It seems like our lives have been running in parallel. I took up the LitRPG genre when my second child was born and consumed them with a passion. I would REALLY recommend the Primal Hunter, The Completionist Chronicles, and System Universe. I concur that The Path of Ascension is a great series along with all the ones you mentioned. Out of all the mentions, He Who Fights With Monsters is my Top recommendation.

Thanks for the recommendations! Have added them all to my Amazon wishlist and look forward to reading them

Probably in my wheelhouse, I'm already reading a couple of these. I'll have to take a look at your other recommendations! Thanks Jeff!

Nice list and welcome back! Wanted to give my 3 series that wernt listed above (Defiance of the Fall and dungeon crawler carl have got to be my favorites of the ones listed though). Im going to have to agree with @pymarathon that Mother of learning is one of my top favorites. Besides that "Book of the Dead" has been a pleasent surprise even though there are only 2 books in the series so far and lastly Wake of the Ravager. If you havent checked them out id recommend them, besides that welcome back and glad you found something you enjoy :-).

Didn't expect this, but it's a nice surprise

A list of some good other ones, my own favorites. Most these i'd recommend in audible format as the voices are great. All the Dust that Falls. -Comedy LITRPG about a roomba isekai. Sounds stupid but super fun. Beneath the Dragon Eyes Moon -Super indepths Healer focused LITRPG MC A bit heavy in the morals but actually faces the downsides to not killing , Victor of Tucson and Falling with Folded Wings - Two series in the same universe with cross overs, great LITRPG series. Unbound - Big LITRPG title rates up there with defiance and he who fights monsters levels, Primal Hunter - Another big in depths title A post apoc litrpg, Underverse - Grimdark LITRPG, a bit explicit that one 18+, Thats just to name a few of the big big ones of LITRPG. In depths , world building, deep characters and plenty of plot and most have over 6 books in each series. My thoughts on these favorites.... While Defiance of the Fall is pretty good, The rest for me were either too 'light' with very little detail or very little fleshed out characters or very campy with emotional issues. Like Carl, dude has way too big an obsession with his cat. Like when he's killing anyone who looks at his cat wrong and constantly going 'you will not break me' it just gets annoying. Same with He who fights with Monsters,Jason just gets more and more preachy and self hating longer it goes on. Constantly spending most the book going over his 'I'm too dark' stuff. Path and Iron prince are good but they are just average, Path tends to just skim rather than really go indepths. It's a fun light read but it moves as a super fast pace like...years go by in a single book in each of the later ones.

Dungeon Crawler Carl Dungeon Crawler Carl Dungeon Crawler Carl! Yyyaaayyy so amazing!

He Who Fights and Dungeon Crawler Carl are definitely somewhere at the top of my own list. I really liked Necrotic Apocalypse for the zombie humor parts and the feeding system it introduced, though it peters out. Another one I liked for the very memorable characters is the Ripple System. House is awkward and awesome (and gets a LOT more interesting once she gets a cat), and Frank is, well, Frank.

Would love to hear some more of your favs… i read 2 of ur favs, one on my wishlist but would love to hear some more

I’m listening to the audiobook of He who fights monsters and it is fantastic. I stopped on book 6 and need to pick it back up.

He who fights with monsters is epic I cant wait for the next book! Just started dungeon crawler carl so far it is funny and great listen!

I've gone thru a lot of litrpg/gamelit audiobooks these last few years as well. I agree that He Who Fights With Monsters is an amazing audiobook. The series that got me in to the genre is Archemi Online. Still one of my favourites. Has some adult stuff it thats not for every one tho. Another favourite is The Hedge Wizard. That one goes more in the general fantasy story direction. I might try Path of Ascension next. Scrolled past it quite a few times already.

Came here because I keep ending up dropping series from lack of focus on the main character. Multiple povs are just too annoying to deal with for me, and it's hard to find anything even touching the sides of The Primal Archer, Defiance of The Fall, and Terra Nova + the tower series by Seth Ring. Everything else seems to have problems where the plot either shifts entirely, growth slows, multiple povs are introduced in a way that makes the main character have less than .33% of the actual writing, or the character making choices that are just downright boring or clearly not what would make them the most powerful. I'll check some of these out, hope they do well!!

good to see ya back, not magic, but glad you are back.

thank you for giving this very hidden and unknown genre a shoutout litRPG has saved my mind from going into the blender more then once and more people need to get to know it. also warformed : stormweaver(iron prince) is my favorite by far the 2nd book is just as good as the first

I've only listened to a few in that genre. Two by Ryan Rimmel recently that I really enjoyed and there were One Bad Roll: A LitRPG Adventure: Fifth Era Apocalypse, Book 1 and The Tap Dancing Tarasque: A LitRPG Adventure: Fifth Era Apocalypse, Book 2. Johnathan McClain narrates them are was fantastic.

The Throne of Glass series is like reminds me of this but with a female lead. I haven’t tried much of this genre. May need to try it! I’m more of a horror, weirdlit girl

where do i find these?

I find RPGlit novels can be hit or miss depending on how many pages there are on stats and how easy things become for the MC after leveling up. My favorite series is a shorter 3 book set, Forever Fantasy Online: GamerLit Epic Portal Adventure. It's a 3 book series about players getting transported through a game to the fantasy world they were playing in as their characters, explores the players getting used to the new bodies of the characters, and how the game becomes far more real afterwards. Lots of references and nods to WoW, raiding and items and such. Loved it. Two other series I enjoyed are, The Divine Dungeon, which the MC is a dungeon core and learns to be a dungeon. Another one is more adult and it's, Morningwood: Everybody Loves Large Chests, where the MC is actually a mimic that lvls up and becomes self aware, lots of humor, gore and some adult stuff, lotsa fun.

Malazan Book of the Fallen - best fantasy series of all time. Started off as a RPG created by Steven Erikson and his friend Ian C. Esslemont. Must read!!!

Just finished the video. Defiance of the Fall sounds a lot like The Primal Hunter's world building.

Where did you get these books? Any place you recommend?

Primal hunter, mark of the fool and all the skills are my top three, defiance of the fall is a contender

Ooh, no love for Mother of Learning or Ar'Kendrithyst?

Is this like the old "choose your own adventure" books?

Give that Fox some Ice Cream!

Jeff try mark of the fool

No primal hunter though???

Have you checked out "The Wandering Inn" ? Real good, and huge (30000+ pages)