The Upgrade Apocalypse, Book 1

A LitRPG Apocalypse Series

By: Charles Dean, R.A. Mejia

Narrated by: Daniel Wisniewski, Elizabeth Plant

Length: 16 hrs and 15 mins

Publisher's summary

When a group of former classmates gather for their 10-year reunion, old grudges resurface as old flames rekindle—and then things go straight to hell. As a shower of comets brings an invasion of reunion-crashing undead, the surviving alumni must band together in this litRPG apocalypse filled with dark humor, horror, and loot cards!

Join the survivors as they navigate a game of life, death, and more death, leveling skills and stats as a world-governing system urges them to struggle on for the sake of glorious battle.

Welcome to hell on Earth. Welcome to the Upgrade Apocalypse!

©2022 Ramon Mejia, Charles Dean (P)2023 Ramon Mejia, Charles Dean

ehhh...

I could have gone on without ever listening to this story. the girls are kinda annoying and the dude's voice at the beginning sounds muffled at random times as if talking through one of those cardboard tubes from a paper towel roll.
I found the story kinda boring. I skipped a good chunk of it, maybe I'd get intrigued, but nope.

freaking amazing

Holy crap was this book and story was amazing. kinda new to a card system but really worked. the narrators did an awesome job, and Lucy, by far, my favorite character, was the best comic relef I passed out, from laughing so hard.

not even a great narrator can save this one

so imagine Mark Tufo being strapped down and force to watch One life to live, Save the Bell the reunion and a crap ton of after school specials. Now he is told to write an LitRpg by gun point. that is this book.

I want to like this but

The starting characters are way over blown characterization. Some get more fleshed out as it moves along but not really. It feels forced. There are times when people who are not with the group but are back in the parking garage are suddenly there and talking like they did not stay behind. Timer detonator suddenly became a remote control detonator. As for the voice work it was good. However the edits were really really bad. Sometimes you will get a line more than once. This happened a few times. It feels like a B movie script with B level production value but fun voice work.

it wants to be good... and Adault oriented?

Good idea for a story and I actually kept listening... but the dialog 😖. Gen z in full effect? The entire series is an innuendo but has to say "freak" or "freaking" but can't use a swear word? did a high school student afraid of their parents write this? just heard the word "shit". Maybe there's hope?

Exciting start to a new series

Have you ever finished a book and still been thinking about it as you start reading the next book and realize that the new book isn’t part of that world?

This book was that good.

A thrilling litRPG apocalypse experience!

The Upgrade Apocalypse, Book 1 by Charles Dean and R.A. Mejia, narrated by Daniel Wisniewski and Elizabeth Plant, delivers a thrilling litRPG apocalypse experience that will have you hooked from start to finish. With a darkly humorous tone, this story combines old grudges, undead invaders, and a game-like system that keeps the survivors fighting for their lives. The writing is sharp, the narrators bring the characters to life, and the result is a hellishly entertaining adventure that will leave you craving for more. Dive into the Upgrade Apocalypse, and embrace the chaos!

it's not for everyone but...

the narration was immaculate. Great job for voice actors. I see alot of reviews that call this book bad characters bad so forth and so forth I finished this book and I loved it the characters are written that way on purpose I highly enjoyed the system the characters powers are all based on now to adress the drunk in the room Lucy I absolutely loved her she is supposed to be a bad comedian absolutely addicted to alcohol and liquor she is written beautifully all the characters have there charm and misgivings even the main antagonist is written well makes my skin creep and God did I hate him good job you two can't wait to read the next book

KU and Audiobook Review

Due to health and other life issues finishing this book took me much longer than it should have so instead of finishing it up and reviewing it within a few days of release at most like I wish I could have here we are 2 weeks later. I ended up splitting it about 50/50 between reading and listening to the audio-book. I personally enjoyed this book, the system reminds me loosely of Genshin Impact and other Gacha games where you combine items (in this case cards) to increase levels and ranks of equipment though the rules in this are a little loose, so while I do recommend this to system apocalypse fans I withhold that recommendation if you don't like the Gacha equipment system (even if there are no character pulls). The characters don't really have a ton of time for growth with things going on back to back so they each come off their own type of extreme or stereo-types of daytime soap operas. Some of the skill choices may confuse or put people off but I'm pretty sure they were picked with book 2 and whatever the eventual end game is in mind by the author(s) and they make more sense in the last few minutes of the book. That being said for the most part the characters have unique skill sets in comparison to the rest of the genre. As far as audio-book narration goes Daniel Wisniewski and Elizabeth Plant did a fantastic job of distinguishing the characters, there are enough characters that might make distinguishing them difficult in text but their performance did that amazingly well, especially Lucy, where does one go to meet a girl like Lucy? Plot aside, if you enjoy or don't enjoy any of the particular mechanics I listed above you should be able to tell if this book is for you. I look forward to the next one.

some errors and bad start but good

the narration was great. There were some editing errors, such as rereading lines, but that's fine with me. the beginning seems a little too calm about extreme parts, such as a shot of nervous or adrenaline over taking them, which could be used as an excuse for the behavior