A book review by: Lee Sonogan

(5th century) Educational, Military strategy

Supreme excellence consists of breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting. – Sun Tzu, The Art of War

I came across this book as one of the best books of all time. With more research, I found out it’s about tactics and strategy about war. I want to apply that to my video games and anything else relevant. First written in Chinese, over the years it has been translated many times. Different translations may be different depending on the translators perspective.

Human behaviour is defined in this book. People in groups display behaviour and actions that need to be managed if your group is going to be successful in war. War is based on deception and Intelligence of soldiers or generals of your army that will be successful in war. Book of origin: China. Language: Chinese, Translated English. Sun Tzu has composed 13 chapters.

The 13 Chapters:

• I – Laying Plans
• II – Waging war
• III – Attack by Stratagem
• IV – Tactical Dispositions
• V – Use of energy
• VI – Weak points and strong
• VII – Maneuvering an Army
• VIII – Variation of Tactics
• IX – The Army on the March
• X – Classification of Terrain
• XI – The Nine situations
• XII – Attack by Fire
• XIII – Use of Spies

This book is a classic and I read the whole thing. Smaller than an average book, it is only 100 pages with big line spacing in there sentances. I read the whole thing in one day. I was hoping that it would give me information that I could apply in real life/video games. It is not useful for video games but if you are in business and you’re trying to compete with others. This book has the information you need if you treat your employees like an army. The ending sums up the use of spies and how to use them. I recommend this book to people in business and people interested in the tactics of war relatable to modern times.

6.89/10

All warfare is based on deception. Hence, when we are able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must appear inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near.   – Sun Tzu – the Art of War