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Post by nathanh on Oct 23, 2021 21:18:06 GMT
I find the "limitation" of the standard gamebook approach, where you learn that there is something you could do at a certain paragraph but you can't do it yet, to be a strength rather than a weakness. When trying to solve a gamebook, I enjoy the experience of gradually filling in routes on my map as "good" or "bad" or "still to be determined". The hidden option approach means that you can never do this---even a game-ending paragraph could secretly be the winning one. I just find this less fun to solve. So when trying to play a gamebook by the rules and solve it, this aspect doesn't add anything for me. And then if I'm just trying to explore a book for fun without following the rules, this is the most annoying type of "there's a way out of this paragraph but you need to know xxx to find out how" to remember (my ranking: names > numbered items etc > hidden options). It's basically impossible to pick up Appointment With F.E.A.R. and get a pleasant reading experience with it. So for two of the ways I like to play gamebooks this is very annoying and for the third it is mildly annoying.
I enjoyed Creature of Havoc despite this, and House Of Hell it isn't used very much so I can just about remember the options. So it doesn't necessarily break the experience but it adds nothing for me and removes a lot.
I don't normally appreciate zero-choice paragraphs that aren't used to converge different routes, but I make an exception where the entry really needs the reader to read from the start to end to get the right experience. Where there are choices or game mechanics, my eyes move to them first. This can be unwelcome in climactic scenarios.
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Post by jmisbest on Oct 25, 2021 13:30:05 GMT
In my opinion even something as simple as being written by Ian Livingstone is enough to make A FF Book A bad FF Book
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Post by a moderator on Oct 25, 2021 23:50:42 GMT
In my opinion even something as simple as being written by Ian Livingstone is enough to make A FF Book A bad FF Book Not all of Ian's books are bad. Still, I must concede that sometimes just knowing who wrote something is pretty much an indication that it's not likely to be worth reading.
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Post by Revenant1 on Oct 26, 2021 8:21:08 GMT
The odd thing about FF is that many (most!) books in the series are weak, too hard, rattled off, etc. and yet we love the series as a whole so much. Let's face it, it has been farmed out by the creators as an arms-length profit-making endeavor from very early on, the only exception really being SJ's slightly later effortbooks (e.g. Creature of Havoc). You could argue that Jon Green is really the only one to have written FF books with love since about 1985.
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kieran
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Post by kieran on Oct 26, 2021 8:59:35 GMT
The odd thing about FF is that many (most!) books in the series are weak, too hard, rattled off, etc. and yet we love the series as a whole so much. Let's face it, it has been farmed out by the creators as an arms-length profit-making endeavor from very early on, the only exception really being SJ's slightly later effortbooks (e.g. Creature of Havoc). You could argue that Jon Green is really the only one to have written FF books with love since about 1985. Not sure that's entirely fair. Yes, I think the books were farmed out as a profit-making exercise, but that doesn't mean the various authors didn't enjoy writing them or put considerable effort into them. Look at stuff like Spectral Stalkers or Moonrunner and the amount of creativity on display there. Even Ian Livingstone probably has more profitable uses of his time than writing FF books yet he continues to do so.
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Post by jmisbest on Oct 26, 2021 9:01:35 GMT
The odd thing about FF is that many (most!) books in the series are weak, too hard, rattled off, etc. and yet we love the series as a whole so much. Let's face it, it has been farmed out by the creators as an arms-length profit-making endeavor from very early on, the only exception really being SJ's slightly later effortbooks (e.g. Creature of Havoc). You could argue that Jon Green is really the only one to have written FF books with love since about 1985. I can't remember when they were wrote or who wrote them but Appointment with FEAR, Rings of Kether, Rebel Planet, Robot Commando and Master of Chaos are potential exceptions and as Return to Firetop Mountain and Legend of Zagor were wrote after 1,985 and weren't wrote by John Green they definitely are exceptions
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CharlesX
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Post by CharlesX on Oct 26, 2021 9:15:21 GMT
The odd thing about FF is that many (most!) books in the series are weak, too hard, rattled off, etc. and yet we love the series as a whole so much. Let's face it, it has been farmed out by the creators as an arms-length profit-making endeavor from very early on, the only exception really being SJ's slightly later effortbooks (e.g. Creature of Havoc). You could argue that Jon Green is really the only one to have written FF books with love since about 1985. Some of the artwork pre-EOTD has been good, it has declined heavily since then. FF has had several good authors (Martin, Morris, Phillips, Waterfield).
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Oct 26, 2021 9:33:12 GMT
The odd thing about FF is that many (most!) books in the series are weak, too hard, rattled off, etc. A lot of them weren't properly play-tested, that's for sure. For me, it's their biggest failing. Not enough attention paid to the 'game' aspect of the gamebook. I would not say most of the books in the series aren't much good though. The series as a whole is ultimately made up of those individual books. For 'rattled-off' books I'd point you in the direction of 'Choose Your Own Adventure' and 'Wizards Warriors and You'. I didn't much like those individual books and consequently don't rate them as a series. Let's face it, it has been farmed out by the creators as an arms-length profit-making endeavor from very early on, Thank goodness it did get farmed out. If not we'd have had about a dozen or so books and no more. Steve J and Ian L were running Games Workshop at the time and didn't have the time to write them at the rate the market was demanding. Happily for the recruitment of new authors the very fact that they were at GW meant that they had numbers of people to hand who already understood D and D, roleplaying and the interest in FF books. See how many of the writers were connected to GW one way or another. It might be worth thinking about what might have happened if that had not been the case and Puffin had tendered books to writers keen to get involved but with no real love of the books or roleplaying as a whole. Or am I wrong and the books would have gone off in other more interesting directions? No way to know for sure but it might be worth having a look at other fantasy gamebook series and seeing how they went. I don't know how 'arms-length' they were after the mid 80's. They certainly had already set the standards for interior and exterior artwork which was an important step, as well as the general themes of the books. As for who appointed the editor of FF, I don't know. But we can see the influence of Games Workshop [and therefore Ian and Steve] again with Marc Gascoigne. And I'm also glad that they were a couple of businessmen too, and looking to make a profit. Who knows how many creative endeavours have failed for lack of people who don't understand how business works? You could argue that Jon Green is really the only one to have written FF books with love since about 1985. That's going too far, for me. A lot of the authors clearly put a great deal of hard work into the books and in many cases surpassed in quality what the originators achieved. And I don't know how much money they got for doing it... not a lot I gather? Read about why and how Joe Dever left to write the Lone Wolf books - it was after a paltry amount of money was offered to him to write an FF book.
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Post by CharlesX on Sept 1, 2022 20:34:54 GMT
Was surfing Youtube and found this relevant vid 'Fighting Fantasy Worst Books in the series chosen by the fans' from 2019. There is nothing in the description of the comments section which explains the source of the survey of the size of the sample, but it's interesting anyway.
If you just want to know their results: 10 Deathmoor 9 Space Assassin 8 Masks Of Mayhem 7 Blood Of The Zombies 6 Gates Of Death 5 Eye Of The Dragon 4 Star Strider 3 Starship Traveller 2 Chasms Of Malice 1 Sky Lord
Not knowing the source of sample size makes this as random as an Ian Livingstone item. I suspect the audience either haven't read Blood Of The Zombies and Gates Of Death or are more into things like game mechanics criticism and setting (non sci-fi and non dungeon-crawl, seemingly) than artwork, gameplay and description. They also seem more willing to criticise Steve and less Ian. I'd seriously disagree with a list that doesn't have Gates in the top 5 worst, and maybe personally I'd stick Port Of Peril somewhere, but that's enough analysis. After 25 minutes of trying I'm still unable to post the link, so I'm giving up 😵 for anyone who's interested or wants a shot at the mountain, it is FIGHTING FANTASY Worst Books in the series by Youtuber Adam J Pestridge, with 5.3K views from 3 years ago.
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Post by terrysalt on Sept 2, 2022 3:13:40 GMT
I find the "limitation" of the standard gamebook approach, where you learn that there is something you could do at a certain paragraph but you can't do it yet, to be a strength rather than a weakness. When trying to solve a gamebook, I enjoy the experience of gradually filling in routes on my map as "good" or "bad" or "still to be determined". The hidden option approach means that you can never do this---even a game-ending paragraph could secretly be the winning one. I just find this less fun to solve. So when trying to play a gamebook by the rules and solve it, this aspect doesn't add anything for me. And then if I'm just trying to explore a book for fun without following the rules, this is the most annoying type of "there's a way out of this paragraph but you need to know xxx to find out how" to remember (my ranking: names > numbered items etc > hidden options). It's basically impossible to pick up Appointment With F.E.A.R. and get a pleasant reading experience with it. So for two of the ways I like to play gamebooks this is very annoying and for the third it is mildly annoying. I enjoyed Creature of Havoc despite this, and House Of Hell it isn't used very much so I can just about remember the options. So it doesn't necessarily break the experience but it adds nothing for me and removes a lot. I don't normally appreciate zero-choice paragraphs that aren't used to converge different routes, but I make an exception where the entry really needs the reader to read from the start to end to get the right experience. Where there are choices or game mechanics, my eyes move to them first. This can be unwelcome in climactic scenarios. As a kid, I loved the whole hidden info thing. I used to read the books cover to cover, looking for relevant numbers and I had a sheet of paper for each book with things like "under stairs - add 10" or "tatsu riddle - egg - 5+7+7=19" scrawled onto them. It put me in the mind of using cheat codes in a video game. I'd found something secret that changed the whole game! Now I could get Siegfried's sword even if I didn't actually find the book it's in! Didn't even realise I was cheating until much later. As an adult, I find it depends how they're used. The anti-cheat stuff is just annoying. I don't want to sit there converting names into numbers just because the author doesn't believe me that I met some dude or own some item. And it depends just how many numbers I'm expected to keep track of. I think it was Armies of Death that had the oracle which was just an onslaught of "but do you have THIS item too? Well, if you do, you know what size shoes the merchant who sold it to you wears, turn to the corresponding reference. If you don't have the item, your adventure ends here." But it can be used well. I thought Jon Green had a clever idea of using the symbols (and adding or subtracting a different number for each symbol) to differentiate the paths through the book depending which character you were playing as in his ACE series. I liked the way it was used in Sorcery where it could reward you for doing things in the earlier books without interrupting the flow if you didn't. It can get tiresome if it's overused though. Much as I love Creature of Havoc, it does lean on the hidden info thing a bit too hard.
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Post by time4tea on Sept 2, 2022 11:07:20 GMT
One thing I dislike in FF books is when there are too many sudden-death branches, with only one narrow path through, which has to be found by trial and error. There are many other ways you can punish the player for making a wrong move, other than a sudden death, which instantly kills the fun. Dock the player some stamina, or a skill point, or perhaps dish them up a somewhat tough enemy. But don't just give an instant game-over. As an example, the number of instant death paths is something I disliked about Bloodbones. In comparison, Warlock of Firetop Mountain had very few of those instant deaths. It aimed to beat the reader by wearing them down more gradually, getting them lost in the maze, and ultimately laughing in their face when it turned out you found the wrong keys as you were exploring the dungeon. Brilliant! I much prefer that, as it doesn't kill the fun early and allows the player to 'see' most of the book on their first couple of read throughs, even though it might take many more to beat it. I think there are many good design principles that some of the later books could/should have learned from WoFM. (in fact, perhaps it would be good to see SJ/IL writing some more books together?) Otherwise, excessive difficulty and/or being too combat-heavy, which the likes of Sky Lord seem to suffer from. Imo, the main challenge of a FF book should be in finding the correct/optimal path. Let's be honest now - the combat in FF is ... how can I put it kindly? ... lacking in depth? Ultimately, it's a pure chance dice-rolling exercise, with often the only choice being when to use your luck. So, if a FF gets its challenge mostly from throwing difficult combats at the player, it is doomed to devolve into something similar to getting someone to toss a coin until they get 15 heads in a row. That's not my idea of fun. Design it like a fun, interesting, quirky maze and cut down on the combats. Otherwise, I totally agree that the writing needs to be good and playtesting it important. There are many books that could have been significantly improved if they were properly playtested.
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Post by vastariner on Sept 2, 2022 15:22:42 GMT
If a spin-off of FFF4 is that there is a plot based on working out the parking charges in Ealing, it's going in the feckin bin within seconds.
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Post by sleepyscholar on Sept 2, 2022 22:47:12 GMT
If a spin-off of FFF4 is that there is a plot based on working out the parking charges in Ealing, it's going in the feckin bin within seconds.
Car? London? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
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Post by a moderator on Sept 2, 2022 22:51:41 GMT
If a spin-off of FFF4 is that there is a plot based on working out the parking charges in Ealing, it's going in the feckin bin within seconds.
I doubt that they'd inspire a new FF plot. A solve-it-or-die puzzle in Ian's next book, maybe.
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CharlesX
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Post by CharlesX on Sept 3, 2022 19:47:04 GMT
One thing I dislike in FF books is when there are too many sudden-death branches, with only one narrow path through, which has to be found by trial and error. There are many other ways you can punish the player for making a wrong move, other than a sudden death, which instantly kills the fun. Dock the player some stamina, or a skill point, or perhaps dish them up a somewhat tough enemy. But don't just give an instant game-over. As an example, the number of instant death paths is something I disliked about Bloodbones. In comparison, Warlock of Firetop Mountain had very few of those instant deaths. It aimed to beat the reader by wearing them down more gradually, getting them lost in the maze, and ultimately laughing in their face when it turned out you found the wrong keys as you were exploring the dungeon. Brilliant! I much prefer that, as it doesn't kill the fun early and allows the player to 'see' most of the book on their first couple of read throughs, even though it might take many more to beat it. I think there are many good design principles that some of the later books could/should have learned from WoFM. (in fact, perhaps it would be good to see SJ/IL writing some more books together?) Otherwise, excessive difficulty and/or being too combat-heavy, which the likes of Sky Lord seem to suffer from. Imo, the main challenge of a FF book should be in finding the correct/optimal path. Let's be honest now - the combat in FF is ... how can I put it kindly? ... lacking in depth? Ultimately, it's a pure chance dice-rolling exercise, with often the only choice being when to use your luck. So, if a FF gets its challenge mostly from throwing difficult combats at the player, it is doomed to devolve into something similar to getting someone to toss a coin until they get 15 heads in a row. That's not my idea of fun. Design it like a fun, interesting, quirky maze and cut down on the combats. Otherwise, I totally agree that the writing needs to be good and playtesting it important. There are many books that could have been significantly improved if they were properly playtested. My preference is for instant deaths when they make sense in game terms e.g. when you fail a roll to swim in dangerous water, run from bad guys, or make a jump. With Livingstone his work can be like "suddenly, a Pterodactyl appears in the sky. Make a 50 50 roll to determine if it takes your purple crayon, which you will 100% need 5 references before the victory one". I think the better FF instant deaths are sometimes those in the gothic tradition - dark, but rarely unfair - by authors such as Stephen Hand, Steve Jackson, or Paul Mason.
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Post by time4tea on Sept 4, 2022 2:19:41 GMT
My preference is for instant deaths when they make sense in game terms e.g. when you fail a roll to swim in dangerous water, run from bad guys, or make a jump. With Livingstone his work can be like "suddenly, a Pterodactyl appears in the sky. Make a 50 50 roll to determine if it takes your purple crayon, which you will 100% need 5 references before the victory one". I think the better FF instant deaths are sometimes those in the gothic tradition - dark, but rarely unfair - by authors such as Stephen Hand, Steve Jackson, or Paul Mason.
I agree and I think some instant deaths is ok, but it can easily be overdone. It's true that it can make sense in certain situations, although I'd counter that by saying that in any RPG, it is up to the 'DM' how often they put the player in all-or-nothing, life-or-death situations. FFs that imo have too many instant deaths: Bloodbones, Creature of Havoc (in the starting area), I think Black Vein Prophecy as well (although it's been a long time since I played that one).
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Post by Wilf on Sept 5, 2022 11:18:12 GMT
If a spin-off of FFF4 is that there is a plot based on working out the parking charges in Ealing, it's going in the feckin bin within seconds.
Car? London? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! When I passed my driving test way back in dim and distant 1992, I swore blind that I would never, ever drive through London. Three decades later, that promise remains unbroken; that particular Circle Of Hell is still unexplored. Given my proximity to the capital, I consider this one of my life's successes.
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Post by sleepyscholar on Sept 5, 2022 14:47:53 GMT
My preference is for instant deaths when they make sense in game terms e.g. when you fail a roll to swim in dangerous water, run from bad guys, or make a jump. With Livingstone his work can be like "suddenly, a Pterodactyl appears in the sky. Make a 50 50 roll to determine if it takes your purple crayon, which you will 100% need 5 references before the victory one". I think the better FF instant deaths are sometimes those in the gothic tradition - dark, but rarely unfair - by authors such as Stephen Hand, Steve Jackson, or Paul Mason.
I agree and I think some instant deaths is ok, but it can easily be overdone. It's true that it can make sense in certain situations, although I'd counter that by saying that in any RPG, it is up to the 'DM' how often they put the player in all-or-nothing, life-or-death situations. FFs that imo have too many instant deaths: Bloodbones, Creature of Havoc (in the starting area), I think Black Vein Prophecy as well (although it's been a long time since I played that one).
I agree, and I think Charles X was being a bit too kind. Not just Black Vein Prophecy, but Crimson Tide, Magehunter and Slaves too. Trouble is, instant deaths were always just too much damn fun to write.
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Post by nathanh on Sept 5, 2022 16:35:16 GMT
BVP is interesting because it definitely seems like you just arbitrarily die a lot, and I guess you do, but at least as you learn the book you realise that it is often because you reach one area after completely skipping a necessary one, which feels less bad than usual even though it'd basically the same.
Slaves has fun deaths but there is definitely an element of "guess what the author was thinking" to a lot of the choices. Until you're in tune with that, it feels a bit spiteful.
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Post by time4tea on Sept 5, 2022 21:06:46 GMT
I agree, and I think Charles X was being a bit too kind. Not just Black Vein Prophecy, but Crimson Tide, Magehunter and Slaves too. Trouble is, instant deaths were always just too much damn fun to write.
It's been a few years since I played some of them, but it seemed to me that there was a trend with the later books (into the 40s) having more instant deaths than the earlier ones. It would be interesting to see a chart of the number of instant deaths by book number.
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kieran
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Post by kieran on Sept 5, 2022 21:48:42 GMT
It's been a few years since I played some of them, but it seemed to me that there was a trend with the later books (into the 40s) having more instant deaths than the earlier ones. Though Keith Martin wrote a lot of the later books and he rarely employed instant deaths. Stephen Hand wasn't too brutal with them either. But yes, there were also a lot of bloodthirsty authors in that bunch too. I would guess that it would actually be the 21-33 range that goes the most heavily for instant deaths: Trial of Champions, Masks of Mayhem, Creature of Havoc, Crypt of the Sorcerer, Star Strider, Chasms of Malice, Slaves of the Abyss and Sky Lord are all brutal. Phantoms of Fear isn't far off their level either. Agreed although you would also have to factor in deaths that can be reached by more than one means, the likelihood of the reader picking an option that leads to an instant death etc.
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Post by a moderator on Sept 5, 2022 21:52:36 GMT
Just off the top of my head, I think Crypt of the Sorcerer and Chasms of Malice are strong contenders for 'FF book with most Instant Deaths'. IIRC, close to one section in ten of Crypt is an Instant Death.
ETA: It's worse than I remembered. 46 sections in Crypt are Instant Deaths. Figure in all the other sections which do nothing but redirect the reader to an Instant Death, and at least an eighth of the book is just a more eloquent version of 'You're dead, mate.'
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Post by daredevil123 on Sept 5, 2022 22:24:56 GMT
Just off the top of my head, I think Crypt of the Sorcerer and Chasms of Malice are strong contenders for ' FF book with most Instant Deaths'. Chasms also has loads of sections that say things like, 'Roll two dice. If the numbers are the same, you die'. Still a much easier book than Crypt, though.
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Post by philsadler on Sept 6, 2022 4:53:11 GMT
Instant Deaths.docx (13.98 KB)Here are the instant deaths (this is not mine, I copied it years ago from somewhere):
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Post by scouserob on Sept 6, 2022 7:48:43 GMT
View AttachmentHere are the instant deaths (this is not mine, I copied it years ago from somewhere): Cool. I just had to chart that. (Below)
You could probably squint at it in a certain way and make all sorts of nonsensical conclusions. So I'll do just that.
It looks like a general increase in the number of instant deaths from book 1 to the around book 25. (Up from around 10 instant deaths up to the high 40s.)
It stays at that high peak for a few books before declining throughout the 30s. (Down from those high 40s to around just under 20 instant deaths.)
After book 40 the variance takes over with some very high and very low instant death values over the next 25 books up to Blood of the Zombies. (Perhaps a general climb up to about 25-30ish instant deaths.)
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Post by sleepyscholar on Sept 6, 2022 9:01:03 GMT
View AttachmentHere are the instant deaths (this is not mine, I copied it years ago from somewhere): Hang on, this means I am way more vicious than Marc? Can anyone who was at the FFF4 panel believe that?Interesting to note the general downward trend with the later books (with odd exceptions). I think maybe writers were learning, a bit...
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Post by kieran on Sept 6, 2022 9:31:18 GMT
View AttachmentHere are the instant deaths (this is not mine, I copied it years ago from somewhere): Interesting. Beneath Nightmare Castle has one of the highest totals of instant deaths, but it's probably one of the easier books in the series - shows that raw numbers don't always tell the whole story. I'm curious that there's apparently 3 victory sections in Siege of Sardath!
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kieran
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Post by kieran on Sept 6, 2022 9:32:44 GMT
Hang on, this means I am way more vicious than Marc? He saved his real bloodthirstiness for his Sonic the Hedgehog gamebooks.
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Post by time4tea on Sept 6, 2022 10:58:44 GMT
View AttachmentHere are the instant deaths (this is not mine, I copied it years ago from somewhere):
Thanks for linking that doc, and to scouserob for charting it!
That is really interesting to see and yes, it seems the number increased somewhat steadily at first, up to about book 20, then it seems to have fluctuated wildly. There is a patch between about 21 and the early 30s where many of the books had >40 sudden deaths. That's 10% of the sections being sudden deaths, which seems very high to me.
So, Siege of Sardath takes the crown with 61! My, that is a lot of instant death (don't think I ever read that one) ... followed closely by BVP with 59. It's no wonder that one stuck in my mind from when I was a kid as being particularly unforgiving.
Interesting as well to see that Deathtrap Dungeon has a lot more than the rest of the first 10. And Beneath Nightmare Castle - 48 - that really surprises me. I guess there are cheap deaths and cheap deaths - some are better telegraphed than others perhaps and easier to avoid. Bloodbones on 32 is not as high as I would have guessed. Perhaps in that one the sudden deaths are more front-loaded or something, so it seems like there are more? I would have sworn that Bloodbones had more than BNC.
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Post by petch on Sept 6, 2022 15:00:12 GMT
Insta-deaths never bothered me all that much, unless there was a surfeit of very cheap-seeming ones (such as the plethora of arbitrary death-by-choosing-the-wrong-direction sections towards the end of Chasms of Malice). In fact in many cases some of the failure paragraphs were more satisfying than the victory ones - take the sadistic glee with which Darvill-Evans describes the various horrible demises in Beneath Nightmare Castle or the variety of different fates, mostly non-fatal, you can guide your character to in The Crimson Tide. I guess I'd include Masks of Mayhem in that category too, if only because its proper ending is rubbish.
I regard the majority of FF books as elaborate puzzles to be solved, and in a way would be disappointed if I didn't die in a number of ways before I got to the ending...it was always part of the fun!
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