From what I understand, Korean novels that involve dungeon-hunting are inspired by tabletop RPG's such as Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder, but what inspired the novels with tower "level" climbing, where each level was practically its own, separate mini-world?
Like the kind that has hunters and the world falling apart and dungeons popping all over the place. Or are you talking about like medieval fantasy ones that has dungeons and monsters and magic.
mmmm no idea, but the first thing I remember reading with that thema was the comic the tower of god by siu and checking the wiki that is running since 2010...
What an interesting read, this may very well be a key source of inspiration for this trope. Thank you for sharing. How each level turned into its own world is still left unanswered. Perhaps it could be Tower of God or Sword Art Online, as mentioned above.
Then there's your plain old episodic television series, like Kung Fu or Star Trek, where every episode finds ths MC at a new place, whether it be another town or another planet. As soon as they arrive, they get caught up in some conflict or mysterious situation that they need to resolve before they can move on. Kind of like quick transmigration without the whole body procession thing.
It’s also inspired by many popular Korean MMO’s and games. Think like the game: Dungeon Fighter Online (where the tower is a daily event for exp and mats grind) And many of the other big Korean MMOs such as lineage. Towers also provide very easily linear story pathing and a clear way to make enemies seem more imposing. Mainly the dungeon areas trope is just level gating or a way to spread out of the story.