Reviews

The Game-Players of Titan by Philip K. Dick

Only show reviews with written explanations

mattrabpc's review against another edition

4.0

I had low hopes for a book that didn't make it on to any notable lists of PKD works, but I really enjoyed this one! This is something that I could see not being for everyone, but it has that Star Trek original series quaintness to it with the mind-bending drug fueled PKD energy. The story hops focus around a few times for such a short novel, starting with the first mystery of what happened to Pete Garden's deed to Berkley, then

Spoiler

the death of bbeg Lucky Luckman

then hops to a ring of

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people with random psionic talents

before all hell breaks loose with

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the nice neighbor kid turning a group of aliens into a Kroonenberg nightmare

then the final face off

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with the evil(?) alien vugs who end up scattering the team across the Earth with a plan for revenge (I think?)

Point is, if you like esoteric sci-fi and want a really abstract criticism of classism then this is the novel for you

literatetexan's review against another edition

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2.0

I've only read one other novel by Philip K. Dick, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, but based on these two novels, I'm not really that interested in his writing. The Game-Players of Titan is strong on plot but weak on characterization. The book has too many characters, all of whom are pretty one-dimensional, and it switches perspectives from character to character too often. The book does present several intriguing ideas, like the post-apocalyptic world with a tiny population, the game of "Bluff" itself, and the interactions between the telepaths and the game-players, as well as the interactions between the vugs and the humans. But there are too many ideas in the book, and none of it really comes together. The main problem is that I just didn't care about any of the characters, including the bipolar protagonist.

gazzav's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious reflective fast-paced

5.0

jimmypat's review against another edition

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3.0

This was a surprisingly fun, fast, and furious novel from PKD. It also was fairly straight-forward and managed to keep the plot moving forward efficiently and, while having a ton of characters, avoided the multi-perspective jumping around that sometimes affects PKDs books negatively. I felt like the ending was a bit too slight, but other than that I had a blast reading this one.

dajna's review against another edition

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3.0

Sir, I admire the way you turned Monopoly into a fierce, bloody, interstellar game. The approaching Christmas afternoon will not be the same this year.

david_agranoff's review against another edition

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3.0

Working a review/notes for the Dickheads podcast. Full episode of the podcast is coming so stay tuned.

The new Dickheads Podcast is here! Who's up for a little Space Monopoly? You can find out how to play in PKD's 10th published novel The Game-Players of Titan. And in the first book episode of our second season, you can listen to what the Dickheads have to say about a world where real-life property is won and lost by gambling on a board game marshaled by psychic aliens from Titan. Plus: PKD's Barely Legal. The head of a scary floating robot god. And The 7 butt creatures of Venus.

https://soundcloud.com/dickheadspodcast/episode-18-the-game-players-of-titan