You

Kind of neat, but not without problems. The setting - guys who become computer game developers growing up in 1980s, then diving into the industry in 1990s - is nice and the description of the computer game world is interesting and the games they created were kind of cool. The characters were fine, maybe, if a bit stereotypical, and the plot was non-existential for a while and kind of forced in the end. The book was a long-winded; more compact and to-the-point writing could've earnt a fourth star.

There were technical annoyances. At one point, the protagonist uses PC commands to start a C64 game. No, it doesn't work like that. Of course the games they create and play are wildly fabulous and way larger than life, and that's kind of boring – reading about someone playing a game of your dreams is not quite the same as playing it.

And come on - how come the book doesn't mention Nethack once, when clearly large part of the Black Arts games is just Nethack? Leaving Nethack unmentioned in the final listing of games is simply wrong.

But despite these flaws, I did care enough to read the book. It's by far no masterpiece, but someone interested in computer games – particularly those derived from roleplaying games – might find this interesting. Particularly if you're a white male.