“I stayed up until 2:30 last night reading this book.
Staying up until 2:30 isnât that unusual for me, but there was (almost) no booze involved, no poorly filmed amateur video of the unspeakable involved, and really no other reason to be up.
In short: Loved it.
Okay, the first fifty pages or so left me unsure. Thereâs a fine line between referencing geek culture in an effort to trick geeks into reading your book and paying genuine tribute to all things geek. And geeks are sensitive to this. Thereâs nothing a geek hates more than having their stuff co-opted by people who donât know what theyâre doing. Seeing the wrong kind of person in a Mario t-shirt boils my blood so hard. If only I could harness my rage enough to rip a giant radish out of the ground and take those bastards outâ¦
But before long, I was convinced. Sold. It was total loving tribute, and it was handled in such a way that I couldnât stop reading.
If youâre a geek, especially a gaming or 80âs culture geek, this is a MUST-read. If youâre not, read the damn thing anyway. Itâs very accessible, and below Iâve made a list of some of the stuff mentioned in the book, so bomb on over if youâre having trouble picking up on whatâs going on.
Get Adventure aka Colossal Cave Adventure:
http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/18/you-must-remember-this-colossal-cave-adventure/
Play Zork online:
http://pot.home.xs4all.nl/infocom/zork1.html
Play Joust online:
http://www.thepcmanwebsite.com/media/joust/joust.shtml
Not the original, but hereâs a pretty awesome take on Pac-Man:
http://worldsbiggestpacman.com
D&D Tomb of Horrors Module:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/oa/20051031a
John Draper:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Draper
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