Prime logo Prime members: New to Audible?
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for $14.95/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.
Initialization  By  cover art

Initialization

By: From Hell,OppaTranslations - translator
Narrated by: Travis Baldree
Try for $0.00

$14.95/month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $33.90

Buy for $33.90

Pay using card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Taxes where applicable.

Publisher's summary

Without so much as a warning, humanity in its entirety was suddenly moved to another dimension. Every person, without exception.

But this new world, with all its opportunities and gifts of wondrous abilities, was a stadium. A deadly arena of an unimaginable scale. And humanity was to be its latest gladiators. Every man, woman, and child was given a weapon and ordered to fight. Stuck in this dimension without a way out, only two options existed for the would-be hunters: Fight with monsters to complete the many trials ahead, or perish.

Faced with hordes of powerful monsters, thrown into battle with complete strangers at random, the unfair game of survival began. And from the very beginning, billions of lives were extinguished in mere moments. But even within this abyss of despair was a small ray of hope: If even one person were to complete every raid, then humanity would be redeemed and restored back to its former glory.

No save points, no revives, no retries. Everyone had just one life to make their way through the gauntlet of raids prepared to test their mettle. Within this marathon of death, one man becomes aware of an exception to the rules of the game.

Translated by Oppatranslations.

©2021 From Hell (P)2021 Podium Audio

What listeners say about Initialization

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1,042
  • 4 Stars
    250
  • 3 Stars
    55
  • 2 Stars
    16
  • 1 Stars
    9
Performance
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1,052
  • 4 Stars
    99
  • 3 Stars
    13
  • 2 Stars
    2
  • 1 Stars
    4
Story
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    862
  • 4 Stars
    209
  • 3 Stars
    67
  • 2 Stars
    17
  • 1 Stars
    14

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

A good performance does make a book good

The writing for this book is embarrassingly bad. It feels like it's written by a old white guy that fetishizes Japanese culture. That is coming from another old white guy that has been watching anime since the 80's. Besides that stats seem to make zero sense at all. They seem to hold little to no value. MC gets thousands of stats and admits he is already as strong or stronger than his first life but he seems exactly the same. He is miles ahead in stats over everyone else yet he feels just slightly stronger. Let's not talk about the worst part of the book. During a early mission the MC meets a young Japanese Samurai. The young Samurai seeing the MC in action immediately vows to become his apprentice. You get nothing but cringe for the rest of that mission. There are 500+ reviews as of me posting this and overwhelming they are positive. I have a hard time believing something this bad could possibly be getting this much positive feedback. STAY AWAY AND SAVE YOUR CREDIT!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

38 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Great fun, and excellent narration.

As usual Travis Baldree brought new life to a great book. I am looking forward to the next one.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

13 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Al
  • 10-12-21

Great start to a series.

I'm quite sure that the translation was very difficult. I'm also sure that in future novels it will get better.

Thoroughly enjoyed the storyline. One of the best things about this book for me was it was a good mix between action, character building and internal feelings. A lot of the litRPG has got way too much character angst and then a ton of action and a little bit of character building, quite frankly I don't need to know everything every character is thinking or their background or how everything happened and why oh why oh why. A good storyline that keeps you interested is what matters to me.

I'm looking forward to the next one!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

11 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Breaking bad in the making

Well written, plot that flows…predictably downhill morally speaking. I don’t regret using my credit but I won’t be using another on this series. It is without doubt a soap opera trolling for audible credit breaking up a story into 8-10 hours segments and calling it a “book”. It probably does have an end planned since it is translated from, my guess would be, Russian (but no guarantees.) There is no rhyme or reason for the ending to happen where it does other than leave a nasty residue on your mind knowing the choices the MC makes the final few minutes after the audio book reaches 10 hours…the witching hour of audio credits evidently.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

10 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Fantastic read. Devoured it.

I truly loved these two books and I'm desperately hoping for more in the series. It's a light read and yet I found it very difficult to put down. Was simple and straight forward without over complications, the plot progresses nicely, and there is enough mystery to keep you guessing. Truly enjoyed it. I have over 250 books in my audio book library and there is a lot of trash out there. This series warrants praise. Clean language.

Do you like what I like?
Cradle (one of my favs)
Master Hunter K (true hidden gem)
Awaken Online (Plenty to sink your teeth into)
Life Reset (Shemer Kuznits in general)
Ready Player 1 & 2
Wheel of Time
Almost everything from Brandon Sanderson. Seriously. He's the best.
Michael J. Sullivan's books (The Riyria Revelations and spin offs - high epic / fantasy)
Red Rising (Tim Gerard Reynolds - futuristic / sci-fi)
The Path to Paz (YA fantasy)

More decent LitRPG stuff:
Noobtown (fun/light)
He Who Fights With Monsters
Irrelevant Jack (surprisingly decent and "clean", which for LitRPG is uncommon)
Ascend Online
Dungeon Crawler Carl

Currently listening to?
Expeditionary Force by Craig Alanson.
Just starting this series and by chapter 10 I am really getting into it.

Why would I promote these other authors as well? I believe that good writing needs to be promoted. The more we support good authors, the more they will put out for us to enjoy! Simple as that.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

9 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Story

Maybe it’s just me but the numbers don’t really make sense!! Don’t really get why he doesn’t want anyone to know his nationality either 🤔

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

9 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Travis is awesome

this book is so good Travis gives it more life this book isn't really in depth it's really just constant growth and fighting which makes it refreshing to listen too

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

8 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Loved it

It’s Absolutely amazing I can’t wait for book 2! Grate mc awesome story and progression!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Fantastic Performance and Fast Passed Story

This is an amazing translation with an incredibly engaging story. I don’t write reviews often. But this surprisingly great book deserved sing public praise.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

If you like enemy of the world then you'll like t

This is one of those books that if you read enemy of the world you'll like it And you can tell why the person didn't put their name in because they seriously could have gotten sued by Disney for some Of the references The author is very gutsy and in some ways original but in other ways there is a paint by numbers to it but it's a good paint by numbers a good set up for the next book With a good dilemma of do I concentrate on myself or do I help people out in order to get this finished finished concentrate on now or concentrate on the future

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

4 people found this helpful