the first days, weeks of the apocalypse which ones are also the most important times in these kind of stories. Most characters grows in these times their powers, expierences and everything other that made the most kind of stories for me as reader interesting. Also we find there some stories they broke with this tradition, when MC left earth and came back. While when they left the grew strengh somewhere else. 

What is realy great is the world building which is great used by the Author to gave us new areas and changed land scapes. The World Building is one of his great strenghs. 

Also interesting are the different sidecharacters of the story while some of them may unrealistic to for readers they cant imagine that some people raised different than them. We have different cultures and how they effect on areas and characters. 

Also great his and recommended for everyone who likes MCs they use Jobclasses engineering, envolving and creating stuff. It is fascinating how MC solves problems with his personal way of creating tools. Everyone who loves MCs doin that will have a lot of fun with this story! 

The systen at all is interesting while it is sometimes a bit to gamelit for myself. People which likes more game mechanisms in systems will love this story over all. 

From here we will follow the great issues of the story and i hope the author will work on these diamond he created. 

The first great problem we will have is that the story is writtin in first person past with changing POVs and i believe deep down in hell is a special place for writers which did that. 

To be fair he didnt screw it up at all. Every changed POV is written in third person limited. What made it well enough.

While some great stories fellow these practice of abusing writing mechanics you can do that if the rest of the story is that great so no one will offended by that. 

First person works as a filter and allows the reader only to have the view of the main character which made it easier for the reader to symph or emphasize with the Main Character and the clue is missing information. The effect works with the reader dont know everything that happened. He is forced into the view of the Main Characters view about the world and how it should works. Every Information the reader get is limited by the first person view and that also the MC only knowing things if he is able to gather the informations from someone or somewhat. 

Followed... 

Here we got a break out and i recommend everyone which dislike chapter 30 to skip to chapter 46 where MC is also free to do what he want again. From there you will see a big change in the quality of the story and how it grews at all. 

While the Main Character had a lot of changes in his personalty after the last two arcs he dont grew in his decisions because sometimes he looks realy smart and in other decisions he looks stupid. It isnt realy clear what kind of character MC pretend to be.

While this is realistic for our world inkonsistence is hard for fiktional characters! It is always a two bladed sword and a risky walk between what is realistic and what kind of realism works for fiktions! 

The third Arc gave us new potential, while it starts were some troubling also in the case how MC got there where he is. We are back in the run of the traditional way of this kind of stories. From this point the story MC grows strengh again. While he learned how important strengh is he also always have some lazy times which made it inconsistenced again. 

Inconsistence decisions of the Main Character is something you have to deal with if you are willing to read it. 

He knows that strengh is important and decide to believe always he is strong enough. Only to made the same mistake again, again, again.

Another big problem with the story is the lack of varity in social systems for the survivors! More inside the spoiler!

One Point that never changes the whole story is that MC shows his mind of innovations with his jobclass. Which brought us to another big problem. While he isnt strong enough to protect everyone he loves and isnt overpowerd like most characters in these kind of stories he also always shows strong factions his abilities in what he can do. He is begging for being hunted. 

I wont told to much about it and wont show every interesting part. But one thing should be told. Another big issue of the story is that the Author like it to introduce new enemies and factions. It is also inconsistence with if MC have some trouble with one part of a faction he sets the whole faction as enemy! Like one human did me wrong so every human is evil now! 

If the author is willing and able to work on his story it could be one of the bigger ones on royalroad. I gave him 5 stars for the potential and tried to as much advices i can in the spoilers for the author!