Dungeon Core Online

Remastered Edition, Book Two

By: Jonathan Smidt, Portal Books

Narrated by: Travis Baldree

Length: 15 hrs and 41 mins

Publisher's Summary

War is coming.

DCO’s latest patch has finally made it possible for dungeons to interact with one another. This can mean only one thing: It is time for some player vs player action. More importantly, it means James and Blank will finally be able to settle their score on the Fields of Battle. Only, there’s a lot more riding on this than pride - if James loses, he will be forced to leave DCO for good.

With everything on the line James and Rue must prepare for the onslaught and grow their dungeon as fast as possible. Which may mean doing things James isn’t proud of, things that involve a lot of dickens....

Blank may be formidable, but the Random dungeon still has a few tricks up its sleeve. James has unlocked an entire new floor, and with it, the most powerful and terrifying Random mobs yet.

Well...hopefully; it is Random after all.

But seriously - how bad could it be?

This is the revised, edited, and novelized retelling of the popular Royal Road web serial Dungeon Core Online by Glyax.

©2021 Jonathan Smidt (P)2021 Portal Books

If you enjoyed the first book read it

I tried to read this book in one go but life kept interrupting. I did read it as fast as I could because I wanted to see how the main fight panned out. The main character is mature for a 16 year old but still a kid. It’s fun and while not light hearted because he’s invested, it’s an irreverent read with a ton of pop culture references from the 80s on.

Amazing rework!

Story:
This story is smooth, nothing is out of place or jars the immersion. Problems show up, they are reacted to or planned for. It feels like the characters are alive, each reaction fits. There isn't a sudden pull away from the dungeon and it's mobs yet still shows good focus on players and side characters.

The main character doesn't have major knowledge that they shouldn't. They are written to be believable and lovable characters.

voice actor:
Each voice had so much personality, Each one vastly different to be recognizable.
When a line was said nine times out of ten one could pick out who it was.
Every line was clear except one.
The terminus (Mecha T-Rex) can be a bit hard to understand at times, but the words and lines are still clear so that might just be personal.
In shorter words I knew what was being said even if I couldn't hear the full words.

personal opinion:
Massive improvements on the original. The pacing is much better, less pulling away from the main story. No massive loose ends, No out of place Dungeon set up.

Tho I am sad I may never see what might happen with the Water. Thouse who know, will know.

I'm looking forward to the next book with anticipation and excitement.

Spoiler bit.

I enjoy how the deus ex machina made sense. It wasn't a Main character just wins, While I won't say much just Incase.
It didn't leave me dissatisfied or cheated like most tend to.

no one would play this game.

Gave up on. this after a couple hours. one of the stupidest concepts in litrpg. People would leave the game on droves with the tiered rollout of updates

A very enjoyable wtf experience

I won a copy of the first book and was so happy I did because this series is just fun. the crazy wackiness and referential humor make you WTF while laughing and cheering. This comes recommend

Less Dungeon Building, A lot of PVP. Another 3.5

So, as we found out at the end of Book 1 this book is all about Dungeon vs Dungeon which includes a lot of Player vs Player. Was this new implementation as bad as I thought it would be? No, but it's not amazing either.

Dungeon Building and Management. This is usually the main part of a Dungeon Core novel. While there is some in this book, there is MUCH less than the previous and most Dungeon Core stories. It may have been one thing is there was a balance through the book, but there isn't. Early in this book there is some Management, but less and less as the PvP aspect takes place more often. It's pretty decent as far as this kind of thing goes, but I was really into this story for the Dungeon Core Management, I already have enough normal LitRPG.

Dungeon vs Dungeon and Player vs Player. The DvD is a novel idea. It plays out pretty well and was fun and enjoyable to read. The aspect of James working together with his players vs Blank USING their players definitely gave a different feel to each side of the battle. The PvP though was okay at best. The story isn't hugely invested in the player side of the game, so there is a distinct lack when it comes to player stuff. Maybe this could be the start of more player involvement in the story. While PvP does allow player interaction between Towns, it's mainly negative. This negative interaction makes me think there wouldn't be any non-PVP interactions between Towns. But who knows, maybe future DvD could be more light hearted instead of cruel PvP.

My reason for the lower rating. Here's the thing. I would have still been pretty happy with the DvD and okay with the PvP. That creates interaction between the Towns which the system really needed. The main problem is that a series ending ultimatum is issued fairly early in the story. At that point all suspense for the end of the book is lost unless this is meant to be the end of the series, which I highly doubt. I understand the need to create a goal and tension, but ultimatums like that aren't the way to do it. From that point on I wholeheartedly believed James was going to win, the story was just about the process of getting there.

All in all, it's not bad. Maybe the next book will be more exciting.

Fun with Puns

There’s a LOAD of cultural references and puns to appreciate here. A fun story with lots of laughs along the way.

Great read

This book brings all the hilarity and chaos that we see in book 1. I love the new mechamics and how James and Roo are growing. Looking forward to book 3!

good read

this is a fun series. I have nothing bad to say about this book.

forced word count is stupid

forced word count is stupid
forced word count is stupid
forced word count is stupid
yes no

Great series

I love these books Travis Baldree does such an amazing job narrating the books and all the cross references to other great book like everybody loves large chests by Neven Iliev and dungeon crawler carl by Matt Dinniman to names just a couple make it all that more epic!

Explosive sheep for the win

So #DCO by Jonathan Smidt. This sequel has an incredible accumulation of pop culture references as well as a vengeful fight for supremacy with a shit load of Dickens 🐔. The depth of characters and their flaws is superbly written. This is a must read 📚5/5🌟 #BookReview

Follow me on Twitter @zennyreadsalot

Amazing

This book continues the laughs and madness of the previous book and keeps you wanting more

Awesome follow up to book 1

Really enjoyed this series, well. Worth a listen if. You loved the first book you won't need any recommendation other than more of the same. If you haven't yet then get book 1 first then after listening to it get this straight away. Some brilliant imagary and will be listening to this one a few times.

A continued delight

If you liked the first, then you will like this. I don't really know if there is more to say, its a continued delight to read, some genuine laugh out loud moments, and you have to love that clock work T-rex.

I would say that more than any other LitRPG, DCO continues to be the VR MMO that I would most like to play, it frankly just seems like the most fun,

This book is fuc.. is such a good book

This book is something that I've been waiting since i finished the first book, the comedy and the references are none stop, I highly recommend that you get the first one if you haven't you wont regret it, while your at it get the second one, cant wait for the 3rd book hope this helped