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[FF 40: Dead of Night]

#1

Games / Re: Gamebooks

Last post by Richard - Today at 09:29:42 PM

FF 40: Dead of Night

 
I remembered nothing about this book until I started reading it, and then I kept recognising things! Strange how memory works. Anyway, it's by one of my favourite FF writers, Stephen Hand (with a co-writer) and one of my favourite artists, Martin McKenna. There's a colour map inside the cover by Leo Hartas.
 
You play a warrior-priest, a Demon Stalker, and the Demon Lord Myurr, a Snake Demon, has kidnapped your parents; your objective is to find them and stop whatever Myurr is up to. You get to choose three special talents from a list of eight; I went with Banish Undead, Holy Circle (a defensive spell) and Speak Demon (which should be called Read Demon really, it lets me understand text in the demonic language).  I cheated by giving myself maximum skill, staminal and luck scores. There is also a novel Evil score, which starts at zero and increases if you do evil, selfish or cowardly things -- this becomes important at the end of the book.
 
I begin by visiting my home village, to find that all is not well. The village priest tells me my parents were found dead a few days ago, and were buried, but after some supernatural goings on he realised that they are actually missing, and their supposed corpses are in fact demons! I have to go to the cemetery, where I hear screaming coming from under the ground, and then two demons burst out of the soil. I use Banish Undead to get rid of them (are demons undead though? Discuss). There's nothing left to do here, so I set off to look for them.

My first port of call is to pay a visit to my friend Sharleena, who can speak to spirits and get information from them. I get to her without incident (avoiding one encounter by hiding from an approaching wagon), and I watch her summon a big scary demon who is compelled by her power to tell her that my parents are somewhere north (not very helpful really, as as I started at the southernmost point on the map, so I had already worked out I was heading north). He then rips Sharleena's throat out, and I have to fight him. I win, but in the process Sharleena's home burns down. It's probably better to not be friends with a Demon Stalker.

Moving on, I find some peasants burying a suicide under a crossroad, to prevent him turning into a vampire. As I'm a priest, I agree to officiate, but it's too late. A vampire bursts out of the coffin, and I hold it at bay with my silver cross while one of the peasants saves the day with a wooden stake. Strangely, I get all of the credit for this.
 
I now have a choice of three directions. Although they boil down to west, north or east, my choice is more informed than that because of the map, which keeps it interesting. North leads to a village in a marsh -- I don't like the sound of that. West feels like a trap, because when I killed the two demons inthe cemetery, I found a clue that there were captives being held that way, but the book warned me at the start that demons are devious and treacherous and like leaving traps, and I should be careful not to fall into those. East seems like an inoffensive route to a village called Astonbury, so not knowing anything negative about it, I head that way.
 
On the way, I find a very suspicious caravan parked at the side of the road, and so I investigate. It is occupied by a seemingly-friendly old man, but at this point the bok asks me if I have Sense Demon talent, and I do not. Hmm... However, I reject the option of attacking him, since I'm supposed to be one of the good guys, and he turns out not to be an enemy. He gives me a clue (which doesn't come in useful later, at least on the route I took), and the next day I take my leave and come to a bridge over a river. Here, I can continue to Astonbury or take a boat to the town of Axmoor, which is on the western edge of the map but beyond the place where I suspected a trap. The boatman tells me there is a plague in Astonbury, and I don't fancy getting mixed up in that, so I leave my horse behind and pay some gold to go to Axmoor.
 
Did I mention I had a horse? I should have, because that's very unusual for a Fighting Fantasy book. He was a lovely white steed called Godsfire, but apart from adding a minimal bit of colour to my background, he has nothing to do with anything, and I had actually forgotten about him until I left him behind (don't feel bad for him though, as apparently he is intelligent enough for him to obey my command to make his own way back home to my monastery). I feel like the horse could have been put to better use, like if having or not having him actually made any difference to anything at all. If I'd felt like he mattered I probably would have braved the plague instead of leaving him on the riverbank. This is really my only criticism of this book, and it's an incredibly minor one really.
 
The ferryman has a young son who duly falls into the river and needs me to rescue him. Fortunately I make the right choice here and save him, and his father rewards me with a refund of his fee for the trip. Also, some woman who is alos on the boat reads my future with some tarot cards. She tells me to look out for -- actually I won't spoil this clue in case anyone reading wants to play this book, but it comes in very, very handy indeed when I finally confront Myurr.

The next day we reach Axmoor, and it's an absolute mess. There is no sign of the human population, and there are signs of demonic occupation. As I disembark, the pier is demolished by some massive tentacles, and rather than trying to fight whatever they belong to I just flee inland. Looking over my shoulder, I watch the boat I was on being broken in two and dragged under the water, with the loss of all on board! (Looking at the alternative choices I could have made, it turns out I missed an opportunity to save their lives! Oops! But I don't get punished with any increase to my Evil score.)
 
Heading into Axmoor, I find a massive evil-looking thing that appears to be responsible for killing everyone here. It's basically a giant organic citadel, and the tentacles I saw earlier are a part of it (like the big monster in Rogue Trooper: Cinnabar). I venture inside...

#2

Events / Re: Gosh! signing

Last post by Colin YNWA - Today at 09:03:38 PM

Jordan Thomas (Weird Work, XINO) & Shaky Kane (Bulletproof Coffin, The Beef) will be signing copies of their latest collection The Man From Maybe on Tuesday 28th May from 6-7pm!

https://goshlondon.com/the-gosh-blog/man-from-maybe-signing-with-shaky-kane-and-jordan-thomas/

I picked that series up and its pretty good. Its no Bulletproof Coffin but good fun. Defo pop in if you are in the area.

#3

Events / Re: Gosh! signing

Last post by rogue69 - Today at 08:52:07 PM

Jordan Thomas (Weird Work, XINO) & Shaky Kane (Bulletproof Coffin, The Beef) will be signing copies of their latest collection The Man From Maybe on Tuesday 28th May from 6-7pm!

https://goshlondon.com/the-gosh-blog/man-from-maybe-signing-with-shaky-kane-and-jordan-thomas/

#4

Announcements / Re: 2000 AD - The Ultimate Col...

Last post by Tomontherun94 - Today at 08:49:18 PM

EDIT: Ignore this, didn't see the earlier messages lmao


Next 3 volumes are up on the site
175/Vol 176: Hope
176/Vol 172: Dark Judges: Deliverance/Death Metal Planet
177/142: Savage: The Marze Murderer/Thousand Yard Stare & Defoe: The Divisor

#5

Creative Common / Re: Cover Puns

Last post by Funt Solo - Today at 08:37:56 PM

Rogue Hooker

The untold story of what went on in Cinnabar between the panels.

(By John Smith.)

I was going to say this sounds like another book of Periwinkle Supreme.

#6

Announcements / Re: 2000 AD - The Ultimate Col...

Last post by IndigoPrime - Today at 07:59:01 PM

Indigo - I think 'The Order' has been confirmed somewhere as being completed at some point in this Ultimate Collection.

This factoid keeps leaking out of my ears. Odd. Anyway, I just saw Forbidden Planet has Scarlet Traces 2 in stock now, so I'm going to order that before it vanishes like Born Bad did.

And almost 20(!) unknowns. It'll be interesting to see what they're filled with. A few more Dredd books must be on the way.

[Part 2 - Not on the list Uncanny X-Men]

#7

Books & Comics / Re: Completely Self-absorbed T...

Last post by PsychoGoatee - Today at 07:53:19 PM

I'll say for me, just another take,

Part 2 - Not on the list Uncanny X-Men

I accept I'm very much an outlier on this and folks either see past the cracks that I perceive to glory in the great plotting. Or the stories have such a foundational part in their reading they don't care. OR they see the craft as so good they don't even notice what I perceive as forced characters I don't trust. I mean none of us can ignore the countless dangling plot threads, but they never really mattered, they were part of the fun wondering when some long forgotten idea would spring back to life. 

My not liking Claremont's Uncanny run is another case of the reader bringing different desires to the table and therefore getting a different reaction to what they read. I do completely get what folks see in them, but they are just not for me these days. And for me this one is a case of not just thinking these comics are good, just not that good. Rather I just don't get on with them anymore at all, wonderful art aside.

I can dig! I'll say, just on the for the time and foundational in your reading thing, there are new fans of this run all the time today too. Myself I'm in the 170s of the run for the first time currently, and I've read it in pieces starting maybe 10-12 years ago. So I've read about 80 issues, plus started New Mutants recently.

I do agree the extra novelistic narration instead of letting the pictures do more of the talking, this does slow down a lot of comics of that time. But I still enjoy the style, and I think the dialogue is good, it gets a bit better as it goes at least so far as well. But I can appreciate it's not on your list, for me I love it.

That said, I'm guessing I might be less into the crossover heavy 1990 end of the run when I get there one day, but that sounds fun in its own way as well.

[Cass and Ra and Herr Sun]

#8

Creative Common / Re: Cover Puns

Last post by The Legendary Shark - Today at 07:50:30 PM

Cass and Ra and Herr Sun - the Egyptian god of the sun and Mrs. Anderson's little girl go on a road trip to find the Nazi who caught the magical fish that ate Osiris's willy in order to restore Mjolnir to Olympus before Quetzalcoatl marries Stalin to usher in the New Age of Weeping Sores and Assorted Miseries which will pave the way for the LHC in Cern to release Cthulhu into Narnia. (By John Smith.)

[Rogue Hooker]

#9

Creative Common / Re: Cover Puns

Last post by The Legendary Shark - Today at 07:29:31 PM

Rogue Hooker - in the seedy backwater gene-brothels of Nu-Earth the glistening fronds and pulsating



No. Just no.

[The Screw-Bix Catalogue]

#10

Creative Common / Re: Cover Puns

Last post by The Legendary Shark - Today at 07:24:28 PM

The Screw-Bix Catalogue - Before his mysterious evaporation, Bix Barton's mortal enemy Fix Farton released a dossier of 150 secrets with the potential to destroy our intrepid hero! Now that dossier is for sale on Eeriebay!! It's just not cricket, by Jove!!!