Captured has a somewhat interesting concept going for it and a few interesting ideas but nothing else. The writing is legible but uninteresting. The plot is somewhat unique but not really, but the fight scenes are miserable.

Naruto fails to get the scroll and without him there to inspire team 7, Sakura and Sasuke fail as well. Sasuke gets put into a team that's missing a member thanks to the intervention of Koharu and Homura. Naruto and Sakura are put in remedial training where the ninjas are better in every way except being flashy.

Right here the author sets himself up for failure. Despite the high levels of suspension you'll require for your disbelief at the less-capable nin being the ones to get better training and become stronger faster, the author is creating a tone for the rest of the piece where the high level jutsu exists but the main characters wont be using them. Naruto and Sakura fight with only kunai and taijutsu, but not flashy taijutsu like Konoha Senpuu or the full lotus like Lee.

That's only compounded by the author's poor ability when it comes to writing any action scenes. The whole thing is just dull. Naruto and Sakura get in a pitched chase/battle with an entire regiment of sand nin and the entire battle is pretty much summed up by "Naruto lost himself stabbing enemies constantly, the battle a blur around him" or some weak shit like that.

The entire fic is an exercise in telling instead of showing. There are a few interesting ideas, like a reserve force, the ino+gaara pairing, the undercover takedown of Root, and the modified sound invasion, but in general it all just falls horribly flat and there's so little conflict. It's just a "watch me fix canon" kind of fic and it pretty quickly devolves into bashing as well.

I wouldn't almost recommend this fic.

 

Ok...that sounds pretty terrible. Good to know why I won't be reading (re-reading?) the thing.

 

What was the takedown of ROOT and sound invasion like, in summary? Think I stopped following it before that and I'd rather not go and read it to find out.

 

Pretty fucking lame. The IDEA of an actual civil-war-esque offensive to take out Danzo's power base is good but the execution was awful. Similarly, the idea of Naruto vs the world style of fighting chase through the woods to warn konoha of the invasion is good, but the execution is terrible.

The first part of the fic is about playing Root into believing Naruto has lost the Hokage's favor/protection and get Danzo to take him into Root and make him a sleeper agent/spy for the hokage. But when Root finally makes the move to actually abduct Naruto, the hokage responds by immediately bumrushing root headquarters. It's not really explained why anything happens the way it does. Naruto does no spying and his whole role in the operation seems superfluous.

Basically, Naruto gets abducted and he and Sakura go through root training designed to "break" them for about a day. Hiruzen tells Kakashi (in an infuriating way where he refers to Kakashi's ANBU persona "Inu" in 3rd person) that he's responsible for getting Naruto back out of there when the invasion begins. Danzo gets called to Hiruzen's office where Hiruzen accuses him and blablabla you're under arrest. Then a fucking ANBU, a FUCKING ANBU, chops danzo's uncrippled arm off from behind. That's it, Danzo down. Take him away boys. Root's base is invaded from all sides by loyal Konoha nin and Root are put down forcibly. No losses and no fighting descriptions for the loyalists.

It sounds cool when I say "root takedown" but really, it just sort of happened without note.


As far as the sound/sand invasion, Naruto/Kakashi/Sakura/Sasuke find the sound invasion ahead of time but Sasuke fucks up because he thinks he's too good etc etc and they leave to report it to the Hokage. IIRC, they are caught out by the Sand invasion force and are forced to run. Kakashi and Sasuke get separated from Naruto and Sakura. Naruto and Sakura have more of the invasion force after them and fight them off way more easily than they should be able to, coming to the Kyuubi Scar (a place where nothing grows because of the Kyuubi 12 years ago or w/e). Naruto gets injured and collapses or something, Sakura tries to get away with him, but hides him when she gets captured. They torture her and Naruto wakes up and goes Kyuubi when he sees. It's all pretty much told with the same amount of description I've given you here.

So nothing really actually happens, but they sidetrack the entire sand invasion force. Also, IIRC, because Kakashi&co are sidetracked and don't make it back, Hiruzen is on guard and sends a kage bunshin into the room with Orochimaru. When Orochimaru springs the trap, he talks for a bit and then the bunshin explodes, ruining Orochimaru's arms. He tries to flee and is cut down by a fucking ANBU. No more Orochimaru.

Oh, and in addition to that, Gaara wasn't a part of the invasion because he was hospitalized for a month after the prelims when Ino used her mind capture and got stuck inside his head. They die if they go to far from eachother so they both share a hospital room in a coma. Eventually Gaara's sand moves their beds closer together and they hold hands, still in a coma.

So then the Sand force arrives and basically leaves before entering the city when Hiruzen says "yo, where's the Kazekage? Orochimaru was an imposter, you've been betrayed, konoha da best" and they walk away.

 

Sounds magical.

 

I'm all for anticlimatic endings and competent Anbu - I loved the fic where the Anbu Commander was on par with Itachi, the Hogakes etc. I'd find it funny if an unnamed Anbu made all those kills.

But, isn't Anbu supposed to be compromised? And how do they know Orochimaru killed the Kazekage, Danzo's right arm is super dangerous and the identity of every single Root agent.

 

lol thats way better then what I read. Im glad you made it worth while for me. Yo you da best man

 

This is all an elaborate attempt to prove the superiority of the Leaf's ANBU system. It's really quite ingenious.

 

Does anyone know quality fics where Naruto is not jinchuuriki?

 

Hurricane Suite by Inert is the only good one I remember.
FanFiction.Net
It's in WbA though, so you probably know it already.

 

yep.

anything else?

 

I really like this one. Sometimes it gets a little preachy/over glorifying of the science.

 

I haven't read most of these stories in a while, and subscribed to them when I was younger, and had a worse taste in stories. So they may be good, and they may be bad. I'll try to write down the impressions of the story along with the summary.

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6130625/1/The-Untraveled-Path

Summary: Minato Namikaze was certain that he would be sacrificing himself for his village. That was his duty as the Fourth Hokage. But what if his plan to sacrifice himself and seal the Kyuubi inside his newborn son had been altered? Nothing would be the same.

I really don't remember much about this at all. All I can think of is that the Kyuubi was sealed back into Kushina, instead of Naruto. Whether you think that is a believable premise or not, is up to you. It hasn't updated in a while too, so....

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7406811/1/Spiraling-Shark

Summary: Humanity has mocked, enslaved, and looked down on us. That is what Naruto thought, from childhood he was destined to do great things. But will it be his destiny to destroy what Otohime worked for, or will it take a special princess to change his mind?

Not one-hundred percent sure if this even counts or not, given that it is a crossover fic. He has a special ability kind of similar to having a bijuu, so if you were looking for a Naruto without that kind of special power, skip this one. I think it's kinda decent otherwise.

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3406885/1/Namikaze-Uzumaki-Naruto

Summary: The 4th Hokage never sealed the Kyuubi into Naruto. Instead he defeated it and gave his son Naruto a new chance at life. A strong, powerful Naruto. He made Jounin at 13 also. Pairing Naruto X FEMALE Haku! Haku is a girl!

Honestly, I'm not sure if you should even bother with this one. It was started back in 2007, and hasn't updated since 2009. I don't remember that much else about the story at all.

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5884541/1/God-of-Illusion-Host-of-the-Devil-s-Arm

Summary: Naruto's sister was chosen for the sealing. The Yondaime lived. Despite his talent and hard work, Naruto slowly faded into the background of his sister. He suffered a crippling accident. His desperate attempt to fix himself will change the world.

My favorite one out of the bunch. Definitely a YMMV fic, though, since Naruto is a child genius and it suffers from the whole loving one twin more than the other thing, but I think he does it believably. Genjutsu Naruto, as well, which is always a plus in my book. However, this also hasn't updated in a while (since 2011).

That's all I got. There is one more in my subscriptions, but I'm fairly sure that one is really bad.

 

Thanks. Gonna read them.

 

No you should be giving us Quality fics. Stories that you found to be of high quality not "they could be good, they could be bad" that's just annoying man, seriously.

 

Well, to be fair, all of those stoies that he posted aren't bad. (Well , I haven't read the third one yet, so dunno about that one).

 

True. What annoys me is that he himself says the stories are sub-standard. Going against the very nature of the thread. Its disappointing.

 

I was posting a little off topic for the thread. I figured that a less than stellar quality is okay when someone was searching for a specific type of story.

 

You should've quoted the original post you're replying to then, even if replace all the text in it with <snip> or whatever. At a glance, it's not obvious that you're replying to someone's request.

 

Take another look.

Post #409, by valcerou, asked "Does anyone know quality fics where Naruto is not jinchuuriki?"

It's quite clear.

All of the following posts were timely responses to that query. Everything was on the topic of non-Jinchuriki Naruto fanfics. It wasn't hidden, it wasn't obscured, it wasn't lost a page and a half ago. It was a consistent dialogue.

It isn't anyone's responsibility to make sure that people who're only cherry picking fic links instead of reading the thread know what's going on.