Ready Player One - Cheap Thoughts

Hm, first time reviewing a book, this oughta go well. Actually yes there is a reason behind why i don't review that many books (or any), it's because i don't really read that often. I read between 2-5 books a year on average, i would like to read more but i'm a slow reader and i'm already behind on the mediums i engorge myself in. With that being said, this is a book that is being adapted into a film by Steven Spielberg no-less and has been called Willy Wonka meets the Matrix, oh and is full of pop-culture references of the 1980s. Sign me up! So the plot of Ready Player One takes place in a dystopian future (How original) where society has all but collapsed and most people prefer to live in an MMO calles The Oasis, a system where people can live out their every day lives, go to school, get a job, meet people, play other games inside the game and also travel across planets, go into the realities of your favourite games and movies and use magic and sci-fi weapons to your hearts content...ahh videogames. But once the creator of The Oasis James Halliday dies, he leaves his entire inheritance hidden inside the game in a series of easter eggs and challenges, whoever finds them all and completes them will inherit his fortune. Several years go by and no one finds anything, that is unti. our protagonist Wade AKA Parzival an average (If incredibly dorky) teenager becomes the first person to find an Easter Egg.

So if you read my post on Shovel Knight we live in an age of 1980's & 90's nostalgia boom which often leads to the market being flooded and not to mention the simple exploitation of simply acknowledging products that you watched. A more basic way to sum up my problem with this system "Hey guys! Remember growing up in the 80's? Remember Family Ties? Remember Atari? Remember Contra!? Of course you do! Give us money for reminding you that you like these things!". Admittedly this story does it a little better than most, the game was created by a man who grew up in the 80s so it makes sense for him to stuff it with references to things he grew up with, i know that's what i'd do. Also the fact that the end goal requires you to have an extensive knowledge of 80s and 90's pop culture so it's more acceptable, but that doesn't excuse the occasions where it's a reference for the sake of having a reference, like acknowledging that Cowboy Bebop existed...because it existed and people like it, maybe it'll make people like me better if i allude to it.

Actually excluding the exploitation of nostalgia, this book does still feel like it has kind of a generic plot, well not necessarily a generic plot, but a generic structure to it. You know how it's going to end, you know the arcs all the characters are going to go through, what struggles are going to be made and all of that good stuff. So if i didn't enjoy the overall narrative and the individual iconographic elements that makes a story unique didn't impress me, why did i like the story so much? Honestly i think it's because even though Parzival's arc is predictable, where he starts off is actually an interesting place, yes the poverty stricken young adult with no chance of escape is a formulaic one but good god is this guy a nerd. And I mean that in the most positive sense because i too am a nerd. This guy spends all of his time referencing movies and playing videogames with his friend Aech while hating the idea of going outside, it that doesn't define half this generation in a nutshell. I don't really know too many grand epic stories of this calibre of popularity that actually have the main character being a dork. And i don't mean in the sense the same way the 90's portrayed dorks, but i mean one who is positively portrayed and highly likeable and respected for being a dork, that feels a lot more like a millennials portrayal of a dork, not an 80's thing which does contrast with the tone of the rest of the story but who cares, it works, i like Parzival and he made for a fun protagonist, even if his actions are predictable from time to time.

As for the supporting characters, they were all enjoyable. Aech, Parzival's best friend and the banter and dialogue between the two is enjoyable and entertaining but it's not until a certain...thing about Aech is revealed that i started to feel like the two were best friends and had an unbreakable friendship. I say thing because I wouldn't dare spoil it for you. Then there was Art3mis, my favourite character in the book, not only is she the toughest player out of the lot but she is laser eye focused on the goal and tries so hard to not let anything else get in the way. But actually my favourite portion of the book was when it focused on the romance between Parzival and Art3mis, yes, in a story about videogames, action and 80s sitcoms, it's the romance that i actually found the most interesting. Not only because it was very well paced and had lots of detail to make it feel like a legitimate relationship but also the set-pieces behind it, it felt as if Ernest Cline the author of the book felt like this was the most important part of the book because every time the two were together it felt like the entire world had stopped just to focus on them. Combine that with the characters' personal views on the relationship and you have an interesting dynamic going on here, the two are in love but Art3mis refuses to go down that rabbit hole because A: It'll distract them from the mission and that's not a risk they can afford and B: Without seeing each other in reality and the fact that their avatars could be incredibly misleading means it's hard to say how much of this relationship is based on feeling and how much is based on the shallow importance of looks, regardless of whether it's a conscious or sub-conscious decision.

Then there are the two brothers Daito and Shoto, who for the most part are likeable characters but didn't feel like they were that major to the story. The best way to describe the two are if Parzival, Aech and Atr3mis are Harry, Ron & Hermione then Daito and Shoto are the Dean and Seamus of the story. Though there is a big scene involving the two roughly halfway through the book and the best way to describe it without spoiling anything is to say...shit got real. The final character worth talking about is Sorrento, the leader of IOI, a corporation that dedicates most of their time, resources and efforts towards trying to solve the easter egg hunt, Sorrento being the leader of the hunt. How to i put this gently? He sucked. Firstly the fact that it takes forever before he even is introduced into the story, even after he is, he has one scene. Yes they constantly mention him and he does show up in the climax of the story, but he has no dialogue outside of his introduction scene and is given such little focus i question what the hell was the point of having him there, just have the faceless organisation.

Apart from that I...can't really think of anything else to talk about. See this is why i don't review books that often! I can't talk about visuals or acting or anything like that, i'm not used to reviewing books nor the specifics of the medium that make it unique so i can only talk about plot and characters, and that makes for a very limited review. But regardless, in terms of story the book is fine, personally the 80's nostalgia motif is redundant and irritating but this book handles it better than most while the plot itself is simplistic and predictable but enjoyable with some emotional moments. The characters are where the book really shines, especially the main trio each having something special that makes them interesting, memorable and stand out from other characters of this genre, or atleast books targeted at this kind of demographic. I'm giving Ready Player One a 7/10.

-Danny