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Post by tyrion on Jun 30, 2020 12:14:22 GMT
Last round another sci-fi book, rings of kether, was eliminated.
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Post by Law on Jun 30, 2020 12:22:20 GMT
Without a doubt the corniest slice of Cheshire cheese in the whole range is AW F.E.A.R. The silver age ham of "thou shall not kill" super heroes and outlandishly themed-villains just doesn't possess the timeless quality that the other books have. I pray that Steve didn't think that it was set in a "modern day" Titan. That. Is. Heresy.
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Post by The Count on Jun 30, 2020 20:53:03 GMT
I made my appointment and voted to get rid of the abysmal comic book thing. Hopefully it will be banished and I can go back to once again forgetting it exists.
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kieran
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Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Jun 30, 2020 21:06:38 GMT
I made my appointment and voted to get rid of the abysmal comic book thing. Hopefully it will be banished and I can go back to once again forgetting it exists. Never realised there were so many Appointment with FEAR haters. It's my favourite of this set by far!
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Post by stevendoig on Jun 30, 2020 22:11:57 GMT
The 11-20 run of FF is the oddest part of the run , in retrospect. Temple of terror is the only 'traditional' one amongst them. Funny looking at this lot wondering how the FF range might have developed in an alternate universe. It does make picking the 'worst' book harder in this section I reckon as the range was finding its way and there's a lot of experiments here (not all that good.)
Saying that, I stuck with Rebel Planet again - after such a brilliant background, it got dull fast.
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Post by Wilf on Jul 1, 2020 0:17:07 GMT
I made my appointment and voted to get rid of the abysmal comic book thing. Hopefully it will be banished and I can go back to once again forgetting it exists. Never realised there were so many Appointment with FEAR haters. It's my favourite of this set by far! Mine too!
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Post by deadshadowrunner on Jul 1, 2020 8:37:13 GMT
Never realised there were so many Appointment with FEAR haters. It's my favourite of this set by far! Mine too! Same here. Never fails to amaze me how Steve Jackson pulled off this ridiculously complex design of four interweaving true paths, especially with no help from software.
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Post by Peter on Jul 1, 2020 8:53:28 GMT
Same here. Never fails to amaze me how Steve Jackson pulled off this ridiculously complex design of four interweaving true paths, especially with no help from software. You and I seem to agree on a lot of things Kieran, but sadly not this book. I was never into the comic book superheroes, so I have to join the "haters" rather than the "fans". Although I fully agree with you Deadshadowrunner, it is amazingly written, so I don't really hate it at all. It is a bit of a masterpiece, so i will always admire it. Just from afar.
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Post by Wilf on Jul 1, 2020 12:32:48 GMT
Superheroes aren't my thing either, really, but Appointment With FEAR is such a great tribute to the genre, it's clearly written and presented with a lot of love. As well as bad puns and in-jokes (Drew Swain, etc.), there's a lot of cheeky riffs on mid-80s pop culture in general (Michael Blackson, Georgie Boy and Vulture Club, etc.), and that wonderfully self-referential moment where you can buy a copy of The Warlock Of Firetop Mountain (right after dismissing Dungeons And Dragons). I love all these little references, and it's fun spotting them all.
Other things that are great about this book: The artwork (by an exceptional comics artist on the cover, and in a faithful comic strip panel style on the interior); the four different superpowers leading to four different True Paths; the dazzling variety of supervillains; the proliferation of secret references (always a joy to come across these); and the sheer intricacy of the design which is on a par with the works of Andrew Chapman or Luke Sharp for structural complexity. And there are so few gameplay errors, too (what few I'm aware of have no impact on my enjoyment of the book, they're that trivial).
It's a refreshing departure in style, content and structure, and it leaves me wanting to read more books like this. A real envelope-pushing magnum opus of a book... or it would be if the same author didn't have House Of Hell, the Sorcery! series, and of course Creature Of Havoc in his portfolio.
It's not my genre, but it's so well-crafted and so much fun, I can't help but adore it. One of my favourite FFs.
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vagsancho
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Favourite Gamebook Series: CRYPT OF THE SORCERER
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Post by vagsancho on Jul 1, 2020 12:48:57 GMT
Agree. I hate appointment with fear. And i hate seas of blood too.
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kieran
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Post by kieran on Jul 1, 2020 13:18:56 GMT
Superheroes aren't my thing either, really, but Appointment With FEAR is such a great tribute to the genre, it's clearly written and presented with a lot of love. As well as bad puns and in-jokes (Drew Swain, etc.), there's a lot of cheeky riffs on mid-80s pop culture in general (Michael Blackson, Georgie Boy and Vulture Club, etc.), and that wonderfully self-referential moment where you can buy a copy of The Warlock Of Firetop Mountain (right after dismissing Dungeons And Dragons). I love all these little references, and it's fun spotting them all. Other things that are great about this book: The artwork (by an exceptional comics artist on the cover, and in a faithful comic strip panel style on the interior); the four different superpowers leading to four different True Paths; the dazzling variety of supervillains; the proliferation of secret references (always a joy to come across these); and the sheer intricacy of the design which is on a par with the works of Andrew Chapman or Luke Sharp for structural complexity. And there are so few gameplay errors, too (what few I'm aware of have no impact on my enjoyment of the book, they're that trivial). It's a refreshing departure in style, content and structure, and it leaves me wanting to read more books like this. A real envelope-pushing magnum opus of a book... or it would be if the same author didn't have House Of Hell, the Sorcery! series, and of course Creature Of Havoc in his portfolio. It's not my genre, but it's so well-crafted and so much fun, I can't help but adore it. One of my favourite FFs. I pretty much agree with all that with the added bonus that I like the superhero genre too.
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Post by vastariner on Jul 1, 2020 13:33:00 GMT
Out of these, Temple of Terror for being a bog-standard (and unfair) dungeon crawl. Really liked FEAR, am not a comic book fan but I did enjoy the stylistic shift in writing and illustrations.
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vagsancho
Knight
Posts: 809
Favourite Gamebook Series: CRYPT OF THE SORCERER
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Post by vagsancho on Jul 2, 2020 4:19:50 GMT
Appointment with FEAR was a huge disappointment. A huge deception. The best title of all fighting fantasy books put all my expectations on the ground when i discovered what it means. When I expected to find an Enemy, a Demon, or a situation that represented Fear itself, I discovered that it was just an acronym, a low play of words. Horrible disappointment for the best title ever.
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Post by Wilf on Jul 2, 2020 6:42:54 GMT
There is no deception. The last word in the title is clearly an acronym, with full stops between the letters, and capitalisation on the book's spine. And it is styled like that on all the subsequent reprints. Whether this is done to show that F.E.A.R. is something other than merely fear, or whether this is done to avoid duplicating the title of a film that was released within a month of the (completely unrelated) FF book, I do not know. I suspect both.
It's certainly a far better title than the accurate-but-bland provisional title "Superheroes".
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Post by deadshadowrunner on Jul 2, 2020 9:11:49 GMT
Appointment with FEAR was a huge disappointment. A huge deception. The best title of all fighting fantasy books put all my expectations on the ground when i discovered what it means. When I expected to find an Enemy, a Demon, or a situation that represented Fear itself, I discovered that it was just an acronym, a low play of words. Horrible disappointment for the best title ever. Now that makes me wonder how FEAR was translated to other languages. A literal translation of fear perhaps? Also, you consider Appointment with FEAR to be the best title of all? Fear is cool and all, but personally Appointment with Fear brings to mind trips to the dentist more so than anything exciting.
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Post by linflas on Jul 2, 2020 11:52:34 GMT
In french F.E.A.R became M.O.R.T. = Maléfique Organisation pour le Règne de la Terreur (Evil Organization for the Reign of Terror). And I really don't like that book as well. By the way, in Temple of Terror, Messenger of DEATH is translated to "Messager FATAL" because "Mort" has only 4 letters. So you may find two "A" letters from "FATAL" in the book.
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Post by Law on Jul 3, 2020 12:53:02 GMT
Superheroes aren't my thing either, really, but Appointment With FEAR is such a great tribute to the genre, it's clearly written and presented with a lot of love. As well as bad puns and in-jokes (Drew Swain, etc.), there's a lot of cheeky riffs on mid-80s pop culture in general (Michael Blackson, Georgie Boy and Vulture Club, etc.), and that wonderfully self-referential moment where you can buy a copy of The Warlock Of Firetop Mountain (right after dismissing Dungeons And Dragons). I love all these little references, and it's fun spotting them all. Other things that are great about this book: The artwork (by an exceptional comics artist on the cover, and in a faithful comic strip panel style on the interior); the four different superpowers leading to four different True Paths; the dazzling variety of supervillains; the proliferation of secret references (always a joy to come across these); and the sheer intricacy of the design which is on a par with the works of Andrew Chapman or Luke Sharp for structural complexity. And there are so few gameplay errors, too (what few I'm aware of have no impact on my enjoyment of the book, they're that trivial). It's a refreshing departure in style, content and structure, and it leaves me wanting to read more books like this. A real envelope-pushing magnum opus of a book... or it would be if the same author didn't have House Of Hell, the Sorcery! series, and of course Creature Of Havoc in his portfolio. It's not my genre, but it's so well-crafted and so much fun, I can't help but adore it. One of my favourite FFs. It's funny... I once thought as you did! I cannot deny it is magnificently constructed but being very much of its time and with the over-saturation of comic book heroes in popular media... I have no desire to replay it and that is a crying shame when one considers how say, a Lone Wolf instalment or other sword and sorcery epic could have turned out with similar planning and dedication. Codewords to avoid cheating are always a must but the sheer amount of mathematical deduction makes you feel more like a gum-shoe than a crime-fighter.
Plus the "fight" with the Titanium Cyborg is an abject lesson in anti-climax.
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Post by Peter on Jul 4, 2020 21:31:39 GMT
Superheroes aren't my thing either, really, but Appointment With FEAR is such a great tribute to the genre, it's clearly written and presented with a lot of love. As well as bad puns and in-jokes (Drew Swain, etc.), there's a lot of cheeky riffs on mid-80s pop culture in general (Michael Blackson, Georgie Boy and Vulture Club, etc.), and that wonderfully self-referential moment where you can buy a copy of The Warlock Of Firetop Mountain (right after dismissing Dungeons And Dragons). I love all these little references, and it's fun spotting them all. Other things that are great about this book: The artwork (by an exceptional comics artist on the cover, and in a faithful comic strip panel style on the interior); the four different superpowers leading to four different True Paths; the dazzling variety of supervillains; the proliferation of secret references (always a joy to come across these); and the sheer intricacy of the design which is on a par with the works of Andrew Chapman or Luke Sharp for structural complexity. And there are so few gameplay errors, too (what few I'm aware of have no impact on my enjoyment of the book, they're that trivial). It's a refreshing departure in style, content and structure, and it leaves me wanting to read more books like this. A real envelope-pushing magnum opus of a book... or it would be if the same author didn't have House Of Hell, the Sorcery! series, and of course Creature Of Havoc in his portfolio. It's not my genre, but it's so well-crafted and so much fun, I can't help but adore it. One of my favourite FFs. I pretty much agree with all that with the added bonus that I like the superhero genre too. Well said Wilf. This is what I was trying to say, but I didn't have the eloquence. I can't even get "unique" right.
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Post by Wilf on Jul 5, 2020 8:21:55 GMT
Hasn't done much good, though. All that's happened since I wrote that post is Appointment has gone from second to equal first! My eloquence is getting it eliminated!!!
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Post by peasantscribbler on Jul 5, 2020 13:38:52 GMT
Wish I could help, but I can't honestly vote for Seas of Blood.
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Jul 6, 2020 10:22:34 GMT
Appointment with FEAR - Most of the early books I know like the back of my hand, either because they are linear, or I played the hell out of them, or I mapped them and the mapping process is a bit like a dissection where you find out everything about the book. This isn't one of them. I sat down just now and played it and had no idea how to win. Echoing wilf - how well constructed it is, to weave into the narrative four different paths. These votes are getting me to reappraise some of my previous thoughts on the books and giving me a new appreciation of many of them. Sadly Wilf, even if I was to change vote and save AWF for this round by dumping Seas of Blood, I fear there's an inevitability to it getting voted off next round.
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Jul 12, 2020 17:09:16 GMT
Appointment with FEAR was a huge disappointment. A huge deception. The best title of all fighting fantasy books put all my expectations on the ground when i discovered what it means. When I expected to find an Enemy, a Demon, or a situation that represented Fear itself, I discovered that it was just an acronym, a low play of words. Horrible disappointment for the best title ever. I looked it up in Portuguese and it went by the name: Encontro com o M.E.D.O.I wonder if you could you tell me how they translated the name of that organisation? What did the letters M E D O stand for in that acronym? Also why is an alternative title Encontro Marcado com o M.E.D.O. ? (Thanks in advance)
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Post by dragontyrant on Jul 12, 2020 18:00:12 GMT
Appointment with FEAR was a huge disappointment. A huge deception. The best title of all fighting fantasy books put all my expectations on the ground when i discovered what it means. When I expected to find an Enemy, a Demon, or a situation that represented Fear itself, I discovered that it was just an acronym, a low play of words. Horrible disappointment for the best title ever. I looked it up in Portuguese and it went by the name: Encontro com o M.E.D.O.I wonder if you could you tell me how they translated the name of that organisation? What did the letters M E D O stand for in that acronym? Also why is an alternative title Encontro Marcado com o M.E.D.O. ? (Thanks in advance) M.E.D.O. stood for "Movimento de especialistas na destruição da ordem", roughly "Movement of specialists in the destruction of order". "Encontro marcado com o M.E.D.O" is not an alternate title but the brazilian one, not portuguese.
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