Tomb of Horrors – Ready Player One Replay

Adventurers stumble down an unstable ramp in the Tomb of Horrors

Tomb of Horrors is one of the most famous modules for Dungeons & Dragons and plays a major role in Ready Player One. Originally created as a tournament module for the Origins game convention, it went on to become a legendarily deadly published adventure for Dungeons & Dragons. Gary Gygax, one of the creators of D&D, created the module … Read more

Akalabeth – Ready Player One Videogame Replay

Akalabeth: World of Doom came out in 1980 for the Apple II. Written by Richard Garriott aka Lord British aka the guy who created the Ultima series, it features a lone adventure exploring a dungeon-filled wilderness. Quote I downloaded every game mentioned or referenced in the Almanac, from Akalabeth to Zaxxon. — Ready Player One p. 64 Game Play Akalabeth … Read more

RPO Replay: Tron – Deadly Discs

The Ready Player One Replay is an exploration of the games that inspired the novel Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Quote After I beat Aech at three rounds of Tron: Deadly Discs, he threw down his Intellivision controller in disgust. — Ready Player One p. 40 Game Play Tron – Deadly Discs is a single-player game for Atari 2600 and … Read more

Ready Player One Video Game Replay

A male teenager climbs up the side of a stack of mobile homes, looking off into the distance, where he sees a dystopian skyline. Cover art from the novel version of Ready Player One

Welcome to the Ready Player One Video Game Replay! Ernst Cline’s dystopian novel Ready Player One (Amazon) is set in a cyberpunk-ish future in which climate change, economic upheaval, pandemics, and other catastrophes have transformed our world. Poverty is rampant, with many people living on the fringes of big cities in the hopes of scraping … Read more

RPO Replay: Smash TV

A Smash TV contestant, surrounded by whirling blades, fends off enemies.

The Ready Player One Replay is an exploration of the games that inspired the novel Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Quote Aech and I had wasted countless hours on two-player classics like Contra, Golden Axe, Heavy Barrel, Smash TV, and Ikari Warriors. Game Play Smash TV is a frantic run-and-gun game inspired by the likes of Running Man … Read more

RPO Replay: Heavy Barrel

The Ready Player One Replay is an exploration of the games that inspired the novel Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Quote Aech and I had wasted countless hours on two-player classics like Contra, Golden Axe, Heavy Barrel, Smash TV, and Ikari Warriors. Game Play Heavy Barrel is a top-down shooter in which one- or two-players blast their way through … Read more

Golden Axe – Ready Player One Video Game Replay

The heroes of Golden Axe: A battle axe wielding dwarf, a great sword using male human, and a long sword-using female human. They stand against a brown tiled background.

Golden Axe is a side-scrolling, fantasy-based hack’n’slash video game that dominated arcades in the early 1990s. Released in 1989 by Sega, the game was one that my friends and I would happily pump quarters into until we completed its epic quest, usually laughing our asses off whenever we did something particularly dumb on screen. It … Read more

RPO Replay: Contra

The Ready Player One Replay is an exploration of the games that inspired the novel Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Quote Aech and I had wasted countless hours on two-player classics like Contra, Golden Axe, Heavy Barrel, Smash TV, and Ikari Warriors. Game Play Contra is a side-scrolling two-player shooter by Konami featuring two muscle-bound … Read more

RPO Replay: Dungeons & Dragons

The Ready Player One Replay is an exploration of the games that inspired the novel Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Quote … hundreds of polyhedral dice like those used in old tabletop role-playing games. — Ready Player One p. 10 A freeze-frame of this scene appears nearly identical to a painting by Jeff Easley that appeared on … Read more

RPO Replay: Robotron 2084

The Ready Player One Replay is an exploration of the games that inspired the novel Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Quote I booted up my emulator and selected Robotron: 2084, one of my all-time favorite games. I’d always loved its frenetic pace and brutal simplicity. Robotron was all about instinct and reflexes. Playing old videogames never … Read more