Discussion The downfall of quality (focus on overpowered genre)

Discussion in 'Novel General' started by PercherTM, Aug 8, 2019.

Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. PercherTM

    PercherTM Go go power ranger!

    Joined:
    Feb 27, 2017
    Messages:
    131
    Likes Received:
    82
    Reading List:
    Link
    I made a similar post (question) ages ago with "is there an influx of yaoi and self insert CEO/Mr perfect novels" and while this is similar its also in a completely different direction and although similar sounding but diff topic so lets get into this discussion unlike the prev question
    I personally love overpowered characters, while novels feel predictable and tbh following logic if its not predictable then its poorly written and unrealistic. I still love seeing the MC smacking someones face around or like in Overlord basically being the embodiment of "You say this is impossible? watch and I do something 100x better with minimal effort" and see everyone just slack-jawed and I feel like that is the main appeal of the overpowered genre cause lets face it, we know how itll play out. we know they wont lose and apart from comedic value that is the main appeal of the genre, proven by the success of one punch man
    now personally I can be considered a fanatic of this genre, but lately. with the genre i love most as the main focus every new novel is basically just clickbait titling like some youtube video, example "I Became the Strongest With The Failure Frame【Abnormal State Skill】As I Devastated Everything"
    And its almost as though you can skip 10 chapters and not feel a difference. Infact you can substitute chapters with any other similarly titled series and it wont feel any different. Yes I have tried.
    If that was all i would just chalk it up to mass trend riding and just look for a gem, but lately those gems have been harder if not near impossible to find. I would much rather reread an old novel than read any of these new ones and I am sure I am not the only one who feels so
    They also strayed from the main appeal of the overpowered genre which I am pretty familiar with (to the point I can claim I have atleast tried 99% of the series on this site with that tag)
    And this problem is not really only the problem with this genre
    romance. action. adventure. fantasy.
    the first one is basically now a competition of who comes up with the most absurd and out of this world hentai plot.
    the second is just copy pastes of either "eat my fist, no *you* eat my bigger fist" or fight scenes being so unrefined you cant bother reading nor understanding whats happening and even if you skip it you wont miss anything so might as well skip to where he/she wins
    the third. bandits and princesses anyone?
    the last. I feel like they just copy paste the world of any big title and just change the names of the empires
    there is always one racist human supreme religious empire. one evil kingdom that everyone hates (usually demonfolk). one elf kingdom in some forest usually titled elvenheim. one beast kingdom (or if the focus of the novel is the beastmen, then theyll be slaves the MC makes a kingdom out of)
    And oddly enough we eat that up like its dinner. I remember seeing so many negative reviews on a novel featuring the above beastmen slave country novel simply because the MC got betrayed by them.. (ofc the writing sucked as they did it for a pretty stupid reason and the MC was pretty dumb too) but the main reason for the reviews as written can be summarized as "the mc was dumb and got betrayed" (the first part I agree to be a good reason, but it was probs set up to grow the MC since it was like chapter 10 and was a nice twist from eternal loyal servants cause you fed them)
    As such I also feel it is somewhat our fault simply cause we eat up any trends, I am the worst with words so I cant explain it but I feel like us as consumers are partly the reason only these type of novels are translated lately
    As I have ranted long enough and I doubt most of you care enough to read all that
    Heres a summary
    "Copy paste titles churned out and how the quality of novels are falling, as well as whether as consumers it is partly our fault"
     
  2. Scholar Occult Cauldron

    Scholar Occult Cauldron Bonk Maestro | Ascended

    Joined:
    Apr 19, 2017
    Messages:
    809
    Likes Received:
    1,036
    Reading List:
    Link
    Is it a surprise that people are willing to write anything for the sake of breaking through and getting money for it (for webnovels, getting a Light Novel, Anime, etc.)? People drink wet sugar with bubbles (coke) even though it isn't good for us, so why wouldn't people read trashy copy paste novels?
     
  3. Liyus

    Liyus Laksha's Desu~ Cat

    Joined:
    Nov 10, 2015
    Messages:
    4,216
    Likes Received:
    4,757
    Reading List:
    Link
    Didn't notice anything....the past months i didn't read anything on NU because there where only chapter of novels i dropped ages ago because i found them shitty or simply the new novels are a copy of the said dropped novel.....
     
  4. Westeller

    Westeller Smokin' Sexy Style!! Staff Member

    Joined:
    Apr 3, 2016
    Messages:
    8,169
    Likes Received:
    24,948
    Reading List:
    Link
    So, uh, basically... whatever the current fad is, it sucks now? :blobrofl:
    Maybe next month we'll have a downfall of quality in mystery novels. One can hope, right?
     
  5. lnv

    lnv ✪ Well-Known Hypocrite

    Joined:
    Jan 24, 2017
    Messages:
    7,702
    Likes Received:
    9,044
    Reading List:
    Link
    I like to call it the "trope paradox".

    Many web novel writers were originally web novel readers. So other than comping up with a "unique premise", the novels are going to end up based on what they read.

    Now there is nothing wrong with that, writing comes from things we read, experienced and our own ideas and a proper writer will borrow things based on their knowledge. As much as people blast tropes, its not the tropes that are the problem but HOW the tropes are handled.

    But the web novel community is made up of amateur authors who probably never even read a book in their life outside of school. They see a cool trope and say, "yeah, lets add that" instead of actually thinking about if said thing even makes sense in their story.

    One of my favorite examples it the once every 10,000 years tomb opens example. Early xianxia had the concept of such a tomb opening and there is generally 1 such instance, maybe if lucky 2. But modern xianxia? A once every 10,000 years tomb opens up every tuesday. Why does this happen? Cause the author is simply using that trope without actually processing if any of that makes sense!

    And that is the "trope paradox" where reader reads a trope of an author, then writes a less thought out novel based on that trope. By the end, the trope has already long lost its original intention and is there simply for nostalgia.

    PS I also like overpowered characters, but overpowered is all about the setup. Without the setup, the overpowerdness becomes stale.
     
    AliceShiki, Sabruness and Mr.Tiemos like this.
  6. Drakaos

    Drakaos Member (Patriarch?) of the Anti-Qidian Sect

    Joined:
    Jan 20, 2016
    Messages:
    513
    Likes Received:
    574
    Reading List:
    Link
    I think it's more like the best ones get translated first, so now there isn't really anything "great" that hasn't already been translated.
     
    Sabruness and Alski like this.
  7. Diametric

    Diametric Waifu Connoisseur

    Joined:
    Dec 29, 2018
    Messages:
    1,184
    Likes Received:
    1,565
    Reading List:
    Link
    I think it might not be that the quality is visibly declining, but perhaps that we forget all of the terrible, low effort stories of the past and only take notice of the good ones that slowly stockpiled over a long period.

    Now you've read all the good ones and the stockpile has ran out you have to wait for the occasional good story to come along, and with it comes a large amount of bad stuff you have to wade through in order to find it
     
    SleepyFox and Sabruness like this.
  8. AliceShiki

    AliceShiki 『Ms. Tree』『Magical Girl of Love and Justice』

    Joined:
    Apr 27, 2016
    Messages:
    24,647
    Likes Received:
    98,365
    Reading List:
    Link
    I don't think quality is falling, bad authors have always existed and will always exist.

    It's up to the reader to realize which ones are good and which ones are bad and choose only the actual good stuff to read.
     
    firefox1234 and Sabruness like this.
  9. PercherTM

    PercherTM Go go power ranger!

    Joined:
    Feb 27, 2017
    Messages:
    131
    Likes Received:
    82
    Reading List:
    Link
    I mean like 2 years ago I could always find around 5-6 titles being updated regularly
    now? i just look. get disappointed and go back to the old ones. ofc i wont deny there are good ones my point is they are so much harder to find that you can just outright never find them
     
  10. AliceShiki

    AliceShiki 『Ms. Tree』『Magical Girl of Love and Justice』

    Joined:
    Apr 27, 2016
    Messages:
    24,647
    Likes Received:
    98,365
    Reading List:
    Link
    Light Novels aren't being translated as often anymore because the LN market grew and companies like Yen Press and J-novel Club are frequently licensing it, so fantranslators are often going after Webnovels instead, which are of lower quality by default.

    So... It's more of a thing of the best products being translated by actual licensed companies.
     
    orematcha, kenar and Sabruness like this.
  11. Sabruness

    Sabruness Cultured Yuri Connoisseur

    Joined:
    Apr 5, 2016
    Messages:
    3,984
    Likes Received:
    4,589
    Reading List:
    Link
    At the very least, the bolded part is probably very accurate when it comes to CN webnovels and mostly accurate to the average JP isekai.

    Yeah, i think this is true. LNs are, by nature, higher quality compared to webnovels (both their source WN as well as in general) but licensing is much better than it used to be so most TLs turn to webnovels.

    TL;DR: the quality hasnt actually gone down, it's just the perception because the sample size of novels translated has increased but now favored towards webnovels instead of published LNs.
     
    orematcha and kenar like this.
  12. IRainstorm

    IRainstorm Dark Sect Ancestor

    Joined:
    Oct 18, 2016
    Messages:
    335
    Likes Received:
    638
    Reading List:
    Link
    I think its a big mix of a factors that pushes amateur author to take the easiest trope novel genre and run with a nearly perfect copy pasta or whatever precedent piece of work that met success on the web.
    Also to add to rational explanations made by everyone else, I personally think the freshness of Korean/Chinese/Japanese faded with each new trope of those story we got to visit, in 2015 I personally was a sucker for Coiling Dragon, ATG etc and even could read MGA level of writing, fast forward a year or two and only ISSTH interested me at some point, and altho my standards to read a story didn't skyrocket the last years, I still would not be able to read a story like MGA or even Coiling Dragon anymore unless it fit my vision a lot more than before or it manages to add a spark that rejuvenate the genre for me.
     
    firefox1234 and Sabruness like this.
  13. cave

    cave Active Member

    Joined:
    Oct 21, 2015
    Messages:
    9
    Likes Received:
    3
    Reading List:
    Link
    That's partly the reason why I made the jump to learn to read Chinese raws, easier to find more variety and little gems that I like instead of being dependent on translators' personal tastes.
     
  14. asriu

    asriu fu~ fu~ fu~

    Joined:
    Jan 9, 2016
    Messages:
    18,546
    Likes Received:
    18,145
    Reading List:
    Link
    put it simple
    bored.png
    even at early phase of WN translation I already have that feeling
    Coiling Dragon, Against The God, I Shall Seal The Heaven, Deathmarch, Zhang Long ect I know I will feel bored with it concept way before it reach conclusion~ yup I put them on same level
    I like OP story for fun but unless mainly comedy, slice of live or I'm on mood to read fast food on general I never care about OP theme story

    hah it never been popular choice among translator, similar with military and supernatural genre

    well if have lil mystery element then I think we may have plenty
     
  15. PercherTM

    PercherTM Go go power ranger!

    Joined:
    Feb 27, 2017
    Messages:
    131
    Likes Received:
    82
    Reading List:
    Link
    i barely read light novels tho? there are wayyy more chinese and korean ones on the market anyway
     
  16. SleepyFox

    SleepyFox Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Apr 2, 2016
    Messages:
    204
    Likes Received:
    253
    Reading List:
    Link
    This pretty much applies to everything - any time I hear someone say something like "music nowadays just isn't the same as it was in the 80s" or w/e I cringe hard. Like, there was a ton of shitty music back then too. Nobody remembers the bad stuff.
     
    Diametric likes this.
  17. Diametric

    Diametric Waifu Connoisseur

    Joined:
    Dec 29, 2018
    Messages:
    1,184
    Likes Received:
    1,565
    Reading List:
    Link
    Not sure why you quoted me with this, my comment wasn't specific to light novels at all and applies to Korean/Chinese novels all the same. Even the fact that I said stories instead of novels was because it applied to things like manga too :blob_tilt:
     
    Last edited: Aug 10, 2019
  18. Simon

    Simon [The Pure One's Chief Steward][Demon Beast]

    Joined:
    Oct 30, 2015
    Messages:
    2,365
    Likes Received:
    1,973
    Reading List:
    Link
    The problem I find is that there is no payoff to the opness, no real goals other than to be the most op. When they do suffer a loss it's just hallow, as they face no serious ramifications other than some loss of face.
     
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.