4 ms·
Ah, K&M. Lots of potential, many fun moments, but it's far from rationalist fiction. Still, if you ever need wish fulfillment that the time you spend at work be
by btown 9y ago
Ah, K&M. Lots of potential, many fun moments, but it's far from rationalist fiction. Still, if you ever need wish fulfillment that the time you spend at work beating down technical debt could instead allow you to fight monsters and cast spells leveraging the mana pool of a giant robot, it's a fun read/watch.
From an unofficial (and somewhat grammatically atrocious) English translation of the original novel [0]:
> Normally, Eru would have given up at this stage and would have chosen a more practical spell. But he knew how to solve the problem because of his unique skills ― programming concept. He had experience in designing and coding software to handle multiple variables. That's why he skipped the beginner magic phase and jumped straight into the 'modified magic' phase. Reviewing the structure of the physical boost script, Eru compressed the structure to minimise the number of variables, creating subscripts that would automatically extract the status of the body. After compiling it, he just needed to design the user interface to make it easier to control, so as to lessen the burden.
> Complicated projects like the improvement of scripts was not something that could be done easily by anyone. Eru, however, was not aware of this, completing the improvement shortly, and the patch was a big enhancement. But even so, it was still difficult to control magic that strained the mind heavily. But with his extraordinary processing ability, it was not much. No one realised that a historical revolution had occurred, but for Eru, this was just a small step in his journey.
[0] http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://skythewood.blogspot.com/p/blog-page.html&num=1&strip=1&vwsrc=0 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://...
- throwanem 9y ago> it's far from rationalist fiction Is that bad? Like any didactic subtype of the genre, rationalist fiction often struggles to succeed in both of the goals set for it; the only example I've as yet found enjoyable - and extremely so! I strongly recommend it - is Unsong by Scott Alexander, also of Slate Star Codex.
- pavel_lishin 9y agoSeconding Unsong. The end felt kind of cheap to me, but the journey was absolutely worth it.
- randomstudent 9y agoUnsong is not exactly rational fiction. The author itself claims it isn't (some people claim it is despite this fact, though).
- throwanem 9y agoI can see both sides of that argument, and I'd be lying to say I didn't consider Unsong rationalist fiction at least partly as an attempt to redeem the genre in my own estimation.
- moron4hire 9y agoAuthors aren't reliable narrators of their work.
- arkh 9y agoNot purely rational you have parahumans where most protagonists' acts have some logic behind it. Not a lot of evil people just because they're evil, and not a lot of pure heroes either. https://parahumans.wordpress.com/ https://parahumans.wordpress.com/ if you want something to read for next month(s).
- btown 9y agoAnd in case anyone isn’t aware, the sequel started yesterday at https://www.parahumans.net https://www.parahumans.net !
- Raphmedia 9y agoI also really loved the episode of "In Another World With My Smartphone" where the character aquires the spell "program" which lets a caster enchant a physical object with a command. The regular wizards use it to, let's say, make a door open when someone says "open" or other minor one-step commands. The protagonist, a modern human stuck in a magical world, uses it differently. He creates sequences with it. He scripts complex programs. [Minor Spoiler] As an example, he ends up creating a magical pistol. When the users speak "reload", the pistol (which the character imbued with a few spells using "enchant") casts a detection spell to finds the closest bullets. If bullets are found, the pistol then casts the spell "aports" on it. The bullets are teleported into the chamber of the pistol. He uses the same concept but with transmogrification enchantments to add voice commands such as "sword mode" or "pistol mode" that transform the pistol into a sword and vice-versa.
- cbhl 9y agoI highly recommend reading the light-novel translations of "In Another World With My Smartphone" as well! You can buy them on Amazon Kindle, or you can subscribe to read the pre-prints at http://j-novel.club/ http://j-novel.club/.
- Baeocystin 9y agoI was a little disappointed that a 600+ year-old fairy didn't remember to properly set conditionals, though. :D
- coldtea 9y ago>Ah, K&M. Lots of potential, many fun moments, but it's far from rationalist fiction. Hasn't that gone out of style with Zola?