Best ff ever 61-68 round 1

[tyrion]

Now for a set of entirely new (or at least unpublished until recently) books. 

[vagsancho]

2 near flawless gamebooks.. Howl of the Werewolf and Night of the Necromancer... Two very good books to me.. For one side, esthetically, and in terms of plot, the first one is better, but i identify myself more with the second...
I think from all these, Night of the Necromancer is the best for me.

[Wilf]

Bit weird that Eye Of The Dragon isn't in this round, but never mind.

Voted for Zombies and Port - the worst by a mile.

I think Gates Of Death is very underrated. It has its flaws, sure (you can win without delivering any smoke oil; passing through the Gates surely means losing your boots; and the less said about the bum monster, the better), but it also brings a fresh approach to FF. It feels like it's being aimed at a new generation, with an injection of humour (bier goggles; socks that smell of cheese), and some cool moments like having an enemy with Skill 400 Stamina 800. It's not unforgivingly difficult, and gives the player second chances to gain clues. And whilst Port Blacksand and the servants of Lord Azzur turn up in the beginning, it's not overburdened with references to past glories. The author must surely have spoken to his kids about what they'd like to see in the book (hence Stick Man is not too far away from the dreaded bum creature) and it feels like a genuine attempt to engage a new audience rather than regurgitate the past for us forty-somethings.

It needed a bit more playtesting, but it's streets ahead of anything Ian Livingstone has put out in recent years, and it certainly shouldn't be hot on the heels of the zombies in this round.

[Wilf]

It goes without saying, though, that the top four places in this round will all be taken by Jonathan Green, right?

[philsadler]

Blood is awful and Bloodbones is much too happy to kill off the reader every five minutes. I don't know about Port, Assassins or Gate (yet) ...

[stevendoig]

Gates is a monstrous pile of rabbit pirlie.

Second vote was nearly a tie between Port and blood.

But blood has the best illustrations in the whole series and port possibly the worst, so Port gets the second vote!

[kieran]

Probably the easiest choice yet.

Blood of the Zombies has a fun and frantic fighting system but it soon gets repetitive, it's incredibly linear, you lose if you even miss one zombie and it's impossible playing by the rules. Even if you give yourself 100 Stamina, the odds are still against you. Makes you long for the good old days of when books like Crypt of the Sorcerer were only near impossible.

Gates of Death is just a mess. Sometimes Higson does some clever things with the mechanics, other times he seems to barely understand them. The setting and characters don't fit in with the other FF books and the humour is like a poor man's Sky Lord. All that would be forgivable though if it weren't for the fact it just goes on and on. The only book I've never gone back to after one playthrough.

[vagsancho]

Rules... Rules... And more rules... Can somebody tell me if Blood of the Zombis is it a good book without the rules?

[Wilf]

Aug 4, 2020 14:41:41 GMT vagsancho said:

Rules... Rules... And more rules... Can somebody tell me if Blood of the Zombis is it a good book without the rules??

Yes I can; no it isn't.

[daredevil123]

Aug 4, 2020 14:46:58 GMT Wilf said:

Aug 4, 2020 14:41:41 GMT vagsancho said:

Rules... Rules... And more rules... Can somebody tell me if Blood of the Zombis is it a good book without the rules??

Yes I can; no it isn't.

It's certainly better without the rules though.

[Wilf]

Aug 4, 2020 16:35:47 GMT daredevil123 said:

Aug 4, 2020 14:46:58 GMT Wilf said:

Yes I can; no it isn't.

It's certainly better without the rules though.

No it isn't.  The quicker you die, the quicker you can pick up a *decent* book.

[philsadler]

Blood is simply a dumbed down version of something that did not need to be dumbed down in the first place. Rather patronising idea methinks. What's more, the fact that IL said that the book was the culmination of 40 years of experience (or whatever) made me think that he must have learnt absolutely f*ck all.

[nathanh]

I've only played the Green books and Zombies on this one. Zombies is unplayable and doesn't quite have enough to make up for it, I do enjoy reading it until I inevitably die though. Of the Green books, I don't like Bloodbones very much either to read or to play, but the other three are top tier. Necromancer might be my favourite FF book.

[The Count]

Easily the worst batch to date with only two books worth bothering with.

The worst are by far Blood and Gates.

Blood isn't a proper FF book, is utterly ridiculous in its banality and is based on an overused modern cliché.

Gates has the puerile bum monster and was clearly written by a total numpty.

[sylas]

Aug 4, 2020 14:41:41 GMT vagsancho said:

Rules... Rules... And more rules... Can somebody tell me if Blood of the Zombis is it a good book without the rules?

I'm one of the few who likes it if we ignore the rules. It's certainly written well despite sticking to a tired old plot. I would ignore the background and the final section though as it's dumb as hell.

[linflas]

I prefer playing L4D instead

[vagsancho]

What about Crystal of Storms in this list?

[Wilf]

Bit premature. It's not out yet, so none of us have read it!

[philsadler]

Aug 6, 2020 10:05:22 GMT Wilf said:

Bit premature. It's not out yet, so none of us have read it!

Maybe some of us are time travelers?

[vagsancho]

Aug 6, 2020 13:03:22 GMT philsadler said:

Aug 6, 2020 10:05:22 GMT Wilf said:

Bit premature. It's not out yet, so none of us have read it!

Maybe some of us are time travelers?

I would not be surprised.