"Ender's Game" Battle Room games coming

Also, as has been stated I believe, he did what he did in the final battle because he was tired of the games they were putting him through. He didn't want to play anymore so he did something that he thought would get him a black mark. Right? Am I remembering that wrong? Anyway, he definitely didn't know, or even suspect, then that he was dealing with real people's lives, and that was almost the end of the book.

That's right Chig, he did something that, were it "real", would have been so reprehensible, so immoral - to HIM - that he was sure it would get him iced and sent home. He WANTED to be sent home to be a "third".

He was dumbfounded when he turned around expecting to be reprimanded and all the elite were giving him a standing ovation. It took Rackham telling him the truth of what he had done, the lie they had perpetrated on him, for him to realise what he'd done, which initiated his multi-day depression nap.

SommerMatt wrote:

Man, ENDER'S SHADOW really annoyed me. I know many people love this book, but what kind of author writes a super popular book with a hero that (in the sequel) is shown to just have been a weaker, dumber, luckier version of a minor side character? This is sort of like George Lucas writing a Star Wars sequel where Wedge turns out to have been smarter, stronger, better, faster, and a bigger master of the force than Luke was. He just didn't feel like getting involved.

I have to totally agree. It was like Card had a hook with the character, and felt the need to duplicate it. He created Bean in every way to be better or have a more disadvantaged start. Ender had a difficult childhood - Bean came from an orphanage / breeding program. Ender was the product of selective breeding - Bean was the result of even more genetic manipulation. Ender was small for his age - Bean was freakishly small. Ender was smart - Bean was smarter. It was like a rehash of the first, except with an even more against the odds main character. Not to mention he was constantly dumping on Ender in Ender's Shadow.

In all fairness, this is Card we are talking about.

Have any of you read Ultimate Iron Man? It's damn near a twisted rehash of Ender's Game.

The man is just kind of focused on one story and he wants to tell it.

Everytime I read this book (once a year since 8th grade) I continue to hate Graff. I'm not a genius. No, it's true, it's true. Please, I know its hard, but believe me, I'm not a genius. But I did identify with Ender when I first read it. He was surrounded by people, friends and enemies alike, and yet he was completely isolated. I felt that way a lot as a kid, only without the scapegoat of one person being soley responsible for these feelings of isolation. Therefore I can see how he would be desperate to leave what he thought was a game, a game that controlled his life for many years, by doing something so crazy they would never let him play again.

That being said, I'd like to see some gameplay footage. Any word on if its a platform/RTS/FPS or what? Or is it just "We're making Ender's Game the Videogame" and no content yet?

I just finished up Shadow of the Giant and as an aside it seems Card made Graff into a somewhat nicer guy. Good of humanity and all that. What I kind of disliked with the whole Bean character is that Ender who was a great character has all but disappeared from the story. I can see why Card did it, yet at the same time I think it would have been better if he were still involved. May not have been possible to keep Ender on the pages, but its as if he discarded Ender in favor of writing books about Bean and to some extent Peter.

Well, he did write 4-5 sequels about Ender, didn't he?

Kind of weird to think that all those "Shadow" books essentially take place during the two years Ender and Valentine are on their way to the colony world (relativity is a wacky mistress). As much of a "cheat" as the ansible was, he never really did explain how you could communicate with someone traveling at relativistic speeds.

SommerMatt wrote:

Well, he did write 4-5 sequels about Ender, didn't he?

I guess he did write the sequels with ended but to me I found both 'Xenocide' and 'Children of the Mind' very plodding and off the original slant of Ender's game. The more recent Shadow books seemed to have returned to the intent of that original. I also find it interesting that on Amazon there is a bundle for the "Ender's Game boxed set" which contains Ender's Game, Ender's Shadow and Shadow of the Hegemon. In effect saying that 'Speaker of the Dead, Xenocide and Children of the Mind' were all somewhat tangential to the original story. I thinnk not reading them doesn't take away from the world card created, although including Speaker of the Dead with the other three is better as a bridge to ender's Shadow.

I heard or read somewhere that 'Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and Children of the Mind' where originally just novels about physics and whatnot. However, he couldn't get them published without wrapping the Ender mythos around it. Basically they weren't written as true sequels or even continuations of the original story, but were using the same characters and universe to get three seperate books published.

SommerMatt:
I can accept that as a difference in the way you interpreted it and the way I did. To me it had seemed that soemwhere in his mind Ender understood that his actions caused people to die, though his conscious mind rejected that knowledge. To me it made Ender more of a hero, but then again I was no longer a teenager when I read the book.

I think this is a great opportunity for younger kids who are first introduced to the magic of Ender's Game. After reading the book they will be able to actually play some version of the game themselves and maybe even let their imagination broaden. I think it's neat.

Grenn wrote:

I heard or read somewhere that 'Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and Children of the Mind' where originally just novels about physics and whatnot. However, he couldn't get them published without wrapping the Ender mythos around it. Basically they weren't written as true sequels or even continuations of the original story, but were using the same characters and universe to get three seperate books published.

I posted this in another thread about Ender's Game. He explains all this in the interview at the end of the Speaker for the Dead audiobook, if I remember right. Speaker was decent, but the other two were so far out there that they just lost their connection to the series.

This comic hits the point so well... XKCD.

Nosferatu wrote:

SommerMatt:
I can accept that as a difference in the way you interpreted it and the way I did. To me it had seemed that soemwhere in his mind Ender understood that his actions caused people to die, though his conscious mind rejected that knowledge. To me it made Ender more of a hero, but then again I was no longer a teenager when I read the book.

well, we can chalk it up to a difference of opinion, although you're the only person i've ever met/heard of who HAD that particular opinion

W

T

F?

This is what happens when I try and post from my pocketPC...

Nice quintuple post, Matt.

For the love of God Matt, we get it. What do you want from us? I DID MY BEST! I DID MY BEST!

C-C-C-Combo!

*block hit* Combo Breaker!

SommerMatt wrote:
Nosferatu wrote:

SommerMatt:
I can accept that as a difference in the way you interpreted it and the way I did. To me it had seemed that soemwhere in his mind Ender understood that his actions caused people to die, though his conscious mind rejected that knowledge. To me it made Ender more of a hero, but then again I was no longer a teenager when I read the book.

well, we can chalk it up to a difference of opinion, although you're the only person i've ever met/heard of who HAD that particular opinion

We could always ask the author I suppose. He is still alive and kicking, and maybe he'd answer the question if he was bored enough.
I'm looking through his Q&A section now:

OSC wrote:

War of any kind is a terrible thing, but communities, and species, have the right to protect themselves from destruction, enslavement, or other dire threats; and in the struggle to save themselves from aggression, they cannot be expected to use only the exact amount of force required and no more, since it is always impossible to know just how much force really is required. Since one's own destruction is the result of guessing too low, the natural response is to guess too high, and a nation involved in a defensive or protective war cannot be faulted for guessing wrong. Nor, for that matter, can a species. So in Ender's Game, though I assign responsibility for the near-destruction of the Hive Queen (and Ender takes it upon himself), I do not assign blame, because I don't consider there to be any blame. You can't be held responsible for not knowing what you could not know at the time of a crucial decision.

Doesn't that quote kind of squash your theory, Nos?

I think Bush used that line to explain why we never found WMDs in Iraq...

this is probably the wrong thread to talk about it, but a few things about EG always kind of bugged me (no pun intended).

-there's a typo in the book that never seems to get fixed... at one point, referring to how the other armies jump out of their gates instantly, the narration says "they learned the exact wrong lesson from BONZO'S misuse of Ender Wiggin." It was Rose, in fact, who forced him to jump out of the gate.

-How could the bugger queens have possibly known that Ender would go to that one particular colony world?

-Card makes it sound like something special that the queen would breed new queens over and over again until they got one who would work together with another queen. Surely there was more than one bugger queen? If not, the entire species would have been killed when Mazer blew up the queen the last time.

SommerMatt wrote:

I think Bush used that line to explain why we never found WMDs in Iraq...

this is probably the wrong thread to talk about it, but a few things about EG always kind of bugged me (no pun intended).

-there's a typo in the book that never seems to get fixed... at one point, referring to how the other armies jump out of their gates instantly, the narration says "they learned the exact wrong lesson from BONZO'S misuse of Ender Wiggin." It was Rose, in fact, who forced him to jump out of the gate.

-How could the bugger queens have possibly known that Ender would go to that one particular colony world?

-Card makes it sound like something special that the queen would breed new queens over and over again until they got one who would work together with another queen. Surely there was more than one bugger queen? If not, the entire species would have been killed when Mazer blew up the queen the last time.

The first item, I believe, might be fixed in the audiobook. If it's not, I never caught it.

The second issue is something I wondered as well. It just seems like way too big a coincedence that out of all the worlds that the buggers inhabited, and all the worlds that could potentially hold life that the buggers hadn't inhabited yet, that he would first go to that one particular world, and find what they left him there. My first theory was that maybe the buggers influenced where he would go, but that falls through in the fact that he didn't choose where he went on the first trip, and the buggers couldn't "find" anyone else's mind in order to influence them.

The third thing... I don't remember him hitting on it much. From the way I read it, it wasn't so much that it was important because they made new queens, but that they made queens they could join with and thrive with, instead of creating a new queen that would be a threat, or hinder their progress through pointless territorial wars.

SommerMatt wrote:

I think Bush used that line to explain why we never found WMDs in Iraq...

this is probably the wrong thread to talk about it, but a few things about EG always kind of bugged me (no pun intended).

-there's a typo in the book that never seems to get fixed... at one point, referring to how the other armies jump out of their gates instantly, the narration says "they learned the exact wrong lesson from BONZO'S misuse of Ender Wiggin." It was Rose, in fact, who forced him to jump out of the gate.

-How could the bugger queens have possibly known that Ender would go to that one particular colony world?

-Card makes it sound like something special that the queen would breed new queens over and over again until they got one who would work together with another queen. Surely there was more than one bugger queen? If not, the entire species would have been killed when Mazer blew up the queen the last time.

As to the first issue, I always thought that was in reference to how Bonzo wouldn't let him participate or how Ender saved his last battle with Salamandar by shooting into the other team because they forgot about him. Everyone thought that was stratagy, but it was stupidity. However, I don't teach a class on it, so I'm probably wrong. And have self-esteem issues and can't assert my opinions, even in an anonymous format such as this. /emo

As to the second issue, I believe they mentioned that humans were focusing conlinzation on world the buggers had already been to, so there were structures they could work with and the environments were similar to earth. It probably couldn't have been that hard to predict which world or worlds would be colonized first and since Ender went with the first wave, he would have found it. And maybe they made similar places on other bugger worlds just in case. I'm still not sold on that one.

I don't know about that one. I don't think he properly expressed that idea in the closing paragraphs of the book.

The first time I read Ender's Game, I thought it would make a really cool game. I wanted a battle room sim. I was younger then. Now I'm not so sure it's a great idea.

Also, I thought I read an interview with Card where he had said that Speaker of the Dead was the story he had wanted to tell and the Ender's Game was always supposed to just be kind of a prologue to the other stories. Or that he never really considered it to be the main story he wanted to tell.

Sorry to dig up this old thread, but I just read the book for the first time (listened to the audiobook actually) and recalled there was supposed to be a game based on it in production.

Not going to discuss the story or what's likely to come, but I did have a thought of an existing game structure that would fit the concept perfectly.

In the novel there are actually three layers of games. There's the obious named games of combat school, the simulations and the videogames they play. They are encased within a social game that is played by Andrew and his classmates. That in turn is incased within the game the adults are playing on them.

Making the named games into gameplay is of course easy, but it'd leave out the other game levels.

But there is a game that has a recognisable game abstract game within a framework of a game of social dynamics. Series, in fact.
The structure of the Persona games (at least, 3 & 4, don't know much about the previous 3) is pretty much an axact 1 to 1 match with the games Andrew plays. Only the context is diffirent. Andrew starts from isolation, then builds his social relationships in order to do better at a more abstract game everyone is playing.

Can you imagine it? Combat school games are like going to Tartarus in P3, the time inbetween is spent on building stronger bonds with existing friends, trying to win over new ones or playing the in-universe videogames (the one with the giant) to change Andrew's 'stats'.

It lacks that third layer of course, the game Andrew isn't too aware of, the game that is being played with him by the adults. At least, it seems so. Being a videogame there actually is a third layer within this structure naturally, the metagame of the videogame and the player. All the game needs to do is allow for this. Of course, that would require a willingess to let go of the plot as set in the novel. It's a gamble. An example; it can be a set event when the player breaks the combat game, gives up on it only to be moved to the next stage like in the book, but it can also be not set. The player can keep playing along the rules the videogame has set for him and go through combat school like any other of the side characters and never become the one to be sent on to Eros. Or never complain about the simulations there and then be introduced to Mazer. But all that'd be a risk. It'd be possible people will play the videogame, finish it but only see a small part of it without ever knowing what they missed.

Just some thoughts.

fauxpunker wrote:

The first time I read Ender's Game, I thought it would make a really cool game. I wanted a battle room sim. I was younger then. Now I'm not so sure it's a great idea.

Also, I thought I read an interview with Card where he had said that Speaker of the Dead was the story he had wanted to tell and the Ender's Game was always supposed to just be kind of a prologue to the other stories. Or that he never really considered it to be the main story he wanted to tell.

I can see Ender's game as a long prologue - it kinda reads that way. However, after EG the books just get stranger and stranger...

Shoal07 wrote:
fauxpunker wrote:

The first time I read Ender's Game, I thought it would make a really cool game. I wanted a battle room sim. I was younger then. Now I'm not so sure it's a great idea.

Also, I thought I read an interview with Card where he had said that Speaker of the Dead was the story he had wanted to tell and the Ender's Game was always supposed to just be kind of a prologue to the other stories. Or that he never really considered it to be the main story he wanted to tell.

I can see Ender's game as a long prologue - it kinda reads that way. However, after EG the books just get stranger and stranger...

Ender's Game was a short story in a Sci-Fi magazine. Speaker of the Dead was initially unconnected to Ender's Game but Card felt it was right to have Andrew be the main character. He then got the publisher to delay Speaker of the Dead so he could get Ender's Game reworked and out as a complete novel, including a lot of new material that would set up Speaker of the Dead. Thus avoiding having to front load Speaker of the Dead with a lot of backstory to explain the main character, instead it just refers back to Ender's Game.

It worked out allright for the most part, I think. The siblings and their parallel story worked very well. It just got a bit weird way at the end with the fantasy landscape made real and the buggers not all being dead et. etc.
The weirdness felt a bit misplaced in Ender's Game, but it's now sequel could've done with a bit more. Speaker of the Dead was very good (especially if you know that Card worked as a missionary in Brazil for a bit). Good enought to be two thirds of a decent Dick novel, except it lacked a big event of immense weirdness at the end that would've made it to the level of something like Martian Time Slip.

Alas, Speaker for the Dead seems to have been reworked as a setup for it's sequel, Xenocide. Another story that wasn't originally intended to be about Andrew. Unlike Speaker of the Dead though this storyline got shoved onto Ender as Card's agent apparently sold the Ender trilogy in britain though there were only two books. And this third book Xenocide is dreadful. He writes terrible tech. All the sudden insights and revelations and compentences and such, his explaining of the physics of his universe in there is as awkward as Rowling's explenations. Hope he'll go back to ignoring exposition and just focus on the people once I get to the Shadow books.
Ironis though that the third book from a trilogy in turn had it's story spread out across two books. I still got Children of the Mind to go through first as I'm doing this at order of publication.

It's a bit of a mess. I'm now purely working through the 'backlog' due to the great production of Fantastic Audio in this audiobook version and looking forward to hopefully a decent 'reboot' with the Shadow books <:]