Note: No idea how many chapters I've read, but I did finish the first volume.

When it comes to isekai light novels there's the good, the mediocre, and the downright bad. While these tiers can apply to all media, isekai light novels seem to almost always perfectly fit into one of these categories. The "good" ones have actual effort put into them and do more beyond playing off basic clichés. "Kumo desu ga, Nani ka?", starts off in a not wholly unfamiliar state. The protagonist starts off in a dangerous environment and has to quickly get stronger by leveling up. Sure the setting and a few other elements are different but it's relatively within the norm. Then everything turns on it's head. I mean EVERYTHING. When the first reveal hits, you realize how little you know and that feeling keeps on growing. Even when you think you know everything, minor and major details you overlooked keep popping up. The plot eventually becomes the main selling point, not any of the isekai elements. Then there's the mediocre stuff. The dime a dozen series that rely far too heavily on their "back of the box" tags to attract attention; "New Gate" comes to mind. Overpowered protagonist? Check. Hot girls who have a crush on Protag-kun? Check. Game elements? Check. We have a winner! Jokes aside, there's really nothing of substance in series like these. No interesting plot, no complex themes, and god forbid actual character development. However, "New Gate" isn't offensively bad. It can be fun to turn your brain off and just read about a cool guy beating up badies in a generic power fantasy. But, there is a limit to this. Some novels are just so bad you just can't. Enter Isekai de Cheat Skill...I'm not going to type out the full title, I refuse. I also refuse to read any more. 1 novel of this crap and I just can't. This series has NOTHING going for it. What makes overpowered characters entertaining is that it's either a power fantasy for the reader and/or you know they earned it. In Isekai de Cheat Skill...Protag-kun does jack squat with his power. He doesn't fight much and said fights have less impact than a pool noodle duel. "Ok, but if the character in question actually earned his power, wouldn't that be fine?" Does accidentally finding an overpowered arsenal and stumbling around until he's OP count as earned strength? "Well are the characters interesting?" Cardboard has more personality. The entire reason we are supposed to care about Protag-kun is that he's fat and was bullied by everyone. I mean, that's fine to develop sympathy for a character but maybe you should, idk, give them a personality? It's REALLY hard to care when Protag-kun is a lesser character to Kirito. Actually, every character is worse than Kirito. The mean people are mean because they're the mean people. The nice people are nice because they're the nice people. At least Kirito can't be defined by 1 word. This light novel is probably the worst piece of media I have ever consumed. Some will reply to such harsh criticism with "could you do better?" While this criticism is exceptionally flawed, I can say with some degree of confidence that I could. I have little skill in writing, but if I actually put effort in, I would already be doing better than the author of this dumpsterfire. Read this if your only alternative is watching paint dry.

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The most basic self insert power fantasy imaginable.

Plot
MC is a fat ugly pathetic loser hated/bullied by everyone including parents/siblings. real sobstory. only grandpa is nice and gives our MC house as inheritance. MC saves kaori (main heroine?) from thugs before holidays. during holidays, he finds a door to isekai in his house that leads to a forest. uses the door to train in forest and come back home daily. becomes slim, really handsome, really powerful/strong etc.. basically OP af. after holidays, upon request by kaori, he transfers to her elite school. real world story happens in highschool, while isekai story happens in isekai. The rest of the story can be described as him saving girls in both worlds, getting praised by everyone and leading a happy life.

Review
The story itself is really generic. As i said, this manga is mostly him being OP and saving hot girls. At chapter 21, he has already saved an assassin, kaori (3 times), siblings, princess (twice), classmate kaede (2 times), classmate rin , a teacher, Miu (model).

This in itself is fine tbh. But there is nothing else to actually differentiate this from other stories. In fact, there's no overarching plot or anything. There is zero tension in combat. Everything from the plot to the characters interactions just feel so pointless and shallow. The story basically gives EVERYTHING to MC for minimal to zero effort: his isekai gate, his powers, magic, skills, beauty, stats like strength/luck, girls falling for him etc.. and at this point, it feels like all of this is kinda not deserved. This is especially sad because the story has bullshit lines like "living a fulfilled life".

Characters
You can't help but feel sad for all other characters around him who are reduced to mere NPCs whose only purpose is to react to MC doing stuff without questioning anything. female characters (even background ones) in particular are basically simps for MC. falling for MC is the destiny of every major female character ever.

Lore
There are elves. There are monsters like goblins/ogres etc.. There's magic, aristocracy, skills, stats etc.. too. you can exchange isekai loot for japanese yen. but nothing is every explained coherently. Basically, everything is just made up for convenience of MC as we are going along with no proper mechanics/balance.



Now, i have a thing for self insert power fantasies, so i read this. But, i would never ever recommend this to people if someone asked me for a good series. there are plenty of cute girls and a decent amount of fan service, which is the main reason for such a high rating for this garbage.

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