I am listening to the podcast 372 Pages We’ll Never Get Back. In episode 1-8 they discuss Ready Player One.

372 Pages We’ll Never Get Back

Real or fanfic

The spreadsheet ! If you’ve seen it before: Now it has more formulas!

These next numbers can’t quite be trusted, as I haven’t got all the numbers. But the calculations are in place.

Summary of important advice

Consistency, continuity.

• An apocalyptic society with astounding delivery service.
• Genius takes forever to solve easy puzzle. Genius is stupid.
• Claiming to have done a task, that would take an impossibly long time.
• Anachronisms.
• The reason for Daito’s name.
• Suddenly changing style and using big words.
• Basing a book on quotes and references and then berating a guy for stealing a design.
• Going outside is overrated / reality is real.
• Halliday is a hero but also a monster?

Be exciting. Have stakes.

• Don’t interrupt the action with a flashforward.
• Don’t interrupt the big climax to tell us what happened seconds before.
• Don’t let the climax be an easy puzzle.
• Infinite ammo.
• No, action in a computer isn’t action.

Flow. Chekhov’s gun.

• Suddenly having a long talk about atheism.
• Masturbation screed.
• Deus ex machina.

Originality.

• Using clichés.
• Being boring.
• Drop Cops.
• Inventing new, bad ways to describe things.

Realism. Being human.

• The Sorentos walk: Walking for minutes without responding to a statement.
• 100s have died, nobody’s looking for survivors, jokes are told.
• Stereotypical Japanese.
• A ticking clock, nobody’s paying attention to it.
• There’s life, death and a fortune, and then a prize is chosen based on feelings.
• All big companies are evil?
• Art3mis changes her mind in seconds.
• Hinting at growth, that didn’t actually occur.

Variety.

• Repeating information too much.
• Repetition of phrases.
  • Cheshire smile.
  • Classic.

Details: not too many, not too few.

• Being weirdly specific, for no purpose, and not making sense. (Toothpaste.)
• Doing “it was like (vague example)”.
• Retelling Blade Runner.

Use words and phrases correctly.

• Using a “new” word that exists already with a very different definition.
• Seem to.
• I can only describe this as…
• Cheshire smile.
• Classic.
• Common technical language.
• A silent cheer.
• Geek film.

Ep. 1, intro + ch. 1-3

Advice

• ❎ Describing A by saying it’s like B. A variety of 80s dance moves.
• ❎ Cliche
• ❎ Repetitiveness
• ❎ Using a word already having a meaning. Gunter.
• ❎ Inconsistency. This post apocalyptic society functions really well.

Oops.

• Missing that Aech is pronounced “h”. Cleared up in ep. 2.
• Mispronouncing JK Rowling.

Ep. 2, ch. 4-8

Advice.

• ❎ Inconsistency. Taking forever to solve an easy puzzle.
• ❎ Inconsistency. Claiming to have done The List, but not having enough time to do so. (Quote below.)
• ❎ Bad extrapolation, progress going backwards.
• ❎ Including too many details.
• ❎ Boring.
• ❎ Clumsy.
• ❎ Using “seem to” when it obviously is.
• ❎ Repetitiveness. Cheshire smile. Every time.

Important quote:

“I watched every episode of The Greatest American Hero, Airwolf, the A-Team, Knight Rider, Misfits of Science, and The Muppet Show. What about The Simpsons, you ask? I knew more about Springfield than I knew about my own city. Star Trek? Oh, I did my homework. TOS, TNG, DS9. Even Voyager and Enterprise. I watched them all in chronological order. The movies, too. Phasers locked on target…I learned the name of every last goddamn Gobot and Transformer. Land of the Lost. Thundarr the Barbarian, He-Man, Schoolhouse Rock! G.I. Joe – I knew them all. Because knowing is half the battle!”

Ep. 3, ch. 9-13

Advice.

• ❎ Anachronisms.
• ❎ Interrupting the exciting bits with a flashforward.
• ❎ The climax is easily solving a puzzle.
• ❎ Is that how we define classic?
• ❎ Weirdly specific, doesn’t make sense. (Toothpaste.)
• ❎ The author stepping in: I can only describe this as…

Running gags.

• Goods and services. (The actual quote is goods and people.)
• Rig. Inflatable cow suit. A hell of a rig.
• Classic. (As in: Cline likes it.)

Source

Oops.

• Ogden/Odgen

Real or fanfic, 5:15

• Mike guessing
• Real. ❎ Fanfic. ❎
• Conor guessing.
• Real. ✔️ Fanfic. ✔️ Real. ❎

Ep. 4, Ch. 14-18

Advice

• ❎ The Sorentos walk. Walking for minutes without responding to a statement.
• 🤔 Doing the big villain scene and not comparing it to a movie, for once.
• ❎ Getting common technical language wrong.
• ❎ Unrealistic. Practically no reaction to 100s of deaths, no attempt to look for survivors. And jokes?
• ❎ Connection. Talking atheism suddenly.
• ❎ Culture. Japanese pictured as stereotypes. Lazy.
• ❎ There’s a ticking clock, but nobody pays attention to it.
• ❎ Explaining some stuff too much, other stuff too little.

Running gags

• Pulling a Pendergast.
• Avoiding lag. (Which wasn’t an issue before.)
• Wade’s father hit a liquor store. (Not actually liquor.)

Oops.

• Acsii text?
• Thinking Oasis is only for the few and only for play?

Real or fanfic, 7:48

• Mike guessing
• Fanfic ✔️ Fanfic ❎ Fanfic ✔️

Ep. 5, ch. 19-24

Advice

• ❎ Masturbation screed. No. Graphic. Unnecessary.
• 🤔 Hard to tell ignorance from jokes.
• ❎ Deus ex machina. No.

Running gags

• The stink tower. A smell interface.
• A pain interface.
• A suit with discreet openings.
• Wade is dumb.
• Stolen honor. Comparing oneself to a genius. Favorably.

Oops.

• Not knowing the phrase fade in.
• The episode is not 6 hours long.

Real or fanfic, 30:30

• Mike guessing
• Fanfic ✔️ Real ✔️ Real ❎
• Conor guessing
• Real ✔️ Fanfic ✔️ Real ❎

Ep. 6, ch. 25-30

Advice

• ❎ No: Mourning and grinning at the same time.
• ✔️ Continuity. (The reason for Daito’s name.)
• ❎ Retelling Blade Runner to readers who know it.
• ✔️ Stakes. As opposed to giving the hero infinite ammo.
• ❎ Life and death and a fortune. And then choosing a prize based on feelings.
• ❎ Calling a group the Drop Cops. Easy. Quick to write. Not good.
• ❎ Suddenly using big words.

Running gags

• Clinean: Giving the same information several times quickly.
• Clinean: Mentioning a problem, but it’s not important.
• Dystopian society works really well.
• A prosthetic testicle.
• Classic.
• Pulling a Pendergast.

Oops.

• Saying next assignment is through ch. 26.

Real or fanfic, 7:13

• Mike guessing.
• Fanfic ✔️ Fanfic ❎
• Conor guessing
• Real ❎ Fanfic ❎ Fanfic ✔️

Ep. 7, ch. 31-33

Advice

• ❎ Claiming to have spent more time than is available.
• ❎ Can’t tell intentional or unintentional jokes apart.
• ❎ Big companies are just evil?
• ❎ Saving the cat at the end of the book?
• ❎ Artemis changes feeling/opinion in seconds.

Running gags

• Dystopian society functioning well.
• No stakes.
• No lag.
• Cheshire grin.

Oops.

• n/a

Real or fanfic, 5:26

• Mike guessing.
• Real ❎ Fanfic ❎
• Conor guessing
• Fanfic ✔️ Real ❎ Real ✔️

Ep. 8, ch. 34-end

Advice

• ❎ Being oddly specific. (About the robot.) The details don’t matter, and aren’t consistent.
• ❎ Repetition of information and actual phrases.
• ❎ Being excited by action in a computer game.
• ❎ Commenting on lack of imagination.
• ❎ Describing action Wade didn’t see, clumsily.
• ❎ Describing something as being like a movie. Coming up with an original way to describe something, badly.
• ❎ A silent cheer?
• ❎ Interrupting the big climax to say what happened just before. He died, but first the head detached.
• ❎ The hero is a genius and stupid.
• ❎ Holy Grail is a geek film?
• ❎ Watts didn’t really learn anything during this story.
• ✔️ Continuity. The winner is now isolated?
• ❎ Reality is real, but going outside is overrated?
• 🤔 Halliday is a monster?
• ❎ Hinting at motivation and growth, but not showing it.

Running gags

• No lag.
• Art3mis might actually be Chuck.

Oops.

• Not recognising Wade could have discovered the right way to address the robot (shouting) beforehand.
• Not recognising Wade’s pregame ritual.
• Not recognising that an event Wade planned and probably heard about from witnesses later could be described in detail.

Real or fanfic, 4:50

• Conor guessing.
• “Fanfic ❎”

A recording of an alternate ending is mentioned?