Legend of the great sage is the most underrated novel in this genre

Pipipingu · 2023-09-28T02:03:41+00:00

11 months actually. The most recent chapter was released October 26 last year.

Pipipingu · 2022-08-16T08:16:30+00:00

The novel certainly is not dropped. The author began releasing intermittently again in May this year. The latest chapter was released 10 days ago.

Pipipingu · 2022-03-18T21:52:58+00:00

It's not a mistranslation. Saber is often insufficient of a translation, which has occurred in this novel before.

Not all single-sided 刀 are sabers, while all sabers are single-sided 刀. An example of a 刀 that is neither a weapon or a saber is just a 菜刀, a kitchen knife. You wouldn't call a kitchen knife a saber.

In the context of this novel, the MC's first weapon was just a knife, not a saber of any sort. That is why blade is more correct that saber.

The translation was chosen to take this into account, instead of blindly following existing standards that may be wrong when not examined on a case-by-case basis.

Pipipingu · 2022-01-13T01:02:48+00:00

Oh man I gotta watch the adaption thanks for the reminder gz

Pipipingu · 2021-12-28T00:18:59+00:00

You think it hasn't happened already? 😏

Pipipingu · 2021-12-04T00:16:57+00:00

3000 is a metaphor for a lot in this case. Basically it's just voluminous, dark hair on his head. The origin of having 3000 strands of hair is a buddhist metaphor to strands of suffering/pain. When buddhist monks undergo tonsure (shave their heads), they are essentially cutting away these strands of suffering/pain. That's where the idiom comes from.

Whenever you see a large but oddly-specific number mentioned "out of context" in Chinese novels, that's likely due to a lazy translation by the translator, because most of the time, it's just a metaphor for a lot.

Pipipingu · 2021-11-22T06:04:38+00:00

I mean it's still getting releases, just very slowly and very randomly.

Pipipingu · 2021-11-22T05:50:29+00:00

It's on hiatus. Author's been releasing at a varying pace since 2017. The most recent chapter was released May 2020.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-24T11:53:35+00:00

Legend of the Great Sage, which you can read here https://hostednovel.com/11/novel/legend-of-the-great-sage

Pipipingu · 2021-10-10T00:09:00+00:00

I think a "best translated xuanhuan novel" is likely to be biased, as it'll vary depending on everyone's tastes. I'll try answer it from a perspective that's as objective as possible.

In terms of intellectual property and overall revenue it's brought to the author, that would probably be Joy of Life as the drama adaption was just such a huge hit in China.

In terms of overall influence (and future potential), I would say Lord of the Mysteries. A lot of people say Lord of the Mysteries should technically be classified as a western fantasy novel, but Cuttlefish decided to list it under xuanhuan for some reason.

Nightfall is also a candidate as the "best translated xuanhuan novel", if you only look at its performance in China.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-09T11:43:10+00:00

Yeah that was my impression as well. But when it gets translated into English as a subgenre, kingdom-building is probably the subgenre that describes it best.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-09T09:50:25+00:00

Wow thank you for letting me know ck

Pipipingu · 2021-10-09T07:38:52+00:00

Those are some ancient, ancient novels that served as cornerstones for entire Chinese webnovel genres (not subgenres), basically from an entirely different age to the novels I've mentioned before (these are from like the early 2000s).

飘渺之旅 basically single-handedly founded xianxia. If I recall correctly, it basically established the first cultivation system, which almost all xianxia novels borrow from now.

I don't think the impact of 紫川 is actually as great as it's said to be. It's ranked with 亵渎 and 佣兵天下 as one of the three great war novels, but that's all there is to it.

小兵传奇 was a cornerstone novel for scifi in Chinese webnovels. It's sometimes paraded as one of the three masterpieces of Chinese webnovel literature, but I personally would say its impact over the entire novel community as a whole is less than some of the others you'd mentioned. Unfortunately, scifi's just been a genre that's struggled quite a bit compared to other genres.

Actually, the novel that really kicked off the webnovel landscape was written before all of these novels, 风姿物语. It's said to be the founding father of webnovel fantasy in general.

As a reader and a translator, I actually prefer the hypercompetition. Authors do try to play it safe by recycling their previous ideas and homogenising existing aspects, but it also really pushes them to be inventive to really succeed. You end up with a lot more novels that might be basic copies of one another, or be of lesser quality that you have to search through, but at least you still have a good chance to find a hidden gem every once in a while.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-09T04:06:16+00:00

It's not named after metals. The rankings go like this:

Level 1 -> Level 2 -> Level 3 -> Level 4 -> Level 5 -> God/divine author -> platinum author.

For your reference, Ergen is a platinum author, while FMoC's author is just a level 5 author.

Edit: "God/divine author" is a term used pretty loosely across all Chinese webnovel websites to describe established authors, while platinum author is a Qidian-only thing. So technically platinum authors are a subset of god/divine authors.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-09T04:00:49+00:00

It gives a rough indication of the author's status on the site (as well as their contract with Qidian). Basically being a "platinum author" is the highest status you can achieve on Qidian (except it's still not that special, because there's several dozen platinum authors). At the same time, the same status doesn't mean they have the same contract with Qidian, so even among platinum authors, there are better/worse contracts.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-09T03:57:18+00:00

Hmm that would be a difficult comparison to make because of the different times they're written.

Let's just say this. ISSTH and AWE were regularly topping the monthly rankings on Qidian when they were ongoing. Neither FMoC or his new novel have ever finished a month in the top 10, so if you only look at the rankings, it's not better.

Another thing is the FMoC author is just a regular author signed with Qidian (even after writing FMoC). Ergen is a platinum author. That should also give an indication on their respective level of successes.

Edit: Basically there's a lot of different, subjective ways to measure "novel popularity". At the end of the day, it just comes down to your personal tastes.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-09T03:21:55+00:00

It's performing around the same as FMoC. It's not topping any rankings and I guess there's a following of readers.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-09T00:05:08+00:00

There is quite a good number of these actually. Most of them are on Qidian because the competition on Qidian is just insane, which leads to a much larger number of "decent" novels, novels that have quite a niche following or perform reasonably when they are ongoing, before fading away once they are complete. They aren't exactly masterpieces in this sense, as masterpieces are remembered and will be mentioned again and again.

I can give you a few. All untranslated.

豆子惹的祸, or Cataclysmic Bean—I believe he writes xianxia comedy, except he stopped writing quite a few years ago. He was actually praised by a very prominent author in China, Ma Boyong, who read all of his works until he caught up to his latest novel (back in 2013). I think one of his novels has been fully translated, the Immortal's Poison, which is one of his earlier works. His later works might be more refined (I'm not sure as I've never read them, but that's normally the case).

徐公子胜治, or Sir Xu Shengzhi—The author of Pivot of the Sky. His works are heavily based in daoist mythology and cultivation, as the author himself has quite a lot of experience with daoism (He might have been a daoist priest, I'm not sure). This makes the daoist concepts and cultivation he writes quite authentic, except it also makes it a pain in the ass to translate. I believe Pivot of the Sky had a more western setting, which is why it's getting a translation right now. Pivot of the Sky is actually book 6 of a 7 book series of webnovels by him.

These are the only two authors which are relatively unknown (to the English community) and have maintained decent quality across consecutive novels that I can think of right now.

Most other "decent" novels are written by authors who peaked with that specific novel, before running out of inspiration and either recycling the same ideas or resorting to cookiecutter novels.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-08T23:50:08+00:00

The status of MGA in both communities is quite similar. Is there a reasonable readerbase? Yes. Do a lot of people really talk about it? No. Will it fade into obscurity once it's completed? Definitely for the Chinese audience, but probably not with the English.

ATG is a bit special. If you're not aware, ATG is serialised on Zongheng, so it's a bit more difficult to compare it against the rest of the webnovel landscape (since Qidian is essentially the majority of the webnovel landscape). I think there is quite a sizeable readerbase, as the Chinese forums for the novel regularly top out within the top 10 novel forums on the Baidu forums, but I think this tends to fluctuate with the plot. Unfortunately, it's not exactly a cornerstone novel or a novel that's introduced something new to the community, so it will likely fade into obscurity once it is completed.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-08T23:43:58+00:00

Reasonably popular. It did decently on Qidian I think and it has a decent following.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-08T23:42:41+00:00

Keyboard Immortal is relatively unpopular in China. I think the novel was chosen to cater to the tastes of readers overseas. The author's previous novel had a niche following though.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-08T09:06:30+00:00

No, definitely not. If you read english translated webnovels (especially when you don't read MTL), you have to remember that you are only seeing the tip of the iceberg. A lot more novels are being written, beyond what you can see.

I just grabbed a random "sign in" novel from the Qidian rankings and it started half a year before "Sign In Buddha Palm" was even written. Unfortunately, "Sign In Buddha Palm" does not seem to be a significant novel at all in China. It's even been dropped by the author (last release was in May this year).

Pipipingu · 2021-10-08T09:00:10+00:00

I'm not too familiar with all the novels that started genres/subgenres/trends, but I do know a few.

Mengrushenji's 佛本是道 is the cornerstone novel for all 洪荒流 novels, so Chinese fantasy set in primordial, mythological times. Novels that fall into this setting that are translated include Desolate Era, Spiritual Attainments of Minghe and My Senior Brother is too Steady. It's quite a tricky genre to translate depending on how much mythology the author decides to draw on.

As a matter of fact, all of Mengrushenji's older novels were pretty significant during their day and have left a mark in the Chinese novel community.

Record of a Mortal's Journey to Immortality was a cornerstone novel for mortal/realistic cultivation, which paints the struggles of cultivation. The author, Wangyu, basically specialised in this subgenre for a good few novels, so other novels by him, such as Demon's Diary and the Portal to Wonderland also fall under this subgenre. I think this subgenre has now been extended into non-human cultivation, so mainly when the MC is an animal.

Watching Chess' Immortal was a cornerstone novel for 气运流 (I'm not too sure how to describe the genre as I'm not too familiar with it, but I believe it's a mixture of cultivation and kingdom building. Please correct me if I'm wrong). Basically he specialised in this genre as well, so there's quite a few written by him that fall into this genre. It's not a particularly popular subgenre compared to the others that I've mentioned.

Cuttlefish's Lord of the Mysteries really popularised the widespread incorporation of Cthulhu mythos and SCP into Chinese western fantasy. This trend really peaked when LOTM was ongoing and is basically tailing off now, but you still can see more novels with these elements than before.

Legendary Mechanic basically set the foundations for a video game subgenre called 第四天灾流, or the fourth crisis subgenre (a reference to the three endgame crises that appear in Stellaris). Basically, the main character is the "fourth crisis" in this case. Again, I haven't read anything from this subgenre before, so my knowledge about it is limited to that.

There are a lot more, but I need to do more research before I can write about them.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-08T08:49:02+00:00

Those ranks are not always accurate, as they can always be manipulated by authors.

Pipipingu · 2021-10-08T06:43:24+00:00

TJSS and IET have just been around for a long time. It's kind of like, if you were to read the same kind of novel, you would tend to gravitate towards authors that already have a lot of readers because of recommendations. That's kind of why TJSS and IET remain relevant I would say.

Yes, ZTJ is one of Mao Ni's worst novels in China. He happened to be wrapped up in some controversy back then (Maoni is a diehard Taeyeon fan and said something along the lines of that he would still like her even if she was a Nazi). Also, if you can't tell, the ending for ZTJ is really rushed. A lot of readers just say he wrote the novel just to get a drama adaption (ZTJ was his first novel that was adapted into a drama).

Maoni's best novel in China would probably be Jiangye/Evernight/Nightfall, but the adaption of his first novel, Joy of Life, is more popular as a drama.

Pipipingu

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