• Viridian Gate Online: The Jade Lord: A litRPG Adventure

  • The Viridian Gate Archives, Volume 3
  • By: James Hunter
  • Narrated by: Armen Taylor
  • Length: 11 hrs and 6 mins
  • 4.7 out of 5 stars (6,667 ratings)

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Viridian Gate Online: The Jade Lord: A litRPG Adventure  By  cover art

Viridian Gate Online: The Jade Lord: A litRPG Adventure

By: James Hunter
Narrated by: Armen Taylor
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Publisher's summary

November, 2042

It's been a busy month for 32-year-old Jack Mitchel:

Three weeks ago, he died.

Two weeks ago, he founded the first Faction in the ultra-immersive, fantasy-based VRMMORPG, Viridian Gate Online.

A week and a half ago the world ended, destroyed by a cataclysmic asteroid.

Seven days ago, he conquered the Imperial city of Rowanheath, bringing all of Eldgard to the brink of war.

Though Jack's Faction, the Crimson Alliance, has a tenuous truce with tech genius and Imperial lord, Robert Osmark, Jack knows it can't last. Osmark is devious and power hungry, and it's only a matter of time before he sends his forces to wipe Jack and his underdog crew off the map for good.

If Jack hopes to survive another month inside of VGO, he must find a way to beat Osmark and his army of bloodthirsty thugs, and a new quest - the Path of the Jade Lord - may be just the ticket. But this quest will be far harder than anything Jack's faced before, pushing him to his mental, physical, and moral limits. And if Jack isn't careful, his quest to defeat Osmark and the Empire may end up turning him into the despot he's been fighting against.

©2017 J.A. Hunter and Shadow Alley Press Inc (P)2017 J.A. Hunter and Shadow Alley Press Inc

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What listeners say about Viridian Gate Online: The Jade Lord: A litRPG Adventure

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Huge plot holes and lazy story development

Great narration – poor story.

The premise is good, but the writing is way too formulaic. Plot holes – ugh, plot holes and lazy writing for days!

So the main character is supposed to be an experienced gamer, but is constantly making mistakes that would make even a casual gamer cringe.

He is presented as this genius smart guy, and all of his friends and associates are impressed with his ideas, strategy, and wit. He makes ridiculous far fetched plans and decisions that always work out, but when faced with simple problems with glaring answers are presented to him, he ALWAYS (as in every single time) makes the obviously bad choice and has to be bailed out by his friends or “barely scrape through.”

Let's talk about his outlook/attitude: he flips between arrogantly cocky, a beacon of virtue, even keeled, constantly second guessing himself, and full of self doubt. Instead of choosing a character mentality (smart guy, cocksure asshole, Mr. Virtue, emo kid, etc.) the author tried to do it all, and it leaves you with a bi-polar, sometimes schizophrenic who is frequently high on coffee and sugar. Be ready for some whiplash.

Is there a serious/semi-serious fight happening? Things start off well – take a turn for the worst – and right at that point where things are going to go terribly wrong or maybe somehow work out – this is when the main character decides to ponder the meaning of life – or the price of beans – or what his favorite color is or should be (you know – to build suspense) – then he makes the right choice and hooray it somehow works out. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.

It is very frustrating because the premise is great, and the overarching story isn't bad either. It is the details that ruin this series.

Does it get better later on in the series?

No.

It doesn't.

The author uses the same old formulas and patterns over and over. Which is a shame because with just a little bit of rewriting this could be one of the best series in the genera. It really had that much potential, but I'm 5 books in and it is just the same pattern repeating endlessly.

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24 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

A D&D campaign for players with no attention spans

All right. I don't write a review unless I absolutely loved it, or absolutely hated it. So here we are.


This is not a character-driven book. I would love to be able to say it's a story-driven book, but that would require there to be a story. the characters are not fleshed out at all, and even the mildly interesting ones are just used for comedic relief.
each and every character is not only bland, but also basically a stereotype.

The main character is lauded for his intelligence and creativity throughout the books, even though he is a complete weapons-grade moron. The biggest fight you've ever been in? Tomorrow you say? Better get completely Jeffried tonight so your hungover. At one point his friends were literally holding him back trying to keep him from doing something stupid, and he shakes them off of him and runs off to do it anyway. Then comes back with a long look on his face and admits to them that he's been kind of stupid.

The entire book is 90% fighting, with small breaks in between and then you go right back into it. Every adjective that the author uses has to be the most extreme form. The drama has to be cranked to a hundred at all times for every fight until you are practically numb.

I would like to create a drinking game where you have to do a shot every time the author types the word "Unleashed", or someone has an "explosion of power."

I would have to save the narrator did a good job with what he had to work with, except for the cringey whisper screaming that he had to do all the time with all the epic shouting going on during the nonstop battles.

This is probably the first audiobook I have not finished. I got to the end, had about half an hour left but I just had to shut it off because I could not take the main characters sniveling, whining, and vacillating.

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16 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Series Keeps on improving

This is one of those rare series that just keeps on improving and improving as time goes on. The characters continue to grow, the plot is like a brick wall being filled in piece by piece with some solid mortar, and the action almost makes YOU bleed. Hunter is pretty slick,as he adds pieces from prior books to build the momentum, and then leaves you with a completed story that has a few plotlines that are unfinished so that you know where the next book is going to start.

The characters are really fun personalities, each distinct and outstanding in their own way. Each makes you laugh a little, grit your teeth some, and sweat a tad too. I think what is best about the characters is that they learn from their mistakes, and in this book they make a one whopper of an error, but they can use their intellects to overcome their adversity. That is why I really anticipate the battle that may be occuring in the next book! Gah, I hate waiting, but the build up is soooo good. I rate Hunter among the ranks of Blaise Corvin, Harmon Cooper, and J.A. Ciparino for the world building and characterizations. This is just pure fantasy at its finest, with just a touch of gamer thrown in for fun. VC is really beginning to carve out a name for itself for good reason.

By the way, Taylor just nails the narration. His voices make each and every character unique and fresh. If I went back to the first book I could admit that his voice for the Spider Queen was enough to admittedly make my skin crawl. I think I just want to hear him make Cutter say something like, "I can't get no satisfaction." Because everytime I hear that thief speak I hear Mick Jagger! Bloody brilliant, that is. Taylor is the man, and he knows how to pace a tale. I laugh everytime he does his "yelling over noise" voice, because I did that when I was a kid playing, too.

The series keeps getting better and better, and if this pace continues I think that we are in for some awesome stories! Even though I did receive a promo code for this review it in no way influenced my considerations of the material, and in fact, inspired me to be more honest. In fact, getting a code generally makes me harsher as a reviewer as I am more often concerned what someone like Me will decide based on my review.


If this review helped, please press the YES below. Thank you immensely!!!

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11 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

Steryotypical

The series started out good but now it feels so standard, like a perfect fantasy. The conflict and tension started to feel pointless as you know everything would end in the most predictable fashion.

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10 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

And my axe!

This book lags far behind the mediocrity of it's predecessors. It reads as if a 20 page novella was padded to the brim with "and my axe!" moments of "we're with you Jack!"

This isn't possible can we really do it?
We're with you Jack
Should we be doing this?
We're with you Jack
Should I dither some more to get my page count up?
We're with you Jack!

If you've read this review you've just read the whole book.

This book is utter sht.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Nuggets of gold in a disjointed story

It's an ok audible plus story but I wouldn't put money on it.
The bits of messiness and odd choices from the city conquest battle continue as the interesting developments of the archane tinkerer and diplomatic progress are quickly brushed over in vague details with one blatantly important invention being thrown on top of the overview because forahadowning. In the last book it is about jack growing up and taking things seriously, However, he completely forgets about the infiltrators the goddess told him about resulting in him murdering a bunch of peaceful warrior monks when everything goes to hell in a false flag attack. The whole deathhead mode and its scaling debuffs as time passes appears out of nowhere and provides no benifit to the story as the already existing threat of the human empire is sufficient cause to hurry and the negative side affects due to plot armor mean that the deathhead paragraphs are just there to pad out the page limit. You could cut out deathhead entirely from the book and nothing would have changed. The author could recover in the next book but I don't know because I'd have to buy the next book and it's not worth anything more than what you already pay for membership.

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

Don't waste your time.

This is when I quit the series. It seems the author is more concerned with quantity of books over quality of the story.

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Great ending, but...

... some boring combat scenes that I mostly have to fast-forward through. The author spends way too much time detailing every part of combat, and some battles are inherently uninteresting because you already know pretty much the outcome.

All in all though, a decent story.

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

The true mojo

Deleted it after the Jake trades he’s dragon for a flying monkey. The main character’s stupidity is used as a plot device to explain things to the audience. I’m sure the author though it was clever but it just comes off as annoying

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Avoid feature in the app?

I’m sorry, I lost interest back in the second book & this was no better.. I only got this because of the “based on your library, we recommend” section.. yes I have previous books and I guess I should have taken the time to review my old ratings/feedback.. but I didn’t, this is a great example of why I wish there was a feature in the app, a tab maybe, to flip to so I could quickly view books I did not like & avoid getting the next in a series.

Armen Taylor, I never feel engaged with the story when listening to him.. I think situationally he has a wonderful voice.

James Hunter/ The Jade Lord: still a good story concept, but the writing lacks a “real or natural” feel to the dialogue. The similes bother me for some reason as well.. I think I may just be being overly critical in this point as a result of not enjoying so much of the rest of the book.. or maybe they are just that bad

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3 people found this helpful