E. A. Hooper crafted a interesting plot for a multi-world litRPG series. While similar to other multi-world books of this genre in terms of progression, it has very distinct differences in terms of progression attributes and their meaning. The biggest benefit of this decision was to reduce the stat repetitiveness that plague other novels in this genre, making the listening experience all the better by not stopping the story for copious reading of stats that mean very little to audiobook listeners. Another likable aspect of the story is that the author spent time providing enough backstory to the main characters (MCs) as to allow some special poignant moments where characters are presented with memories of the real-world life and the hardship of not being there. As the primary antagonist, Lucas was written in a way to show where he allowed his insecurities to slowly move from minor to pretty much diabolical as the game progressed. I dropped the Story rating one star for what seemed like an obvious incorrect conclusion, that being Lucas’ culpability and ultimate punishment for his actions. Any defense lawyer with their salt would easily by able to place the blame squarely on ARKUS and because of that probably could have easily made Lucas out to be a victim of whom is owed many millions of dollars for his suffering at the hands of an video game, imo.
The performances of Justin Thomas James, Jeff Hays and Laurie Catherine Winkel were all very well done; although, the the voice acting of Vincent was a bit more stoic and grampa-y than I preferred.