Dungeon Crawler Carl: For those who prefer to read RPGs instead of playing them

While I'm not fully sold on the LitRPG genre, it's good to see that it can be fun.

Dungeon Crawler Carl
By Matt Dinnaman
Published by Ace, 2024
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It can be interesting to explore subgenres or micro-genres that are popular among subsets of readers but may not be especially well known to people outside of certain fandoms. One of these genres that has seemed to gain popularity lately is the LitRPG, which takes tropes from role-playing games of the tabletop or electronic variety, having characters start out as low-level noobs in fantastical settings and then slowly grow in skills by killing monsters and gathering or crafting weapons and equipment until they have epic powers and are ready to take on huge final bosses.

If it might seem like these sorts of stories miss the point of RPGs, which are all about being in control of a character and participating in a story, well, you can tell that to the many fans of popular podcasts or YouTube series in which people play through entertaining and exciting campaigns using Dungeons & Dragons rules or other types of tabletop RPG settings. LitRPG is just another branch of that growing tree, although rather than providing an example of collaborative storytelling, it gives a single author a chance to both craft a campaign and run characters through it. These books may not feature the level of improvisation or spontaneity that comes from players reacting to and sometimes struggling against the bounds of the stories that they are supposed to follow, but when done well, they may have the potential to provide more satisfying narrative arcs and more cohesive structures.

Whether Dungeon Crawler Carl will meet those expectations remains to be seen, since it is just the first entry in a series that currently spans seven books, with more to come in the future. It’s a pretty notable success story, beginning life as a series that author Matt Dinnaman published online before being picked up by a major publisher. Dinnaman has built up a pretty substantial fandom, and in addition to building toward the completion of his long-running story, it looks like adaptations in other media are planned, including a TV show, graphic novel, and yes, a tabletop game.

That’s all very exciting for Dinnaman, but the only thing that really matters is whether the books are any good. Judging by this first entry in the series, they probably won’t be for everyone, but they’re entertaining enough to keep one reading, providing plenty of goofy humor, exciting action, and interesting ideas to keep a reader turning pages, if only to find out what will happen next. That may be part of what makes RPG-style storytelling so popular; these tales are designed to keep the players moving forward, always ready for the next battle, the next opportunity to level up, and the next chance to obtain more loot.

The plot here is fairly rudimentary, although there are enough details to make it clear that Dinnaman has thought through the setting and planned for lots of plot twists and dramatic intrigue down the road. The eponymous character is a regular guy who just barely survives an apocalypse because he had run outside in his underwear in the middle of the night to get his ex-girlfriend’s cat out of a tree. In this apocalypse, aliens have shown up, killed most of humanity without warning, and prepared to strip the Earth of its resources. But they’ve also created a game that the survivors can compete in by entering a dungeon that has been generated magically (or using sci-fi technology that’s equivalent to magic) beneath the Earth’s surface. Participants are challenged to make it all the way to the 18th floor of the dungeon, and their exploits are broadcast throughout the galaxy, providing popular entertainment for trillions of beings.

The dungeon itself features all of the usual trappings of role-playing games, including monsters like goblins and kobolds, various types of magical weapons and armor, spells and skills that can be learned, and levels that can be gained by accumulating experience points. It even features a video-game-style interface that gets added to players’ vision, allowing them to view descriptions of monsters and items, check their position on maps of the dungeon, and access items in their inventory. It’s the kind of thing that anyone who has played these types of games would be familiar with, to the point where it almost seems generic.

Fortunately, Dinnaman keeps it from being a boring slog through a bunch of typical battles using familiar weapons and tactics. He approaches the quest with a sense of humor, adding plenty of goofy details and maintaining running jokes as Carl encounters crazy situations and figures out how to prevail. As mentioned, Carl starts the quest in his underwear and basically barefoot, and it quickly becomes clear that his quest to find pants and shoes is going to be in vain, mostly because the overlords operating the dungeon think it’s funny to keep denying him what he wants. Carl is also accompanied by the aforementioned cat, a proud and prissy force of nature named Princess Donut who gains the ability to talk, achieves some impressive stats that allow for powerful magic spells, and eventually becomes an essential partner in Carl’s battles.

Dinnaman also makes Carl’s adventures exciting by regularly throwing in unexpected twists and obstacles. While there are some situations that Carl approaches in the stereotypical fashion, squaring off against monsters and overcoming them through strength and battle tactics, he’s more often forced to use his imagination to come up with ways to get out of dangerous situations and overcome the odds. As many RPG players do, he figures out ways to push against the structure he’s contained within or come up with game-breaking combinations of skills and systems to prevail even when he’s forced to fight powerful, seemingly unbeatable creatures. It’s an approach to storytelling that works really well, allowing Carl to learn about and follow the rules of the dungeon while also straining against the oppressive system that has destroyed his world and is forcing him to engage in battles to the death for the entertainment of others.

Due to the popularity of the book series, there has been something of a backlash, with some claiming that it is terribly written and others complaining about various elements that may be perceived as problematic. Much of this comes from the book’s attempts at edgy humor, usually in the ways the dungeon masters have based various elements of the setting on exaggerated versions of human culture. There are some evil llama creatures who are meth dealers, hillbilly leprechauns who are working with fairies in a multi-level marketing scheme involving the sale of moonshine, and plenty of other examples of such silliness. Many of the descriptions Carl reads when learning about items and creatures in the dungeons are full of “provocative” attempts at humor, such as:

Standard Healing Potion.

Increases your health by at least 50%. Doesn’t cure poison or other health-seeping conditions such as succubus-inflicted gonorrhea. So remember to wrap it up, bucko.

This sort of thing is obviously meant to be mildly offensive, and Carl himself finds it unfunny and annoying, so it’s hard to get too worked up about it. Other criticisms that the series has received are even less sensical, such as the claim that the book is right-wing propaganda, which certainly seems like a stretch. If anything, it’s very lightly anti-capitalist, with some plot elements relating to the corrupt practices of the corporation running the dungeon and stripping Earth of its resources, as well as some examinations of the ways reality TV and similar forms of entertainment can be exploitative. Attempts to have Carl reckon with the morality of his actions occasionally pop up, although they’re little more than bumps along the road that give him brief pause as he continues on his quest.

So no, this isn’t exactly great literature. It doesn’t provide much in the way of incisive commentary or fresh takes on genres that force readers to reexamine their prejudices and expectations. It isn’t going to change anyone’s mind about the morality of cheering for characters on reality TV competitions. It’s not going to lead to hate crimes because the book’s evil villains engage in gross stereotypes. It’s just a fun romp that provides many of the same pleasures that may come from playing through RPG storylines. In fact, it’s entertaining enough that readers will most likely want to proceed immediately to the next entry in the series to find out what exciting battles and plot twists Dinnaman has in store. There’s nothing wrong with that; we can all use some formulaic junk food in our diets, and when it’s crafted to be this tasty, we’re going to want more.