Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint

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Ahh this seems to be a new addition in here and I was WAITING for this to be added.

Note that the webtoon just recently released a few months back and I will be writing my review for the 36 chapters I have read, not the webnovel.
So let's get to it now, my review might be a bit too long with some spoilers.


STORY: 10/10
This starts off with a simple yet exciting plotline that many readers might be able to relate to. Our MC here is an avid reader of webnovels and he followed one of them in particular called "Three Ways to survive the apocalypse" ... for 10 years religiously seeking a distraction from worldly matters.
The intriguing part kicks off the moment he finally finishes reading it with the message, "There are three ways to survive this apocalypse. Everything is fading and becoming unclear now. But one thing is certain, if you're reading this, you will survive". He was the the sole reader. Then at once, everything came to a standstill.

Fiction became reality.

It's basically this huge Jumanji mixed with Hunger Games. Except the entire world has fallen prey to it and only the MC knows how the plot goes. Oh and did I mention that the whole world has now become a huge streaming service for the entertainment of celestial beings? The story continues to get more and more and complex and interesting as it goes on but I'll leave that for you to discover. The world building here is *chefs kiss*. Power System is extremely well thought out.

ART: 10/10
From the same studio that did the art of Solo Leveling, need I say more?

CHARACTER: 10/10 (100/10 if I could)
The Characters CARRY.
Kim Dokja the mc. The story at first leads you into believing that he's a naive and clumsy guy. I mean, what would you expect from someone who failed multiple exams getting enrolled into a third rate college and still struggles with work, seeking happiness from reading a web novel throughout his life. It becomes quite apparent once the apocalypse begins though, that he is NOTHING like that.

He stands at this very fine line between good and bad, that he could even be considered a realist. That should be the case for a 28 year old man. He does what has to be done to survive. He's cunning and manipulative as well, leads you to wonder why he did not become a businessman! Surely with his intellect and memory power, he would not have performed this badly at life? Turns out later in the story that there is more to him that meets the eye. It has not been covered completely in the webtoon yet, but I must say I'm hooked.
It's never dull when he's on the scene, bringing out new and innovative ways to clear each scenario, a method that you might have never expected. It's not even about overpowering the difficulties, it's about outsmarting them.
I should mention that while Kim Dokja is the main character, there is a true protagonist, the one who was the actual protagonist of the webnovel he read. Funny thing is, this character would more suit the OP af, good looking trope that protagonists of fantasy genres like these have.

The side characters are great as well. They are a mix of the characters that Dokja actually read about in the webnovel plus characters that are exceptions. Each character has their own specialty, personality and traits and they grow in their own ways. Some mysterious characters included. Their interactions are a treat to read especially. It would take a hundred years if I have to describe each of them so let's leave it at that.

ENJOYMENT: 10/10
The comedy here is surprisingly top tier! It has a very dark and gritty start, so the comedic scenes feel very welcomed and also natural. No fanservice involved, so that's a plus point. Keep an eye out for the viewers of this grand show too, they keep this webtoon very lively with their reactions.
I'm enjoying this quite a lot so far and I would really recommend you to check this out for yourself whether you enjoy this too or not!

OVERALL: 10/10
Yes yes I know that this has been a completely positive review. Unfortunately, I'm unable to find any glaring flaws in this media. If there are any, it was easily ignorable. ORV has high potential, and from what I've heard from the reviews of the webnovel, it doesn't fall of in quality but rather rises in it. The biggest negative I would say is that this is addictive, so I suggest waiting for more chapters to pile up before beginning instead of committing my mistake.
Another little flaw is that the pacing is a bit slow, but I'd say that is good since this is a plot heavy manwha and a lot of the information in the beginning is relevant later on so rushing through the concepts won't help.

TL;DR Read Omniscient Reader and see if it is your cup of tea! I do not think you would regret giving this one a shot!

Okay. Here's the thing. I absolutely adore Omniscient Reader. The webnovel is easily beside my favourite novels/series like Les Miserables and Lord of the Rings. Seriously. The novel is just that good, and I honestly, wholeheartedly recommend reading the novel if you're someone who loves stories and great characters. There are a lot of impactful and heartbreaking moments in the book, and it moved me to tears both while reading it and thinking about it. So yeah. I love this novel. But then why did I only rate the webtoon a 7?

The thing is that Omniscient Reader is a story told from an unreliable point ... of view---throughout the story, Kim Dokja is constantly misleading the reader, hiding things from you, and thus you rely on the other characters who are more concise and clear with intent (Yoo Joonghyuk, Han Sooyoung) to fill you in on what he may have left out of the narration. Kim Dokja does not like conveying his emotions, he wants to *appear* like a calm and level headed leader who totally knows the best course of action, but the narration of other characters, the fourth wall, and even his own views on himself betray this. It shows you just how lonely he is and how lowly he views himself, and why he has no value for his own life, and why he is willing to throw away his life for his companions (because they are his everything). The point of view changes in this novel can let you into how the others view the world, and how Kim Dokja actually felt during a certain moment. On top of this, it lets you know what other characters might have been during between periods of time (ex. When YJH threw KDJ into the Han River during the itho-im not spelling that-saur scenario, he actually came back to the bridge and waited for him for 3 days). The webtoon chooses to focus almost entirely on Kim Dokja, and the effect of an unreliable narrator loses all of it's meaning when you can see the action rather than having to trust Kim Dokja to accurately describe what is happening. I think that the loss of the unreliable aspect of the novel, combined with the fact that you don't really read all of his thoughts, I can get why people don't think his motivations make sense, because his motivations lie within his constant commentary, and the rumblings of the fourth wall or the viewpoint of another character help further your knowledge of his character. As a result, I think his webtoon counterpart lacks depth that his original webnovel self had. Removing the context of Kim Dokja's thought process and ramblings, it makes webtoon Kim Dokja come off as flat sometimes (not all of the time, but definitely certain moments where he had plenty of internal dialogue reduced to a few sentences).

I also feel like the reader loving the story metaphor is lost in other forms of media, and that is why I fear the release of the movie to be honest...with the webtoon, those elements are completely removed since you can't hear all of Kim Dokja's thoughts and the thoughts of other characters, and I feel as if it focuses entirely on the action instead. Also, the addition of new characters (like that one dude from the peace land arc, whom I cannot recall the name of. in the novel it was just Asuka Ren, which ties in to the theme of authors and readers loving the stories that they make, and the peaceland arc was way longer now that I think of it) is something that I believe to be unnecessary.

The art is amazing, beautiful colours and clean lineart, and some panels are so beautiful I'd frame them if I could tbh...

But other than that, as a reader of the novel and the first person to sing it's praises to the highest point in the Alps, I think that the original meaning and overall emotional impact of the novel is lost in the webtoon because of the lack of external narration and because Kim Dokja is no longer an unreliable narrator. Thanks for sticking around!

Oh boy, a Korean Webtoon that hits ALL the right vibes but manages to be completely meaningless.

Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint (or ORV) is about an underdog hero who had faithfully and loyally read a webnovel to its conclusion. You can say he's dedicated, since he turned out to be the ONLY reader after 3,149 chapters.

It's easy to see why ORV is so appealing. It's your typical... I guess "hybrid" isekai where the world manages to turn into a video game. It has fresh and interesting ideas, blending in RPGs with a worldwide battle-royale streamed to the... stars in the sky.

But not only does the world-building fail ... to captivate me, I just found the story to be oh so very DRY. I dropped this webtoon at chapter 21. I think I gave it a fair enough shot.

At the very least, I expected a functional game because well... I'm a GAMER. As sexually repre- cringe as that sounds, do I really need to explain myself? Do you not understand the significance of my undoctored photo of Marianne smiling? Hmph. Casual.

Even though my expectations are bare minimal when consuming media, ORV manages to be even worse than my baseline expectations. Not only does it fail to prove that it's a game, it abuses the creativity of game mechanics solely to drive the plot forward - a catastrophic and fatalistic flaw.

Where do I even begin with this mess? Well, let's just start from the little details. Whatever the hell this "game" is called, it appears to be an RPG from the onset. You have stats and skills to complete your objective. You even have traits, which allow for a "General Evaluation" of the character. What's repulsive is that all of the things I've mentioned are more labels than anything. While that IS what they are in typical RPGs, the way ORV uses them is to merely assess a person's capabilities and personality. But you don't need to be a GAMER to tell that the edgy teenager has the "Edgy Teenager" trait, or that the Reader can read text faster. It's this uninspired creativity that makes me think that "Press F to pay respects" had more meaning than this.

Okay, but what about something tangible ORV has? You mean the "regressors"? They just seem like the same archetype as "Edgy Teenager". You can't tell me that "Regressors" have a special meaning behind them because they don't. They're innately edgy because they look like they've seen some shit. And those Dokkaebis? Seems like a cop-out that act like tangible beings for the CONSTELLATIONS to watch via twitch.tv. Bleh, the Constellations. They're these beings that sponsor your journey to beating whatever game this is. Through a dialogue box, you can basically surmise what they're thinking and that their donation of a paultry 100 coins is enough to say they like what you're doing.

Ugh, these dialog boxes are my biggest gripe with this webtoon. They tell the reader (both Dokja AND you) EXACTLY what they need to know. But these boxes are EVERYWHERE and explain SO much that you don't even need to think about what's going on. Oh, slap a kid? You'll get 5 dialog boxes from different constellations that basically tell you whether or not they approve of your action (they don't). It feels... too convenient. Almost as if the author is using game mechanics for sheer convenience...

But hold on Mr. Chips901, if you were actually IN a game, you'd actually want that kind of information to drive your decision-making. And you'd be correct, wayward reader. But this convenient information doesn't stop at what the gods think of you, the convenience extends to EVERYTHING. From the skills to the traits, all of it is just too convenient and the writing is to blame here.

Yes, I'm saying the writing is trash. Because in the first "game," Dokja SUDDENLY becomes super OP and is already well beyond our mortal comprehension. I mean, he literally has a skill called "FOURTH WALL" without any description to its abilities or capabilities. Holy shit, the authors are BRAZENLY going for the WOW and SHOCK factors! You'll never know what THE FOURTH WALL is fully capable of, but it can negate you from fear, block people from spying on you, and can even do your final exams for you so that you don't flunk high school. Neat! Now, if it could do my taxes and date my women for me, only then would I consider it "overpowered."

The point is, this shitty facade of a game won't work on me. The story bombards you with window dressing words to tell you that Dokja's playing the game right. But do YOU know what's going on? The answer is no. If you did, you'd be able to explain the significance of everything exactly BECAUSE it's a game. The failure to prove otherwise means that the game... isn't really a game.

Okay, let's move on to the lack of foreshadowing. Every situation/conflict/obstacle that the characters face are all so predictably boring. Instead of using what you have in the environment to formulate a solution, which would showcase the writer's creativity, ORV almost always elects to tell the reader that Dokja had it all figured out all along. All of this is presented in the SAME moment that the problem is being solved instead of showing the character doing ominous things for the future. It's exactly like you inviting me to a hardware store to assassinate me. And instead of using the wealth of tools at your disposal, be it a hammer or screwdriver, you instead call in an ICBM missile to blow up not just me, but the entire hardware store solely because you want to look cool. +++++S T Y L E.

Isn't it obvious that this webtoon isn't for me? This is a story that doesn't need you to think about anything, really. The story lays itself out, from how characters feel to the most overly convoluted solutions for convenience's sake. If you don't like substance in your anime because it simply hurts to think about it, you'll enjoy this story just fine. But even if this webtoon "gets good" much later, I just don't see a point to it when I'm being spoon-fed everything from character expressions to THE PLOT TWISTS.

What's the point of the journey if you know where you're going? There is none. Curiosity is what drives your passion and reasoning. The lack thereof proves that the journey isn't a meaningful one. In other words, I find ORV completely tasteless because there's nothing to be curious about. Its ideas are great ones, but it can't manifest itself into something much greater. If ORV had something going for it, then I would have already found out within the 21 chapters that I read. And if you still think that I'm missing the point, then please enlighten me. If you can prove that ORV had something worth reading about, then I shall continue reading and change the rating accordingly.

"A Reader should fight like a reader." - Chapter 21. This is where I gave up. Everything about this statement shows just how unfortunately shallow this webtoon is. Go ahead, go outside and announce to the world that ORV is the next greatest thing since Sex 2. I'll just go play a REAL video game like Hades instead. Just be back before dinner, mkay?