Author:Ernest Cline Published: 2011
A perfect feat of nostalgic charm, fangirl satisfaction and completely engrossing storyline.
This book has stolen my heart. It’s so wonderfully written, and so absolutely, insanely clever. It’s been a really long time since I read a book that struck so many chords in me, brought out so many emotions, and brought out a large amount of huge, no-holds-barred, fangirl grins.
In the year 2044, reality is an ugly place. The only time teenage Wade Watts really feels alive is when he’s jacked into the virtual utopia known as the OASIS. Wade’s devoted his life to studying the puzzles hidden within this world’s digital confines, puzzles that are based on their creator’s obsession with the pop culture of decades past and that promise massive power and fortune to whoever can unlock them. When Wade stumbles upon the first clue, he finds himself beset by players willing to kill to take this ultimate prize. The race is on, and if Wade’s going to survive, he’ll have to win—and confront the real world he’s always been so desperate to escape.
The book follows our not-so-heroic hero, Wade. After billionaire game-creator James Halliday dies, leaving his fortune up for grabs in a virtual scavenger hunt, the world goes crazy. But when no one has found anything after five years, the competition, while not forgotten, has lost it’s momentum. That is, until Wade, or rather his avatar Parzival, finds something. And that’s where the book takes off.
I was born in the 80’s and a lot of the references are things that I grew up watching, reading or loving. To have all of these things that I’ve loved in some capacity or another, as a child and an adult, feature so seamlessly in a story that was so contemporary was utterly joyous. But even so, all these great tugs at my heart strings aside, the story was completely engrossing. It started off a little slow, but once it got going, it swallowed me up and I was hooked, dying to know how our heroes would defeat the guys that you can tell were just written to be hated.
Without digging too deeply, and getting all philosophical, this book is just good old fashioned fun to read. I related to more than one of the characters and I cared enough about them to be concerned by what was happening to them – I was dragged into their world and for me that makes a good book.
In a classic battle of Good vs. Evil, and a Star Wars like charm of a rag-tag band of misfits joining in their pursuit to save the world, this book really has everything a fangirl could want and more. recommended to anyone who loves a great science fiction story with a little bit of a love story, loads of texture and a brilliant and gripping ending sequence!
Hoth: There isn’t an awful lot of things to do on Hoth in regard to exploration, but you can of course, you can zip around on a TaunTaun. My favourite part was fighting the Wampas, needless to say I died a few times, those guys are tough! This location has it’s peak as you make your escape and take down the AT-ATs!
Endor: Just as you would expect, Endor is kind of beautiful. It has is such a lovely lush feel after the cold barrenness of Hoth. And of course, there are Ewoks. They aren’t very detailed, more like little children’s Lego figures, but still cute none-the-less. There are some more cool places to explore here, such as the treetops and the Scout Trooper camp. Not to mention, riding a speeder at top speed!
Pokémon will forever live in my heart. It was the first game I ever completed to the end, and one of the very first games I received and played on my original Gameboy. (which I still have in working condition with my Elite Four beating team still saved). I always buy the new games on release day and I am still on my quest to Catch ‘Em All. Pokemon started my love of adventure RPG games, and ignited in me my desire to ‘catch ’em all’ – the fire in me that seeks to explore every dungeon, and find every item. Pokemon for me instilled a love of adventure, of team work and strategy, but also of completion as I still work to fill my ever expanding pokédex.
As an older gamer, my love of RPGs evolved when I first picked up a n Elder Scrolls game, Morrowind was probably my first, but Skyrim stole my heart. Probably the game that I have dedicated the most play time to (if you don’t combine my Pokemon totals), with over 1200 hours. This game is stunning. It is absorbing. It has the perfect balance of guided quests and free roaming. The open world is seamless and there are so many nooks and crannies and caves to explore that the completionist in me totally lapped this game up. It is simply a joy to play and a perfect escape from reality. But honestly, no description is going to do this game justice.
The characters, as well as their immersion into a Disney-based universe simply took my breath away. I will never forget beating Xaldin on my first attempt, and how excited I was about it. Not to mention the epic Sephiroth battle in KH:II. Kingdom Hearts took my heart so violently I have the game’s icon permanently inked on my skin. I suppose Kingdom Hearts and final fantasy kind of fall into the same category of fantasy RPG, but Kingdom Hearts stands alone for two reasons, it’s connection with Disney is magical, seriously, the mash-up is stunning and the uniqueness of the worlds it presents is amazing, plus it tends to drag you back into your childhood and all the fils you watched growing up, but the concept is also unique, the keyblade is a symbol of hope, and these games are all intertwined ever-so-cleverly.
Who doesn’t love hurling shells at their friends to blow them up while speeding down a track with a cool theme, avoiding obstacles? Mario Kart can make and break friendships, and I became best friends with my other half while bonding over Mario Kart 7 on DS. I was never very good at racing games, the controls were always so touchy, and I crashed, A LOT. But Mario Kart never seemed to present those problems to me, not anymore than they did anyone else anyway. Mario Kart, I think, taught me about myself in regards to competition, I was never an overly competitive person until I first played Mario Kart on N64. Since then, it has become one of my all-time favourites, and I pull it out whenever I get the chance. In fact, I bought a wii U just to play Mario Kart. (And Zelda of course…)
Zelda is one of those games that just absorbs you completely, taking you into a new world entirely. I remember not only playing these games, but reliving them in my mind while I was at school or at work, thinking about them all the time. Once I start playing a Zelda game – it owns me. And this isn’t a bad thing. Zelda games are beautiful, they are engaging and they are FUN. But once again, fantasy, adventure RPG, the difference with Zelda is the many puzzle-soling aspects throughout the game, they are challenging and kept me super engaged with the game, the story and the characters. Zelda games are smart, they are cunning and they kept me so as well.
The Final Fantasy games must be some of my favourite games to play just for the sheer beauty of the landscapes and environments. Don’t get me wrong, the story lines and characters are equally beautiful and engaging, and most of the FF games are super fun to play. And if none of the above wins your heart, the soundtrack certainly will. It’s the strategy in this series that places this in the category as games that shaped my knowledge of the greater gaming world – until I played a final fantasy, I didn’t really think about strategy, not even when I played Pokémon, which I do now. Final Fantasy taught me that having a good strategy can be the difference between winning and losing.
One of the first platformers I actually finished, I owe my love of classic and new platformers to this game. Of course I’ve played Mario’s and Sonic’s, but Yoshi was the character I fell in love with, and I share his love of melons too (the fruit, let’s keep it clean). I spent hours of my younger years slaving away, completing chapter after chapter, saving all the Yoshi’s and collecting all the fruit. The OCD in me loved the tidiness of the side scrolling platformer, enjoying the compact selection of world on the screen, just enough to focus on the task at hand. Yoshi also became one of my favourite characters, and is always my go to selection in Mario Kart.
Obviously a winner in my book because it has one of the most kick ass lead ladies in the business. But the thing about Tomb Raider games that sets it apart from any other action-adventure RPG I have played, is the game-play, the timed-jumps, flips, wall-climbs and ledge-crawls that create an amazing sense of tension. Obviously there are other games of this calibre that I could have chosen, such as Assassin’s Creed or Uncharted, but Lara won me over in these games, growing up I didn’t have an awful lot of strong female lead characters in games I was playing, and Lara was, let’s face it, the most kick-ass chick on the gaming market. Lara taught me that you don’t have to be a dude to be a hero, or a survivor, or to kick-ass, and the too young to understand feminist in me strongly appreciated the representation.
Games that challenge me are by far my favourites, and this RPG problem-solver was one of the best. The puzzles in this game could sometimes keep me occupied for days, scratching my head and frustrating myself to no end, but I loved it. This game, as a gamer, taught me patience, something up until this point I didn’t have much of, usually having purchased the user guide to try and finish the games to completion. But with Portal I didn’t want the guidebook, I didn’t want to google it, I didn’t want to cheat, I wanted to find the answers myself and feel the victory when I made it through each test, while GLaDOS (or Wheatley) taunted me. And it was oh-so-satisfying.
Crystal Caves is old. Like I had to install it with a floppy disk and load it in DOS old. But as old as it is, it is an amazing side-scrolling platformer and one of my all-time favourite games. Plus the ancient sound effects were uber-cool. This game taught me determination: I had no internet, I had no cheat books, It was just me and the game, and my little blaster gun. And it was hard. The graphics were simple, as was the story, but the puzzles were challenging and the gameplay was choppy at best, and even though it took me over a decade to finish this game (I finally downloaded and finished it in 2013), it was a huge part of the games of the 90s that pushed me to fall in love with gaming as a whole when I was just starting out in games. Our childhood memories and the games we still, after all this time, hold the most dear as some of our earliest gaming memories are the ones that make us GAMERS, instead of just people who play games.
