Video game books you've enjoyed?

I've been reading Dragon Age: The Stolen Throne. It's pretty great. I know a lot of people swear by the Halo books and I also like the first Mass Effect book. But are there any game books you've really enjoyed?

The first Mass Effect book was fantastic and the Dead Space book was good for what it was.

I really enjoyed the Myst books. The morality dynamic of "creating" the worlds via the books versus "linking" to pre-existing worlds in infinite space is interesting.

Here's all 3 books on Amazon.

Mass Effect: Revelation by Drew Karpyshyn

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

Those are the only two I can recommend, and I suppose Ready Player One is kind of a stretch, since its not about actual games.

Halo: Fall of Reach was pretty good.

Anyone know if those Elder Scrolls books are worth it?

The Stolen Throne!

I got a fan novelization of Planescape: Torment when I bought it on GOG. It's fantastic, and I think it's free for anyone who does a web search for it.

Basically someone transcribed every bit of dialogue from his playthrough of the game, and tied it together with decent narration, not just "and then they fight." When I got to a point in the game where I couldn't take the combat anymore, I picked up from that point in the book.

I'm reading through Machinations (Ultima: The Technocrat War, Book 1) right now. It's quite good.

Does Neal Stephenson's Reamde count? That was pretty fun.

The novel that came with Stonekeep. It's also the only video game related book I've read.

I really liked the first few Resident Evil novels when I read them in like 1999, but I was in middle school and had pretty bad taste, so I can't vouch for their actual quality.

The Warhammer and Warhammer 40K books can be pretty good, but I don't know if you'd count those as video game books simply because there are WH video games. Some of the 40K books do cover events specifically related to some of the games, but I haven't read any of those.

The Gears of War books by Karen Traviss are great.

ICO: Castle in the Mistis supposed to be pretty damn good.

The novelisation of MGS1 is alright.

The first three Mass Effect books are pretty awesome.

Also, while not strictly a "video game book", any video game loving bibliophile needs to read Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. It's a fantastic book steeped in video game references and is a really enjoyable read.

I bought the first three Mass Effect books a while back, but haven't started reading them yet. I also just picked up the Witcher book "The Last Wish"; since I love the games so much I wanted to read some of the source material.

The Nylund Halo books are really good. I liked him as an author before then and was very pleased with what he did with them.

I thoroughly enjoy Fall of Reach and First Strike. The Flood however, can eat a dick.

@BBAlpert: Fire Warrior isn't bad. Way better than the game at least.

The Fall of Reach is one of the best game books released.  I can't imagine what it'd be like playing Halo without knowing about the whole Spartan II experience.  The first Mass Effect book was great, with some good stuff in Retribution.   
 
Blizzard used to put out some awesome ones.  The earlier Warcraft books were really good, such as the Well of Eternity books, Day of the Dragon, Lord of the Clans, Rise of the Horde.  Along with the Diablo universe (Kingdom of Shadow, especially.  Basically anything by Richard Knaak).  I quite enjoyed Speed of Darkness, a short Starcraft novel about the marines.  I, Mengsk was another good SC thing that led into Starcraft 2's disappointing narrative.

And then Masters of Doom, which is all about id and the two Johns.  But that's nonfiction (I think!)

I know it came before the games, so isn't strictly a videogame book, but The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski is a great introduction to The Witcher's universe.

Splinter Cell, the first two Dragon Age novels, the trilogy of Halo novel plus the fall of reach, and the Republic Commando Novels and I loved them all.

@GalacticPunt said:

I got a fan novelization of Planescape: Torment when I bought it on GOG. It's fantastic, and I think it's free for anyone who does a web search for it.

Basically someone transcribed every bit of dialogue from his playthrough of the game, and tied it together with decent narration, not just "and then they fight." When I got to a point in the game where I couldn't take the combat anymore, I picked up from that point in the book.

Besides this, there is also an official book to the game... which is unfortunately pretty mediocre at best... So for the best Planescape: Torment story experience stick with the game or the above mentioned novelization by Rhyss Hess...

i know its not a video game book but i enjoyed the warhammer 40k books

Ravnor and ezienhorn

@BBAlpert said:

I really liked the first few Resident Evil novels when I read them in like 1999, but I was in middle school and had pretty bad taste, so I can't vouch for their actual quality.

haha, i was going to say pretty much this, at the time i remember them being awesome, even the 2 that didn't have direct links to the games impressed, fuck knows if ill think that now, it was over 10 years ago i read them

as pointed out by others the Mass Effect books are pretty crucial if you were a fan of the series

I've never read a video game based book.

Speaking of which, one of these days I'd like to see someone make a really kickass game about Ender's Game. Someone somewhere is going to come up with a fun way to do zero-G movement. Eventually. I hope.

I've read the first three Mass Effect novels, most of the Halo books, most of the Resident Evil books, and the the Splinter Cell books. All those Mass Effect books were pretty good. Halo: Fall of Reach is still probably the best video game noveliziation I've ever read. The rest of the Halo books are a bit iffy in quality. The RE books are a bit silly but kind of interesting in the way they play out, especially the addition of a mysterious character named "Trent." The first two Splinter Cell books are pretty good but the others are a bit weak. It was the books that made me so attached to Sam's daughter and, as a result, so pissed off when she was "killed" in one of the games.

In terms of games novelizations, the Mass Effect novels are pretty good. Especially the first one... Also, the Bioshock book has its moments. I wouldn't call it great, but its quite decent.

About books that talk about games, the industry and its history, "All your base are belong to us" and "Grand theft childhood" are good reading material.

Finally, about game making, I really enjoyed "The Art of Game Design", but I haven't read enough on the subject to know if there are better options out there.

PS: Believe it or not, there is a novelization of God of War. I would stay the heck away from it, as I barely made it through the introduction...

ME: Revelation was a great book.

@HerbieBug said:

I've never read a video game based book.

Speaking of which, one of these days I'd like to see someone make a really kickass game about Ender's Game. Someone somewhere is going to come up with a fun way to do zero-G movement. Eventually. I hope.

Remembering the Shadow Complex controversy ,this might get... at least interesting...

In general I think if you stay clear of adaptations, you'll be okay. I've enjoyed:

Halo

• Fall of Reach
• Ghosts of Onix
• The Cole Protocol
• Greg Bear's Forerunner saga

Warcraft

• Lord of the Clans
• Arthas

All of Drew Karpyshyn's Mass Effect work

All the Wing Commander books (been a long time since I've read them, though)

All of Karen Traviss' Gears work

Fable: The Balverine Order

Dragon Age: The Calling (this was actually my first Fantasy novel and I was extremely surprised by how good it was)

I enjoyed the Elder Scrolls novels quite a bit. I'm also a big fan of the all the Gears of War books as well. I actually have a lot of game related books on my shelf right now, Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Elder Scrolls, Gears of War, Halo, etc.

I really want to read the first Witcher book (I know it was a book before the game), can anyone tell me that it is worth my time?

The first Mass Effect book, "Mass Effect: Redemption"

Didn't care for the other two, and I haven't tried the latest one yet.