Mostly chronological.
Pov story telling switching between different persons.
Less combat the better.
More realistic the better or at least stay true to the rules of the fantasy world.
Detailed descriptions of environments are a plus.

Favorites: Otherland, Memory/Sorrow/Thorn, Rama series, Helliconia, Ringworld series, Wheel of time, Flood/Ark, Time Odessey.

Anyone slightly interested in VR should read Otherland, that will get your imagination going.

Alex Benedict series also has a lot of VR as well, its pretty good read, it barely has any fight scenes and mostly all about politics and future history (as the main character is an antique seller)

• chronological

• 3rd person

• I'd much prefer a good balance of the two, like exploring the world with a protagonist

• yes, I'm always interested in other people's take on how future will look like

• yes, same reason as above

• humans only (unless there are interracial romances tehehe). aliens almost always end up being an extension of our own stereotypical and xenophobic approach to different cultures, in stories aliens are often depicted as being completely void of individuality and the entire race would behave exactly the same, most people don't mind it because we'll probably never see aliens in our life time anyway and it's just a 'story', but I think the way they are being depicted is quite pathetic because many people still view other countries the same way (even though they'll never admit it), I'm probably being cynical but whatever.

• Deus Ex, I prefer it's not too far into the future either.

• Wheel of Time, I know I'm the minority here but I don't think Song of Fire and Ice and Game of Thrones are anywhere near as good as people make them out to be.

I have a similar opinion, Between book one and book 2 it was interesting, then it dragged out into book 3 (storm of swords... the show currently reached half of this book the other half is in next season , "Red Wedding" and "Purple Wedding" )

Spoilers

Spoilers

Spoilers 

I really think the series should have stopped with this book, it seems after this one Martin got a computer and went online to see what his fans thought about "Purple Wedding" and then his writing became more like fanservice than what he intended , almost all the things that happened seem to be according to fan reaction, for example "Lady Stoneheart" later and then the focus of the characters becomes really weird for example "Cersei" suddenly became a good person, and tries to find retribution when all she did was look after her kingdom and family but because the fans loved the Starks suddenly she was evil, she didn't even care about Joffrey (sure no one would he's a jerk) but she did care earlier so why did she suddenly change her mind? , Arya and Tyrion are two other characters that also lose their interesting personalities because of fan feedback.

Hey a lot of people apprieciate that Martin is close to his fanbase, but to me I think an author should not be driven by his fanbase but they drive their fanbase, they're the "gods" of their story not the readers. I imagine people will lose interest in the series after this season because most of the personalities you experienced in the older books are drastically changed and "simplified" in later books just for the sake of making more books in the series.

SPOILER ENDS HERE

another thing I actually like/dislike is how it drags out into the details, almost every time a character shows up he has to go and mention what they're wearing and what they're doing and what brands of shoes they're wearing, almost every time, I know it adds to the story but it drags it out a lot this way, I LOVE that things are always there for a reason and that every town has their own merchants and every sword is different, but you don't have to go detail things twice because a different POV character saw them for example "Arya saw this dude and he was wearing red boots, he had long hair blah blah blah" "and then Cercei saw this dude, he was wearing red boots and had long hair blah blah blah" , I do love writing about stuff like that myself, I go into detail about brands and markets (as a scifi) but not mention it every time a new chapter starts just for the sake of making the books longer.

boy I do hope this little rant doesn't go back and bite me in the back, I did like the books and all but they're not perfect, Martin did find a gimmick to make people not stop reading by being brutal and vulgar and killing off characters after spending time with them after their role becomes unimportant (and then replacing them with others)

and that is really a good concept, I sure do not want to read 8 books of the same exact characters (-cough- Sword Of Truth -cough- , but that series gets a pass because it doesn't take itself too seriously) but there is a point where you realize this is repeating the same gimmick over and over and ironically instead of it being unpredictable it becomes very predictable.