Gamebooks

[The Enigmatic Dr X]

Also, Congrats!

[Dark Jimbo]

Sorcery, you say?

Switch, you say?

Why choose when you can have both, I say.

Sorcery - the Switch version

Loyal readers (both of them!) of my Sorcery adventures thus far will know I was indeed playing the fancy-pants new electronic version...

Shamutanti Hills
Kharé part I
Kharé part II
Seven Serpents part I
Seven Serpents part II
Seven Serpents part III

Highly recommended to all and sundry (the games, not my playthroughs)!

[Richard]

I'm seeing a pattern!

I want to see a four-part playthrough of book 4!

[Barrington Boots]

I would also like to see that!

Fortnights Zanbar Bone avatar reminded me that I am started playing Portal of Evil but various things (work, stress, Baldur Gate 3) distracted me and now I've forgotten the bulk of the plot. It was quite good so I'll have another go of it. I've also got Grey Star the Wizard!

[Barrington Boots]

And that's Portal of Evil in the bag!

I'm not able to write up my full journey through this one, but I thought it was a very good book. It's by Peter Darvill-Evans and whilst not as good as Beneath Nightmare Castle its another great one.

The basic plot is that an evil dude named Horfak is using an army of pseudo-zombies to invade the land. What makes it interesting is that he's doing this by chucking people through a magic portal, where people are either mindwiped and end up part of his army of minions or get transformed into something else, usually a dinosaur or some other monster, because the portal is to some Lost World type place... so you start off investigating dinosaur incursions but if you're not too gung-ho you quickly realise these monsters aren't what they seem and the deeper plot is gradually revealed.
The setting is standard fantasy stuff (and mostly in a forest) but all beautifully detailed - there's none of the gothic atmosphere of BNC but there's some flair to some of the prose:  there's a lovely scene if you take the time to free some caged birds. It encourages exploration, as you can quite quickly get through the plot to the end but if you do you'll find yourself missing a lot of information and items to win.

Having played it a few times there's definitely an optimal path through the book but it's possible to skip a few bits as a lot of the items merely serve to make things easier, although there are a couple of absolutely vital items if you want to survive. One, a mirror, I managed to get three times but the other, some explosive, is only available in one spot and if you miss it, you're dead. This makes the book feel quite forgiving, especially as there's not too many auto-deaths and the optimum path also avoids a lot of dangerous combat. I suspect it's possible with any stats, although there are a few do or die skill, stamina and luck tests near the end. Choices and puzzles reward paying attention: there's a few 'left or right' choices that can lead to you missing key encounters but that's part and parcel of FF. There was one puzzle I couldn't work out at all though (you can circumvent it if you have rope) so if anyone else has played it I'd be interested to know how it works.
Although the setting is kind of generic and enemies are goblins and such for most of it there's some interesting encounters along the way and some memorable scenes. The end bit, where you pass through the portal, sadly feels a little rushed and if anything the 'get to the portal' bit could have been trimmed for a bit more prehistoric stuff later.

Art by Alan Langford who we all know draws a mean dino. The cover is the weakest art here.

I didn't know much about this one before playing it but I recommend it. Next up - Vault of the Vampire and (probably) a full playthrough.

[Fortnight]

I have all of the books (Puffin, Wizard & Scholastic) but I've only played them up to Armies of Death (which is where I got up to when I stopped buying them as they came out).

Although, thinking about it, I did play Return to Firetop Mountain casually (as in without dice and granted a fabulous set of stats), and found it extremely easy - or maybe it was just chance since I got through to the end first go.

I was waiting until I'd got all the rest before playing any new ones through, but now I have them all I'm instead waiting for that "right time" to sit a play properly, and map the books out like I used to as a kid. Been waiting for ages. Now I'm waiting until my house renovations are out the way. Then I'll have some time to dedicate to them. *sigh*

Maybe it's the rose-tinted spectacles but it seemed as though the interior art went a bit downhill after Armies of Death, though perhaps my favourite internal art is the "Demonic Slayer" from Knights of Doom (by Tony Hough).

[Funt Solo]

Now I'm waiting until my house renovations are out the way.

I turned a life-corner a few years ago and stopped thinking about life being endless (in which there'll always be time to paint that Warhammer mini, or to read that pile of comics) and started realizing that I have a finite amount of things like time and eye-sight and that, at some point, because I'm an avid collector of nerd-things, I will have so many nerd-things that there simply isn't enough lifespan left to experience them all.

[Reflecting pleasantly now on the construction of a long sentence.]

[Fortnight]

I turned a life-corner a few years ago and stopped thinking about life being endless

Ah I've been there too. This is one of the reasons I'm doing the renovations now, while I can. So I can create somewhere pleasant to live out my declining years. Coming to terms with the notion that one day I'll be sat in my home, helping handles on everything, with my feet clad in my brown plaid dad slippers, a pretty young nurse on call to change my nappy, and surrounded by so many nerd-things I don't know which to nerd-out over. All day. Every day. Could be good.

[Barrington Boots]

I'm missing the last five of the Puffin run Fortnight, as well as Howl of the Werewolf, so if you do play them all through I'd be really interested to see what those in particular are like.
Mapping them is the only way to go as some of them are obscenely difficult otherwise: as an adult I've found the puzzles on the whole easier, but the books still vary wildly in difficulty. It's been a fun experience so far. Artwise, I'm not far past Armies.. but I've not seen any decline in standards and I think my next book up is the first Martin McKenna one - I've a tremendous affection for his work based off 80s White Dwarf so seeing more of his work is going to be a real treat, I think.

[Fortnight]

Lucky for me I have two copies of every title, one that's nice, minty and first-editiony, and one that's tattier for playing. Several titles I have more than two copies. At the last count I have 42 copies of The Warlock of Firetop Mountain.
I don't know what I was thinking.

No spares of the last 5 though, sadly. And none of Howl of the Werewolf, although that one should be easier to pick up. I've heard that one is very good though, so I'm wondering if I should not worry about going through them in order and do the ones that are supposed to be excellent.

I played a series of recent gamebooks by Victoria Hancox and they were surprisingly really good. All puzzles and no need for dice n that in those which takes away some of the annoying randomness inherent in FF stuff. Very atmospheric and they definitely benefit from a bit of mapping.

I think my next book up is the first Martin McKenna one

I like Martin McKenna's art in these, and he improves a lot as they go on, I think.
So you'll be on Daggers of Darkness, which is the last one I got before I stopped buying them new. I don't even remember playing it back then!

The degree to which I loved these books as a kid you'd think I'd be right into D&D, but, being a solitary lad I never got to play. And so never really got into the tangent stuff like miniatures and role-playing material (Dragon, etc, although I do have some copies of Dragon magazine, and I think I have a couple of Clarecraft figures - certainly one at least).

I still don't know anyone who plays D&D, and these days I'm almost entirely housebound due to health problems, so too late to start. Ah well.

[Barrington Boots]

Howl of the Werewolf is £100 on ebay at the moment! I asked Jon Green about a reprint in person earlier this year and he sid there's a reluctance to reprint anything that wasn't authored by Steve or Ian, but hopefully that will change at some point. I've also heard it is amazing.
I wouldn't expect to get a spare of the last five from you - they change hands for more money than Howl on the second hand market. If you had 42 copies of Deathmoor you'd be better of than 42 copies of Warlock (42 copies is nuts btw! You could build your own Firetop Mountain out of those)
Sorry to hear you're in ill-health though dude, hopefully having some book-based adventures will be a pleasant way to spend your time..

I second the priase of Victoria Hancox - only the played the first one of her series and it was very, very good. I am interested to try more.
And for D&D, it's totally possible to play online these days through means of virtual tabletops (VTT) such as Roll20. I suspect if you really wanted to give it a bash there would be a forum somewhere where you could sign up and give it a bash!

[Fortnight]

I just looked on ebay and you're right. 100 quid! And that's the cheap one! Blimey. You'd think Scholastic would put out the ones that folk are crying out for. I mean, I'm all for almost-Charlie Higson and wee Pratchettette penned material if it's good (not played those two yet, but ho... that cover... you know the one I mean... wtf?) but let's have some of the others!

Although maybe JG is getting off lightly given the treatment of the reprints. Maybe it's just me, but I don't like the B-format paperback size, and the interior illustrations are just not... right. Is the printing cheap? On the wrong paper? I don't know, they're just all so hard to see. (And that cover... dear dear me). And the font is shit. Bring back Palatino and those old-style numbers that hang below the line! Classic.

And I definitely recommend the rest of Victoria Hancox's Nightshift series (or The Cluster of Echoes as I think it's now called - my copy of the first one has a simple plain cover with a b&w image and I don't remember any mention of a series in it, so the series maybe something of a retcon). But they're all really good. Perhaps the follow-ups seemed not quite so impressive, but that may be because the first one was such a great surprise that my expectations may have been raised too high.

[Richard]

there's a reluctance to reprint anything that wasn't authored by Steve or Ian

That's annoying and foolish, some of the best books in the series are by other authors.

I used to have three editions of The Warlock of Firetop Mountain, and then I decided that was excessive so I sold one. Why do you have 42? Are most of them foreign language editions?

I like the art in Portal of Evil but I have absolutely no recollection of anything that happens in it, which is not a good sign, so I think I'll skip it. I might give the next three a go, but I'm impatient to get onto Master of Chaos, which is one of my all time faves.

Not read Howl of the Werewolf, but you play as a werewolf and it was voted best FF book in a readers' poll a few years ago. (I'm a big fan of Green's later book, Night of the Necromancer, where you play as a ghost, with skills like walking through walls and possessing people.)

Not heard of Nightshift before, what is it about?

[Fortnight]

Why do you have 42?

Oh, well I had the one I bought as a kid, then the one I bought when they rebranded with the green spine so they all looked nice and matching on the shelf, then I grew up and... paused.

Years later I decided I would rekindle my old love for gamebooks and bought up loads of job-lots of them on ebay so I'd eventually get them all, and in those days you could buy job lots for a few quid plus postage and most of them came with Warlock. These days the market has sussed their collectability and they mostly get sold solo.

Then I went after a first edition, then a better condition one, then an even better condition one to replace that, and finally a near-mint one.

Then there is the Wizard versions, regular and special edition, B-format edition, then an A-format edition before Wizard folded, plus the anniversary edition.

Before you know it I got shitloads.

I suppose I got carried away, but now I can't get rid of them. I can't throw away a book - I just don't have it in me - and I don't have to sell them if I don't want to. I keep the different impressions and the rest are spare and can be given away. Or they could if I could get to them right now. Much is in storage right now due to the aforementioned renovations.


Is it excessive? Of course. Do I care? No. Do I care what anyone else thinks? No.

Not heard of Nightshift before, what is it about?

First one is set in modern day in a hospital with a worker on a night shift (you) and after dozing off you wake and things are... different. The people who should be there aren't, and something else is... And you need to get out.

No dice, no stats. Just puzzles. And it's not written for junior readers, but neither is it mature-only as far as I recall.

The second one is about a job interview from (perhaps literally) hell.

The third about paranormal investigators.

etc.

They're all a similar gothic feel. And after just googling to check I discover that there's been two (-and-a-half) more published since I last looked. Those'll be a nice Christmas present to myself.

[Barrington Boots]

I think it was someone on this very thread that recommended Nightshift to me. It's a clever gamebook: no dice, as Fortnight says, but some good puzzles. It's quite dark, I think a bit gory, but not 'adult'. I enjoyed working it out, although you 100% need to map it.

I fully meant to get the next one in the series but delayed at the time after filling my room with FF books, Way of the Tiger, Freeway Warrior and so on. I must remedy that.