#litrpg

A lot of traditional fantasy fans don't like it because it's, well, missing most of the stuff that we love about traditional fantasy. There is often very little character development and very little philosophical musing. There is often no nuance or complexity.

But I've seen folks say some very mean things about the subgenre and the people who like it. ... And I don't think they get the fundamental draw of LitRPG. I'm mostly coming at this as an outsider, so I could be very wrong about this; I've seen a lot of people talk about the LitRPG/progression fantasy settings they're building on r/worldbuilding and r/fantasy, and I've read a wee bit of it but not much. I'd love to see someone who reads a lot in the genre weigh in.

But it seems like the main draw of this genre, the main daydream powering the fantasy, isn't actually about the leveling up or even about the clever tricks that the heroes use when they're under-leveled. It's that in a LitRPG world, if what you can do is reduced to a number, that number means something.

Like, the whole 'isekai with power scaling based on video game mechanics' genre came from Japan and Korea, right? And it's aimed at teenagers, right? ....Think about it for a sec. Across the world, and especially in East Asia, a lot of teenagers' lives revolve around one number: their school grades (and/or test scores). If your grades suck, you are treated as subhuman until you get your shit together. If your grades are good, you are under an incredible amount of pressure to keep it that way. Your grades/test scores are A Number That Defines Your Fate.

And like, grades are a terrible measure of human worth for a whole bunch of reasons. But one of the biggest ones is that, as a high schooler, they're not actually under your control. There are absolutely things you can do to raise your grades if you're struggling, but a lot of your life circumstances, as a teenager, are defined by someone else. If your parents are fighting and keeping you up til 3 AM? Or if you get a teacher that hates you and grades you accordingly? Your grades are going to suffer, through no fault of your own, and there isn't much to be done about it. Everyone knows that The Number That Defines Your Fate is garbage, and yet you have to obsess over it, or you're going to suffer for the rest of your life.

The fantasy of LitRPG is that the Number that Defines Your Fate is an objective fact, that hard work and persistence can actually change that number for the better, and that having a higher Number makes you cool rather than 'tired, stressed out, and unable to have any time to be yourself'. It isn't focused on relationships because most of its target audience doesn't have time for relationships, romantic or otherwise. There isn't room for philosophy or nuance, because most of the kids reading this stuff are tired to death and want popcorn fiction they can read between juggling 16 different assignments.

When you ask a friend to send you a pose idea and they send you a gif.

To be fair I do support the Clive Fancast of Assad Zaman.

I may or may not finish this one, but I still really like the movement in it!

You just know Clive is making the most heinous drink imaginable 🤣😭

 ✨ COVER REVEAL ✨

We’re thrilled to share the cover of Erin Ampersand’s Time to Play 💥🐢

The start of a rollicking, unputdownable LitRPG series that Matt Dinniman calls “pure gold” in which everyone on Earth is forced to take part in a worldwide survival competition—everyone, including Meghan Moretti and her three lovably chaotic kids. 

Time to Play is out August 18, 2026! Find out more at the link in our bio! 

Cover art by Spencer Flock 

New Dungeon Crawler crochet patterns I finished. So proud of my Carl and Donut 🥰🏆🐈💀