Ender's Game (spolier)

Just a quick review before I forgot the details. I haven't read sci-fi fiction for some time already. Most of my sci-fi consumption in the last few years are anime, manga, and occasionally, movies.

I'd say that Ender's Game is a reasonably interesting story, but it's not too 'realistic'. In particular, the children don't act like children at all. It's okay to change their role settings to teenagers or even young adults, and most of the stories will still work. In contrast, the children and teenagers in japanese animes really act according to their age, most of the time, at least when they're not in 'battles'. So I'd still think that even Code Geass is more complex and deeper than this supposedly serious sci-fi Ender's Game. One major reason is that the author is so limited by the 'western' morality constraints. I guess he thinks that getting children to fight real war is already such a 'taboo'... so he's so restrained in most of the plots. In particular, most of the casualties are so distant, but one could argue that this is intentional.

Another major fault with the story is that no reason is given why the 3 siblings of a single family will become the most powerful and intelligent folks in the entire world. There is also much Americanism that I got to dislike more and more over the years.