So, I figured I’d start giving brief reviews of various Isekai (Transported to a different world) series. Please note that my judgement might be skewed due to the sheer terribleness of some of the shit I’ve read. The format will probably change over the course of the reviews. These will be short, without even a summary of the plot. Also, I should note, just about any mention of quality is in terms of what I’ve read of the genre itself. This is important, because the entire genre is basically a landfill of wish fulfillment and attempts at edginess.
“In a different world with a Smartphone”.
May as well start with some basic statistics.
Format (that I’ve read): web novel
How far I’ve read at time of writing: 67
Protag Gender: male (15)
Harem elements: yes (worksafe, protag is incredibly dense)
Fanservice: minimal (for the most part)
Protag power growth speed: Hard to gauge, the best parts of the series are the casual ones so I haven’t been paying too much attention. Things get stupid sometimes though.
Well, I’ll start out by saying, this series isn’t great (as you can probably IMMEDIATELY guess from the fact that a: it’s a harem series, and b: that it’s Isekai). I’ve cringed several times (although I’ve certainly read worse.) Despite the title, the smartphone isn’t even close to being the focus (which I’m actually thankful for.) Although I don’t dislike any of the characters, I can’t think of a single character I ACTUALLY like so far, as most of them are fairly devoid of personality, albeit in a way that gives the series a somewhat cheery atmosphere. (Wait, no, there is one character I kinda like, but she just showed up recently so I forget she exists.)
However, it’s not terrible. It feels somewhat earnest, especially given the fact that, considering the protagonist’s age, the writer is quite possibly in high-school. The protagonist’s most useful abilities are ones you might not normally think of (his most useful so far has been “slip”, which simply removes friction from below somebody temporarily), and they’re shown as having limits. The protag’s most notable power jumps come when he learns how to use the abilities “Enchant” and “program”. I feel like they could be used much more inventively however. I guess the best way to describe the series is..... cute? There are certainly scenes that are shockingly bad and/or feel like wish fulfillment or attempts to appeal to readers who are reading it for that purpose, but, for better or worse, a fair amount of it feels like the author is just trying to have some harmless fun.
Worst moment so far: Protag gets a call from the head god saying Polygamy’s totally okay over in that world and the whole pantheon over there is wondering how many girls he’ll marry. (Note: this scene is INCREDIBLY egregious compared to the rest of the series so far. The protagonist is actively against getting married at the moment and is too fucking dense to have anything close to sex happen. Unfortunately, this is in not only due to HIS age, but in no small part due to the age of some of the girls who are interested in him, hence him getting out of a marriage by saying they should wait several years. This is a BIG part of what makes me think this series is aimed at middle-school and high-schoolers. Or at least, hope that it is. I probably won’t normally be clarifying “worst moments” in these reviews unless the author seems to have EXPLICITLY done something to rectify it, but this one feels so jarringly out of place compared to the rest of the series that it felt worth mentioning)
Favorite moment so far: The mental image brought about by a duke gleefully riding a bicycle. He’s just so happy.
Final conclusion: Fairly mindless, not good, maybe even bad, but it’s “cute”, and makes me smile fairly often (although I will admit that it’s sometimes due to the corniness.) This isn’t a series to avoid, but I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it either. In the unlikely scenario it gets a manga, stay away from that at all costs.
Will probably continue to read.
