I'm 20, and I've got plenty of fond memories of game books like these, especially the Sorcery series, and the way of the tiger series from knight books. My dad had a small collection of game books, and my brother and I used to sit around on rainy days playing them. Good times.
You know what I want? A Pokémon gamebook. Or, some kind of Monster Tamer gamebook. The Pokémon could function as a combination of combat and items. "If you have an electric Pokémon, turn to page 45"
@6:00 my uncle had a full bookcase of CYOA books in the late 1980s... made me a fan. Looking at those was amazing, but I couldn't open them until I had my own. Being too sensitive, the books could not be handled by a kid in my uncle's will to keep them pristine. He started gifting me Lone Wolf books for birthday and chritmas. Got them to this day. 1-20, 21,22,26. Just bought 29 yesterday. Have 30-32 on the way, and once the reprints of those in the 20s i'm missing are out my libraire will let me know!
@@AgeofInk This one. Plus the Sorcery series vid! Though your Tolkien vids are also super fun. You’ve a great voice and command over your scripts. Don’t be afraid of many more, nor how you wish to do them. Don’t second guess yourself. Do as you’ve been doing, as what you’ve done, especially more recently, has been super solid! I wish you well moving forward!
I’m 33. We had game books and they were popular. Growing up in the 90s, we had video games as well, however, most were not engrossing unless you played a lot of RPGs. Since I played RPGs, I fell in love with these after looking at the front covers and seeing lizard men, orcs, wizards, and warriors. I was an avid reader of Tolkien and later on would read Malazan, Stormlight, and Wheel of Time series. These books, helped shape what later on, I decided was an integral part of my personality. So, that being said, I would say under 30 years old and you probably haven’t read/played a game book. I met Steve Jackson at a gaming convention and we talked for probably 45 minutes while we played a copy of his newest game he was releasing in 2002. Sure, the craze has died down, but there are still those of us who collect these and hold them dear to our hearts.
Beautiful short video. I am a 90´s kid that first inherited FF books from my older brother. I guess i was very lucky, being in that exact time before videogames became really big. Thanks to that i was able to fully enjoy such amazing books and to this day they have shaped my taste in fantasy, writing and art.
I loved Choose Your Own Adventure books as a kid, and when I found my first copy of a Fighting Fantasy book (Warlock of Firetop Mountain), in an amazing little used book shop, I thought I had found something truly magical. Seriously, I remember feeling like, in that moment, I was in one of the 80's fantasy films I grew up watching. I had been playing D&D for a while at that point, but this book was something different, something perfect for when I couldn't make it to the game store or was away from my hometown. It was MY adventure and MY journey into a magical land. That felt amazing.
As a French dude I have to thank you because I never understood before why on the internet they were all looking from different editors... because it was the case! haha
the ones I remember were Choose your Own Adventure (the most popular name everybody remembers) but also twist a plot, find your fate, which way, and some licensed franchise spinoffs from these (star trek, doctor who, indiana jones, etc) and many one-offs using similar mechanics of choices sending you to different pages and endings. time machine was kind of unique in that it had only one true path through the rest getting the reader caught in a "loop." the more "gamey" ones were Space Ace (which featured points), Wizards Warriors and You (choosing your equipment or spells at the start of your chosen role), and of course the others like Narnia, Lone Wolf/World of Lone Wolf aka Greystar the Wizard (and Highway Warrior which I only heard about but never read), Way of the Tiger, etc. which wanted you to write stuff down on a character sheet (photocopied or in the book itself) and occasionally roll dice, to HeroQuest (there were only three of these but all three featured a standard narrative and then a full gamey section as well as in the 2nd and 3rd books at least --- a whole quest you could import into your heroquest board game). Then there were the star wars books that came out much later, which were pure CYOA and a couple of more gamey West End Games books that weren't based directly on the movies. there are surely many more I'm missing especially those that were released outside the US. wasn't Goosebumps also a game book? I'm sure they continued after their heydey in the 80's and 90's in other forms. I wonder if a Kindle edition of these types of games would work? They can be re-done in the form of a website, but to me nothing beats holding the physical book in your hands (though it can be easier to cheat in this way). I think generally these books were aimed at 10-12 year olds though some of them (like Way of the Tiger) were a little more gruesome and targeted for "YA", teens. CYOA had some simpler books aimed at little kids but these can even be more frustrating because they're so short there isn't much story from a single run through.
I'm only 18 but I've picked a few up recently as a sort of solo ttrpg fix in between d&d games. Must say I'm surprised these aren't more popular today I've been having a great time!
the quality of your presentation is top notch! subbed. yes, this was my era. here in the Philippines, my younger brother, cousins, and friends enjoyed Grailquest, FF, Choose, Wizards Warriors & You, Sagard, Way of the Tiger, and much more. cheers
I’m 24) and I remember playing through the first 2 Sorcery titles, when they were released in videogame format, artwork and all. I just discovered that they were actually game books. This is so cool.
I got curious recently when Ian Livingstone was set to visit the biggest game store in town, but flipping through the new editions of Fighting Fantasy made me think the new publisher thought I was too old to give them another read. The new illustrations are a real shame, and I don't think I'm the only one who's had that kind of reaction to them. A recent TH-cam rabbithole reminded me of the charm of the original illustrations, though, so I finally decided to find a set of the first eight Wizard reprints, which I'm really looking forward to try for the first time since the early 2000s. If that goes well, I'd be very curious to try the Sorcery saga, Lone Wolf and the newer Legendary Kingdoms books. Videos like these really help to bring this cool genre to new audiences, cheers to that!
Cheers! Glad it opens old books to new audiences. There are good and bad things to say when it comes to new editions, but none of them are the focus on this channel. Nostalgia comes first :)
I was a teen in the 1980s living in France (still am!) and I have vivid memories of these magical books; I still have a bunch of the ones translated and published by Gallimard and even French creations (by Hachette Editions) such as the medieval fantasy "La Saga du Prêtre Jean" (feat. Prester John!), or the super-heroic slapstick "Superpouvoirs". I believe they can still be given as gifts to children of all ages, especially the minors. Thank you for giving me the kickstart to read them again in my 50s!
This is AWESOME!!! (subbed!) I have been making several FF and AFF videos lately as I have just discovered them... your video was excellent and taught me a ton! Now I'm off to find some LONE WOLF books!
Man i loved these sorts of books dearly. They were cheap and easy to find (most were in my local library). This was my gateway into Fantasy and Superhero RPGs and I dearly love them.
What a beautiful video. I have fond memories of all the Fighting Fantasy books and Sorcery! series and games. In fact I'm staring at them all on top of my computer desk as I type 🙂 Thanks for the effort in creating this 👍
I live in France and here Gallimard has never stopped publishing them, the better they are coming back into fashion and there are a lot of new authors who are excellent and continue to keep game books alive. Many fighting fantasy have been reissued in large formats and in hardback collectors series
I still remember like it was yesterday playing hooky and telling my parents I was sick just to stay home and play Freeway Fighter ! Those are some great memories. I’m 46 now with two girls and no one to pass on the torch 😂 but still have all my books on the shelf 👍 great video thanks for that !
I wish fewer of the books suffered from "one true path". Ian Livingstone was particularly notorious for this. In that vein death from going left or something equivalent with no basis for a decision sucked. However, when it worked it was really great. The sorcery books were a fantastic example of that.
I played them in the 80s and have loved them ever since. I have them all from fighting fantasy, lonewolf, greystar, bloodsword, way of the tiger, golden dragon fantasy gamebooks, cretan chronicles and more.
Yes, greystar the wizard is a great series. My favourite series is bloodsword where you can play solo or a solo team. Each character is unique especially the sage. I still read gamebooks now.
Lone Wolf was my first gamebook more than twenty years ago, before the advent (in my case) of RPG video games like Final Fantasy. Today I am a father and a software engineer by profession. I was wondering: it might make sense to create an app/website to give new life to this genre of books. Something that allows you to have the experience of pen and paper, but with the possibility of sharing the gaming/reading experience with other people? I'm familiar with the AON project, but I'd like something more gamified.
I own all the Fighting Fantasy game books up to 53? and many others including the Lone Wolf series. I occasionally dust them off an playthrough them, as such they're in a pretty rough shape. This video is a great review or introduction. My favourites are any featuring Russ Nicholson's art.
I fondly remember Forest Of Doom, probably around 1983 or so. Then I got a ZX Spectrum, and all FF books were forgotten - I played text adventures on there from then on.
I loved these as a kid. most of them however I read at the library, rather than owning (had a few CYOA I got as a gift and some Twist a Plot I remember ordering from our elementary school book order catalog). I grabbed lone wolf and way of the tiger before knowing what they even were (based mostly on the cover, I know, kid's don't judge the book by the cover, right!). later in life I have been looking out for them and have gotten some cheap lots of some I remember fondly and some I never knew existed. good fun, albeit some of them were absolute nonsense with purely random good and bad endings, they filled the childhood desire for thrills and scares... some of them were really frustrating teasing you as far as the "big theme" (you never find what you're looking for, get trapped in time, etc). they were a good way to encourage reading while passing the time productively... even the kids who "cheated" by using bookmarks and skipping to the "good" endings still got their practice in!
Exactly! Thanks for sharing your thoughts, really great analysis. Yes kids judge by cover, yes they crave for thrill and scare, and yes this certainly contributed to making kids more literate.
I'm 21 and I played all the Blood Sword game books when I was in elementary and middle school They were amazing, the setting, characters, feel of the world, and combat were amazing, and I have really fond memories of them
These were my childhood. Forest of Doom was my first gamebook. Only missing the last few of the og set. Love these books and I'll never sell them. My faves are House of Hell and the underrated Master of Chaos, which I always wished was double the size; really enjoyed MoC.
In the Uk we had a television series called The book tower. This series dramatized parts of books as a way of enticing children into reading more. One such book was FF1 The Warlock of Firetop Mountain where they dramatized the early encounter of the Guards gambling. Do you sneak past or attack.... I was hooked.
Played my first gamebook "The Forest of Doom" by Ian living stone when I was 11 back in 2005. I didn't know the rules for the game but would still read through it multiple times.
I've only learned about these now and wow!! I kinda wanna figure out how to make a popup book one with a paper doll and a set of actions possible per page that can lead to some other outcome. Or.... something, I only just found out about this but how awesome it would be to create new possibilities!
My first gamebook was "The Warlock of Firetop Mountain", but I had to return it because the book was misprinted, giving the first half of the book twice. So I finished "The Citadel of Chaos" first. I continued buying the books up through "Trial of Champions" (#21). I played many other such book lines: Steve Jackson's "Sorcery!", The "Lone Wolf" series (and its "Grey Star" spinoff), some Ninja series (was that "Way of the Tiger"?), one set of books that was supposed to let two players dogfight (but also had single-player stories), "Be an Interplanetary Spy", and others. I still have a bunch of those books, I think.
My dad bought me my first Fighting Fantasy gamebook back in 1984 when I was 11 and over the years I collected all of the original 50. I only have a handful left now and wholeheartedly regret divesting my collection as they can be worth a small fortune now depending on the title. Growing up in an English inner City in the 1980’s was pretty grim, but thanks to Sir Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson (where’s HIS knighthood?), I had somewhere to escape to and spent more time in Port Blacksand and the other areas of Allansia than I did anywhere else. Sadly, Other people my age found their escape from reality by sniffing glue or stealing things, mine was a more healthy, less risky and enjoyable pursuit. Fighting Fantasy game books were simply wonderful.
Thanks for sharing your experience of that time! I also began reading them in 1984. And yes, for sure this was a healthy occupation of the mind. Even if my dad would prefer me reading "real" books :)
Loved these books and still do. Solo Journaling RPGs and Solo RPGs have, to some extent, brought back this medium (at least in print). However, this is largely because many such games are independent productions made by indie writers and designers, often published as zines or self-published books. Bigger companies are less willing to invest in the concept of game books I think, because you don't hear about any major productions out of a mainstream publisher anymore. I am working on a few solo rpg zines right now (I have two published, but they aren't anything like a gamebook, but the new upcoming ones hew much closer to the concept).
Both myself and brother were obsessed with game books, especially Fighting Fantasy. We would each buy a copy from a second hand store, and swap when we'd finish playing. I remember there was a monthly magazine called Warlock as well.
I am 27 years old, and I have only ever heard of the Choose Your Own Adventure books, but ... not these! And now I really want to check them out! They look incredible and really fun! Which one should I start with and what kind of dice do I need?
It was an entire universe for us kids of the 80s... Glad to hear younger generations are interested. Why not begin from the beginning, with Warlock of Firetop Mountain?
I am 39 and I remember borrowing these books from my local library before eventually buying a bunch of them at my annual bookfair in primary school. I would always buy a few Fighting Fantasy and Mario choose your own adventure books. I still own all of the ones I bought, which are first runs and have some value. I will never part with them though and basically hand them to my daughters when they are older and I am passing so they can sell them off or keep them for the memories. Edit: My eldest daughter, who is 9 now, already likes to read these books with me and loves fighting the monsters. She get really into them, even acting out the fights and certain scenes as we read together. I put on my old my narrative voice and she gets incredibly invested. I just wonder if it will stick once I am gone.
Thanks for sharing, Paul! Very interesting. And you're lucky that your daughter is that much into it: my kids of the same age are not really interested. They played 2-3 books and gave up :)
@@AgeofInk I think with my girls is they have very creative minds. They describe things in great detail and much like me, when they read or hear about things that are exceptionally descriptive, they can see and smell thibgs and places. I myself remember being able to smell the damp cave walls and the old musky wooden boathouse when reading through the Warlock of Firetop Mountain.
This is truly a rabbit hole of wonders. A few years back, I stumbled upon a torn copy of Crown of Kings in a used bookstore. I played Sorcery! in the 80:s, but never the last part. I had to buy it. Then I decided I couldn’t play it without having played the other three first, so I looked them up. And I started to think about Lonewolf. And Way of the Tiger. And Sherlock Holmes Solo Mysteries. Pretty soon I was branching to things I did get around to back then, like Blood Sword and Grey Star the Wizard. Apparently there were also new worlds to explore like Heart of Ice, Dracula and Legendary Kingdoms. Wonderful! The bookshelves grew. Now I even look for interesting projects yet to be released, like Expeditionary Company. It feels good to be back!
Im just 20 and collecting lone wolf and fighting fantasy books both as a collection and to experience them. Theyre great fun and im sure there more people in my gen to share these thoughts
I played these to death! Bought many many FF books, still have a shelf packed with them. Sorcery was the best by miles! Can't believe FF never did another 4 book series, Lone Wolf wasn't quite the same, but good. The best two I ever played were the 6 book "Car Wars" gamebook series and the 6 book "Falcon" gamebook series.. Both 10/10 :)
I discovered warlock of firetop mountain on my own as a 12 or 13 year old in the mid nineties. It was the only one in my small town library in South Africa such a great memories though
I have had to deal with people telling me "hippopotamuses," and "cactuses," and "octopuses" are correct usage now, but I absolutely *will not* accept "dices!"
Sorcery is cool. I keep wanting to do a series like that with a dedicated spell book. That spell book was neat. I have one in process but haven't worked on it in a while. I've written a Fighting and Fantasy style work that has been turned into the editor and hopefully will come out eventually. Good things can't be rushed, right? Most of my books are closer to Joe Dever's Lone Wolf or straight choice based books. Although I always my own spin on it.
I just started the first Lone Wolf book with my son, but the reading level is a bit too difficult for him. Is there a series that you would recommend for him to try?
I was hooked on those books in my early teens back in the 80s after a friend introduced me to those books. He also introduced me later to "Dungeons & Dragons", which I also got hooked. I wished that I had the first 15 titles ( I have 8), and I regret not having bought them when they were very cheap.
I grew up on these. Most of my collection was Fighting Fantasy, with volume 3 of Blood Sword, volume 5 of Lone Wolf and volumes 3 to 5 of Way of the Tiger. And the funky Eternal Champions one based on the videogame. Loved them a lot, though Fighting Fantasy was pretty hit and miss at times. My cousins had the interesting Duelmaster vs series of gamebooks. Wish I owned copies of those, loved the setting and character archetypes.
@@AgeofInk Yeah, it was a hand me down. While I liked it, it was a long saga and I didn't feel like I'd have any chance collecting the full set so I only ever bought Fighting Fantasy instead thanks to their more standalone nature.
It would be cool to have an ordinary RBG boardgame with additional books for each participant. Maybe more like a cartoon with numbers where each book shows the proceedings from the player's perspective sort of....
Hey!! So… …have you tried D100 Dungeons?!? I was a huge gamebook fan in the 1980’s - my favorite was GrailQuest by Herbie Brennan. (I don’t get why it doesn’t get more love?!?). I also played Lone Wolf. But recently, I discovered d100 Dungeon, and I am also exploring two other series- one from the 90’s - Fabled Lands, and a modern day furthering of the concept- Legendary Kingdoms, Valley of Bones. These gamebooks are DIFFERENT in the play pattern. The first I mentioned is radically different. They lean heavier into Game, while still having a “scripted” element. If you haven’t played d100 Dungeons, it has my highest recommendation. I see it as a fundamental innovation in gamebook spaces..!
I'm 22. When I was much younger my dad was going through some boxes of old stuff, he found an old copy of Warlock of Firestop Mountain. He gave it to me and I don't think I've ever beaten it without cheating because I remember no matter what I did the book would just send me back to a paragraph at the start of the loop. Maybe if I went to play it nowadays I'd have no issue. Some years later I picked up Trial of Champions, Return to Firetop Mountain and Crypt of the Sorcerer (I'm convinced you can't beat Razaak without cheating at this point). I went on to play Inkle's digital adaptation of Sorcery! and then the original books, and they remain my favorite to date. So much so that I've turned the Sorcery! series into a DnD adventure to run for my players, with my own twist in it too. They've completed Sorcery and we've decided to continue that campaign in the world of Titan. It's been going for two years and I've ran them several other gamebook encounters and enemies and villains from the series.
Maybe there's a misprint in yours? It says you can pretty much win with any stats, but that's not so in Warlock of Firetop Mountain. You have to beat a specific strong monster in the beginning in order to get something that helps you win later on, which requires you to have good strength or fighting ability. But the idea of the gamebook is interesting. You don't just lose by choosing the wrong path and meeting a sticky ending, but can lose by rolling bad die/dice.
You say of the player, ‘his adventure’ and suchlike, but almost every Fighting Fantasy book was very careful never to gender the reader or character, so that boys & girls could immerse themselves in the story equally. Virtually none give the character a name. I was just replaying _Appointment With F.E.A.R._ today, and it is one of these rare ones. But note how the hero is called the Silver Crusader (not Silver Woman or similar, oft-gendered, superhero name) and their civilian secret identity is Jean Lafayette. That French surname suggests the forename could be taken as the French equivalent of John, or you can read it as the differently-pronounced English name, Jean. Highly calculated ambiguity! In the PC and Android versions of the gamebook, by Tin Man Games, the enhanced interactivity means that you get to choose your superhero’s monicker plus also their sex and consequent selection of hairstyles & costumes. The text then becomes appropriately peppered with _ma'ams_ or _sirs_ that were deliberately missing from the original book. There are a few with slip-ups. I have _Seas of Blood_ in front of me, and it involves vying against Abdul the Butcher for the title ‘King of Pirates’. It’s otherwise scrupulously neutral. I also can’t think of any FF gamebook where it’s implied that any NPC is attracted to or by you. Other series were different. _The Way of the Tiger’s_ protagonist is a monk; Fire*Wolf is a very manly barbarian; Lone Wolf is a Kai Lord.
I always wished Steve Jackson would publish more of Khahabad, the realm where Sorcery! took place. Loved the atmosphere and art from that series. A full rpg/campaign setting would be amazing.
@@AgeofInk ❤️That’s great man. It’s weird, this is the second video I’ve seen on FF in the last few days, but they are both recent. I went looking for it because I had the itch… it’s like the Gen Xers are all waking up from the same dream at the same time. Will check it out, for sure. Best to you and yours.
Good video, i really liked the info. The last part was so cliché i wondered when a mime would walk by with a actual Brigitte and a bottle of wine. No need to get all sappy and philosophical just to get a ending.
These are my childhood massive memory's going to get a book from saved money & many a time tried to write my own ,recently at 44 just bought deathtrap dungeon again,and whilst looking at titles came across the ninja game books that I'd totally forgotten about which I then ordered 3 straight away
In Bulgaria gamebooks were popularized in the 90s (right after the communist regime) by the translator of Tolkien's LOTR. There was a whole pleiad (hehe!) of Bulgarian authors who wrote unique local new gamebooks alongside the translated ones. The Bulgarian gamebooks became so popular that for a time they occupied the top positions for overall bestselling books of any category in the country. They had amazing print run numbers. In total the "first wave" of gamebooks in the 90s were over 200 different volumes. Around the economic crisis towards the end of the decade the market of gamebooks crashed and never fully recovered to its former glory. Since the 00s computer games (especially Diablo and then WoW) overtook the leadership of kid's attention. Nowadays there's a "new wave" of gamebooks and amazing new authors developing even more original mechanics, systems and settings, but it's more of a niche thing for nostalgic older people who grew up with the first wave, and not nearly as popular with the kids anymore - who are now mostly playing video games on phones, tablets, consoles and PC. Alongside the amazing Bulgarian authors of gamebooks, we also had brilliant illustrators and our local gamebooks had absolutely stunning illustrations - both color covers and ink inside page ones. I certainly believe the quality of the Bulgarian gamebooks is so high (both literary and mechanics -wise) that they deserve quality translations in any language for fans of the genre worldwide.
I loved these books so much growing up. The Fighting Fantasy books were evil! I don’t think I ever made it through Deathtrap Dungeon alive! I also remember a Captain America game book that was very faithful to the comics material, called ‘Rocket’s Red Glare’.
It's a nice highlight of the format, but it wholly misses the fact that Flying Buffalo had been doing the same thing for years with the Tunnels and Trolls "Solo Modules," which allowed you to take a character from the standard Table Top game into a professionally written adventure. "Buffalo Castle" came out in the mid 70s. (having just checked it was 1976. WOFTM was 1982) Because they used a full rules set, the T&T solos were like standard rpg mods at the time and aimed at certain classes or levels of characters. And T&T only used d6 (at higher levels you needed a LOT... and however many you are thinking... its probably more than that!) so you didn't need to find somewhere that sold polyhedron dice, you could just raid all your board games. The format was almost identical. Numbered narrative text encounters spread throughout the book in no specific order, each with either a choice, or challenge that when decided, would offer options of which page to turn to next. Some of the more complex ones for say Wizards, would have more options depending on which spell you chose to defeat an enemy, for instance; "Hellbomb Burst" (T&T's far more interesting sounding version of D&D's "Fireball"...) was not a good idea in a confined space with lots of combustibles in the room... and the solos would take that into account. They weren't as tight on the narrative and story lines as the FF or Lone Wolf books, but the actual adventures were superior. It's also worth pointing out that Ian Livingstone wrote the "Deathtrap Dungeon" Fighting Fantasy book in 1984, seven years after Flying Buffalo released their "Deathtrap Equalizer Dungeon". Both of which require you as a player to "take up the challenge" of a deadly dungeon filled with deadly traps and deadly monsters, run by some deadly lunatic or other, with no more motivation than, "Fame, riches, just make something up, cos that's the plot dude... just go with it!" (DED was also the first to account for the idea that a player might choose to come out after fighting an enemy, Heal Up, then go back in...) Quite possibly the greatest thing about them was that a novice DM could use one to get used to running a game for other players by simply reading it out loud to their group, and this was actively encouraged by the writers. The player options were limited to those within the solo, but it was a fantastic way to learn some of the soft skills of being a DM. I was pretty much the "Forever DM" of our group, regardless of what game we were playing. Sometimes one of the players would volunteer to have a go, and I often showed them how to use the T&T solo books as a way to get them into it. Knowing the rules is one thing, writing a great adventure is another, but being able to present the whole thing to a group is the most important skill a good DM can have. Many modern gamers mock T&T for its ultra slim rule-book, compared to the minimum 15 edition expansion model we now "enjoy" as a standard from those pesky Wizards. But it was way ahead of its time in many regards, and as game systems go, it was easily the most accessible. And in the "Rulebook size to Fun" ratio remains, in my opinion anyway, unparalleled.
Thanks for sharing! Heard of T&T but never played it, and D&D neither. So not much to say about them. Played other RPGs, strategy wargames and othet boardgames.
@@AgeofInk T&T was a lot of fun. Like I say, the main difference was that FF were better "story telling" devices, but Flying Buffalo were better examples of a Fantasy Adventure Game. I think Lone Wolf tried to improve on FF with both narrative and in game mechanics. The group I used to play RPGs with were pretty much agreed, that after the first one, Lone Wolf would have been better just as a series of novels without the game elements, as we actually found them quite distracting from the stories. (And that was after playing T&T Solos with a full rules system behind them...) Speaking as someone who came to Fighting Fantasy after playing the Flying Buffalo solo adventures, one thing that always annoyed me about the FF books was if you got a really cool sounding spell, or magic item, and wrote it down on your character sheet, more often than not you then weren't able to use it until the one very specific situation that it was made for. Felt very much like the "Text Driven Computer Adventure Game" phenomenon of the time.
I give a reading workshop in some schools and I use gamebooks. They re always innovative and interesting, more than a video game, a gamebook has a better inmersive experience. animating the art you see in the pages is the best special effects ever and I have noticed that when concentrated and dealing with the multitude of problems you have in these books, they loose the notion of time and it's like retrning form other world.
I got some CYOA books when they first came out. It was interesting reading to an ending, then starting later to "try again." I must have done the "what if" by going back and choosing the alternate decision after a page with an ending I didn't like. I don't think I "mapped" the decision tree as a kid but I must have had some way to account for all the endings so I didn't miss any. Some of the decisions were so random (left or right) with no information as to not really be a decision. And a couple of the early adventures made me feel like, what's the point? What am I doing to solve the mission? In _Who Killed Harlowe Thrombey?_ the murderer is practically ready to confess to anyone, so the best ending is probably when someone gives you $1000 as a reward. In _Your Codename is Jonah_ the information you're supposed to be seeking is in the mail, so shows up regardless of what you do; I guess your secondary mission is to break up a spy ring, but he never tells you that! In _The Third Planet from Altair_ people on Earth decode the message that sent you there while you're exploring the alien planet, so your discoveries don't matter much; you may as well have stayed home! About a dozen years ago I was looking for alternate 2nd-person decision books. I got a couple under the D&D label, but I don't think they were game books. I also found some really terrible ones, by people who obviously didn't know how to make them or what the point was. I mean, when there's only 4 endings and most decisions just branch and link back up to get to the author's intended ending, he/she doesn't really want you to choose! So I found out about the Fighting Fantasy series and picked up a box on Ebay maybe 10 years or so ago (they were originally sold outside the U.S., since they had CAN, UK, AUS, and NZ prices on them, but not dollars). One thing they did differently is had numbered sections or paragraphs rather than devoting a whole page to the result of a decision. I thought it interesting and novel that they used stats and dice and inventory. I did map out the first one, _Warlock of Firetop Mountain._ I discovered you have to beat a strong monster early to get something in order to win, so stats and dice do matter. Another book involved you choosing spells, but when it came down to it, you could pull the curtain to let in the sun and kill the vampire, so what was the point of stats, spells and dice? I think I tried a couple more before giving up. I found at least one where in order to progress you just had to roll high stats at the start followed by good dice throughout, and if you failed a die/dice roll you were done and had to start over. Maybe I should have cheated? Someone said that if they got bad starting stats they quit and started over until they got high ones. If I ever get in the mood again, I'll try another one.
They were far from perfect but overall they offered quite a good experience. Thanks for sharing your own experience and your thoughts about this cultural phenomenon! You should give the Lone Wolf series a try someday
I had the whole collection as a teenager, but stupidly got rid of them as I had too many books and moved so many times as an adult, I've regretted it ever since.
I am 50 and I can proudly say I still have all my Lone WOlf books and some of my Fighting Fantasy books. Great nostalgic video.
Thanks for sharing and glad you still have then. Keep them well
@@AgeofInk I keep them well perserved. Old friends like that you treat like gods.
I'm 20, and I've got plenty of fond memories of game books like these, especially the Sorcery series, and the way of the tiger series from knight books. My dad had a small collection of game books, and my brother and I used to sit around on rainy days playing them. Good times.
Glad to see that younger generations are also into these!
I'm just 26 and I love game books. I first played it in India when I was reading Goosebumps.
You know what I want? A Pokémon gamebook. Or, some kind of Monster Tamer gamebook.
The Pokémon could function as a combination of combat and items. "If you have an electric Pokémon, turn to page 45"
I've seen a few "Roll & Write" games inspired by Pokemon, but I doubt there will ever be an official one.
I played them, I loved them and I still have them on my shelf. :)
Awesome memories of great books
@6:00 my uncle had a full bookcase of CYOA books in the late 1980s... made me a fan.
Looking at those was amazing, but I couldn't open them until I had my own. Being too sensitive, the books could not be handled by a kid in my uncle's will to keep them pristine. He started gifting me Lone Wolf books for birthday and chritmas. Got them to this day. 1-20, 21,22,26. Just bought 29 yesterday. Have 30-32 on the way, and once the reprints of those in the 20s i'm missing are out my libraire will let me know!
My brothers had the Fighting Fantasy series in the early 80's.
30 years later, I bought them again for my nephews to play.
They loved them too.
I have 18 of the 20 Lone Wolf books released in the USA. Absolutely started my love of gaming!!
That's great, thanks for sharing!
These videos are outstanding and fun!
Please, please, please more!
MORE!!! 🙂
Thanks :)
Please do tell me which ones you've liked the most.
@@AgeofInk
This one. Plus the Sorcery series vid!
Though your Tolkien vids are also super fun.
You’ve a great voice and command over your scripts.
Don’t be afraid of many more, nor how you wish to do them.
Don’t second guess yourself.
Do as you’ve been doing, as what you’ve done, especially more recently, has been super solid!
I wish you well moving forward!
I’m 33. We had game books and they were popular. Growing up in the 90s, we had video games as well, however, most were not engrossing unless you played a lot of RPGs. Since I played RPGs, I fell in love with these after looking at the front covers and seeing lizard men, orcs, wizards, and warriors. I was an avid reader of Tolkien and later on would read Malazan, Stormlight, and Wheel of Time series. These books, helped shape what later on, I decided was an integral part of my personality. So, that being said, I would say under 30 years old and you probably haven’t read/played a game book. I met Steve Jackson at a gaming convention and we talked for probably 45 minutes while we played a copy of his newest game he was releasing in 2002. Sure, the craze has died down, but there are still those of us who collect these and hold them dear to our hearts.
Thanks for sharing! Wonderful covers indeed
Beautiful short video. I am a 90´s kid that first inherited FF books from my older brother. I guess i was very lucky, being in that exact time before videogames became really big. Thanks to that i was able to fully enjoy such amazing books and to this day they have shaped my taste in fantasy, writing and art.
Absolutely right. And thank you for your interest and your feedback!
I loved Choose Your Own Adventure books as a kid, and when I found my first copy of a Fighting Fantasy book (Warlock of Firetop Mountain), in an amazing little used book shop, I thought I had found something truly magical. Seriously, I remember feeling like, in that moment, I was in one of the 80's fantasy films I grew up watching.
I had been playing D&D for a while at that point, but this book was something different, something perfect for when I couldn't make it to the game store or was away from my hometown. It was MY adventure and MY journey into a magical land. That felt amazing.
I experienced something like that too!
There was something really special with these books.
I'm 24 and I've been writing one for two years! It's the biggest gamebook ever made.
Wow, that's interesting indeed!
Can you comment here when you finish it?
Link to a preview?
Awesome!
@@TheMegaRedHead It's finished, but it's going to take a while to edit things, playtest it and complete the illustrations.
I grew up with the Lone Wolf books. I had a copy of The Magnamund Companion which I poured over like it was a real encyclopedia.
The very best.
As a French dude I have to thank you because I never understood before why on the internet they were all looking from different editors... because it was the case! haha
Exactly ,)
And French dude here as well ;)
As a kid I read Give Yourself Goosebumps and I read the hell out of them!
the ones I remember were Choose your Own Adventure (the most popular name everybody remembers) but also twist a plot, find your fate, which way, and some licensed franchise spinoffs from these (star trek, doctor who, indiana jones, etc) and many one-offs using similar mechanics of choices sending you to different pages and endings. time machine was kind of unique in that it had only one true path through the rest getting the reader caught in a "loop." the more "gamey" ones were Space Ace (which featured points), Wizards Warriors and You (choosing your equipment or spells at the start of your chosen role), and of course the others like Narnia, Lone Wolf/World of Lone Wolf aka Greystar the Wizard (and Highway Warrior which I only heard about but never read), Way of the Tiger, etc. which wanted you to write stuff down on a character sheet (photocopied or in the book itself) and occasionally roll dice, to HeroQuest (there were only three of these but all three featured a standard narrative and then a full gamey section as well as in the 2nd and 3rd books at least --- a whole quest you could import into your heroquest board game). Then there were the star wars books that came out much later, which were pure CYOA and a couple of more gamey West End Games books that weren't based directly on the movies. there are surely many more I'm missing especially those that were released outside the US. wasn't Goosebumps also a game book? I'm sure they continued after their heydey in the 80's and 90's in other forms. I wonder if a Kindle edition of these types of games would work? They can be re-done in the form of a website, but to me nothing beats holding the physical book in your hands (though it can be easier to cheat in this way). I think generally these books were aimed at 10-12 year olds though some of them (like Way of the Tiger) were a little more gruesome and targeted for "YA", teens. CYOA had some simpler books aimed at little kids but these can even be more frustrating because they're so short there isn't much story from a single run through.
Again, many thanks for sharing, it's really appreciated!
Cool story bro
"Give Yourself Goosebumps" was the Goosebumps take on Gamebooks.
I'm only 18 but I've picked a few up recently as a sort of solo ttrpg fix in between d&d games. Must say I'm surprised these aren't more popular today I've been having a great time!
Glad to hear that my friend!
the quality of your presentation is top notch! subbed. yes, this was my era. here in the Philippines, my younger brother, cousins, and friends enjoyed Grailquest, FF, Choose, Wizards Warriors & You, Sagard, Way of the Tiger, and much more. cheers
Wow, good to know! Thank you for your feedback and your interest
I’m 24) and I remember playing through the first 2 Sorcery titles, when they were released in videogame format, artwork and all. I just discovered that they were actually game books. This is so cool.
Thanks for your interest
I got curious recently when Ian Livingstone was set to visit the biggest game store in town, but flipping through the new editions of Fighting Fantasy made me think the new publisher thought I was too old to give them another read.
The new illustrations are a real shame, and I don't think I'm the only one who's had that kind of reaction to them.
A recent TH-cam rabbithole reminded me of the charm of the original illustrations, though, so I finally decided to find a set of the first eight Wizard reprints, which I'm really looking forward to try for the first time since the early 2000s. If that goes well, I'd be very curious to try the Sorcery saga, Lone Wolf and the newer Legendary Kingdoms books.
Videos like these really help to bring this cool genre to new audiences, cheers to that!
Cheers!
Glad it opens old books to new audiences. There are good and bad things to say when it comes to new editions, but none of them are the focus on this channel. Nostalgia comes first :)
I was a teen in the 1980s living in France (still am!) and I have vivid memories of these magical books; I still have a bunch of the ones translated and published by Gallimard and even French creations (by Hachette Editions) such as the medieval fantasy "La Saga du Prêtre Jean" (feat. Prester John!), or the super-heroic slapstick "Superpouvoirs". I believe they can still be given as gifts to children of all ages, especially the minors. Thank you for giving me the kickstart to read them again in my 50s!
You're welcome sir!
Toute notre jeunesse...
Eh oui! 😀 @@AgeofInk
This is AWESOME!!! (subbed!) I have been making several FF and AFF videos lately as I have just discovered them... your video was excellent and taught me a ton! Now I'm off to find some LONE WOLF books!
Glad to hear that!
Lone Wolf is planned next after Tolkien
Man i loved these sorts of books dearly. They were cheap and easy to find (most were in my local library). This was my gateway into Fantasy and Superhero RPGs and I dearly love them.
Ah...I remember my 80s. I miss those books and those times. They were amazing.
What a beautiful video. I have fond memories of all the Fighting Fantasy books and Sorcery! series and games. In fact I'm staring at them all on top of my computer desk as I type 🙂 Thanks for the effort in creating this 👍
Thanks for your interest!
Next in line, the Golden Dragon series...
I live in France and here Gallimard has never stopped publishing them, the better they are coming back into fashion and there are a lot of new authors who are excellent and continue to keep game books alive. Many fighting fantasy have been reissued in large formats and in hardback collectors series
Thanks for sharing!
I wish this video was 10 times longer. Wonderful stuff!
Glad you enjoyed!
"If you are under 35" would be more accurate.
Being 41, it literally was my introduction to fantasy RPG, LONE WOLF!!!
This takes me back. Now I need to get some and even better get some on my iPad.
I still remember like it was yesterday playing hooky and telling my parents I was sick just to stay home and play Freeway Fighter ! Those are some great memories. I’m 46 now with two girls and no one to pass on the torch 😂 but still have all my books on the shelf 👍 great video thanks for that !
Almost same story here... Same age, but boys instead of girls ;)
Trying to interest them with the books...
I wish fewer of the books suffered from "one true path". Ian Livingstone was particularly notorious for this. In that vein death from going left or something equivalent with no basis for a decision sucked. However, when it worked it was really great. The sorcery books were a fantastic example of that.
That means that Steve Jackson was another notorious for this, since he wrote the series
45 here, I loved SJ and IL FF books, used to rent them from the local library's, got me into D&D ...oh and mad max thanks to freeway fighter.
Thanks for sharing!
I am 9 and my biggest interest is fighting fantasy (I love Creature of Havoc)
You did an amazing job covering this topic
Many thanks Mohammed
I've just started playing Forest Of Doom again for the first time in nearly 40 years. Nice video, thank you.
Thanks for sharing!
I played them in the 80s and have loved them ever since. I have them all from fighting fantasy, lonewolf, greystar, bloodsword, way of the tiger, golden dragon fantasy gamebooks, cretan chronicles and more.
Wow, the whole lot?! Awesome 😀
I think many of them are underrated, for instance Grey Star the Wizard.
Yes, greystar the wizard is a great series. My favourite series is bloodsword where you can play solo or a solo team. Each character is unique especially the sage. I still read gamebooks now.
I really enjoyed the history of these. I had a great time playing and collecting them when I was younger.
Thanks for sharing and glad you enjoyed!
19 years old , father introduced me to these and i still have a massive collection
Thanks for sharing!
Lone Wolf was my first gamebook more than twenty years ago, before the advent (in my case) of RPG video games like Final Fantasy. Today I am a father and a software engineer by profession. I was wondering: it might make sense to create an app/website to give new life to this genre of books. Something that allows you to have the experience of pen and paper, but with the possibility of sharing the gaming/reading experience with other people? I'm familiar with the AON project, but I'd like something more gamified.
Thanks for sharing!
As for me, pen and paper only :)
Wonderfully informative and beautifully filmed.
Glad you enjoyed, thanks for your interest!
I had all of the Fighting Fantasy books back in the day. We used to photocopy the adventure sheets so we didn't ruin the book.
I own all the Fighting Fantasy game books up to 53? and many others including the Lone Wolf series. I occasionally dust them off an playthrough them, as such they're in a pretty rough shape. This video is a great review or introduction. My favourites are any featuring Russ Nicholson's art.
Great :)
Thanks for your feedback. It's good to know that people still play those legends.
Citadel of Chaos still haunts my dreams. You have a lovely collection.
...Also, Russ Nicholson hype!
Thanks for your interest!
I fondly remember Forest Of Doom, probably around 1983 or so. Then I got a ZX Spectrum, and all FF books were forgotten - I played text adventures on there from then on.
I loved these as a kid. most of them however I read at the library, rather than owning (had a few CYOA I got as a gift and some Twist a Plot I remember ordering from our elementary school book order catalog). I grabbed lone wolf and way of the tiger before knowing what they even were (based mostly on the cover, I know, kid's don't judge the book by the cover, right!). later in life I have been looking out for them and have gotten some cheap lots of some I remember fondly and some I never knew existed. good fun, albeit some of them were absolute nonsense with purely random good and bad endings, they filled the childhood desire for thrills and scares... some of them were really frustrating teasing you as far as the "big theme" (you never find what you're looking for, get trapped in time, etc). they were a good way to encourage reading while passing the time productively... even the kids who "cheated" by using bookmarks and skipping to the "good" endings still got their practice in!
Exactly! Thanks for sharing your thoughts, really great analysis. Yes kids judge by cover, yes they crave for thrill and scare, and yes this certainly contributed to making kids more literate.
Great video mate! I really liked the documentary style you used. Entertaining and informative
Thanks a lot mate, appreciated!
Unfortunately for me, they were not in my area in the 80's. I definitely would have got them.
I'm 21 and I played all the Blood Sword game books when I was in elementary and middle school
They were amazing, the setting, characters, feel of the world, and combat were amazing, and I have really fond memories of them
Very good books. Thanks for your feedback!
These were my childhood. Forest of Doom was my first gamebook. Only missing the last few of the og set. Love these books and I'll never sell them. My faves are House of Hell and the underrated Master of Chaos, which I always wished was double the size; really enjoyed MoC.
Thanks for sharing. I too began with Forest of Doom.
In the Uk we had a television series called The book tower.
This series dramatized parts of books as a way of enticing children into reading more.
One such book was FF1 The Warlock of Firetop Mountain where they dramatized the early encounter of the Guards gambling. Do you sneak past or attack.... I was hooked.
Thanks for sharing :)
Played my first gamebook "The Forest of Doom" by Ian living stone when I was 11 back in 2005. I didn't know the rules for the game but would still read through it multiple times.
Thanks for sharing your experience
Fantastic overview. Thanks for uploading Age! 👍
Glad you enjoyed it!
I've only learned about these now and wow!! I kinda wanna figure out how to make a popup book one with a paper doll and a set of actions possible per page that can lead to some other outcome. Or.... something, I only just found out about this but how awesome it would be to create new possibilities!
Thanks for sharing!
My first gamebook was "The Warlock of Firetop Mountain", but I had to return it because the book was misprinted, giving the first half of the book twice. So I finished "The Citadel of Chaos" first. I continued buying the books up through "Trial of Champions" (#21).
I played many other such book lines: Steve Jackson's "Sorcery!", The "Lone Wolf" series (and its "Grey Star" spinoff), some Ninja series (was that "Way of the Tiger"?), one set of books that was supposed to let two players dogfight (but also had single-player stories), "Be an Interplanetary Spy", and others.
I still have a bunch of those books, I think.
Yes, that was Way of the Tiger.
And what about Golden Dragon? That's my latest video study here.
@@AgeofInk I don't think I had those, though they look a little bit familiar.
My dad bought me my first Fighting Fantasy gamebook back in 1984 when I was 11 and over the years I collected all of the original 50. I only have a handful left now and wholeheartedly regret divesting my collection as they can be worth a small fortune now depending on the title.
Growing up in an English inner City in the 1980’s was pretty grim, but thanks to Sir Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson (where’s HIS knighthood?), I had somewhere to escape to and spent more time in Port Blacksand and the other areas of Allansia than I did anywhere else.
Sadly, Other people my age found their escape from reality by sniffing glue or stealing things, mine was a more healthy, less risky and enjoyable pursuit.
Fighting Fantasy game books were simply wonderful.
Thanks for sharing your experience of that time! I also began reading them in 1984. And yes, for sure this was a healthy occupation of the mind. Even if my dad would prefer me reading "real" books :)
Loved these books and still do. Solo Journaling RPGs and Solo RPGs have, to some extent, brought back this medium (at least in print). However, this is largely because many such games are independent productions made by indie writers and designers, often published as zines or self-published books. Bigger companies are less willing to invest in the concept of game books I think, because you don't hear about any major productions out of a mainstream publisher anymore. I am working on a few solo rpg zines right now (I have two published, but they aren't anything like a gamebook, but the new upcoming ones hew much closer to the concept).
That's correct. Thanks for your feedback
Both myself and brother were obsessed with game books, especially Fighting Fantasy. We would each buy a copy from a second hand store, and swap when we'd finish playing. I remember there was a monthly magazine called Warlock as well.
Thanks for sharing your experience
Currently playing forest of doom and recently creature of havoc lot's of fun for solo play reminds me of D &D so much.
I am 27 years old, and I have only ever heard of the Choose Your Own Adventure books, but ... not these! And now I really want to check them out! They look incredible and really fun! Which one should I start with and what kind of dice do I need?
It was an entire universe for us kids of the 80s... Glad to hear younger generations are interested. Why not begin from the beginning, with Warlock of Firetop Mountain?
I am 39 and I remember borrowing these books from my local library before eventually buying a bunch of them at my annual bookfair in primary school. I would always buy a few Fighting Fantasy and Mario choose your own adventure books. I still own all of the ones I bought, which are first runs and have some value. I will never part with them though and basically hand them to my daughters when they are older and I am passing so they can sell them off or keep them for the memories.
Edit: My eldest daughter, who is 9 now, already likes to read these books with me and loves fighting the monsters. She get really into them, even acting out the fights and certain scenes as we read together. I put on my old my narrative voice and she gets incredibly invested. I just wonder if it will stick once I am gone.
Thanks for sharing, Paul!
Very interesting. And you're lucky that your daughter is that much into it: my kids of the same age are not really interested. They played 2-3 books and gave up :)
@@AgeofInk I think with my girls is they have very creative minds. They describe things in great detail and much like me, when they read or hear about things that are exceptionally descriptive, they can see and smell thibgs and places. I myself remember being able to smell the damp cave walls and the old musky wooden boathouse when reading through the Warlock of Firetop Mountain.
This is truly a rabbit hole of wonders. A few years back, I stumbled upon a torn copy of Crown of Kings in a used bookstore. I played Sorcery! in the 80:s, but never the last part. I had to buy it. Then I decided I couldn’t play it without having played the other three first, so I looked them up. And I started to think about Lonewolf. And Way of the Tiger. And Sherlock Holmes Solo Mysteries. Pretty soon I was branching to things I did get around to back then, like Blood Sword and Grey Star the Wizard. Apparently there were also new worlds to explore like Heart of Ice, Dracula and Legendary Kingdoms. Wonderful! The bookshelves grew. Now I even look for interesting projects yet to be released, like Expeditionary Company. It feels good to be back!
Thanks for sharing your thoughts about this wonderful world!
Im just 20 and collecting lone wolf and fighting fantasy books both as a collection and to experience them. Theyre great fun and im sure there more people in my gen to share these thoughts
Good to know! Thank you for sharing
I played these to death! Bought many many FF books, still have a shelf packed with them. Sorcery was the best by miles! Can't believe FF never did another 4 book series, Lone Wolf wasn't quite the same, but good. The best two I ever played were the 6 book "Car Wars" gamebook series and the 6 book "Falcon" gamebook series.. Both 10/10 :)
Thanks for sharing!
Hi sir Can I ask what tune is playing at 2.58 please? Lovely tune.
It's called Macedon is Yours, you can find it in TH-cam's free content library
I always enjoyed the randomness of the dice life or death at each roll .
It's thrilling indeed
I discovered warlock of firetop mountain on my own as a 12 or 13 year old in the mid nineties. It was the only one in my small town library in South Africa such a great memories though
Good to know you could still come across one at this time!
I have had to deal with people telling me "hippopotamuses," and "cactuses," and "octopuses" are correct usage now, but I absolutely *will not* accept "dices!"
ok noted ;)
I nearly clicked off the video, as soon as I heard that. Oof.
Sorcery is cool. I keep wanting to do a series like that with a dedicated spell book. That spell book was neat. I have one in process but haven't worked on it in a while. I've written a Fighting and Fantasy style work that has been turned into the editor and hopefully will come out eventually. Good things can't be rushed, right? Most of my books are closer to Joe Dever's Lone Wolf or straight choice based books. Although I always my own spin on it.
I just started the first Lone Wolf book with my son, but the reading level is a bit too difficult for him. Is there a series that you would recommend for him to try?
Golden Dragon. Simple and efficient.
I was hooked on those books in my early teens back in the 80s after a friend introduced me to those books.
He also introduced me later to "Dungeons & Dragons", which I also got hooked.
I wished that I had the first 15 titles ( I have 8), and I regret not having bought them when they were very cheap.
Thanks for sharing!
They are still cheap for some of them.
Oh these are the Choose your own adventure books, i remember these.
Hop un abonné en plus. Vraiment quelle epoque . J'aimerais tellement voir l'univers de Sorcery et d'autres se developper depuis des decennies ^^
C'est clair. A défaut de pouvoir directement développer ces univers, on peut déjà faire leur promotion en vidéo!
I grew up on these. Most of my collection was Fighting Fantasy, with volume 3 of Blood Sword, volume 5 of Lone Wolf and volumes 3 to 5 of Way of the Tiger. And the funky Eternal Champions one based on the videogame. Loved them a lot, though Fighting Fantasy was pretty hit and miss at times. My cousins had the interesting Duelmaster vs series of gamebooks. Wish I owned copies of those, loved the setting and character archetypes.
Only one from Lone Wolf?
@@AgeofInk Yeah, it was a hand me down. While I liked it, it was a long saga and I didn't feel like I'd have any chance collecting the full set so I only ever bought Fighting Fantasy instead thanks to their more standalone nature.
Oh and Way of the Tiger was my brother's, he has no interest anymore so I kept the books.
Great video!
It would be cool to have an ordinary RBG boardgame with additional books for each participant. Maybe more like a cartoon with numbers where each book shows the proceedings from the player's perspective sort of....
Interesting idea!
i remember these i would really love to have one of these as a visual novel game like bringing this style of book to life
Sure
Hey!! So… …have you tried D100 Dungeons?!? I was a huge gamebook fan in the 1980’s - my favorite was GrailQuest by Herbie Brennan. (I don’t get why it doesn’t get more love?!?). I also played Lone Wolf. But recently, I discovered d100 Dungeon, and I am also exploring two other series- one from the 90’s - Fabled Lands, and a modern day furthering of the concept- Legendary Kingdoms, Valley of Bones.
These gamebooks are DIFFERENT in the play pattern. The first I mentioned is radically different. They lean heavier into Game, while still having a “scripted” element. If you haven’t played d100 Dungeons, it has my highest recommendation.
I see it as a fundamental innovation in gamebook spaces..!
Played Grailquest as well as Demonspawn yea. And many other "non standard" series. Don't know about d100 Dungeons but thanks for sharing!
I'm 22. When I was much younger my dad was going through some boxes of old stuff, he found an old copy of Warlock of Firestop Mountain. He gave it to me and I don't think I've ever beaten it without cheating because I remember no matter what I did the book would just send me back to a paragraph at the start of the loop. Maybe if I went to play it nowadays I'd have no issue. Some years later I picked up Trial of Champions, Return to Firetop Mountain and Crypt of the Sorcerer (I'm convinced you can't beat Razaak without cheating at this point). I went on to play Inkle's digital adaptation of Sorcery! and then the original books, and they remain my favorite to date. So much so that I've turned the Sorcery! series into a DnD adventure to run for my players, with my own twist in it too. They've completed Sorcery and we've decided to continue that campaign in the world of Titan. It's been going for two years and I've ran them several other gamebook encounters and enemies and villains from the series.
Very interesting, thanks for sharing! Adapting Sorcery to DnD was the right thing to do for sure :)
You're right this series is very good.
Maybe there's a misprint in yours?
It says you can pretty much win with any stats, but that's not so in Warlock of Firetop Mountain. You have to beat a specific strong monster in the beginning in order to get something that helps you win later on, which requires you to have good strength or fighting ability. But the idea of the gamebook is interesting. You don't just lose by choosing the wrong path and meeting a sticky ending, but can lose by rolling bad die/dice.
Game books where great entertainment. Fighting Fantasy where my favorite, but I remember some others focused on D&D worlds. Such great times
Great times indeed, thanks for sharing!
You say of the player, ‘his adventure’ and suchlike, but almost every Fighting Fantasy book was very careful never to gender the reader or character, so that boys & girls could immerse themselves in the story equally.
Virtually none give the character a name. I was just replaying _Appointment With F.E.A.R._ today, and it is one of these rare ones. But note how the hero is called the Silver Crusader (not Silver Woman or similar, oft-gendered, superhero name) and their civilian secret identity is Jean Lafayette. That French surname suggests the forename could be taken as the French equivalent of John, or you can read it as the differently-pronounced English name, Jean. Highly calculated ambiguity! In the PC and Android versions of the gamebook, by Tin Man Games, the enhanced interactivity means that you get to choose your superhero’s monicker plus also their sex and consequent selection of hairstyles & costumes. The text then becomes appropriately peppered with _ma'ams_ or _sirs_ that were deliberately missing from the original book.
There are a few with slip-ups. I have _Seas of Blood_ in front of me, and it involves vying against Abdul the Butcher for the title ‘King of Pirates’. It’s otherwise scrupulously neutral. I also can’t think of any FF gamebook where it’s implied that any NPC is attracted to or by you.
Other series were different. _The Way of the Tiger’s_ protagonist is a monk; Fire*Wolf is a very manly barbarian; Lone Wolf is a Kai Lord.
That's right, many thanks for the awesome feedback!
I always wished Steve Jackson would publish more of Khahabad, the realm where Sorcery! took place. Loved the atmosphere and art from that series. A full rpg/campaign setting would be amazing.
Planning a next video about it!
@@AgeofInk ❤️That’s great man. It’s weird, this is the second video I’ve seen on FF in the last few days, but they are both recent. I went looking for it because I had the itch… it’s like the Gen Xers are all waking up from the same dream at the same time. Will check it out, for sure. Best to you and yours.
I first saw these books in my elementary school's library in the 90's, before the internet, PC, and even Console got big and occupied our time.
I loved the fighting fantasy books.
Sorcery was how I got into these kinds of books, and I sure as hell ain't leavin.
Good video, i really liked the info. The last part was so cliché i wondered when a mime would walk by with a actual Brigitte and a bottle of wine. No need to get all sappy and philosophical just to get a ending.
the world should know about French version gamebooks
As french all readed in the same collection :)
These books also started my life journey into rpg games and gaming in general
Thanks for sharing your experience!
How can one find the gamebooks in French? The ones shown in the video look brand new.
I have bought them over years in used book shops here in France. You can find them on ebay.fr for instance
These are my childhood massive memory's going to get a book from saved money & many a time tried to write my own ,recently at 44 just bought deathtrap dungeon again,and whilst looking at titles came across the ninja game books that I'd totally forgotten about which I then ordered 3 straight away
Thanks for sharing your personal experience!
In Bulgaria gamebooks were popularized in the 90s (right after the communist regime) by the translator of Tolkien's LOTR. There was a whole pleiad (hehe!) of Bulgarian authors who wrote unique local new gamebooks alongside the translated ones. The Bulgarian gamebooks became so popular that for a time they occupied the top positions for overall bestselling books of any category in the country. They had amazing print run numbers. In total the "first wave" of gamebooks in the 90s were over 200 different volumes. Around the economic crisis towards the end of the decade the market of gamebooks crashed and never fully recovered to its former glory. Since the 00s computer games (especially Diablo and then WoW) overtook the leadership of kid's attention. Nowadays there's a "new wave" of gamebooks and amazing new authors developing even more original mechanics, systems and settings, but it's more of a niche thing for nostalgic older people who grew up with the first wave, and not nearly as popular with the kids anymore - who are now mostly playing video games on phones, tablets, consoles and PC. Alongside the amazing Bulgarian authors of gamebooks, we also had brilliant illustrators and our local gamebooks had absolutely stunning illustrations - both color covers and ink inside page ones. I certainly believe the quality of the Bulgarian gamebooks is so high (both literary and mechanics -wise) that they deserve quality translations in any language for fans of the genre worldwide.
Thanks for sharing!
Indeed it would be interesting to know of Bulgarian gamebook translations
I loved these books so much growing up. The Fighting Fantasy books were evil! I don’t think I ever made it through Deathtrap Dungeon alive! I also remember a Captain America game book that was very faithful to the comics material, called ‘Rocket’s Red Glare’.
Thanks for sharing!
Still play today, with a group of friends, socially. Like every few months.
Im 42 btw.
So cool! Thanks for sharing
Choose your own adventure was fun
It's a nice highlight of the format, but it wholly misses the fact that Flying Buffalo had been doing the same thing for years with the Tunnels and Trolls "Solo Modules," which allowed you to take a character from the standard Table Top game into a professionally written adventure.
"Buffalo Castle" came out in the mid 70s. (having just checked it was 1976. WOFTM was 1982)
Because they used a full rules set, the T&T solos were like standard rpg mods at the time and aimed at certain classes or levels of characters. And T&T only used d6 (at higher levels you needed a LOT... and however many you are thinking... its probably more than that!) so you didn't need to find somewhere that sold polyhedron dice, you could just raid all your board games.
The format was almost identical. Numbered narrative text encounters spread throughout the book in no specific order, each with either a choice, or challenge that when decided, would offer options of which page to turn to next. Some of the more complex ones for say Wizards, would have more options depending on which spell you chose to defeat an enemy, for instance; "Hellbomb Burst" (T&T's far more interesting sounding version of D&D's "Fireball"...) was not a good idea in a confined space with lots of combustibles in the room... and the solos would take that into account.
They weren't as tight on the narrative and story lines as the FF or Lone Wolf books, but the actual adventures were superior.
It's also worth pointing out that Ian Livingstone wrote the "Deathtrap Dungeon" Fighting Fantasy book in 1984, seven years after Flying Buffalo released their "Deathtrap Equalizer Dungeon". Both of which require you as a player to "take up the challenge" of a deadly dungeon filled with deadly traps and deadly monsters, run by some deadly lunatic or other, with no more motivation than, "Fame, riches, just make something up, cos that's the plot dude... just go with it!"
(DED was also the first to account for the idea that a player might choose to come out after fighting an enemy, Heal Up, then go back in...)
Quite possibly the greatest thing about them was that a novice DM could use one to get used to running a game for other players by simply reading it out loud to their group, and this was actively encouraged by the writers.
The player options were limited to those within the solo, but it was a fantastic way to learn some of the soft skills of being a DM. I was pretty much the "Forever DM" of our group, regardless of what game we were playing. Sometimes one of the players would volunteer to have a go, and I often showed them how to use the T&T solo books as a way to get them into it. Knowing the rules is one thing, writing a great adventure is another, but being able to present the whole thing to a group is the most important skill a good DM can have.
Many modern gamers mock T&T for its ultra slim rule-book, compared to the minimum 15 edition expansion model we now "enjoy" as a standard from those pesky Wizards. But it was way ahead of its time in many regards, and as game systems go, it was easily the most accessible. And in the "Rulebook size to Fun" ratio remains, in my opinion anyway, unparalleled.
Thanks for sharing! Heard of T&T but never played it, and D&D neither. So not much to say about them. Played other RPGs, strategy wargames and othet boardgames.
@@AgeofInk T&T was a lot of fun. Like I say, the main difference was that FF were better "story telling" devices, but Flying Buffalo were better examples of a Fantasy Adventure Game. I think Lone Wolf tried to improve on FF with both narrative and in game mechanics. The group I used to play RPGs with were pretty much agreed, that after the first one, Lone Wolf would have been better just as a series of novels without the game elements, as we actually found them quite distracting from the stories. (And that was after playing T&T Solos with a full rules system behind them...)
Speaking as someone who came to Fighting Fantasy after playing the Flying Buffalo solo adventures, one thing that always annoyed me about the FF books was if you got a really cool sounding spell, or magic item, and wrote it down on your character sheet, more often than not you then weren't able to use it until the one very specific situation that it was made for.
Felt very much like the "Text Driven Computer Adventure Game" phenomenon of the time.
@@andrewtomlinson5237 Good to know :)
Thanks for sharing this feedback
I give a reading workshop in some schools and I use gamebooks. They re always innovative and interesting, more than a video game, a gamebook has a better inmersive experience. animating the art you see in the pages is the best special effects ever and I have noticed that when concentrated and dealing with the multitude of problems you have in these books, they loose the notion of time and it's like retrning form other world.
They are quite something indeed.
I got some CYOA books when they first came out. It was interesting reading to an ending, then starting later to "try again." I must have done the "what if" by going back and choosing the alternate decision after a page with an ending I didn't like. I don't think I "mapped" the decision tree as a kid but I must have had some way to account for all the endings so I didn't miss any. Some of the decisions were so random (left or right) with no information as to not really be a decision. And a couple of the early adventures made me feel like, what's the point? What am I doing to solve the mission? In _Who Killed Harlowe Thrombey?_ the murderer is practically ready to confess to anyone, so the best ending is probably when someone gives you $1000 as a reward. In _Your Codename is Jonah_ the information you're supposed to be seeking is in the mail, so shows up regardless of what you do; I guess your secondary mission is to break up a spy ring, but he never tells you that! In _The Third Planet from Altair_ people on Earth decode the message that sent you there while you're exploring the alien planet, so your discoveries don't matter much; you may as well have stayed home!
About a dozen years ago I was looking for alternate 2nd-person decision books. I got a couple under the D&D label, but I don't think they were game books. I also found some really terrible ones, by people who obviously didn't know how to make them or what the point was. I mean, when there's only 4 endings and most decisions just branch and link back up to get to the author's intended ending, he/she doesn't really want you to choose!
So I found out about the Fighting Fantasy series and picked up a box on Ebay maybe 10 years or so ago (they were originally sold outside the U.S., since they had CAN, UK, AUS, and NZ prices on them, but not dollars). One thing they did differently is had numbered sections or paragraphs rather than devoting a whole page to the result of a decision. I thought it interesting and novel that they used stats and dice and inventory. I did map out the first one, _Warlock of Firetop Mountain._ I discovered you have to beat a strong monster early to get something in order to win, so stats and dice do matter. Another book involved you choosing spells, but when it came down to it, you could pull the curtain to let in the sun and kill the vampire, so what was the point of stats, spells and dice? I think I tried a couple more before giving up. I found at least one where in order to progress you just had to roll high stats at the start followed by good dice throughout, and if you failed a die/dice roll you were done and had to start over. Maybe I should have cheated? Someone said that if they got bad starting stats they quit and started over until they got high ones. If I ever get in the mood again, I'll try another one.
They were far from perfect but overall they offered quite a good experience. Thanks for sharing your own experience and your thoughts about this cultural phenomenon!
You should give the Lone Wolf series a try someday
Thanks
In Denmark we have "Sværd og troldom" wich translate to "Swords and sorcery"
So Troldom is Sorcery in Danish. Interesting!
I had the whole collection as a teenager, but stupidly got rid of them as I had too many books and moved so many times as an adult, I've regretted it ever since.
Same here...