The New Gate

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As I write this review I have read the first 4volumes of the LN, those are the only ones released/translated to English so those are the only I am capable of reading/reviewing.

Upon reading some of the manga I became interested enough to go to the LN. A good choice, the LN is much better than the manga, more detail, better development and ofc sheer content. The LN does have a down side of constantly introducing new items, objects, and concepts. Not to mention making the main character out yo be god tier OP. However it is an enjoyable read.
The story follows Shin who after defeating ... a final boss is transported to the same world, 500 years later. He survived an online death game (similar to SAO I assume) but was alone unable to escape. All the NPC's now have emotions and feelings which are that of a living being. Upon Shin'a arrival he the rewards for defeating the final boss are noticed, he is now OP beyond belief in a world that has digressed since the time of players. Shin sets out to learn of the new world, a way back, and meeting his former ally's from 500 years ago. All while hiding his identity as a "High Human", and existence refered to as God-like rulers hundreds or years ago.

Art: as an LN art isn't as important, however I'll give it an 9. Most of the monster and characters illustrated are very well done. The elves are made out to be very attractive (very much so intended), while monsters are made out to be what they are —monsters. I think it gives pretty good character design and illustrates all relevant characters.

Characters: I'd say this is an 8, I like the main character Shin but I sometimes he annoyed me a bit. He questions to often how much power he should use, and after 4volumes he still has not tests his 100% power enough to use it well. Also it has a possibility of going all harem >.<, hoping not but..... Anyway this far it is showing signs of romance.

story: the first 2 volumes it was a solid 7-8, fun to read but nothing ground breaking. However volume 3 was different, was a 9-9.5 IMO. Has very good development and an epic battle, and tons of feels. If you tempted to drop the LN, read up to volume 3 before you do so. You won't regret it!!!! The 4th volume wasn't spectacular like the 3rd but I feel stuff is in the works... Hoping the 5th will hype me up. I want him to be exposed to the world as a high human, sooon soooon ;). 8.5 for story overall

Enjoyment is an 8.5, it's worth the read. I never felt bored reading it, enjoyment leads into my overal of yes an 8.5
(Grammar/spelling gl mwahahaha)

I'm sorry if this is a little long and too detailed, or not detailed enough where you would want a review to be, but I just wrote this the way I'd want someone to tell me about this light novel, with how much light novels rely on only text and can really eat up time before it's worth it. So I wrote it with that in mind, and here it goes.

So if you were too lazy to read or didn't get the synopsis, this is a story about a guy becoming godly powerful and winning the death mmorpg he and a bunch of other players ... were locked in, only to wake up in the fantasy world the game was based in 500 years later. I myself get a huge kick out of an op main character whipping out his powers and making his enemies and his friends jaws hit the ground before he wraps it up like nothing, but if you don't enjoy that, this is definitely not for you. But honestly, even if you do, like me, I can't really recommend this LN either.

The problem with the op mc genre is the lack of tension. With the recent Overlord anime, the climax of the season was a fight with one of his own team because the only people in that world even close to his power were his own people, and any other fights across the season lacked impact when you knew if push came to shove the mc could whip out his +9999 god broom and sweep up the trouble no problem. I won't say overlord did it well, but The New Gate is just insufferable by the end of the fourth volume. He wakes up with seemingly untouchable power and the whole first book is just him realizing he is basically a god walking around with crippled ants, and the only way the author can bring any tension to anything is that the MC is trying to hide his power because it would be so troublesome to show off and have the world's eyes move onto him. That's it. That's the first two books. He starts trying to feel out the world as quietly as he can whining about not wanting to stand out while he does unbelievable shit over and over. It's just tedious.

The sad thing is that I like Overlord, because even though there's no tension the MC just goes around doing what he wants and killing anyone who gets in the way or might spread his secret power around, something the "good guy" Shin of new gate would never do, choosing instead to do all he can to keep his strength a secret while constantly making sure you know that he could destroy everything if he didn't have to stay secret. The rub comes from the fact that The New gate has set up a fantastic premise that is just not at all utilized. Shin went from a fucking desk job behind a computer or a shut-in NEET life or whatever (it hasn't been explicitly said yet) to being trapped in a fantasy game with his life on the line, dealing with who knows what, similar to SAO fare (allies dieing in front of him, facing the harsh realities of humanity, yaddah yaddah). Imagine if the guy from SAO finished the game and was supposed to get out, only he was the only one that wasn't allowed to go home to his family and friends. After all of that hell he was just given more power and pushed further into his cage with no hint to where the keys are and left for the trash. Maybe I'm a wierdo, but I'd be pissed, or depressed, or feel something other than bland acceptance of this bullshit reward. This is a story about a man who should be on the edge, given godlike powers, and put into a world of crippled ants, which would seem interesting to me, but not a thought or tear is wasted on that. No, we have to make sure that no one finds out he's a god cuz that would be sooooo annoying, right?

Honestly the only thing that kept me going was the potential setups I saw. As I said above his situation seems really interesting to me, and as the story goes on his relationship with the characters he had known as mindless NPCs in the game, now given full life and consciousness is also very interesting, but it's all just laid out and forgotten. It may just be me trying to make a mountain out of a mole hill, but when it comes down to it that's all this is, a mole hill that I was sure could be a mountain. There's no tension, shallow characters, and recycled plot. It's not terrible all things considered, but I just can't get over how much potential is here that just gets pushed aside so that the character can whine some more about trying to hide his godlike powers and Tiera can gasp about how Shin did or said or had something that was impossible over and over.

And for this last little bit I just had two last warnings for people that are a little "spoiler"-y, so be warned. First off there's the constant reminders that Shin could, fo sho, deal with whatever situation he's in with a flick of his wrist if he wanted to, which isn't deal-breaking for me but gets super grating by the end of a novel that was already wearing me thin. And second, and this is a bit petty I guess, but at one point Shin is teleported pretty far from the character Shnee, and when he contacts her he finds her freaking out about his disappearance, he says the most bullshit and cringe-worthy line about how even though she was powerful, she was still a woman. It is just printed feces. Schnee even says that she is freaking out because Shin had disappeared for a second time, the last time leading to him being gone for 500 YEARS during which she had looked all over for him. I mean isn't that just like a woman, becoming upset that someone you put above all others as a leader and a love interest disappeared to who knows where for who knows how long. Women, right guys? This shit has been bugging me so bad since I read it. It's like the author is too dumb to make interesting, deep characters, so he's trying to squeeze them into the most ridiculous, digestible boxes he can. These two things the writer does were just ungodly annoying at times, so if this shit has riled you in the past, I'd say give this one a pass.

TL:DR
Honestly not a bad read, as long as you don't mind the lack of tension the OP MC genre tends to bring. But the waste of potential that is here, in my opinion of course, just sours me every time I think back on what I read or think about continuing the translations as they come out. So if your looking for something simple and like this kind of stuff, then this is decent enough.

OK, after 10 tomes worth of wasted time I came here to leave a warning. So lets start.
1. Story. A completely OP MC in a fantasy world, that came to life after being a MMO game, with all NPC's gaining will and mind of their own. Not a new thing to see, so the main question is what does MC do in this whole new world, where he is basically a god? The answer is "pretty much nothing". For the most part he just ran around trying to gather his party of support NPCs that he used to have when he was in MMO ... (what kind of MMO was that, if you could just solo it with bots?). There is a hint of something big and sinister with fate of the world being threatened, but in those 10 tomes even "big and sinister" mobs don't stand a chance against MC, so it doen't really feel like a threat. Also this novel doesn't bother with explaining things, so sometimes you will have to accept something for granted (like this MMO becoming a death game - noone ever explained it, noone announced it, people just KNEW that they will die if they are killed in MMO. How, why, and how it even happened? Who cares.)
2. Characters. A cast of completely one-sided templates. MC is OP as hell, but not only he rarely uses his power, he HIDES his power level for the most stupid reason of "not drawing attention" that he, obviously, fails miserably, and this gets even more stupid when everyone around him starts to discuss how cool he is. Basically, most conversations about MC are using words "amazing", at wich point I want to ask author to stop with this self-inserting praise. Also, despite having a GF he was more or less intimate with, he continues to pull this "dense anime protag" card, wich is not only hardly believably, but irritating. Other characters are not better - here is your mandatory "loving pure waifu" option, here is your "secondary pure loving waifu" option, here is your set of "loyal to the death comrades" options. All of them look more like cardboard cutouts, not real personalities. But it is not even the worst part of it - when we get to villains it gets even worse. Bad for the sake of being bad, abusing power just to be even worse, not having any redeeming quality to get to the bottom. Yep, that is your average villain here. While I could ignore it with villain-NPCs, when I read 10-th tome, which is a big flashback to the times of MMO, I just could not take it anymore. Can you imagine an adult man, who is so obsessed with some random noone who is just a TOP-1 player in this MMO, that he would go into yandere mode, ignoring the fact that his actions will cost him life? I can't sorry. Neither I can imagine PVP guilds surviving in a "deathgame MMO", where you can just die or even if you survive and get into real world - get jailed for murder.
3. Art. A lack of it more likely. For a novel, that mainly focuses on "MC awesomeness" combat feels really messy. Lots of moves are shouted out, lots of everything is flying - but it all feels more like a mess or a waste of time, cause we all know, that OP MC can never loose to a trash mob, nor said trash mob can do anything at all. Descriptions of all the abilities are basic and lack any artistic efford invested, so I found myself skipping most of the combats at some point. If I have to rate this whole mess of a novel I would call it "readable" and nothing more.
4. Enjoyment. Welp, I would say this one should not be read for enjoyment, it is better at killing time (and to be honest, this is the only thing this novel is good at).

Overall/TLDR: read it if you have a lot of spare time, nothing to do and zero expectations. In any other case it would be a huge waste of time.