Ascend Online and the LitRPG genre

I'm a big fantasy novel enthusiast and will often read even junky fantasy novels when I'm bored and run out of better things to read. So, when my brother recommended Ascend Online to me I didn't hesitate to give it a shot.

First of all, let me just talk about the LitRPG genre for a second. What is it? I'm pretty new to it myself, but from what I can tell it's just a story about people playing a game. Literary Role Playing Game. To me that sounds a bit silly and hard to imagine anyone writing a good story like that. But man, I was sure surprised at how GOOD Ascend Online was... I will have to read a few other examples of LitRPG before I can really make a judgment call on the genre as a whole, but this one series is a shining example of what the genre can be, at least.

So, yeah, Ascend Online has it's issues... I needed to make a huge suspension of disbelief right from the start when millions of people willingly "plug themselves into the Matrix," in a sense, in order to play a Fully Immersive RPG. However, getting past that, the story within the game world is amazingly exciting and fun. I really felt like I was along for the ride as characters gain levels and find new equipment. The author tells a great story and brings together a lot of gaming tropes in new imaginative ways.

Part of my reason for posting about this is because I want to find people who would like to discuss the books, but I would also like to spread the word about this amazing series. So, what are your thoughts? Have you heard about Ascend Online or LitRPGs in general? How do you feel about fantasy novels these days, with so many people self publishing on Amazon? (personally I find it hard to find the gems among the stones). Does anyone have any favorites within the LitRPG genre?