In Crime and Punishment, the drunkard Marmeladov gets hit by a carriage and dies. In a very low-brow fashion typical of Dostoevsky, Marmeladov isn’t reborn in a fantasy world with a game-like system that would help him rise to the top.
Why do so many people like this author?
Also what’s with the title? “Crime and Punishment?” What was wrong with, “I Killed An Old Lady To Steal Her Money So My Cute Sister Wouldn’t Have To Marry A Rich Asshole But Now I’m Bedridden With Guilt And The Police Are After Me?”
with a game-like system that would help him rise to the top.
I’m guessing since video games and RPGs hadn’t been invented yet, the game-like system is Kriegsspiel?
I’m so tired of these “isekais with a twist”, where it is clear that the author didn’t actually want to write an isekai, but that was the only thing they could get greenlit. I don’t blame Dostoevsky, we all do what we can to make ends meet, but a story where a guy gets isekaid but we follow the people left behind in the original world is just ridiculous.
I think they mostly start as like semi-free web fiction being published chapter by chapter, and the most popular ones get turned into actual light novels with some backing which can then later be picked up by a mangaka and/or turned into an anime series if they’re popular enough. That’s why the titles are basically a story pitch and why there’s so much “genre fiction, with a twist” that come out of it: they’re trying to at once appeal to a popular genre audience while at the same time standing out from the crowd.
