u/As_Previously_Stated — reddlx

Goodread link for convenience

I absolutely loved the tone and worldbuilding of the book. It reminded me of how people talk about discworld(I've tried a few of them but it never clicked) with it's wacky, not quite serious, fantasy world that is nonetheless full of interesting places and interesting fantasy concepts, as well as the satire of real world concepts.(A futures market for prayers? lmao)

I've seen some reviews complaining about infodumping, but personally I found them a joy to read. Something about the tone and the prose just made it flow really well so it never felt like a chore, and the world is the books best aspect so I was always happy to hear more about it.

The idea of a small time wall-god lucking into a boon that slows the aging of the guardsmen who work on top of him, which turns guardsman into the most wanted job, and leads to the wall being extend and widened to allow more people to work on it, which then snowballs until it turns into an ever growing megastructure that covers most of the continent it's located on is such a cool and unique fantasy city concept.

We spend most of the time inside the Wall, and it's full of interesting locations with history and texture. You can tell the author did a lot of research and had a bunch of ideas he wanted to cram into the book.

He touches on all kinds of stuff from, from economics and ecology, to archeology, and a LOT Of critiscism of the endless growth mindset of our society. It's not very subtle, nor super deep, but I found the ways he weaved it into the worldbuilding and history quite enjoyable to read.

I think my biggest issue with the book is the characters. They're not terrible, nothing like three body problem or anything, but they're just kinda fine. The books feels more like a fast paced romp through interesting locations while the author (mostly through Thea) infodumps about the world and it's history, than a character study.

Oh, and apparently it's a litrpg book? It doesn't really feel like it for most of the time, but there are some similarities. I've not read a lot of litrpg books, on count of most of them being bad, so the only thing I can really compare it to is Dungeon Crawler Carl.

The most obvious similarity is Thea and Aven strategizying about which boon to pick, which feels similar to the lootbox rewards in DCC. There's also the way you channel soulstuff for feeding gods which is similar to the cultivation concept, but there are no explicit levels or anything like in DCC. It also have a few "Oh we just did something, time to pick our loot" moments. I didn't mind the litrpg moments, but it wasn't really the draw for me.

TLDR: Not a literally masterpiece, but a really fun read with a very creative and unique world. I feel like I'd wanna play a dnd campaing or bethesda style RPG set in Cambrias' Wall.

I've only watched the one season and none of the other country versions so sorry if this isn't a novel observation and just something all the fans already know and likes about the show, but the way the game is sold to you as a viewer and the way the game actually works is different.

If you read the blurb describing the serie or just listen to the way the contestant talks in the contestant interviews, and claude talks in voice over, you'd think the point of the game if you're a faithfull is to just catch all the traitors.

Kinda like a more high stakes "Secret Hitler" where you just have to play nice, be honest, and identify your fellow liberals(faithfull) and vote out the facists(traitors).

But that's not actually how the game plays out. Even if you manage to identify the traitors early on which is really hard because it's not like they have an incentive to sabotage the games, or anything else that would give them away, the game rules just allows the traitors to keep recruiting new ones.

Which makes sense, it's a huge expensive production and they want it to run for the full 12 days so they can make a whole season of television out of it, but this fact completely changes the incentive for the faithfull.

Because of the fact that the game won't end until you are in the final round with like 6 other people, suddenly your incentive as a faithful isn't to eliminate the traitors, but to eliminate your fellow faithfuls until you've secured a spot in the finale. There's 22 of you, and only 6 or so people are getting into the finale.

Idk, maybe this is intentional to cause more infighting and drama, but it feels weird that the show isn't sold that way. Like, Claude is almost scolding them every time they banish a faithful, but the game is clearly set up that they have to do so and thin the herd before the "real" game can start. You're not actually on the same team as the other faihtfulls until you've secured your spot in the endgame.

It means that the faithful ends up having to play the game in two very different ways. First you have to just stay alive at any cost, which means pointing fingers at fellow faithfuls, until when the game is allowed to end, and it's time to actually start eliminating the traitors.

Especially since if you take up the role of traitor hunter early one, you're just going to get killed by the traitors. Standing out is dangerous and you're better of playing it safe and just hoping someone else who where suspicious or loud gets eliminated. It's very clear that when the faithful have nothing to go on, anything that makes you stand out can means being banished since they have to banish someone, and everyone is just happy it's not them.

I'm not sure if this is a good or a bad thing. It makes the game more interesting in some ways, but less interesting in others. Like it feels like so much of the agency is in the traitors hands.

As a faithful, you have no information to go on unless the traitors make a big mistake. So you're kinda just rolling the dice and hoping someone else gets eliminated until you make it into the last few episodes and you finally have any chance of eliminating the traitors, and there's any point in doing so since they wont just get replaced.

It feels like you're incentivized to play as boring as possible unless you're like a social god who can manipulate everyone like a marionette(and even then you have to look boring and nonthreatening, or the traitors are going to kill you)

Like I don't think it's random that the people who got to the finale where 2 traitors and mostly people who didn't really play the game. Both Meryl and Aaron felt like they just got there because they where nonthreatening, the two traitors got there per definition since they'll just recruit a new ones if one dies. Hannah was the only faithful who played the game and actively tried to suss people out, but she survived since will knew she trusted him, and she was mostly wrong in her predictions, and therefore safe to let live.

I think this is my fear for future seasons, I loved watching this season, but I'm worried it's going to get boring watching what's essentially a secret hitler game that's not allowed to start until you're like 3/4 of the way through over and over again.

The social dynamics where really fun but the lack of strategy and "game mechanics" for most of the season felt kinda lacking. It feels like it would be a lot more interesting if the traitors had some incentive to do things that could out them to the faithful, like sabotaging the games. But even then, as long as the game won't be allowed to end until the last episode, the faithfull are going to be unable to have much agency until the last few roundtables.

^(Please tell me if there some strategy or implication of the rules I've missed, I really liked the first season but unless I've missed something it feels like its going to get stale quickly in further seasons)