Establish

Dungeon Robotics Series, Book 1

By: Matthew Peed

Narrated by: Nicole Poole, Gabriel Vaughan

Length: 8 hrs and 44 mins

Publisher's Summary

Regan Earle was a robotics scientist that inadvertently caused the robot takeover of the world. When his last creation completes a decade-long plan to end his own life, he ends up surprised. Creation offers him a second chance to test his wits and cunning in another world. Fate, however, is fickle and Regan ends up as a Dungeon Core...with all his memories. Is the world of Murgin ready to face such a dungeon? Let's find out....

Earth 2150. Nearly 20 years since the robot uprising, where all AIs designed by inventor Dr. Regan Earle went rogue and started to take over the world. Or at least, that's what everyone thought until a year later Earle himself sent out a message. A message that stated his creations would shut down if he were killed. He even went so far as to place a beacon on top of his building that broadcasted his location. The humans fought against the machines for decades in a futile attempt to destroy the tower. Until one day....

©2019 Matthew Peed (P)2019 Tantor

Great story, bad voice acting

The story was so good that it helped me overlook the borderline monotone voice acting.

really good

I'm not sure if it's the author or the narrator but at one point he reads 'salt pepper' instead of salt peter

Voice acting is plain horrible

Gabriel Vaughan is essentially monotone throughout the entire book.

Story is about standard audible dungeon core quality. Some good qualities but an editor should have spent some more time with the author.

Male voice, whole not very good

The story is an interesting concept but it seems to be written very boringly. Doesn’t seem very exciting or interesting.
Make voice actors sounds very monotone and unemotional.

I would of stopped listening to this had i not bought the credits i used to get this audio book.
Wouldn’t recommend.

Female voice did great with what she was given

Great story, but really bad narrators

Such a great story ruined by lackluster narrators. Particularly Nicole Poole, her performance was horrid.

A decent dungeon core book

I found the book very interesting as long as you like dungeon core books.
The only fault I can think of is that the synopsis is a bit misleading. I expected the book to be about a man turned into a dungeon core in the world that was taken over by the machines.

Nice story, good performance, silly mistakes.

This is a good dungeon core book with an interesting premise. The execution is average, definitely worth a purchase and a listen. The biggest problem is the little things. The use of metric by an agricultural society that is "stuck" in a complacent state is a truly lost opportunity: if the dungeon used metric and the natives used imperial units, it would have been really interesting contrast, but to have agrarian people to use metric (also an arbitrary system of measurement, oh, the irony) is just silly.

I look forward to hearing more of this series, but the incongruities are annoying.

Also, he calls saltpeter "salt pepper".

starts off slow gets better by the end

it starts off slow and gets better by the end and is a good setup for the Nextbook

Not Bad

I really Cant wait for the next one! It was really good. 3 words left.

Meh

This book advances at a breakneck pace, skippibg over important details and rushing through things in a sentence that would be better served taking an entire chapter.

The characters are all... off. I've listened for an hour or two, and everything just seems to work out for thr two main characters. Things that need to work go without a hitch without experimentation or coercion... it's mary sueish. The main guy has no problem adjucting to being a dungeon core, the main girl has no problem adapting to weird situations, everybody likes them except people who are clearly evil.

Only an hour into the book and I don't understand anyone's capabilities, but especially the dungeon core's because he just pulls magic symbols from nowhere, then he just makes automotons from magic with no work?

And, oh jooooooy, another stat-based dungeon core book with a fairy companion. Am I the only one tired of these two Dungeon Core conventions? can we not have everything governed by stats, have a dungeon core with a helpful female companion?

EDIT: Yeah, kept listening. The female baroness is definitely a mary sue at the least. the POV switched to a slave, and of course the golden hearted mary sue BARONESS came to personally deliver help to the slaves, awe she's so virtuous. Then the scene ended abruptly as usual.
This book advances at a breakneck pace, skippibg over important details and rushing through things in a sentence that would be better served taking an entire chapter.

The characters are all... off. I've listened for an hour or two, and everything just seems to work out for thr two main characters. Things that need to work go without a hitch without experimentation or coercion... it's mary sueish. The main guy has no problem adjucting to being a dungeon core, the main girl has no problem adapting to weird situations, everybody likes them except people who are clearly evil.

Only an hour into the book and I don't understand anyone's capabilities, but especially the dungeon core's because he just pulls magic symbols from nowhere, then he just makes automotons from magic with no work?

And, oh jooooooy, another stat-based dungeon core book with a fairy companion. Am I the only one tired of these two Dungeon Core conventions? can we not have everything governed by stats, have a dungeon core with a helpful female companion?

EDIT: Yeah, kept listening. The female baroness is definitely a mary sue at the least. the POV switched to a slave, and of course the golden hearted mary sue BARONESS came to personally deliver help to the slaves, awe she's so virtuous. Then the scene ended abruptly as usual.

Then the slaves and their evil, irredeemable masters go intk the dungeon and, of course the genocidal dungeon core who has never had a problem killing decides to save our POV slave for... reasons?

and the slave just... reacts so terribly. She hardly seems bothered for someone impaled to a wall for 15 minutes, and when asked if she wants to live, she thinks to herself "I thought about all the things I hadn't done with my life yet. I wanted to find love" and then the author got lazy and continued "and so much more." And then just moves on. If the author was going tk half-ass it, they just shouldn't have even had her think about it!

and then she's transformed into a robot, and the first perskn description of her transformation is just horrible. She's dying and transforming, but somehow she can tell that her horns have grown centimeters, and she has time to note her hair changing color. But then she senses "some

Hard to believe this is narrated by real people

I don't like leaving reviews, because many people have worked hard on the end product and I want to respect that.
This time I feel compelled to warn others about the quality of the audiobook.

The book feels childishly written, with overly simplified sentences reminiscent of high school writing.
However, when I read it, I can skip over these issues as there is enough of a difference between this book and other dungeon core stories.

But all enjoyable moments are destroyed by the poor narration. Yes, there is an underlying robotic theme so having robotic narration would be thematically appropriate. The end result is that the male and female voices sounds like a terrible text to speech program, with no nuance or pacing. It also highlights the childish writing and makes it physically painful to listen to the story. My co-workers keep asking me why I am wincing, thinking I am sick.

Neat take on the dungeon core genre

If you are ok with a bit of an over-the-top-but-smart powerfantasy, this series is for you.

I enjoyed this entire series so far (halfway in book 8 currently) it starts out pretty decent and improves along the way.

I enjoyed how the Main Character is not exactly the hero in this story and might actually be or flirts with being the villain.

Sure the MC seems overpowered at times, but the story builds attachment and investment with secondary characters and the world over time, which are caught between the MC and other threats, keeping the story somewhat grounded.

The female characters are a bit one dimensional in the first book, maybe the second too, but the author seems to improve on this later on. Nothing overtly sexual happens, but the MC can be perceived overly fatherly or patronizing.
On that same vein, the MC also does not really seem to have any flaws.

Both the author and the MC seem to get distracted with 'projects' and 'side stories' which are also discarded again easily, often without any clear resolution of that storyline, or with any impact on the characters. Quality of the story fluctuates because of this.

Some power creep does occur in the later books, but it is often vague what the end of the power curve really is.

Another slight pet peeve is that each book is not really a contained story, the story in continuous and books seems to start and end arbitrarily.

(Later edit: some spelling/writing errors can be heard here and there)

Sounds pretty negative, but it is fresh and fun enough to keep me wanting more.

Loved it

I loved the book, a really nice power curve. Good story, nice world mechanics.

though saying 'salt pepper' instead of 'saltpeter' is kind of annoying

Dissapointing

This is a very standard dungeon core story with a bland overpowered MC. He instantly becomes amazing at magic the moment he is born and doesn't really rely on robotics. It's more like a skin for his dungeon than anything else.

DNF so maybe the last 3 hours are where it gets good.