Is Ready Player One the most autistic book ever written?

[Anonymous No.6253215]

It's literally reddit the book.

[Anonymous No.6253303]

Is it even possible to write a good story set inside a video game?

[Anonymous No.6253335]

>>6253303
It's hardly even possible to write a good story for a video game, so I guess not.

[Anonymous No.6253341]

>>6253335
I'll agree that Ready player one was shit but Video game stories can be rather brilliant thanks to their advantage as an interactive medium

[Anonymous No.6253342]

>>6253215
I read this. Fucking horrible book.

I refuse to call it "reddit the book" though, purely because something being "reddit" is such a diffuse term at this point, devoid of any meaning (like being autistic, or fedora-prone, or Tumblresque or whatever else).

[Anonymous No.6253344]

>>6253215
You didn't like it because you're in your 20's. The book instills the reminder of pre console gaming nostalgia. If you weren't alive for it, you won't understand it.

[Anonymous No.6253346]

>>6253341
Not really, or at least they can rarely ever get on a level that even comes close to the most shitty fiction.

[Anonymous No.6253349]

I knew it was gonna suck when the little blurb about the author said he likes to spend his free time 'geeking out'. WTF is that supposed to mean.

I only checked it out because a copy came with Lootcrate but I only managed to get halfway through it. It's basically hunger games/mazerunner with ghostbusters references, and just as shit.

[Anonymous No.6253351]

>>6253346
I believe they can, it is extremely rare but there are video game stories that are on the level of great literature.

[Anonymous No.6253354]

>>6253351
>there are video game stories that are on the level of great literature
Kek'd. Still, 1/10, poor effort, no novelty.

[Anonymous No.6253356]

>>6253351
Ok, please give an example of such a game, because I find that somewhat hard to believe.

[Anonymous No.6253359]

>>6253346
any medium related to story telling can be as good as literature it's just literature as a medium is more likely to produce great stories and more filled with great stories whereas with a lot of other mediums it's rare that they get on literature's level

[Anonymous No.6253363]

>>6253356
Shadow of the Colossus to an extent, Drakengard/Nier series. have great well written stories with good underlying themes and ambiguous at times. characters that develop and you learn more about that require multiple playthroughs to fully understand ect

[Anonymous No.6253366]

>>6253354
>I read so I must be more sophisticated then others

try out other mediums instead of one anon. every medium has their gems it's just /lit/ is more full of gems

[Anonymous No.6253369]

>>6253363
Ok those have, at best, and as awsome a thing that is to have in game, mediocre genre-lit credentials, you said high literature.

[Anonymous No.6253371]

>>6253344
This guy gets it.

[Anonymous No.6253372]

>>6253369
what do you consider high literature anon just wondering?

[Anonymous No.6253374]

>>6253341

That's not really a matter of writing, though. The best video game narratives are ones where you create the story. Journey is a good example of a very simple story where the emotion is generated by you and your partners, through teamwork. I've played games of Journey where my partner drew a love heart at the end and games where I cried.

I'm not a video gamer, so that's something. But as far as the written games go, Last of Us, MGS, all those blockbuster interactive movies are pretty much just mediocre films but with interactivity.

[Anonymous No.6253378]

>>6253215

Why do you guys read books like this?

And then go and complain about it?

I don't understand. I don't even bother reading books like that because I know I'm not going to like it. There are too many books on this planet for me to waste time trying to read something like that.

[Anonymous No.6253383]

i know you shouldn't judge books by covers and especially not by jacket quotes, but "willy wonka meets the matrix" sounds like the worst thing ever.

[Anonymous No.6253384]

It is absolutely terrible - black/white characters with obvious nerd pandering (good guys are open source kids! Bad guys are closed source industry!), the story just proceeds to cram in more 80s references which the characters seem to find cool (except that they're born long after these movies ran and shouldn't know them in the first place). Stupid ending, generic writing, terrible.

As for computer games with a good story: Recent SF games had at least better stories than recent SF movies, Mass Effect for example broke with an interesting SF trope that Star Trek introduced and is now far spread. In Star Trek, mankind is benevolent, and usually has better technology than the civilization the Enterprise encounters. In Mass Effect, mankind sucks - they're "the new kid", either ignored or loathed by the other alien species. Life has no meaning, mankind is insignificant. I liked that.

The story itself was a bit generic ("old ones" attack and you have to safe the day) but had some really good events (Mordin's death), yet it still suffered from some other Star Trek tropes (all members of species X are Klingons errr warriors!!!!)

Ending wasn't as bad as all these mouthbreathers on the Internet made it out to be, certainly didn't warrant all these petitions and rage.

[Anonymous No.6253389]

>>6253344
If a book needs me to have had a couple of specific experiences to 'understand' it, it's probably not very good.

[Anonymous No.6253391]

The audiobook is narrated by Wil Wheaton. I mean, come on. That tells you everything you need to know.

[Anonymous No.6253393]

>>6253384
Again, it's because you're in your 20's jesus. How much fall out boy did they play at your prom?

[Anonymous No.6253396]

>>6253389
A couple? We're talking about at least half a decade of living.

[Anonymous No.6253398]

>>6253393
please, I'm 29, I grew up with Herbie, Back To The Future and Short Circuit

The book is still shit and if you're this old and you can't see this then you still have a long way to grow as a reader

[Anonymous No.6253399]

>>6253398
Nice try. Being 29 still places you at being born the year AFTER the first Nintendo came out. You STILL have no point of reference. Your first console was probably a game cube or ps2. Newfag.

[Anonymous No.6253400]

>>6253372
Hard to define really, some pretentious shit like "a well-crafted reflection on the human condition" or something. Alternatively "whatever it is that sets Lem's Solaris apart from virtually all the rest of science fiction".

I think like in film, this would have to take a form appropriate to the medium, but it's hard to see how gameplay mechanisms, normally geared towards providing some sort of visceral gratification, could be used to convey any but the simplest insights.

[Anonymous No.6253405]

>>6253400
Well I think my example of multiple playthroughs is a good way of incorporating story into gameplay which can also be done in other ways which helps with gaming being such a young medium and all. I recently finished the game nier a month a go and there's still things I can take from it so it got me thinking that I think gaming is capable of being on literature's level or at least close to it but then again I'm not a hardcore reader (not counting manga) I've only read about 50 books in my lifetime so invalidate my opinion if you must, I just came to /lit/ since I've been in a reading mood lately

[Anonymous No.6253408]

sometimes i lay awake at night awestruck at the thought that not only was this written but people out there like it

[Anonymous No.6253411]

>>6253363

The problem is that these games, and any game that is considered to have a great story in the video game world, is considered great because of the unique qualities that video games provide to storytelling, viz., interactivity.

Most people don't consider this a problem because in their mind Shadow of the Colossus' interactivity enhances the story (which, if we're being honest, is not an exceptional story aside from that when compared to film and literature).

The reason it's a problem is this: these games, rather being "enhanced" by interactivity, are, in a storytelling sense, using interactivity as a crutch.

You feel a great deal playing Shadow because you are playing it. And that's something video games can't escape. The quality of the story relies on the player taking not of all their own choices. It's a collaborative process. Except you can make a person feel with even a mediocre story if you give them enough control. It's cheating, in a way. Even if it is a defining characteristic of gaming.

How to make a great game:
1. Take a story not even on the level of a mediocre Hollywood tentpole film, but oftentimes blatantly copied from a number of mediocre Hollywood films.
2. Add interactivity.

That's the key to making a groundbreaking emotional experience in a video game.

[Anonymous No.6253412]

>>6253344

I bought the book for my papa.

He said he liked it so you're probably right.

[Anonymous No.6253423]

>>6253411

Good post.

It's a case of people being affected by their enjoyment which leads to them not feeling the need to critically evaluate it, but it's arguable that even more scrutiny is needed because of the interactivity-bias (and ergo enjoyment).

Appreciation of games like SoTC has lended me to thinking it's easy to consider games like a canvas, which you as a player (in that collaborative process) come to paint. All games are like that. The player fulfil the role of artist and feels like they are both artist and story-teller. They see too much of the way the story unfolds as their own-doing and so end-up over-rating the experience of story as a result.

[Anonymous No.6253428]

>>6253412
Thanks, guy. It's a "you had to be there" kind of thing. It's the same way that playing all the ww2 era call of duty games in existence is not the same as being a 20 year old private first class sitting on the muddy side of a road in bosnia praying a sniper didn't pick you offin 1996. You weren't there

[Anonymous No.6253431]

>>6253354
>>6253356
Pathologic

[Anonymous No.6253432]

>>6253215
Apparently someone doesn't know what the word "literally" means

[Anonymous No.6253433]

>>6253423
>>6253411
Solid argument and i'd have to say I agree but doesn't your point prove that if high literature level story telling was ever used well in a game then add interactivity to it and doesn't that make it an even better experience?

[Anonymous No.6253434]

>>6253423

I like games, but I've always just had a negative opinion of filmic storytelling in video games. Or even the need people have for a story in video games.

I'm the Journey guy earlier in the thread and for me a game like Journey is how to tell a great video game story. Because, really, there isn't a story, there's just gameplay. But at the end of it, you feel as if you've been on a great journey. Gameplay pushes it all along and it's the gameplay that elicits the emotion. No need for a shitty capeshit-tier story that the video game press is going to hype up because they aren't used to halfway decent stories.

[Anonymous No.6253443]

>>6253433

But I don't think that would ever be possible. Because to create something of high art, you need control as an artist. "Literature" and "art film" are terms without any real meaning, but to me they designate, respectively, books with an emphasis on form and films with an emphasis on form. More than content.

But there's only so much you can orchestrate in a game, while also providing the player with the room to play a game (what he paid his money for).

If you achieve a high level of storytelling, but have to sacrifice gameplay for it, your game is a different kind of failure. I would argue an even greater failure.

I don't think you can measure story success in games in the same way you can measure success in literature and film (which as I mentioned is often focused on the form rather than simply a "great story").

Video games have more in common with board games like chess than they do literature.

[Anonymous No.6253444]

The feels...

[Anonymous No.6253447]

>>6253443
Elaborating on that last chess statement, I mean that the game of chess provides the players with a chance to create a kind of art or practice a kind of science (the players in a chess game control the mood completely, they form the story of that game). But the game of chess itself is a game. It's not a story. It's not art without the people playing.

[Anonymous No.6253458]

People who say video games can't be great, play some fucking dark souls.

[Anonymous No.6253462]

>>6253447
Would Civilization (or other simulation games) be similar to chess in that way? There's no pre-given story but the story you create by your actions

[Anonymous No.6253471]

>>6253399
That's no way dude. I'm 21 and my first console was an N64 and my first handheld was a brick gameboy. His first was probably an SNES.

[Anonymous No.6253474]

>>6253462

I would say so. It's hard using the chess analogy, though, because chess carries with it so much weight, but, yes, that's what I meant.

In video game criticism there are two terms: "narratology" and "ludology". Narratologists believing that story is most important in games. Ludologists believing that gameplay is most important. To a ludologist, for example, Lara Croft's backstory, her personality in the cutscenes, all of that is unnecessary information because she is but a pawn, a game piece.

I've been called a faggot on 4chan for saying shit like this, but basically I'm a ludologist in this matter. Gameplay is most important for me. And the greatest "stories" for me are the ones that the players make.

It doesn't even have to be inside of the game. It can even be that time your friends came over and played NBA Hangtime and even everything social that is tied to that game. That's the stuff I remember and that's stuff that, to me, is unique to video games as an art.

I appreciate that some people like cinematic stories, but I don't see the point really. Vice City is fun to play through if you want to inhabit the world of Scarface or Miami Vice, but independent of that, I don't need a story.

[Anonymous No.6253527]

>>6253471
Then the statement still rings true

[Anonymous No.6253532]

>>6253527
Doesn't matter whether you were there or not, book is still atrocious, I don't really see your point

If that point is true then I shall make a movie for "your" generation that is just cosplayers screaming GHOSTBUSTERS BACK TO THE FUTURE KITT NUMBER 5 over and over again and it should be the best thing ever

[Anonymous No.6253536]

not even close

[Anonymous No.6253562]

>>6253532
Jokes on you, fagbot. People my age don't cosplay. We just make new products for you little shits to buy. Enjoy your homestuck.

[Anonymous No.6253571]

>>6253562
>he's proud of being a cog in the wheels of capitalism

jokes on you, neet masterrace

[Anonymous No.6253600]

>>6253571
Jokes on you, I can't hear you over the sound of all muh sheckles. Stop voting for democrats, negroes and women and you'll get somewhere. Money can't buy happiness but it buys everything else. Oh yeah, fuck the Jews too. Nuke the Middle East and let's open an arcade there

[Anonymous No.6253617]

>>6253600
>goes off on completely random rant on women and minorities and how people should get nuked
What is wrong with you, /pol/? We're deeply concerned about your mental health.

[Anonymous No.6253637]

>>6253600
>>6253617
Sorry about that. A bit caffinated here. Was hitler caffinated? With enough redbull I'd kill Jews too. My apologies, sometimes it comes across like Tourette's. Anyway. The comment this all goes back to is the fact that there's a certain feel that comes with growing up in the "arcade era". There's nothing like it anymore. I genuinely wish you could have experienced it so that you'd better understand the ephemera and miasma that earnest cline accurately recreated in the book. *cough*cough*
niggers.

[Anonymous No.6253652]

>>6253428
When has a good story ever been something you had to experience to enjoy. I just didn't get the Odyssey because I've never been a king in Ancient Greece. I couldn't get into Moby Dick because I've never hunted whales.

[Anonymous No.6253667]

>>6253374
What about lore? The Elder Scrolls has a pretty interesting lore with clear influences from Hinduism, Borges and other literary influences.

[Anonymous No.6253924]

>>6253637
Will you do something to get banned pls?

[Anonymous No.6254044]

>>6253411
>He thinks that a great game has to have a great story

Just fuck off back to GameFaqs already.

[Anonymous No.6254064]

>>6253924
Aww didums get their feelings hurt by a fact? That's adorable. It's a shame that plowing that glassy eyed tart of a mother of yours isn't a bannable offense or I'd have been cast out years ago. That and every other anon with a shiny nickel in their pocket. Put on your big girl panties, kiddo. Or borrow some from that snaggletoothed jackel that spawned your dopey ass. *cough*cough*
Double nigger

[Anonymous No.6254070]

>>6253356
Passage.

[Anonymous No.6254086]

>>6254070
Are you trolling or literally a mental retard?

[Anonymous No.6254098]

>>6254086
Again with the use of the word "literal". Of course he's trolling. If he was a "literal" retard, he wouldn't have the mental capacity to stop shitting himself and drooling over his caretaker while staring off into the void while wearing a fancy helmet. YOU need to stop acting like a figurative retard.

[Anonymous No.6254167]

>>6253341
Interactivity isn't an advantage.

[Anonymous No.6254183]

>playing videogames

you better be 13 years old

[Anonymous No.6254216]

>>6254183
I played them until my early 20s. Were those grand strategy games like Eu4 anyone elses outro to video games?

[Anonymous No.6254229]

>>6253399
us poor niggas used the NES until like 1996

[Anonymous No.6254248]

>>6254216
Coincedentally yes, my last game I played was Victoria 2

And then I got sick of videogames, and really sick of the people who play them, and the whole "gamer" culture for being chock full of manchildren

[Anonymous No.6254303]

>>6253667
References that will be lost on most gamers, and the people who will be inspired by the references will likely be exposed to the same sources through other medias.

[Anonymous No.6254304]

>>6253215
>Is Ready Player One the most autistic book ever written?
Reddit the book, meet tumblr the book.

[Anonymous No.6254471]

>>6254304
Nyet

[Anonymous No.6255011]

>>6254183
*Tips fedora*

[Anonymous No.6255081]

>>6255011
Nicely meme'd

Very nicely meme'd. You have a lot of potential as a memer

[Anonymous No.6255198]

>"need to have experienced the period to understand it"
>99% of literature has been written before the birth of anyone currently living

This is terrifying logic that fans of this book will use.
I read it too, dreaded the endless masturbation of wiki history the most. I didnt expect much though...

Thankfully, I did not experience this shitty, thumb-sucking period of commercial America. I don't doubt that this shit is to blame the scum on this site: Ready Player One marks the semen stained conception of 4chan by their man child-fathers.

[Anonymous No.6255219]

>>6254216
Warlight for me.

[Anonymous No.6255222]

>>6253341>>6253341
I'll say that games have a different strength group, focused largely on interactivity, and many/majority games don't make games don't make games that could only be games, use interactivity as a watery crutch to push along a bad storyline.
Some games are different, but there's a reason I don't play much anymore. Johnathan Blow puts it very well, most games don't respect your time, but that is a matter of individual, though sadly widespread, development choice, not a necessity of the medium.

[Anonymous No.6255810]

>>6253356
Mother 3

[Anonymous No.6255827]

>>6253536
>tfw you ripped off Ulillillia's style for a short story about a man with severe OCD and won a $150 prize

[Anonymous No.6255867]

>>6255222
>most games don't respect your time

I agree, there is far too much bloat and waste in video games. I've become less inclined over time to play them because of that, in fact, it's nearly killed my interest in gaming, and I say that as someone with a lot of free time on my hands.

[Anonymous No.6255877]

>>6253536

Lmao what the fuck is this?

[Anonymous No.6255903]

>>6255877
a masterpiece

nice dubs

[Anonymous No.6256599]

>>6254216

CK2 and the like. Stopped when I turned 19, uninstalled Steam and never looked back.

[Anonymous No.6256628]

>>6256599
So mature ; ^)

[Anonymous No.6256650]

This book is just a wish fulfillment fantasy for nerds/geeks. The quote on the cover "willy wonka meets matrix" is accurate. Reading this made me cringe and I had to force myself to finish.

[Anonymous No.6256862]

I didn't mind the setting or the references in the novel. It was the main plot point that killed it for me. Win this dudes crazy huge inheritance, but to do it you must become his exact copy. Like what he liked. Know what he knew. The protagonist had to become an expert on this douchebag. He was a total sperglord that would have fit in well with /r9k/. And everyone went along with it! Society fell apart because of this asshole that made what was essentially occulus rift plus second life.

[Anonymous No.6256864]

>>6253428
You are a fucking retard, and even worse, you are over 30, like vide games, don't know what makes good literature. You are pathetic.

[Anonymous No.6256868]

>>6253444
Cool pixels, asshole.

[Anonymous No.6256873]

>>6254098
Hello gramps, you must be new to the internet. Everyone knows literally is being incorrectly, we are just not autistic enough to give a shit about it.

[Anonymous No.6256901]

>>6253341
games are for playing, sorry

[Anonymous No.6256907]

>>6253349

>hear faint rustling down hall
>peek head into son's room
>he is on his bed, thrashing about spasmodically while minecraft is open on his laptop, which is on the floor
>"what are you doing?"
>>geeking out, dad, you wouldnt get it

[Anonymous No.6256932]

>>6253400
Nier, and Digital Devil Saga fill that.

[Anonymous No.6257009]

>>6253393
>going to prom
Normie's leave this thread now.

[Anonymous No.6257013]

>>6257009
this. why are there so many normies here? absolutely disgusting.

[Anonymous No.6257723]

>>6253356
http://torment.sorcerers.net/unovel/html/trmnt050.shtml

I think Torment is up there. This is one of the moments that I still remember vividly.

[Anonymous No.6257774]

>>6253389
>this book needs to be for everyone!

wrong.

[Anonymous No.6258839]

>>6257723
Torment is really one of the most overrated pieces of storycrap I've ever met. really, the so-called 'depth' of the story mostly means encyclopedia-copied articles on certain philosophical schools disguised as 'dialogues'. If you erase that part, the story is nothing more than a generic fantasy story

[Anonymous No.6258906]

>people thinking games can't have good writing
KAIN

IS

DEIFIED
E
I
F
I
E
D

[Anonymous No.6259240]

>>6253391
I completely agree.

[Anonymous No.6259266]

It was an alright book, had a lot of potential but lost itself by focusing too much on the simulation parts rather than the real life implications of the contest. Case in point, the MC gets out of any real life trouble too easily and barely reacts to any of the shit that goes down (although that may be because he's fucking autistic)

[Anonymous No.6259287]

>>6258906
CAST HIM IN
A
S
T

H
I
M

I
N

Seriously though why cant more videogames put an effort into their writing rather than aping movies

[Anonymous No.6260041]

>>6258839
is it really though. I've played the game like three times beginning to end, and never... How is it a bad story again? Because of philosophy, or what? No, it's a good story about an immortal and his interesting companions, his mistakes, the nature of a long life and many different personalities, it has a love story that engages even though it's never actually played out in the game, there's meaningful betrayal, there's a neat antagonist and... I won't go on, I suddenly realized I think you're wrong here buddy.

[Anonymous No.6260408]

i just finished this. it was fun. not too serious and was nostalgic and had a good atmosphere. but it was very very predictable.

[Anonymous No.6260446]

>>6253303
Probably not, but that didn't stop me from doing it.

[Anonymous No.6260467]

>>6253215
The author is clearly obsessed with a very specific culture from a very particular era, and the book is all about listing all of the things he likes and glorifying them and trying to fob them off on the next generation. Definite aspergers traits.


However...


Those video games and books and TV shows and toys did impact my life and it was nice to revisit them.


Also...


The plot is clear, pleasant, has a little tension, the ending is very good.


The only things that bothered me were...


The adolescent love story, which was awkward but no more awkward than a lot of others.
The slightly odd body-denial, the head shaving and exercising and eating portrayed as necessary evils.

[Anonymous No.6260528]

>>6259287
I think it'll be the next movement in video games. We're mostly past the whole cinematic deal: COD-clones are (finally) dying out, and are being replaced in popularity by games focusing on atmosphere: see the rise of indie games. But then look at games like Spec Ops: The Line or New Vegas: they have characterization, implied story and emotional depth. You have to work things out on your own frequently, and people are taking notice of that (particularly with Dark Souls 1 and 2: just look how many YouTube channels are dedicated to story in them). Soon games that revolve not around mechanical puzzles but around critical thinking problems and the ability to notice/follow thematic elements will be widely accepted and hailed as masterpieces.

>tfw gotta wear shades

[Anonymous No.6260539]

>>6260528

[Anonymous No.6260540]

>>6253303
I wrote a novel inside a video game. I'm not about to go Phil Fish and pretend it's an amazing book that you plebian muckrackers just don't understand, but I do at the very least understand pretty well just how particular that setting is to write in. First and foremost you have to come up with the rules beforehand on how this shit is going to work, or else you get what happened in Ready Player One, where it's like "Well he can do this because I don't know plot needs it" and then justifying it with "it's open source lol". No, you design the goddamn game as though you were actually making it or you're going to end up with plot holes and inconsistencies coming out your virtual ass.

The other thing (and this is really easy to fall prey to I've found) is forgetting to make it obvious to your reader that the setting is indeed a video game, and not just ye old fantasy land or space-y sci-fi universe. RPO wasn't so guilty of this, but .hack for example was atrocious at times with it.

[Anonymous No.6260552]

>>6253341
you forgot this

[Anonymous No.6260559]

>>6253356
Civ

[Anonymous No.6260562]

>>6253303
I read Slum Online. It wasn't very good but it was cool how literally everyone was a loser so that made it more decent

[Anonymous No.6260576]

http://www.dejobaan.com/elegy/

I reeeeally want to get this. I love Shelley.

[Anonymous No.6261044]

Will there ever be a good novel written about video game culture:

[ ] Yes

[ ] No

[Anonymous No.6261152]

>>6261044
How do video games have a culture

It's just a bunch of kids buying things and shitting their diapers when something goes wrong

[Anonymous No.6263147]

Literally reddit the X is such a non statement

[Anonymous No.6263153]

>>6261044
>video game "culture"

Cyberpunk already exists as a genre. The culture today is just commoditization, but without any of the noir glitz and stylistic glamor. It's really just kids getting angry at digital interlocutors while eating junk food. You can't really write novels about that.

[Anonymous No.6263585]

I liked it, it was fun and a light read. Helps that I read it on vacation, probably. The "geeky" references were not very invasive. The ones I got was a nice touch, the ones I didn't get did not bother me.

[Anonymous No.6264789]

Its the retarded cousin of snow crash.

[Anonymous No.6264880]

>>6253356
Silent Hill 2
L.A. Noire

[Anonymous No.6265220]

>>6263585
Not invasive? For real?

The entire book is built on geeky references

[Anonymous No.6265428]

>>6253215
every video game book is cringey as fuck

[Anonymous No.6266375]

>>6253536
Honestly, that looks dank as fuck. would read

[Anonymous No.6267064]

>>6263147
Literally reddit the post.