Ready Player One Is an Awesome Science Fiction Book for Nerds

In the third episode of Transition, we talk about the 2011 science fiction novel - Ready Player One. Host Pranay Parab is joined by Kawaljit Singh Bedi and Aqiul Colombowala to talk about the book and its audiobook edition.

A word of warning for all those listening - this episode has a whole bunch of spoilers about the book - so if that bothers you, listen to it after you’ve read the book. We start by discussing the book’s core premise and how believable (or not) the world is. Some of the descriptions at the start of the book can get tedious for a few and we air our thoughts on that.

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Then we get into the meat of the book and start talking about the characters and how they set out to capture the three keys. The core of Ready Player One revolves around 80s trivia featuring games such as Black Tiger, Zork, Joust, and Pac-Man, and movies such as WarGames. We wonder whether nerds growing up in the 80s would’ve come across all of these elements and how much of the trivia in the book was common knowledge back then.

A deep dissection of all the characters and their sometimes irrational actions follows, with praise for characters such as Art3mis and Aech in no short supply. We also talk about weak characters and a bunch of plot holes. It’s safe to say that you’ll need to be prepared for some suspension of disbelief while reading Ready Player One. All of that and more on this episode of Transition.

You can subscribe to Transition via RSS or just listen to this episode by hitting the play button below.  The music for this episode comes via Magnus Souleye Pålsson's album PPPPPP, which is the soundtrack for the game, VVVVVV.