I came back to give it another try in case I was overly hasty, but naruto being a special snowflake chunin anbu whatever repulsed me enough where I decided to drop the story for good. Lone wolves arent interesting to read about, nor any kind of weird floating team member of specialness. Blegh.

So, I read the first 3 chapters (mostly, I skipped the nonsense until he was born), and then checked reviews and Authors Notes for 4 and 5 to get a better idea of what people are thinking. Realistically, I have a problem with the intro after reading the AN for 5. It wasnt really working for me, and this explains why. The author wasnt looking forward to writing an adult mentality into a toddlers body. Cool. There are ways around this problem. A really simple one is to just start the story later. Have the kyuubi night, then note there are twins, and then timeskip to age 7 or whatever when you want to actually start the story. I mean, you are the author here. No one is stopping you. You are allowed to skip things you dont like.
But overall, this has resulted in an early problem for me. One of the things that absolutely bothers myself (and I suspect many readers) is when a MC has mental issues. Unless the story is about overcoming trauma, skip the brain damage and identity crisis stuff. Its an issue of both agency and frustration with a character the reader can perceive as being dumb. I will agree with some other reviewers though. If you are introducing someone into the story who knows the events of naruto, then there is an expectation to try and stop bad things, or do it better than the canon character did it.

Anyways, the first 3 chapters were enough for me to lose interest. I just checked a few things before I was leaving to see what everyone elses thoughts were on the subject. I think you are a capable writer, but lack an understanding of what works well structurally in storytelling. For instance, save your drunken jonin writing for when your main characters can engage in it naturally. Put where it is, it totally messes with the flow of the story.

Bleh. That an anbu would tail his charge far enough for someone to unknowingly henge and deal with a kid that ran to a park in a manner a uchiha wouldnt notice? Feels forced.

You thought to invoke Joshua Graham and thought we wouldn't notice.

I have to admit I just found this story and have been just reading it like crazy since started it yesterday. Really great story and your use of the characters and OC's is awesome. Thank you for the great story.

So, I usually don't leave reviews, but this story is getting one:

Firstly, I pussyfooted about reading this story for a while because it is so, so, SO long. 800k(almost 900k) words is crazy. That is almost the entire length of Harry Potter. Yesterday, I gave it a shot and spent an hour finishing it up today.

I'm mixed. I enjoyed it—why else would I read ~900k words of it—but there are some heavy issues I take with this story. I'm going to try and be constructive with my criticism, so I'll begin with what I liked.

The writing is good. The spelling, grammar, syntax, etc etc is all at a level where it does not impede the flow of the story, so that is great. It is also funny; I genuinely laughed hard over many of the jokes you wrote, so I'd say comedy is one of the best attributes of your story. The characters also felt very real—I loved Rin. She's awesome and I like her a lot. The growth characters had felt natural and logical. I didn't like Ino and Hinata much, but that is because of bias, not because of a flaw in their writing.

I could go on and on about the things I liked about this story. Creativity, good writing, and realism are all here in spades…but, as humans, we always focus on the negatives, even when 99% is good. Now, for my gripes.

Too slow. Way, way too slow. This story might have the worst pacing out of any fanfic I have ever read. It should not take 900k words to get to the timeskip. 500k words to get to the chunin exams is insane. You give TOO much information that it becomes hard to keep track of everything that is happening.

Of the same vein, Naruto's growth makes no sense. He has been learning Hirashin for the majority of the story and still hasn't learned it. His dad could do it by ~14. Naruto had advice from Tobirama, hundreds of clones, and an older mental state to work on this stuff. It makes no sense for him to not have learned it. He has spent decades, if not centuries, learning this stuff.

This goes for other things with Naruto. In one note, you said you wanted to avoid making Naruto S rank by the time he became a genin...but he's been using dozens, if not hundreds of clones to train everyday while also being a genius on the level of Itachi, Minato, Orochimaru, or Kakashi. He should be an S rank nin. He has spent decades, if not centuries, worth of time training due to the amount of time his clones have put into training.

It feel unrealistic to have him grow so, so, so slowly that it becomes unsatisfying when he makes a big leap. He either never should have been a prodigy or he should not have been able to utilize clones to train until he was older. That way, his growth would make SO much more sense. If Itachi could be S rank by thirteen, the guy who has hundreds of clones training everyday, a body that build muscle rapidly, and prodigious intellect should also be able to be S rank by thirteen.

Next, some things feel forced. Naruto not being a toad summoner felt forced. Naruto's slow growth feels forced. Ino mind-transferring him so they could become friends felt forced. Ashina henging as Tobi so Naruto would freak out and accidentally reveal he was a reincarnate felt forced(I still don't get WHY Ashina would do that). I could list them, but you get the point. At times, changes felt like they were happening because the plot was demanding it to happen opposed to it organically occurring.

Well, that's all from me. I hope this didn't come off as rude—I really DO like this story. Giving criticism is, in my opinion, meant to be a compliment towards you, not an insult.

honestly I think Naruto is the only perfect successor to Jiraiya's spy network since he can use Hiraishin to move around the continent speeding up flow of information for konoha only downside i would see would be lack of growth since you'll have to develop contacts and that takes a lot of time

damn now it makes sense that Ashina was a reincarnate honestly the creed sounder something from earth lol

okay no matter what other people say I love how you really put to life the personalities of legends.

Honestly I kinda wished Naruto hear asked how it feels like to fight a sage gives him ideas on how to improve his fighting style when he becomes a sage

Honestly it was more like Itachi getting fooled by Danzo like come did it never occur to him that Hiruzen would never eliminate whole clan it's stupid way to weaken your shinobi forces and he should've known about it honestly

tbh Naruto is kinda a one of a kind a genius among genius since he is not held back by chakra reserve and strong body because of age.

Finally a fic where someone thought of hijacking the seal of hyuga it's been on my mind for years why no one wrote how stupid the Hyuga's are for basically having a slave seal that could be hijack by sealmasters

as someone who works in a store it is not uncommon to have out of date or rotting food we gotta toss out and to be honest it wouldn't be to hard to just not toss it out and give it to him

This MC is such a fucking loser. Congrats, on becoming a genocide enabler.