Echoes of Rundan

Information

Status

Ongoing

Year

2019

Author

RobertKeene

• 5. Landfall: Chapter Five
  Dec 12, 2019
• 4. Landfall: Chapter Four
  Dec 8, 2019
• 3. Landfall: Chapter Three
  Dec 6, 2019
• 2. Landfall: Chapter Two
  Dec 4, 2019
• 1. Landfall: Chapter One
  Nov 30, 2019

Reviews

Community Reviews(10)

• tarakisRoyal Road

  ★★★★★ 5.0

  The team of RileySKeene is writing a pretty darned good world building adventure. It really captivates me and leaves me wanting more. The characters are pretty well thought out and have good depth to them. It is not your typical game mechanics either, it is fresh and interesting. The style and grammar are very well done. It is definitely worth my time and mebbe yours too.
  :D CHEERS (c)
• WolfKitRoyal Road

  ★★★★★ 5.0

  This is something of a slow burn and the plot is only just kicking off so I will refrain from writing a full review just yet; but the writing, characterization, and worldbuilding thus far are very solid.
  Eagerly following to see where it goes.
• GreysamaRoyal Road

  ★★★★★ 5.0

  This ,in my expert opinion, is the best story on RR by far. I hope that anyone reading this will immediately rush on over and read RobertKeene's story Echoes of Rundan. Everything from the characters to the plot are excellent and creative. Mr. Keene has done something most authors strive to do. He has successfully breathed life into the characters he has created. Reading EOR you will laugh at the silly antics of the pcs you will anxiously bite your thumb as the MC gets into all sorts of trouble and you may even whisper "wow" under your breath as secrets you never saw coming are revealed. All in all if you are looking for a well rounded story kinda sorta set in an MMORPG type world with mystery and mayhem around every corner then look no further because Echoes of Rundan is the story you are looking for. Step right up one come all and be amazed as you read this gripping tale of a man and his faithful party members in a vrmmorpg who must face the forces of darkness.
• djeargon29Royal Road

  ★★★★★ 4.5

  The story is very well done and I love it, but first 12 chapter are rough to go thru and you should probably just skip those.
  Reviews must be at least 50 words long Reviews must be at least 50 words long Reviews must be at least 50 words long Reviews must be at least 50 words longReviews must be at least 50 words longReviews must be at least 50 words long
• JahnesRoyal Road

  ★★★★★ 4.5

  Overview
  This is a story for those with the patience to wait for a good story to unfold. It starts slow, and this pace has continued to the time I am writing this review (Chapter Thirty). By no means does this mean that this story is bad, however. Untypical for the LitRPG-Genre, there is a heavy focus on the characters and conversations rather than the underlying mechanics of the game. This makes this not a read for everyone, especially on Royalroad, but no story ever is.
  The conclusion is at the bottom, so skip ahead if you wish to skip my blabbering.
  Style
  The style gets the job done. It flows well and I noticed no discernible hitches in my reading experience. The author obviously knows what they are doing, and I particularly liked the way they manage to convey the protagonist's feelings without having to resort to massive monologues.
  Furthermore, the world-building is done with taste. A wider world is always in the back of the story, but it is slowly unveiled without overwhelming the reader.
  Grammar
  You know the grammar is good when you hardly ever have to stop and think about it. 'Nuff said.
  Story
  The story is, in my opinion, the weakest part. The way the protagonist gets into the game requires a significant amount of suspension of disbelief. It ripped me out of my immersion for a while as I questioned the actions of the main character.
  Putting that aside, however, the in-game plot seems to have only really started picking up at this point, which is why I am tentatively giving the story 3,5 stars. I like the way the author interweaves game mechanics with realism without having to resort to blue screens.
  Character
  The characters are strongly fleshed out here. There may not be a massive cast, but every character seems to have established motivations. Whilst they may be a bit flimsy for people willing to immerse themselves in the game world to such an extent, I wouldn't doubt that there are many such people in reality as well.
  The only thing grating on my mind is N
• LiterallyGooseRoyal Road

  ★★★★ 4.0

  Edited / Revised 29.07.2020 (Spearhead 113).
  There are a lot of things to like about this story and the author. They post chapters regularly, meaning you can usually get a decent fix of the story. They are happy to have discussions in the comments and are visible. The story itself has an interesting MC, the world building is well done, there is a decent vain of humour throughout, including 'in jokes' that make sense to the reader and enough pop culture / meme references to satisfy most readers.
  However, the problem is that there is no tension in the story. The consequences for the MC if he dies are so slight and inconsequential that there may as well NOT be consequences. This becomes more of a problem with a supporting cast of characters whose struggles are hard to care about because again, there is no real consequences to their deaths. The ongoing 'is he, isn't he' narrative regarding one characters NPC status was interesting at first, but doesn’t do enough to generate tension in the plot to cover for this issue.
  I think the story is grammatically excellent, the prose is well written, the action is well thought out and the world building hints enough at a bigger picture to be extremely interesting.
  The fact there isn’t any dramatic tension however stops this novel being excellent, which is a shame, as there is a lot to admire in the work.
  It follows the RPG part of LitRPG too much and not in an overabundance of blue boxes. MMORPGs rely on penalties for armour costs, loss of loot, loss of progress etc to sustain tension in the player, but this can't work as a plot device in a web serial.
  Pacing wise, you can tell that the MC has a long route (grind) to real power. At this stage we are 113 chapters in and he is still dealing 5 damage points and has a very limited repertoire of moves. This smacks too much of the grind elements of an RPG in my opinion, however this will no doubt appeal to min / maxers and those who like this kind of slow burn.
  Overall, there is definit
• claws8367Royal Road

  ★★★★ 4.0

  I enjoy the story.
  Things i like about it:
  - the fights scenes ( are done well )
  - base building aspect ( its slow and fast at the same time)
  - MC has depth ( he isnt perfect and still figuring things out)
  Things i think can be done better:
  - gimmie more blue boxes ( how can i ever get my dopamine hit!)
  - but for real, this story is way slower then the average reader on this site is used to. ( i dont mind it)
  - the mc is your average bloke he isnt that special in comparison to the other players. He doesnt have a cheat and he isnt a super soldier in RL. ( i dont have a problem with this, infact sometimes those are deal breakers for me)
• StarvelingRoyal Road

  ★★★★ 3.5

  Generally well written and fun to read except for one aspect that I will explain below. While it's not an original story idea it's not completely following in other stories' footsteps.
  None of these complaints are bad enough for me to stop reading. The first one will be if it continues, the last one isn’t that big a deal.
  The weakest part of this story is the world building and character development. Interestingly, they suffer from the opposite problem than the one that most stories have. Rather than too little information, this story has too much. Or, maybe more correctly, the author isn't presenting the large amounts of information in the right way.
  I can't provide from text examples without spoiling parts of the story but it's just a general lack of Chekhov's Gun.
  It's grating to read exposition about a test that can be shown rather than told. The reader is stuck with dialogue from characters that are unimportant, extraneous details about this side character's body language when trying to remember another unimportant character's name. To make it worse, this specific piece of exposition is coming directly after another facet of the test where people were having trouble writing without a table. Is that important? No. Do I care about the main character's embarrassment when using the floor to write? No. Perhaps I could, perhaps it develops the character, but too much time, effort, and emphasis is put on a minor detail that is, at best, a supporting aspect of much more effective moments of character development.
  This is also how the game mechanics are explained to the reader and the main character. There has to have been a more elegant and more interesting way to teach the reader the rules of the setting. The tutorial is skipped like the author knows that it would be boring for the reader to read but then what might as well have been a tutorial is written in immediately afterwards.
  Overall, the author is relying on character dialogue too heavily as a strategy for dump
• QuietLionRoyal Road

  ★★★★ 3.5

  Minor Spoilers below.
  Edited 2/22/20 as I felt need to clarify some points and expand on others.
  Second edit on 2/24/20 on review and score because of changes the author made due to review.
  Overall I think this story could be a great read. Chapter 1-7 flow nicely, the main character, an accountant named Dylan lives a decent life, working by day and playing online games by night. His current one is getting stale, no longer stimulating his mind as it once was. He seemly enjoys the tactics of fighting, but due to real life issues his normal team is no longer playing.
  Enter Monsoon Entertainment, a gaming company that is rumored to release the next big thing. Full Immersion Virtual  Reality. Introduced, via a MMO game. Dylan, gaining a invitation from his friend Nakala (a developer of the game, more on this later) is to become a beta player of the upcoming game, or so he hopes.
  After passing a written and physical test to qualify for the game, Dylan is told that, yes this is in fact a fully virtual game, but the invitation isnt anything casual. This invitation is for a 5 YEAR program. On top of the shocking news, he is told that in order to proceed, he need to give up POA limited  POA (power of attorney) during this time, so the company can keep his affairs in order.... Okay. Well, thats a big kink in this. Maybe its still worth it though. I mean, he must  be getting paid something major as an incenti, nope!, just the knowledge that hes in on the ground floor of the game. A game that might (and likely will its a beta) be reset for when its in full release. The ONLY, concession they give is a guarantee that he will still have his job available when the 5 years is up (along with him continuing to be paid as if working).
  Now, you might say Dylan continuing to be paid while playing could be incentive enough, I mean, I know id love to be paid to play games, but he's still not truely being paid. The money he would get is the same money he already would be getting for doing h
• avkRoyal Road

  ★★ 2.0

  If gender and sex talk is all you really care about but you're looking to distract yourself with some fantasy stuff on the side this story is for you. If you're not into that, move on.