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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:19:09 GMT
From TUFFF... Thought I'd do this in a few parts. Feel free to join in with your own wee stories!! PART ONE - Getting started. My very first gamebook was 'Forest of Fear', a choose your own adventure. I mind sitting against a wall during lunch time in my primary school playground with two pals, explaining why this wasn't a normal book and how it would probably be fun if we read it together, which we did! Not entirely sure how old I was but primary four or five sounds aboot right (In Scotland that means I was 8 or 9) I definitely acquired quite a few choose your own adventure books after that (all but 4 are now lost). I remember going to stay with my Granny in Blairgowrie during the summer and going into the one book shop in town - imaginatively called 'The Book Shop' - looking for gamebooks - they had none. I remember being rather forthright and arrogant (for me) as I told the two assistants in a rather know it all attitude what a gamebook was and that they should stock them - surprised they didn't give me a skelp! A few months later I was back in Blairgowrie and checked the bookshop out - they didn't have choose your own adventures, but they did have Wizard Warriors and You, so I bought the Haunted Castle of Ravencurse and enjoyed it loads. I remember taking it to school and dropping it in a big puddle and my mum had to chuck it out!! (I bought a replacement about 5 years ago!) Anyway, one day in Woolworths in my home town of Forfar (Oh Woolworths, why did you leave us?) I was looking at the bairns books and came across 'Appointment with FEAR'. I had enough pocket money to buy it, so I did!! I went home , read the rules and proceeded to fill out all my stats in the adventure sheet in biro! - I suppose I thought i'd only need the one shot to win the book! Obviously I didn't and I stuck some white stickers over my biro, which are still n place today!! I' guessing I bought the book in 87 or 88. Lets face it, its a good book, but one that's more appealing to a slightly older person than a 9 year old! It took me a few months to buy another FF book - the next one was Robot Commando!! I'm presuming the dinosaurs on the front hooked me!! By then my bestest pal for the entire of my time at primary school (its closed noo btw, it lay empty for years but opened a couple of years ago as an unusual 'community church'.) had discovered FF as well, which led to an informal and unspoken competition between us..... Which I'll tell you about next time!!! Hope that wasn't too boring!!  |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:22:10 GMT
From TUFFF... Would you be interested in adapting this into an entry in "The Magic Quest" column for Fighting Fantazine? The column is about how people became fans of FF. (328) Despite your best efforts, you find yourself decaying in front of a computer screen. Your adventure ends here. |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:22:31 GMT
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:23:49 GMT
From TUFFF... PART TWO - Collecting My next FF purchase was Masks Of Mayhem. This was more like it!! I loved it from the start and still do. I know its a toughie and isn't loved by everyone, but when you're not playing with dice it makes a difference!! I think the fantastic artwork for this book also helped!! I remember always being stuck at the end with wondering who the traitor was, I remember giving a shot of this book to my best pal (as above), (we'll call him Keith, for that was his name.) and he sussed out who he was!! But he wouldn't tell me, the wee monkey! Anyway, Keith ended up being the only other big time FF fan in my class. There were a few others who quite liked the books. I remember one who had four books (Scorpion Swamp & Crypt were 2 of them), but his mother had apparently said that was all he was ever getting!! I also remember another friend having one book 'Demons of the Deep', which e carried around with at school for weeks. Inside were two photocopied pages which always kept hold of. One was of the relevant adventure sheet, and the other was the rules for the Lone Wolf series!! Anyway, the summer holidays between primary 5 and 6 were upon us - This would be the summer of 1988. I never saw much of Keith during the summer because my mother never liked any of my pals which weren't of her choosing - she's still like that! |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:26:03 GMT
From TUFFF... Anyway, although we never said as much out loud, we both knew that it was our responsibility to buy a shed load of FF books over the holidays, and have a good chat about it on our return to school. We had a holiday to England booked and I spent all of my saved up pocket money there on FF books. I remember on our last day of our holiday going into a bookshop somewhere in England (The shop was called 'The Library' for some reason) and picking up Sword of The Samurai. My father said to me 'You're buying too many of these books son, you'll grow out of them soon and it'll have been an awfy waste of money' I don't listen to my faither very much. I also remember picking up Sky Lord during the summer holidays, I only say this as it was displayed in the bookshop as the latest FF release, and I bought each FF book in release order after that until book number.... well , I'll save that for later! Anyway, school came round again - it felt like ages , though of course, back then Scottish bairns got seven weeks holidays - a week more than their English counterparts - hee hee. First thing I did was find Keith.
'How many books you got now?' he asked. 'I've got 22 now' I boasted. 'Got all 33' said the cheeky wee lad. He won!! |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:28:13 GMT
From TUFFF... PART THREE - CLASS AWARENESS. Anyway, I really wanted to get all 33 books. I had to ask Keith how he did it, coz I tried really hard but there were plenty of books that never seemed to be in stock wherever I looked. (Obviously, or I would have got them!) And as for Titan & Out of the Pit, which always looked so amazing depicted on the inside covers - well, I could always dream... Turns out, over the summer, Keith had put an order for FF books at 'Neil A Robertsons' - Forfars only bookshop. It took nearly all summer but he got them all eventually. Now Robertsons was a scary place for a wee laddie. It was a triangular shaped corner building. It was a stationers on the ground floor (boring - but my sister used to love looking at the pencils!??) and there was a spiral staircase that took you up to the books on the first floor. However,if they only had one staff member on , and you wanted to look up the stairs, they wouldn't let you - if you were a child, but even if yer mum or dad were with you!! They are not open any more. Anyway, my birthday had just past , so I put an order in with them for the last of my books, and while I was there I chanced ordering Titan, Out of the Pit, Fighting Fantasy and the Sorcery Books - again, I could always dream... A few weeks later I had the first 33 books - no sign of the others - bah. I told Keith at school 'Aye' he said 'But do you hae this??' He produced from his school bag an outsize copy of Out Of The Pit. Damn! |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:31:11 GMT
From TUFFF... Anyway, I'm getting there. We used to bring two or three books at a time to school to read during our 'library session' The rest of the class got curious and wanted to read them. Only regular novels wee stocked in our library. We would have to open our own!! So, for the next few months, Keith and I brought ALL of our books to school each morning so that virtually the entire class could have a chance of playing FF - I kid you not!! Keith even made up wee loan tickets on a typewriter so nothing went astray (and thankfully none did.) The teacher, Mrs Mitchell was most intrigued and suggested me and Keith do a talk on gamebooks. I cant recall if we ever did. Anyway, primary six turned to primary seven. I certainly was still buying the books through this time. Me and Keith used to play and discuss them all the time. I remember a few topics, which I shall summarise; Livingstone - easy Jackson - hard (true , if you don't play with dice and pretend you have all the items etc.!!!) Finally realising that those books that say 'present' were not actually penned by L & J (though the presence of Steve Jackson on book 8 & 19 confused us until we finally got Titan) The Space books were crap - Still agree with that on the whole!! We really must write one. -- I think we drafted out a few backgrounds a few times, but no more than that. Anyway, I remember that neither of us could get anywhere with Creature of Havoc , nor the sorcery series (when they finally turned up!) cheating, or not!! A few of us even played Dungeoneer, though I don't think they enjoyed it, coz I was GM and i'm a bit rubbish.
Anyway, this takes me up to the start of The Academy I was officially a big boy noo!! how long could I get away with loving FF books?? Find out in a whiley... |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:32:05 GMT
From TUFFF... Love hearing about the history of your fascination with FF! Keep it coming. I might have a go at this myself. |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:35:00 GMT
From TUFFF... Its my day off today, its absolutely pouring it doon, and the bairn is behaving himself, hence why I've posted these much quicker than I intended!! Anyway PART FOUR - Decline. I definitely wasn't playing FF as much at the Academy. All the (new) lads in my form class knew I had them all, some were vaguely impressed, and I don't recall anyone thinking it was particularly sad!! I do remember when one of them got one up on me one morning by waving a copy of Keep of the Lich Lord under my nose!! I wasn't aware of its release at the time!! Anyway, I'd lost contact with my best pal Keith (he was in a different form, you'd think it was a different town!), so FF wasn't quite as much fun. I do remember thinking Legend of the Shadow Warriors was fantastic - which it still is! Anyway, I remember (whether this was the case elsewhere) that Spectral Stalkers and Tower of Destruction were released together and I really disliked them both. Then the Crimson Tide came out, and I'm afraid I hated it!! That giant Mudworm made me so made. I stopped buying the books. But not for long. |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:39:39 GMT
From TUFFF... Two years later I was 16. I went up the scary spiral staircase in Forfars only bookshop and dodged into the children's section.....
I saw the row of FF books and thought to myself, who stops a collection at number 47?? So I went and bought the next three.
I remember thinking (coz I was a man now, at least in Scots law) that I would sit and play Siege of Sardath without cheating in the slightest.
I never cheated.
I spent a week with that book.
I still haven't completed it!!
I didn't read Moonrunner at all - I presumed it was a science fiction one coz it had 'moon' in the title!!!
Return to Firetop I did complete!!
Anyway, for some reason I went back a few weeks later, I couldn't resist, I picked up Island of the Undead.
Played it, didn't like it.
I remember the only FF book they had that day that I didn't have was Night Dragon, I resisted the urge.
A few months later I saw the Zagor Chronicles on display at John Menzies in Dundee, but again I resisted.
No more!!!
I more or less stopped reading them with a couple of exceptions.
When I was seventeen I was struck down with my annual chest infection and was bed bound for over a week. I said to myself - 'I'm going to crack Creature of Havoc' no cheating
I did!!
That was fun, so I did the same with the Sorcery series.
But I would say that between 94 and 99 that was aboot it! |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:41:03 GMT
From TUFFF... Glad you're enjoying Paltogue.
I'd love to hear similar tales from as many people as possible!! |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:43:59 GMT
From TUFFF... Last bit. while the bairn eats his tea!! PART FIVE - Slow rebirth.
Anyway, when I was 19 (1998) I started work in the family business. We have a chain of shops selling clothes and dealing in kilt hire/sales. The nature of my branch (Montrose) means that it can be seriously quiet for an hour or more at a time, punctuated by really busy spells. I needed something to do!! I dug out all my old FF books and started playing them at random in the shop. That was good fun!! A year or two later, I got internet access at work, and at a whim, I looked at how many FF books there were (and indeed if they were still publishing them - I had no idea!) Really cheesed off when I realised that I was so close to a complete set having stopped at 51 - though I know now that this was quite common, hence why some of the later greenspines can cost a fortune nowadays!! Anyway, in 2003 my wife , completely off the top of her head and with no prompting or hinting from me, managed to fill the gaps in my collection for Christmas - excepting Deathmoor which was extortianate at the time ( I got it a year or two later) That's pretty much me up to date!! As you'll know I'm re reading them (to win) from the start right now. Without turning into a big baby, part of what I like about re reading them is looking at my ten year old handwriting in the adventure sheets (where applicable) , the smell of the books, the way certain pictures and
passages set off childhood memories for me. Oh, aye - and they are also still really good!! (Mostly!) That's me done, hope you enjoyed. Someone else have a turn!!! What a nice wife!! |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:45:37 GMT
From TUFFF... I started work in the family business. We have a chain of shops selling clothes and dealing in kilt hire/sales. Brilliant! Is it anything like the kilt shops in Auld Reeky which until recently (when they were banned by the council) blasted out bagpipe versions of 'We Will Rock You' and other rock hits?! |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:46:24 GMT
From TUFFF... What a nice wife indeed. Great story, by the way, enjoyable. I guess you, like some of us, hope that your bairn will enjoy FF one day. I myself got two, and intend on introducing them when the time is right... Until then it's out of their destructive little hands! Speak in extremes, it will save you time. |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:47:15 GMT
From TUFFF... Brilliant! Is it anything like the kilt shops in Auld Reeky which until recently (when they were banned by the council) blasted out bagpipe versions of 'We Will Rock You' and other rock hits?! Nah, no music at all at the moment - It costs money!! |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:48:27 GMT
From TUFFF... What a nice wife indeed. Great story, by the way, enjoyable. I guess you, like some of us, hope that your bairn will enjoy FF one day. I myself got two, and intend on introducing them when the time is right... Until then it's out of their destructive little hands!
Thanks. Regards the bairn, yep I hope he gets into them, but as you say, its getting them at the right time (which definitely isn't at the moment!! - he's not quite two) although he does enjoy looking at the covers just now! |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:49:09 GMT
From TUFFF... Yar, chewing on FF is just not as good as playing or reading them, at least from our point of view. Speak in extremes, it will save you time. |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:50:58 GMT
From TUFFF... Paltogue, Part 1: How it all began I grew up in a remote, rural part of Northern Ireland, an area a bit like a wetter, more miserable American Bible-belt, with added sectarian strife and lots of superstitious old farmers. Just the sort of place to get a young, active imagination wishing it was somewhere else... Our local village library was a glorified portacabin, but it was here that I was first exposed to fantasy literature such as The Lord of the Rings and, best of all, gamebooks. I must have started reading Choose Your own Adventure books around about the age of 10 or 11, which the library had a good stock of. Then one fateful day in 1986, I spotted a book with a green spine and an amazing cover that I hadn't seen before: Island of the Lizard King. Suddenly CyoA books were forgotten as I was blown away by the fantastic cover, fearsome monsters and baffling gameplay of this new kind of book. To begin with I didn't fully understand the rules: did you really have to repeat steps 1-7 in every battle until someone's STAMINA reached zero? Really? (To this day, I've struggled with the concept of bothering to play by the FF rules I'm afraid.) Shortly after, I found another of these amazing books in the library, this time City of Thieves, and again I was blown away and I was completely hooked. I just had to tell my friends at my high-school in Omagh all about my new discovery. When I did, it turned out that several of them had got there before me and already had substantial collections of the books. Now that everyone's fascination with FF was out in the open, we all went FF mad and could talk about very little else. One of my friends had pretty much all of the FF books up to Robot Commando (I was very envious, but at least he let the rest of us read them when he brought them in to school), and another was in the process of acquiring his older cousin's collection, so it fell to me, with my measly pocket money, to break new ground and buy the next new book, Masks of Mayhem, which we could all then share. There was only one bookshop in Omagh, and thankfully it regularly stocked the FF books, so off I went one lunch time and made that fateful purchase. I was no longer an FF virgin! We all devoured the book in short order and very quickly I decided that one book doesn't make a collection, so it was time to buy another one. I had done the math and worked out that my mum fed me well enough at breakfast and at teatime that I could get by at lunch with a handful of penny chews, so I could spend the rest of my pocket money on FF books (my mum wouldn't have approved of this at all, from a nutritional perspective at least, so buying the books had an added exciting element of illicit behaviour about it too). But which book would it be? Masks of Mayhem was the newest one available, and the only other fantasy one that no-one else had was Scorpion Swamp (apparently on account of its crappy cover). So Scorpion Swamp it was, even though I too had misgivings about the cover. Again, we all devoured the book, in the changing rooms, during art class (the art teacher never seemed to care if anyone was actually doing any work; if he had, he would have noticed a curious outbreak of Styracosaurus and Lizard Man drawings) and at break times. Not as good, we felt. Not enough cool monsters (i.e. monsters with very high stats) or baddies, and far too easy (for those not playing properly by the rules at least). As 1987 dawned with no new FF books appearing in the bookshop, what would the future hold for my burgeoning new interest? 1987 was to prove pivotal for my interest and my collection - come back for Part 2 to find out how. |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:54:16 GMT
From TUFFF... Between the interview by Stuart Lloyd, the blog, and the 'playing the books in order' thread, my story's already out there. One of these days I might put it all together in one place, but not yet. |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:55:23 GMT
From TUFFF... Between the interview by Stuart Lloyd, the blog, and the 'playing the books in order' thread, my story's already out there. One of these days I might put it all together in one place, but not yet. It would indeed be nice to see it all pulled together into a continuous narrative. |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Nov 30, 2013 23:56:23 GMT
From TUFFF... paltogue - liking it so far! Interesting how choose your own adventure books were the 'way in' to FF in both our cases! |
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Post by stevendoig on Dec 1, 2013 12:28:50 GMT
Jings! - Thanks for finding this and putting it up here!! |
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Post by stevendoig on Dec 1, 2013 12:29:05 GMT
Jings! - Thanks for finding this and putting it up here!! |
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Dec 2, 2013 0:03:40 GMT
You're welcome It would have been a shame to lose it. |
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