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Post by petch on Jan 23, 2022 11:50:50 GMT
It would be interesting to know how much of a part imposed restrictions on the authors played in the creating of the books, as if there were any, they didn't seem to be applied very consistently. Prior to any of Sharp's entries, Appointment with F.E.A.R and Creature of Havoc were clear exceptions to any such rules, although I'd imagine Jackson had the clout to overrule any attempted editorial interference; but other books like Talisman of Death and Phantoms of Fear didn't appear to have such stringent word count restrictions either. Later in the series, as the tomes got thicker, limitations seemed to go entirely out of the window, with later Keith Martin and Jonathan Green books in particular packing tons into a single reference. I think the point was that at no stage were there clearly imposed restrictions. In other words, there was no standard operating manual for the series, accessible to all writers. So the restrictions under which any particular writer was operating were just those that they happened to have heard the last time an editor bothered to tell them (if they felt like abiding by them, which I guess many didn't). And although Puffin clearly had policies which varied (as I've mentioned elsewhere, towards the end of the series I got the impression they were trying to reduce the number of paragraphs), they didn't get clearly communicated. Thanks - interesting to know! I guess in the case of Sharp's works, then, although I dislike the idea of too much editorial interference, they could have benefited from a bit of tweaking, as bloodbeasthandler suggests. There are some interesting ideas in them, but they're not always presented effectively, resulting in some garbled paragraphs like the one terrysalt quoted. It could well have been down to the fact that English wasn't his first language, but some guidance or tightening up could have helped express them that much better.
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Post by sleepyscholar on Jan 23, 2022 11:53:25 GMT
Thanks - interesting to know! I guess in the case of Sharp's works, then, although I dislike the idea of too much editorial interference, they could have benefited from a bit of tweaking, as bloodbeasthandler suggests. There are some interesting ideas in them, but they're not always presented effectively, resulting in some garbled paragraphs like the one terrysalt quoted. It could well have been down to the fact that English wasn't his first language, but some guidance or tightening up could have helped express them that much better. Remember also that 'Fighting Fantasy' wasn't the editor's first language, either!
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Post by CharlesX on Jan 23, 2022 22:51:49 GMT
This discussion tangent of Luke Sharp's weaknesses (whatever his considerable talents) brings to mind a remark my brother made many years ago, that Luke Sharp might as well have been writing his gamebooks via machine. I think Swift's Gulliver's Travels satirically includes a machine which prints books via random letters and words thrown together. I don't quite agree with those two things, because I think art and gameplay is about what people want, not solely how hard the scribe is working. These days such criticism would apply more to Livingstone, sadly; while I'd rather play AI Dungeon than Gates Of Death, and not just because of its gameplay and heavy rule ambiguities. I personally think Luke Sharp has a real flair for writing, even if his writing style and gameplay mechanics can grate. I really think without the OSCs Chasms would rank much higher on the gamebook rankings, or deserve to. As it is, it's interesting the ridiculously unfair Chasms is ranked just below the very easy Starship Traveller - it's position there, and the fact it's below Starship Traveller (which has sub-average writing), suggests we prioritise enjoyment of the gamebook's difficulty over things like originality and rarity.
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Post by sleepyscholar on Jan 24, 2022 4:59:54 GMT
This discussion tangent of Luke Sharp's weaknesses (whatever his considerable talents) brings to mind a remark my brother made many years ago, that Luke Sharp might as well have been writing his gamebooks via machine. I think Swift's Gulliver's Travels satirically includes a machine which prints books via random letters and words thrown together. I don't quite agree with those two things, because I think art and gameplay is about what people want, not solely how hard the scribe is working. These days such criticism would apply more to Livingstone, sadly; while I'd rather play AI Dungeon than Gates Of Death, and not just because of its gameplay and heavy rule ambiguities. I personally think Luke Sharp has a real flair for writing, even if his writing style and gameplay mechanics can grate. I really think without the OSCs Chasms would rank much higher on the gamebook rankings, or deserve to. As it is, it's interesting the ridiculously unfair Chasms is ranked just below the very easy Starship Traveller - it's position there, and the fact it's below Starship Traveller (which has sub-average writing), suggests we prioritise enjoyment of the gamebook's difficulty over things like originality and rarity. As I've mentioned before, the only FFs I have on my shelves here that I didn't get free are Daggers of Darkness and Moonrunner. I put Luke Sharp in a similar category to Herbie Brennan: he has his own particular style, his own foibles, and while they may damn him for many readers, I think they should be appreciated for what they are. The FF series as a whole benefits from its 'outliers' -- especially when, as you point out, one of its two main 'inliers' seems to have seriously lost the plot along the way.
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Post by vastariner on Jan 24, 2022 9:42:19 GMT
As it is, it's interesting the ridiculously unfair Chasms is ranked just below the very easy Starship Traveller - it's position there, and the fact it's below Starship Traveller (which has sub-average writing), suggests we prioritise enjoyment of the gamebook's difficulty over things like originality and rarity. I think it's about how satisfying a book is. An easy book with stellar writing is going to go above a well-structured and intriguing plot with basic text. Space Assassin for instance generally ranks quite low, even though it has a lot of fun stuff, an impossible McGuffin, an imaginative weapon...but also an underwritten ending that makes concluding the book like a mundane side-door in a dungeon crawl.
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