Ready Player One

I really think there's going to start to be a backlash against this book, especially if the movie doesn't get good reviews. It's every bit as wish fulfillment-driven as Twilight, but with less originality and far worse prose.

"Going" to be? There absolutely already is.

Case in point: I am reading Armada solely because I'm keeping up with a podcast mocking it.

... trying to, at least. It's incredibly dull.

Yep. It doesn't help I've seen people on these very forums going 'Ready Player One is amazing! Huh, that YMMV page is a bit negative. I'm going to go trim some examples from it'. I'm paraphrasing, but yes.

Ready Player One is... really not good. "And they were called sux0rs because they suck". The insistence of derivative descriptions rather than actually describing. The random tangent on "I wish I could tell my nice neighbor about how worthless and stupid her religion is and I'll go off on how it is such to the audience, but I'm too nice to break her heart". Art3mis and all of the problems there. Daito and Shoto (I think that was the other one's name?) performing tired Asian stereotypes. Not to mention how really really simple the puzzles are. "A Tomb of Horrors. Taken from face value, it would suggest a tome in which horrors reside". Oh, and the narrative constantly executing its own tension by following up most stakes with "Oh, I totally had planned hours ago on how to get out of this. There was never anything to worry about".

Its not an unworkable story. There's potential if you really sat down with a big red pen (or several) and edited it down. In fact, I'm really happy with reports I've heard that the movie adaptation is going to be a lot more pragmatic about the book's issues and... thankfully avoiding the cyber sex machines. That part is BOUND to be cut.

I cannot wait for the movie to be out and the hype around it to die down, just so the internet stops complaining about the goddamn book and I can enjoy my trashy cotton candy in peace.

RPO is perfectly servicable wish fulfillment cyberpunk.

It is wishfulfillment. That doesn't mean it doesn't have problems. But, I mean, that could be said about a lot of things. I'm not trying to diss people who like it. I mean, I don't like twilight but if your fantasy is a vampire prince coming to rescue you or something, like what you like. I just can't stand the people who insist that there aren't problems with it.

edited 15th Feb '18 8:49:42 PM by InkDagger

I don't think anyone's actually claimed that RPO is a flawless masterpiece, but since the movie trailer came out, a lot of people have come out of the woodwork to rant about how terrible it is in every respect. It's impossible for the topic to come up at this point without someone going "lol RPO is trash and the only people who like it are idiots who think references are a valid substitute for good writing".

It's incredibly tiring. No, the book isn't exactly a literary classic. Yes, I liked it anyway. What of it?

I feel like most of the backlash is hipsterish "niche work goes mainstream, therefore becomes badwrong". Which isn't to say that the criticisms people have are being invented wholesale, but more that the backlash is why they're being shrieked at maximum volume from all corners of the internet instead of people shrugging and saying "I thought it was dumb, but whatever".

There might well be problems with it. I even noticed some of them in passing. But as Rule of Cool evoking, geeky wish-fullfilment and escapist fantasy goes, it does its job very well. I would even say the MST3K Mantra applies pretty strongly.

But hey, if criticizing stuff gets your rocks off, have at it.

I think its also that the movie announcement boosts something into mainstream conciousness meaning more people are reading it and, with that, you'll find less people where the niche nature of the work will allow them to write off the flaws. The niche appeal only goes so far with some people. I also equally know of some female friends of mine who'd heard the book was about video games, read it, kind of got uncomfortable with the more... typically video game male audience elements, and then were vapidly attacked by fans of the book who insisted that they were being too "feminazi" about it.

It kind of goes both ways. Though I'd argue that it goes a lot further on one side than the other.

There's nothing wrong with liking your cotton candy. But it's surprising to me that so many CRITICS gave this book glowing reviews, and that a legendary film director signed on to direct an adaptation of it. The critical reception was vastly out of proportion to the quality, and like the Rifftrax guys point out, it makes little sense that they hated Armada for the same reasons they loved RPO.

It was a novelty at the time.

By the time Armada came out, the trick had been found out and the Clineian dialog was viewed for the garbage it was.

That makes sense. Still annoys the shit out of me, though. You can see it in this very thread — there were a grand total of 14 posts in this thread since 2011 (when the book came out), all positive. We've more than doubled that in two months (since the movie trailer came out), and the new comments are mostly negative.

It also does factor in that a dozen stupid books are published every day. A stupid book is a stupid book. Dime a dozen. Movies have a lot more money and people involved suggesting a higher level of quality behind them that should be matched to whatever story they're adapating. Hence why movies also tend to bring people out of the woodwork.

Basically, almost ANYTHING can get published these days. It takes FOREVER and a lot of work for anything to become a movie.

edited 17th Feb '18 4:35:32 PM by InkDagger

I think the Hatedom is a bit annoying, personally.

The books are harmless.

Yes, they involve such silly dialogue as "The Delorean time machine was from the classic 80s movie Back To the Future" but really, why are you reading it if you don't like this sort of stuff?

Interesting article on the shift in attitude regarding RPO. tldr, Gamergate completely changed the nerd culture landscape, and the initial reaction to RPO is pre-Gamergate while the current reaction is post-Gamergate.

I find myself largely agreeing with the conclusion that that's the reasoning behind the shift, even if I still don't agree with the post-Gamergate conclusion that RPO is badwrong. I'm not going to argue that RPO is a wonderful example of progressiveness in representation and attitude, but I don't think it's bad on that score (the main characters are a white guy, a white girl, a black lesbian, and two Japanese guys). The article points out that the 80s cultural references don't hit anything oriented towards girls (think Jem And The Holograms or Lisa Frank, both of which are quintessentially 80s and also very, very girly) — which is a fair point! — but I'm willing to forgive it because it's specifically supposed to be about Halliday's particular obsessions rather than 80s culture in general. It'd still be better if it was more inclusive, and the Doylist reason is clearly Author Appeal for Ernest Cline, but it's still better than saying "it's about all 80s pop culture, no matter what!" and then conspicuously ignoring half of 80s culture.

Other points are similar. They complain that Artemis is a flat character (all the characters are flat) and that she's Wade's "reward" for "winning" even though she rejects him earlier in the book (she doesn't; she basically says "not now" rather than "no", sticks to that despite his rather pathetic and douchey attempts to circumvent it — presented as such in the narrative itself — and then more or less picks up where the left off once the hunt for the egg is over, which is exactly what she'd been saying the whole time) and dismisses the "pay some more attention to the real world, maybe" aspect of the ending as lip service (despite having basically every character, including Alpha Nerds Who Are Super Great like Haliday and Oz, hammer on that point with the subtlety of a falling anvil).

Ultimately, my take on it is that while RPO isn't bad on the cultural front, it's not good either. The main difference is that pre-Gamergate "not terrible" was good enough and post-Gamergate it's not. Maybe there's some truth to that (if the status quo is bad, then being merely status quo is part of the problem), but RPO wasn't written with post-Gamergate attitudes in mind because it predates Gamergate. It seems odd to be invoking Fair for Its Day for something less than a decade hold, but there you have it. (The article also points out that Armada, which has many of the same problems as RPO but came out in post-Gamergate 2015, was treated much less fondly even on its release. i'd also argue that Armada is just not as good, even in the fluffy it's-just-dumb-fun way, but that's neither here nor there.)

edited 27th Mar '18 6:50:42 AM by NativeJovian

I think the issue is people are basically trying to turn the book into something more than it is. It's a bunch of Continuity Porn for nerds. I liken it to those ridiculous Scream parodies which included scenes from the movies popular at the time (I don't even remember...yes, SCARY MOVIE) except they're for the 80s and aimed at the mid-30s to 40 year old white male nerd demographic.

I disagree on the Artemis breakup being permanent, though. It was a full breakup, IMHO, because she didn't want to focus on anything but the egg and she basically dismisses the idea they have a deeper connection.

Yeah, they get back together but that's after Wade goes through Character Development and becomes Jason Bourne to protect them from the evil megacorp.

It's made pretty clear that the reason Artemis breaks things off isn't "I'm not interested in a relationship with you", it's "the egg comes first and the relationship is interfering with that". I don't recall if she ever explicitly says "we can resume the relationship after the egg is found", but it's a clear implication in any case.

That's exactly why she breaks it off.

However, it's made very clear that it's the End-End of their relationship and she has no intention of ever taking up with Wade again. The Egg is everything and after the Egg, she plans to devote herself to saving the world.

Which, at that point, Wade has no interest in.

If you don't agree, I should point out Wade's complete emotional breakdown over the breakup is a big part of he movie and goes in some sleazy directions.

edited 27th Mar '18 8:07:27 AM by CharlesPhipps

I've been thinking about Ready Player One lately. It's a good book, but there's one issue I have with it. And that is. . . I think Aech should have been the main character. Think about it. When we (and Wade) first see her, we assume she is actually a white man because that's what her avatar looks like. The reveal that she's a black woman suggests that she feels the need to hide who she is, even in the Oasis. And the sad thing is, that happens a lot in real life. The story should have been about her. We should have been following her as she defied not just the odds of winning the challenge, but people's expectations of her. The story would have been even more interesting that way. It could have been a commentary on the exclusionary nature of "nerd culture".

I felt the same except with Artemis.

Basically, Wade is the least interesting character in the book.

Protagonists frequently are. At least in works with strong supporting casts.

edited 31st Mar '18 7:42:56 PM by Robbery

The thing with Wade is that he's the only one who came up from absolutely nothing. Aech supports themselves with e-sports jobs enough to live comfortably. Artemis lives with her solidly middle class family. The Daisho brothers we don't know much about their home lives, but they do seem to have their own (separate) apartments to themselves. Meanwhile, Parzival lives in a trailer park ghetto, has to scrounge and repair busted hardware just to connect to Oasis in the first place (and has to hide it from his caretakers, or they'll steal it), and at the beginning of the book he doesn't even have enough cash to pay the off-planet travel fees.

This is a big (if unspoken) part of Parzival's attitude about what he'd do once he found the egg. Artemis would use it to help save the world, while he would use it to make his own life secure and comfortable. Caring about others is a privilege of people who aren't constantly worrying about where their next meal is going to come from.

Mind you, Aech is a former homeless teen. So she's already a story of escaping nothing.

But less, the fact he's literally a trailer park kid is part of the fantasy.

"Interesting article on the shift in attitude regarding RPO. tldr, Gamergate completely changed the nerd culture landscape, and the initial reaction to RPO is pre-Gamergate while the current reaction is post-Gamergate."

I think this hits it right on the nail, esp. when combined with the fact that the cultural references really didn't age well. It's a paen to an era (the '80's) that itself is now considered by many to reflect a flawed culture—the last era in which casual sexism and/or racism could be mass-produced without any pushback. It was the era of "The Bonfire of the Vanities", the last decade of unrepentant excess. After gamer-gate, that was never going to go well.

Something similar happened with "Ender's Game".

For what it's worth, I enjoyed both the book and the movie, but that may reflect how old I am: the references I remember help make up for the flaws. That won't work for most younger people, esp. women and people of color. These days, being oblivious to the larger cultural implications of a work isn't good enough any more.

Sequel incoming.

As someone who unironically loves RPO, I'm excited.