Viridian Gate Online: The Artificer

A LitRPG Adventure (The Imperial Initiative, Book 1)

By: S. R. Witt, James A. Hunter

Narrated by: Matthew Broadhead

A tech genius. A corrupt politician. The world hangs in the balance.

October, 2042

In two weeks, the world will die, murdered by a nine-mile-wide, extinction-level asteroid.

And Robert Osmark—billionaire and savvy tech-—couldn't be readier for the fiery apocalypse.

Unlike the shortsighted masses, he's been diligently preparing for this day from the moment the asteroid first appeared. Through his relentless efforts, digital salvation now awaits anyone bold enough to take the leap and permanently transition into the brand-new, ultra-immersive, fantasy-based VRMMORPG, Viridian Gate Online. And Robert Osmark will lead this new world he has created.

But even with every advantage skewed in his favor, Osmark faces powerful opposition. A rogue faction of global elites led by US Senator Sizemore isn't content to merely survive the apocalypse. They have their sights set much higher, and are recruiting dangerous allies, undercutting Robert's efforts at every turn, and hiring VGO's most deadly assassins to get what they want. To win, Osmark will need to viciously crush all opposition before his plans turn to ash.

©2019 James A. Hunter and Shadow Alley Press, Inc. (P)2024 Tantor

Don't like giving written reviews. Felt necessary.

The narrator, over enuciates his s, t, and soft c's making him sound like a snake at times, other times it's just sounds harsh. His accent work is good but his descriptions are rushed and at times, comes of as disinterested. Also he mispronounced stamina every time. Some times it sounds like stamna, others it's stanima.

Story was good Reader not so good

Timeline wise, listen to this NO EARLIER than book 4 of the main Viridian Gate Online series. Can be before or after the first 2 Firebrand books.

Story filled in a lot.

Narrator: Awesome voice, but ZERO Story Telling abilities. NO Inflections in the right places. Just sounds like an AM Radio anchorman reading the news on and on... Sorry Matthew, but ya might stick with Biographies or something that doesn't require a STORY TELLER's narration skills.

narrator needs to learn how to pronounce words

I truly enjoyed the story but the narrator really needed some help. His cadence was difficult to listen to and his pronunciation of several words was completely off. I almost stopped listening after the 1st chapter just because of the narration. But I'm glad I listened to the end because the story was quite entertaining.

I think this is my favorite book in the series.

It ties everything together. Connecting or revealing all the loose threads that the main series doesn't show you.
I hope they write more in this sub-series at least as good as this one.

keep em coming

this book was was a good storyline. it didn't have as much action, but it didn't need it. great start to the storyline.

know what you're getting into

vgo(not just this book) is the marvel movies of books its fun and light, easy to absorb but has some subtle nuance if you care enough to find it I absolutely love the series because the characters are very relatable start with the illusionist series not just because it's a prequel but because characters are amazing and the story seys the stage well just don't expect 100% continuity it's still an amazing story

Did he just say “Stanima”??

Not done with this book yet, but it’s been pretty rough trying to get through it.. this narrator has nothing on Armen Taylor. This guy’s inflections are very awkward… it’s almost like every sentence is a question. And he keeps mispronouncing words! I guess the editors weren’t paid enough to care.

I hate giving 4 stars!

A bigger fan of VGO you will not find! which is probably why I couldn't get on board with his interpretation of Robert Osmark. Armen Taylor set the tone and Mr. Broadhead went a different direction. Ended up reading most of it on Kindle. Still a great book, and good performance! Just for me it's like changing actors on a show... took me out of it a bit.

Awesome to hear the other side

Very cool to relive the Adventure from the empire side! Paints a whole new picture of Robert

Great story

It was great to see everything from Robert's side. It will make everything going forward more meaningful, and it was also nice to see the imperial side a bit. The one annoying thing was how the narrator kept saying stanima over and over at least 100 times, instead of stamina. Don't know if that was a typo, or an error on his part. At first I thought I was hearing things, but nope, stanima stanima stanima, ugh. Other than that it was a good performance.