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A review by guyfantastic
You by Austin Grossman
1.0
I had a real hard time getting into this book. I have a lot of things in common with characters in this book - I'm a software engineer, I play video games, and I'm roughly the same age. The book seemed to flow between a narrative novel and a lesson in game design and software development - some of which wasn't even correct. The main driving force of the story is , but the description of it isn't remotely accurate, and the way it would be overcome is not by . And even if it was, they totally gloss over the fact that the main character in the story is not a software developer, and is totally unqualified for . I thought the connection between the game engine and the was a strained and frankly stupid way to make the plot have meaning. There are huge problems that make the plot beyond a huge stretch of the imagination.
Besides that, there are some other issues I had that don't relate to software development. In the flashbacks, I kept waiting for the interesting bit that would put a new perspective on the current developments. It seemed like it was always on the horizon, but it never happened. The book tries to draw a parallel between the game characters and the person playing the game by switching perspective mid-sentence. It's sometimes confusing, but mainly it doesn't work, and it plays heavily into the geek-in-moms-basement stereotype. Also, there are several loose ends and things are just never really made clear. He tried to clean some of that up in a way that reminded me of the end of Animal House and Fast Times at Ridgemont High, where they throw in a "where are they now" kind of add-on blurb. And despite the similarities between myself and some of the characters, I just didn't care about any of them.
Spoiler
a software bugSpoiler
playing through all the gamesSpoiler
bug fixingSpoiler
economyBesides that, there are some other issues I had that don't relate to software development. In the flashbacks, I kept waiting for the interesting bit that would put a new perspective on the current developments. It seemed like it was always on the horizon, but it never happened. The book tries to draw a parallel between the game characters and the person playing the game by switching perspective mid-sentence. It's sometimes confusing, but mainly it doesn't work, and it plays heavily into the geek-in-moms-basement stereotype. Also, there are several loose ends and things are just never really made clear. He tried to clean some of that up in a way that reminded me of the end of Animal House and Fast Times at Ridgemont High, where they throw in a "where are they now" kind of add-on blurb. And despite the similarities between myself and some of the characters, I just didn't care about any of them.