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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Jun 15, 2019 15:35:24 GMT
My thoughts, in no particular order:
1. Heavily influenced by Middle Eastern and Far Eastern culture and legends.
2. Multiple endings.
3. Not particularly linear (exception Slaves of the Abyss which is quite linear).
4. Difficulty level above average.
5. Riddling Reaver cameos.
6. Themes of alienation and disorientation. In Magehunter you are a stranger in a a strange land. In Black Vein Prophecy you wake up facing a corpse, not even knowing who you are, though other people appear to recognise you. The beginning of Crimson Tide gave me a sense of bewilderment. |
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,458
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Jun 16, 2019 13:33:25 GMT
7. Having high stats is often a disadvantage
8. Unclear quests
9. Complex characters and motivations
10. Red herrings galore
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Post by deadshadowrunner on Jun 17, 2019 3:04:00 GMT
11) Codewords
12) Lots of hidden sections
13) New mechanics
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Sept 29, 2019 8:20:45 GMT
12) Lots of hidden sections
Magehunter is a good example of that - I only just now found out how to get to the Logaan encounter, the Dark Elves (dwellers below) or even get the diamond and meet the Riddling Reaver. I still don't know my way around the book. In all the times I have played it I have never encountered the 'Golden Lion Lord' or the 'Green Nightmare'.
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Post by sleepyscholar on Aug 9, 2020 6:47:53 GMT
12) Lots of hidden sections
Magehunter is a good example of that - I only just now found out how to get to the Logaan encounter, the Dark Elves (dwellers below) or even get the diamond and meet the Riddling Reaver. I still don't know my way around the book. In all the times I have played it I have never encountered the 'Golden Lion Lord' or the 'Green Nightmare'.
I wrote the thing and I don't know my way around that book. It's the only one of my books that I actually played myself after it was published, and thoroughly enjoyed. Which perhaps explains why it is so widely reviled among the cognoscenti! It was written as a reaction to Crimson Tide, which was intended to be very difficult (but which was subject to inadequate analysis, on account of me having to meet the submission deadline). Magehunter was conceived in terms of all the rollicking adventure moments I could stuff in to it -- admittedly much ripped off from the movie Warlock ("YOU are Richard E. Grant pretending to be Sean Connery while fighting Julian Sands"). It was also designed in the hope that paragraphs changed their meanings depending on where you were coming from. The latter explains why there was so much in it to surprise me... |
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Post by The Count on Aug 9, 2020 23:27:45 GMT
Magehunter is a good example of that - I only just now found out how to get to the Logaan encounter, the Dark Elves (dwellers below) or even get the diamond and meet the Riddling Reaver. I still don't know my way around the book. In all the times I have played it I have never encountered the 'Golden Lion Lord' or the 'Green Nightmare'.
I wrote the thing and I don't know my way around that book. It's the only one of my books that I actually played myself after it was published, and thoroughly enjoyed. Which perhaps explains why it is so widely reviled among the cognoscenti! It was written as a reaction to Crimson Tide, which was intended to be very difficult (but which was subject to inadequate analysis, on account of me having to meet the submission deadline). Magehunter was conceived in terms of all the rollicking adventure moments I could stuff in to it -- admittedly much ripped off from the movie Warlock ("YOU are Richard E. Grant pretending to be Sean Connery while fighting Julian Sands"). It was also designed in the hope that paragraphs changed their meanings depending on where you were coming from. The latter explains why there was so much in it to surprise me... I only got to read Magehunter in the school library during lunch which was followed b y a free period so I found it baffling yet intriguing - unfortunately, I never saw it in the library again or in a shop so couldn't fully explore it properly. The Crimson Tide is difficult, but is very clever so not as difficult as it appears once you realise that you need to choose the other option at the start so that you avoid the editors error, and has so many alternative endings that it needs replayed constantly to find them all. Both of them, alongside Slaves and BVP, are unfairly criticised for assuming some intelligence on the part of the reader in my view. |
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Post by sleepyscholar on Aug 10, 2020 3:22:08 GMT
I wrote the thing and I don't know my way around that book. It's the only one of my books that I actually played myself after it was published, and thoroughly enjoyed. Which perhaps explains why it is so widely reviled among the cognoscenti! It was written as a reaction to Crimson Tide, which was intended to be very difficult (but which was subject to inadequate analysis, on account of me having to meet the submission deadline). Magehunter was conceived in terms of all the rollicking adventure moments I could stuff in to it -- admittedly much ripped off from the movie Warlock ("YOU are Richard E. Grant pretending to be Sean Connery while fighting Julian Sands"). It was also designed in the hope that paragraphs changed their meanings depending on where you were coming from. The latter explains why there was so much in it to surprise me... I only got to read Magehunter in the school library during lunch which was followed b y a free period so I found it baffling yet intriguing - unfortunately, I never saw it in the library again or in a shop so couldn't fully explore it properly. The Crimson Tide is difficult, but is very clever so not as difficult as it appears once you realise that you need to choose the other option at the start so that you avoid the editors error, and has so many alternative endings that it needs replayed constantly to find them all. Both of them, alongside Slaves and BVP, are unfairly criticised for assuming some intelligence on the part of the reader in my view. "ONE trait of Paul Mason's gamebooks! Ha ha ha ha ha! TWO traits of....." (Sorry: The Count is my favourite Sesame Street character) I've had some contact, off-and-on, with gamebook fandom for over two decades (I mean contact in terms of getting stuck in, rather than just having written some of the books fans read), and I have always found the criticism of my books extremely fair. As an expatriate of nearly 30 years, I love Marmite, and had a box of Marmite snacks sent to me (by Dave Morris, as it happens) only a couple of weeks ago. And I'd much rather have written books that are like Marmite, than ones that are like Mars bars. Many gamebook readers find the weird settings and stuff in my books a distraction, and I respect that. Others find the peculiarities of the system and routing annoying, and I respect that, too, and don't think it shows a lack of intelligence. Similarly, I wouldn't say that someone who read, say, Talisman of Death rather than Crime and Punishment, was relatively less intelligent. Dostoevsky never wrote a second-person description of being stabbed through the gut with a harpoon... And while we're on the subject, I met author (not comedian) David Mitchell in a garden in the town of Ledbury about 16 years ago, and in our conversation he revealed that he was a fan of Fighting Fantasy as a kid -- which explains a lot about his books, when you think about it. You can imagine how annoyed I was to discover that he had given up reading them before number 32! |
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sylas
Baron
"Don't just adventure for treasure; treasure the adventure!"
Posts: 1,678 
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy, Way of the Tiger
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Post by sylas on Aug 10, 2020 15:40:14 GMT
You should have at least guilt tripped him into reading Slaves of the Abyss. If he stopped at Sky Lord (no.33) then it would have made more sense.
Speaking of which, Slaves does seem like the most favoured of your books among the fans (if the current Polls are anything to go by), and the least Marmitey as well. It also has my favourite instant death paragraph of the series.
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Post by sleepyscholar on Aug 12, 2020 2:04:31 GMT
You should have at least guilt tripped him into reading Slaves of the Abyss. If he stopped at Sky Lord (no.33) then it would have made more sense. Speaking of which, Slaves does seem like the most favoured of your books among the fans (if the current Polls are anything to go by), and the least Marmitey as well. It also has my favourite instant death paragraph of the series. Who knows? After we spoke maybe he did go and read Slaves of the Abyss, and suitably inspired then went on to write Cloud Atlas... |
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Post by sleepyscholar on Aug 12, 2020 14:52:26 GMT
It also has my favourite instant death paragraph of the series. Come on... don't keep us in suspenders! |
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sylas
Baron
"Don't just adventure for treasure; treasure the adventure!"
Posts: 1,678
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy, Way of the Tiger
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Post by sylas on Aug 12, 2020 19:13:36 GMT
It also has my favourite instant death paragraph of the series. Come on... don't keep us in suspenders! |
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Post by Wilf on Aug 12, 2020 20:14:54 GMT
That one, and the one many years in the future where they pull your sword out of the ruins of Kallamehr. Both of those are brilliant.
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sylas
Baron
"Don't just adventure for treasure; treasure the adventure!"
Posts: 1,678
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy, Way of the Tiger
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Post by sylas on Aug 12, 2020 21:11:14 GMT
Slaves of the Abyss, House of Hell, and Deathmoor all have a good selection of gruesome and creative instant death paragraphs in the series.
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Post by sleepyscholar on Aug 13, 2020 0:41:44 GMT
I was curious whether it would be one of the 'conceptual' ones or the 'gruesome' ones. It's no secret that it took me a while to really grasp Fighting Fantasy, but one thing I did get from the off was the importance of the death paragraphs. If you're going to be told to start again, the least you can hope for is a bit of entertainment.
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