I haven't read the books, but I've been mostly enjoying the Tencent series. It definitely suffers a bit from its slower pacing, and can even feel a tad repetitive at times, but I respect what they're trying to do here. It's an interesting story, and there have been some good moments and emotional scenes that help break up some of the monotony.

I suspect that when I reach the end I'll say it probably should have been 20 episodes instead of 30 or something, but I also plan to watch all 30 regardless. Butchering it with an 8-episode series would've been much worse than going all-in on a full-sized adaptation. I definitely prefer too many episodes to too few.