Stuff I Read: Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline

After a young man and his friends win ownership of the largest and most influential tech company on the planet, they stumble on a game-changing technology and shortly thereafter, release it to the public. However, lurking in the code is a malevolent entity that wears the face of the genius they idolized and threatens to kill billions of people. Buckle up, kids, as Ernest Cline returns us to the OASIS in his 2020 sequel, Ready Player Two.

Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline

At the end of Ready Player One, Wade Watts and the High Five assumed control of GSS and its signature product, the OASIS—a virtual social network so ubiquitous its economy and interactions run parallel to real life. Watts and his friends take over per the will of the late OASIS creator, James Halliday (who used the avatar Anorak in the OASIS) as a reward for Wade completing a years-long Easter egg hunt in the virtual world. Shortly after gaining control of the company, Wade finds a prototype of Halliday’s last great invention: The OASIS neural interface (or ONI). Where normally, someone would log into the OASIS with a cumbersome VR headset and extensive sensory input setup, the ONI allows the user to insert their consciousness directly into the virtual world, removing the barrier between the real and the simulation. A user can now directly see, hear, smell, touch, and taste the world. After much debate about whether or not to do so, the ONI is released—fracturing the High Five and ending the relationship between Wade and his newly minted girlfriend, Samantha (Art3mis in the OASIS). Within months, the ONI is the primary source of connection to the OASIS, and once the new tech hits a user threshold (7,777,777), James Halliday’s avatar, Anorak, returns, this time as a far less benevolent figure. Trapping Wade, Aech, and Shoto in the OASIS via their ONI, Anorak tasks Wade with finding the Seven Shards of the Siren’s Soul. Anorak gives him 12 hours to complete this new Easter egg hunt, or he will effectively lobotomize the millions of ONI users connected to the OASIS.

Ernest Cline nakedly and shamelessly returns to the well on this one. In Ready Player Two, we see the same stuff we saw in the last outing: a fascination with 80’s retro, and an intense love of the John Hughes film aesthetic. The players have changed a bit, however. Aech has fully embraced her sexuality; Shoto is married with a baby on the way. Not all these changes are great though. Wade (OASIS avatar: Parzival) has become (ascended to or descended to, depending on your take) a full-on tech bro, having assumed control of the wealthiest company on the planet and alienated himself from the object of his obsession in the first book, Samantha. And Anorak, formerly the avatar of the socially awkward (and long-dead) co-creator of the OASIS, is now a sentient AI. These changes to two of the core characters in Ready Player One completely recontextualize the events from that book, as both Wade and Halliday/Anorak are portrayed as less socially awkward and more manipulative and creepy, using their vast resources and control of the OASIS as justification for their actions. If this is Cline’s intent, then well done, sir. However, there are too many people who revere Wade the way Halliday was revered, even as Wade casually flaunts his ability to boot anyone from the OASIS who angers him. The OASIS is so well-integrated into the rest of the world that in-game currency is spendable in the real world economy, so the eviction from that economy at the whims of a power-tripping, newly-rich kid has troubling implications.

It was fun to reconnect with some of the legacy characters, as the previous book’s High Five make up the board of directors at GSS and Ogden Morrow is included early on as an advisor. However, Wade’s actions splinter the group, and we don’t get to spend as much time with them as you’d like. Also, once again, Wade spends a significant amount of time pining over Samantha. We do get introduced to the Lo-Five, a hero-worshipping analogue to Parzival’s group. While it’s clear they were intended as a mirror to Wade and his friends, they’re played more as a convenient fix to the story’s central quest. They deserved more than to just be a Deus ex Machina.

Ready Player Two is a return to the well for Ernest Cline, more of the same if you liked the first book. However, the bloom has come off the rose to this one, and the changes to the central characters cheapen the original significantly. Get this only if you must own the entire story.

Pros: Return to a fully realized universe with a big change and a cool central conceit.

Cons: We did this already. All of it.

Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars.