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Armada

Ernest Cline

Start date: April 12, 2016

Finish date: April 30, 2016

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What Members Thought

Aug 28, 2015 Yzabel Ginsberg rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: arc-netgalley, action, war, science-fiction, aliens, good-ideas-but, arc-edelweiss, ai-and-robots, games

[I received a copy of this novel through NetGalley and Edelweiss, in exchange for an honest review.]

I loved Ready Player One by the same author, and I was rather worried about this one: reviews were extremely mixed, and I kept wondering whether I'd like it or not. In the end, while I didn't enjoy it as much as I did RPO, I still managed to like it. Which doesn't mean it's not without faults. Basically, for me, this was all a constant game of "good!" and "but...!".

Armada plays with a lot of trope [I received a copy of this novel through NetGalley and Edelweiss, in exchange for an honest review.]

I loved Ready Player One by the same author, and I was rather worried about this one: reviews were extremely mixed, and I kept wondering whether I'd like it or not. In the end, while I didn't enjoy it as much as I did RPO, I still managed to like it. Which doesn't mean it's not without faults. Basically, for me, this was all a constant game of "good!" and "but...!".

Armada plays with a lot of tropes, from beginning to end. The video games-addicted kid living in the memory of a father he never knew, and who suddenly finds himself an ace in a top-secret military organisation where his gamer skills are of the utmost importance. Games used as training (more about this later). The hot gamer/hacker chick. A handful of mavericks saving the world. Faceless aliens threatening humanity. The same aliens' strategy resembling so much that of a video game.

The downside is that, in a way, the novel also feels like some kind of wish-fulfilment, and this always tends to ring a bit silly. Unless this is another subverted trope? It's difficult to tell. Another issue may be the way the novel ties into specific works, namely Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card . Although I didn't read it, I know enough to see the links, and the same goes with movies mentioned along the way. It's acknowledged in Armada, but I can't make up my mind whether it's homage or "borrowing too much", so to speak. And then, there are all those "geek culture" references that are OK for a while, yet become burdensome in the end. They were more justified in RPO, because of the nature of the game itself and the hints the players had to decipher; here, they tether between "hey, funny", "I don't get it" and "you didn't need to explain that". (In other words, the balance is very thin between references readers may miss, references that are understandable and in the right places, and references that are likely to make one roll their eyes.)

The story itself could've been more original; on the other hand, it could also have been *less* original. All in all, it was interesting along the pattern it followed, if you like such patterns. Good call on some characters' part to wonder about the aliens' real goal. Also, the stakes are real. People do die in this book. The invasion leaves destruction in its wake, and the gamers have to quickly wake up and realise it's not a joke, it's not a game anymore. The way they're quickly thrown into this new reality, brought to this realisation, was a "good" thing, as it made the threat more real. But! At the same time, the twists were fairly predictable. Or was it on purpose, to fit into the mould of tropey alien invasion stories?

Speaking of the characters: likeable enough, but nothing to write home about. Zack was probably too serious for his age, and the others didn't left much of an impression. Nice and forgettable. I wish I could've gotten to know them better, see more of them, as it would have made more of an impact when X or Y got into trouble during a fight against the aliens, and so on. (And yet, again, I have to wonder: isn't this also part of the private jokes contained in the novel—a bit like red shirts? Tricky, I tell you!)

2.5-3 stars, in the end, to even out things between all these "buts". I didn't dislike it, *but* I didn't love it the way I had expected to. It had good ideas, *but* were they homage, playing on tropes, or just using existing works to build without too much effort? The characters were likeable, *but* very cardboard-like too. And so on. You get my drift... ...more

4 likes · Like · see review

Jul 03, 2015 Amy rated it liked it

Shelves: _own-home-library, fiction, _own-ebook, from-publisher, read-in-2015

Since Ready Player One was one of my favorite books in the year that it was released, I had truly high hopes for this one. I think Ernest Cline has a really unique voice and I was eager to fall into the world he creates again. And this is a good book ... but it's no Ready Player One and it suffers from the comparison. I think that many of the less than positive reviews I've seen seem to be focusing on how this book wasn't Ready Player One. I really tried to see this book on it's own but it's dif ...more

2 likes · Like · see review

Aug 03, 2015 Krissy rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobook, lawlz, pgs-300-399

Pretty good. I liked it. Plus the audiobook was narrated by Wil Wheaton which made it even more enjoyable. He is a terrific narrator.

2 likes · Like · see review

Jun 28, 2015 Rhonda rated it liked it

Meh. *shrug*

I do love that there is a "Gamer SciFi" genre now though. :) ...more

1 like · Like · see review

Mar 26, 2014 Heather - hturningpages rated it it was ok

Shelves: sci-fi, i-really-tried-to-like-this, sorry-i-got-bored

I think this is more like 2.5 stars? This may be partly due to it being listened to as an audiobook as opposed to reading a physical copy. I've heard Will Wheaton narrate before (for The Redshirts) and I have already read and enjoyed Ready Player One so I thought I knew what to expect. Unfortunately, I really didn't enjoy this one as much as either of those :/ maybe I'm just not a fan of crazy unbelievable conspiracy theories, but I feel like there was also just way too much overlap between the ...more

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Jun 30, 2015 Jane rated it did not like it

Shelves: sci-fi, unfinished

I loved Ready, Play One but gave up on this after 75 pages. I simply couldn't get into a book which was still focused, at that point, on the synopsis of a video game. ...more

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May 07, 2014 Theresa rated it liked it

Shelves: science-fiction, 2016

A fun read but don't expect too much from it. It read like a list of movie and gaming references from the 80s. And there was way too much deus ex machina going on. ...more

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