Arnold O'Connor is a gamer who just lost his office job to AI. Short on cash, he can appreciate the irony of taking a job at an indie gaming company looking to train their monster AI. But Anachronism Interactive isn't looking for just any players to copy from, they're interested in hardcore gamers.

After being run through a series of psychological tests while hooked up to a brain scanner, Arnold finally gets a chance to check out the game these scientists have been making. Already questioning his sense of reality after all the mind games and brain twisters, Arnold finds himself immersed in a world that's both utterly real and disconcertingly incomplete.

As each iteration of the company's flagship game releases, Arnold is drawn farther and farther into the alternate reality. And as the game world becomes more real, the real world begins to fade away entirely.

His only hope of escape lies in ultimate victory.

Freshly unemployed gamer Arnold O'Connor is short on cash and facing eviction. When an indie game developer advertises looking for participants in a brain study to help revolutionize enemy AI, he's not thinking about the benefits to his hobby, just his bank account.

But things get weird once the trials start. Neuroscientists monitor his brain waves as Connor performs a variety of tasks, culminating in venturing into a testing version of the very game they're hoping to develop. The tests mess with his sense of reality, seeing things he can't touch and deafened to some sounds but not others. The game world operates on the same principles, forcing Arnold to wonder whether he's inside the game or just playing it.

The only way to find out for sure is to reach the end victorious!

Rather than emerging victorious into the real world, Arnold O'Connor finds himself back at the beginning of Spires of Fate. This time, it's an alpha build he'd stuck inside, and he's forced to choose an entirely different class. With no outside help, he'll have to find allies within the game if he hopes to escape.

What's old is new again as parts of the game world have been fixed, updated, or simply overhauled. New challenges await. New adversaries threaten. And waiting at the top of the spire itself is a simple-sounding quest goal that supplants all others.

Slay the Mountain Lord.

Connor and Dizzy have a problem. The game has rebooted yet again. Their names have been stolen, and they're limited to the advanced classes they earned last time around. On top of that, the beta version of Spires of Fate had enabled worldwide PVP combat. It's going to be the two of them not just against the world, but against the rest of the player base, too.

But they know the game. They've got the experience. And the goal hasn't changed: get to the top and slay the Mountain Lord. And no dirty tricks by the developers are going to stop them.

He defeated the Mountain Lord. He won. But the game didn't end, it merely evolved. Taking on the title of his fallen predecessor, Mountain Lord Konroh gets his final task: defend the spire at any cost.

A whole host of new systems open up. Erstwhile villains now owe Konroh their fealty. He can reassign monsters to new zones, teach his minions new strategies, and beef up his fortifications to his heart's desire. But everything come at a cost. To pay for it all, he'll need to kill players without getting personally involved. Because to harm a player before they enter his castle will incur penalties that could cripple Konroh's hopes of survival.

And those players are coming for him. Defeat is inevitable when you're a raid boss... or is it?

Gary Burns just wanted to create the greatest RPG campaign of his gaming career. But a freak magical accident sucks him into the very world he created—as himself. Surrounded by heroes who look and sound like his friends, Gary is forced to play out the story he wrote.

Worthless in a fight, Gary must prove himself valuable even if it means feeding the team insider knowledge.

Because he needs to keep his friends close—and himself alive—until he can solve the puzzle he never designed: how to get everyone back home.

Gary Burns just wanted to create the greatest RPG campaign of his gaming career. But a freak magical accident sucks him into the very world he created—as himself. Surrounded by heroes who look and sound like his friends, Gary is forced to play out the story he wrote.

Worthless in a fight, Gary must prove himself valuable even if it means feeding the team insider knowledge.

Because he needs to keep his friends close—and himself alive—until he can solve the puzzle he never designed: how to get everyone back home.

Gary Burns has been kidnapped, thrown in a dungeon, and tortured for information. Worst of all, he's been separated from his friends, so no one even knows where to look for him. Cut off from his support network, Gary uses the only tools at his disposal: a silver tongue and an insider's knowledge of the game world that's second to none.

With a makeshift party of former foes, Gary must not only escape his captor but plan for payback. Because nothing passes the time in a dank, lightless prison cell like plotting revenge. And when your adversary is a centuries-old lich with the might of an army at his disposal, death is a starting point, not a victory.

Fresh off their defeat of the lich's army, Gary and his friends find themselves preparing for an even larger threat. While unlocking elder magic gave them the juice they needed to turn aside one foe, it unstoppered the bottle holding back an ancient evil. Gary knows what's coming because he wrote it.

Now, with political responsibilities crushing him from one side and a demonic army looming on the other, Gary must balance the necessity of victory with the means to achieve it.

After all, what good is saving a kingdom only to become the villain?

Sgt. Reggie King wakes up from a battlefield injury to find himself physically intact. But the hospital staff insist he’s not fit to return to duty. As part of his psychological recovery, they introduce him to a game.

Armored Souls is a tank game on steroids. Giant, walking mechs called juggernauts engage in interplanetary wars as noble houses and mercenary factions wage endless battles for supremacy. For the pilots of these juggernauts, the rewards are glory, cash, and XP.

As a tanker in real life, Reggie has a leg up on tactics and leadership, but he’s got a lot to learn in the game world. Saddled with trigger-happy commanding officers, slacker teammates, and bafflingly incompetent NPC underlings, Reggie will have to struggle to make headway.

Meanwhile, a sinister player decides to make Reggie’s life hell after their two factions clash. Reggie is forced to find a solution to his griefer problems while battling the real life demons that chased him into the game in the first place.

…and they won’t let him quit.

Sgt. Reggie King wakes up from a battlefield injury to find himself physically intact. But the hospital staff insist he’s not fit to return to duty. As part of his psychological recovery, they introduce him to a game.

Armored Souls is a tank game on steroids. Giant, walking mechs called juggernauts engage in interplanetary wars as noble houses and mercenary factions wage endless battles for supremacy. For the pilots of these juggernauts, the rewards are glory, cash, and XP.

As a tanker in real life, Reggie has a leg up on tactics and leadership, but he’s got a lot to learn in the game world. Saddled with trigger-happy commanding officers, slacker teammates, and bafflingly incompetent NPC underlings, Reggie will have to struggle to make headway.

Meanwhile, a sinister player decides to make Reggie’s life hell after their two factions clash. Reggie is forced to find a solution to his griefer problems while battling the real life demons that chased him into the game in the first place.

…and they won’t let him quit.

Reggie King lives his life in the Armored Souls universe. But there’s more to the game than taking missions as they come. Even turning a secret asteroid base into a kickass man cave only holds appeal for so long. There comes a time when a platoon of mercenaries either needs to join up with a major faction…

Or create one.

With the founding of Wounded Legion, Reggie takes on responsibility for building and recruiting an elite fighting force capable of conquering planets. But while crummy little independent worlds and uninhabited rocks are easy to capture, the real prizes involve fighting other factions to secure. In the process, Reggie makes enemies, including one troll who refuses to win gracefully. Rather than rough up Wounded Legion and move on, Liberty Clan decides they want to wipe Reggie and his friends off the galactic map.

It’s all by the book. The game rules allow it. To avoid extermination, Reggie has to find a way to combat a foe ten times as powerful as his own. A diplomat might broker a deal. An assassin might go straight for the enemy leader. But Reggie’s a soldier, and he’s going to fight this war the way he knows best.

After a glorious run as the world’s first full-immersion VR mega-game, Armored Souls is on its last legs. Competitors are on the rise, and the company’s own projects are surpassing it. In a last-ditch effort to inject new life into the game, Valhalla West announces a tournament with such an awesome prize that no player can resist.

Reggie has led Wounded Legion to the top ranks of the factions on the Armored Souls servers, but the game has gotten easy for him. Too easy. When Valhalla West announces their tournament plans, Reggie springs into action to prepare for it. His motives are twofold. First, it’s the most excitement he’s felt in years.

But more importantly, Armored Souls is Reggie’s entire world. He’s willing to fight to keep it going as long as he can.