Hard Reset

At the start of this bland western litRPG from Yanez (Full Throttle Savage), Tom Dexter wakes up in a coffin-like box with little memory of his previous life. He’s taken in by a helpful older man, Wade, and meets a mysterious woman named Doc, who gives him a red pill that begins to recover his memories. The next day, he meets the town marshal, Bishop, who calls him a “Gamer,” leading him, somewhat belatedly, to question whether he could be inside a video game. He strikes out to find answers but is abruptly killed, and the perspective changes to Sara and her junior tech Bob, workers at the Tanus Corporation who keep players like Tom trapped in a violent video game that, it is implied, may be humanity’s last hope for survival. Tom wakes up again in his coffin and soon reencounters Bishop, who, in an anticlimax, straightforwardly explains how the game works and takes Tom under her wing. Slowly, Tom and Bishop make progress toward the game’s underwhelming final objective, with help from Doc and an obnoxious yet well-meaning AI named Gary. Yanez hangs a lampshade on the narrative’s by-the-numbers plot (at one point Bishop comments, “How tropey. Who wrote this, anyway?”) but does nothing to subvert or upend expectations. Peppered with trite pop culture references and predictable reveals, this undeveloped story is a slog. (Jan.)