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video game

The Ready Player One “Easter Egg” That Bypasses the Backlash

April 18, 2018 by Matt Hill Leave a Comment

this quick post plays
through three short stages

the third contains
the Easter egg

all three potentially
contain SPOILERS


Stage One: “Microreview”

if you haven’t seen Ready Player One
(or read Cline’s book),
you really should;
particularly if you’re the
target demo:
a “nerd,” “geek,”
pop culture afficionado
of a certain stripe
(70s-80s gaming, sci-fi, etc.)
(more on this later)

but even if you’re not
the target demo du jour,
you should still see it,
cuz it’s a fun,
eminently Spielbergian,
bombastic popcorn flick
(tho, prepare to
suspend plenty disbelief
and prepare to groan
at the too-neat ending)


Stage Two: “Context”

if you’ve seen this movie already –
more certainly if you’ve
read the book,
have this kind of thing
on your radar, etc. –
you may have a sense of the
Ready Player One backlash
that’s been afoot:

e.g. 1: Steven Spielberg’s Oblivious, Chilling Pop-Culture Nostalgia in “Ready Player One”

e.g. 2: The Ready Player One backlash, explained

(those two pieces are helpful
primers and there are others)

the gists of the criticisms
have to do with
Cline, Spielberg, or both
succumbing to certain
negatives of nostalgia and some
nasty exclusivity concerning
particular pet passions
(this involves something
called “Gamergate”)

i think there’s obv
plenty valid points here,
but delving in fully
is beyond this post

(for some
thoughts on nostalgia, see my
good, bad, ugly: nostalgia edition)

(for some
thoughts on how groups
(like gamers)
crave things like
ownership, community, etc. –
relevant to them
playing out negatively
re: Gamergate – see my
a pop invite to the church)


Stage Three: “Spiritual < Spiritual”

while in general i agree with
Rob Bell that
“everything is spiritual,”
i think some
desires
(longings,
hungers,
senses of privation,
experiences of lack,
problems,
issues,
whatever)
are more clearly so

in this instance, by “spiritual”
i mean something like
“essential to our being
as humans;”
i also mean something like
what’s at play here:

“If I find in myself desires which nothing in this world can satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world.” ~ C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

here, in other words,
spiritual = supernatural

and HERE is where we discover
the titular EASTER EGG –
the “secret” that “saves”
Ready Player One
from some potential negatives
brought up in Stage Two….

Ready Player One, really,
is about these spiritual/supernatural
longings/desires;
specifically, i see
The OASIS
(the movie’s VR game world)
as a proxy for
desires for
things like:
love, belonging, community,
escape, freedom, victory,
meaning, enjoyment, passion

Ready Player One
says this about people:
people need
love/meaning/etc.
and they’ll do
whatever it takes
to get it
(including create
fictional worlds where they do)

but now notice how
Ready Player One‘s
counterintuitively anti-gaming ending –
when we’re told something like
“the real world is what’s real” –
also says this about people:
real (read: spiritual) problems require
real (read: spiritual) solutions,
and *bigger* ones, too

in other words: spiritual < spiritual

it may seem like The OASIS
can give Wade (the main character)
what he needs,
but nah: he needs Samantha (the girl)
irl for that;
in this same way,
our ultimately
spiritual/supernatural
desires for
love/meaning/etc.
must be “solved” by something/someone
ultimately
spiritual/supernatural –
and *bigger –
too

and,
to me,
with this Easter egg
of perspective in hand,
Ready Player One –
though imperfect –
communicates something
very valid,
very real
about being a human

(for some
thoughts on how
humans often
sneak these kinds of
Easter eggs
into pop culture, see
what it means that you like things that are like other things that you like
and
Get Re-Enchanted: Stranger Things 2, Pop Culture & God)

 

 

Filed Under: Editorial, Film, Reviews Tagged With: 1980s, atari, backlash, Christian, easter egg, ernest kline, gamergate, games, gaming, God, interpretation, Jesus, meaning, media, movie, negative, nostalgia, OASIS, ready player one; steven spielberg, religious, review, spiritual, video game

gaining from the waiting

November 25, 2016 by Matt Hill Leave a Comment

2886483-tlg_e315_06

do you know about
The Last Guardian?

it’s this game
that’s infamously been
in development
since 2007;
spiritual successor to
2001’s Ico and
2005’s Shadow of the Colossus

it was originally slated
for release in 2011,
then pushed back,
moved from system
to system,
and re-slated in 2015
for release in 2016, October,
then delayed once again
until December, 2016 –
mere days away
as i write these words

now, you may have predicted that
i’m one of the
eager anticipators
of this game –
one of the many who
*loved*
Ico and Shadow of the Colossus,
and if so,
your prediction is correct

you may have also predicted that
i’m one of the many
who find this
waiting excruciating;
but if so,
your prediction is not correct

not only are these games
suuuuuuuuper zzzennnnnnnn,
attracting and instilling a sense
of calm reflection,
antithetical to things like
excrutiating over waiting,
i also like to think
that this particular
waiting situation,
like other, bigger,
more well known waiting situations,
is generally a *good* thing –
a thing to be embraced,
benefitted from,
enlarged by

how so?

consider:
“absence makes the
heart grow fonder;”
so too waiting

consider:
since 2001,
i’ve had the pleasure
of playing through
The Last Guardian‘s
spiritual precursors
several times,
enjoying their
artistic vision,
their quiet, sublime statements
about love, loss, life

even now,
mere days away
as i write these words,
i’m taking
yet another opportunity
to revisit them –
like a ritual meant
to more than remind,
but to ingrain
essence,
to create and underline
identity,
to birth and stoke
love,
to form
followers fit for waiting,
because:
such things are fit for followers
and waiting for such things
is worth the wait

do you know about
Jesus?

he’s this random guy
who claimed to be God
like 2,000ish years ago

these old stories about him
say he died, but came back to life,
and he’s supposed to be returning
sometime to sort of set
everything with the world
right

now, you may have predicted that
i’m one of the
eager anticipators
of his return,
but i bet now you know
that i don’t find this
waiting excruciating

i bet now you know
that i think it’s
part of the point

i bet now
you’re thinking of
rituals –
Sunday morning meetings,
bread and cup,
witnessing to the
ends of the earth –
rituals to ingrain,
to create and underline,
to birth and stoke,
to form
followers fit for waiting,
because:
such things are fit for followers
and waiting for such things
is worth the wait

i bet now,
i hope now,
in waiting situations,
you’ll get
suuuuuuuuper zzzennnnnnnn
and
calmly reflective,
and
benefit from,
get enlarged by,
the gaining from the waiting

Filed Under: Editorial Tagged With: Christian, game, hope, Ico, Jesus, Playstation, ritual, second coming, Shadow of the Colossus, The Last Guardian, Ueda, video game, waiting

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