Ready Player Two (Ready Player One #2)

by Ernest Cline

The game began with a brief animation, showing Princess Kurumi changing out of a fancy silk kimono into her red kunoichi garb, as the poorly translated message PRINCESS’ES ADVENTURE STARTS is typed out above her, one letter at a time. Then a familiar warning appeared in the center of the screen: PLAYER 1 START, followed by a rectangular map of the kingdom showing my current position at the bottom, and the route I would have to follow to reach Kanten Castle. Then the first level or “step” of the game appeared—a sprawling green meadow, covered in patches of colorful flowers and strewn with the occasional tree or giant boulder. My tiny pixelated avatar appeared at the bottom center of the screen, and in that instant I was back in the zone. I wasn’t Kira Morrow, or Parzival, or Wade Watts. The controls became an extension of myself, and I became the vengeful Princess Kurumi, clad in blood-red silk and armed with an infinite supply of throwing knives, intent on reclaiming my stolen kingdom at any cost.

Were the video game sections of the first book also this painful, and I was just paying less attention because it was an audiobook?