kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Apr 6, 2024 17:30:27 GMT
I missed Popeye Doyle out of my Narc character list above, and this car chase is reminiscent, in its length, of the chase in the French Connection. Chapman actually based it on one of the chases from the first Mad Max film. To be honest, it feels more French Connection-y to me too.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Apr 4, 2024 14:14:53 GMT
I'm pretty sure it's also the plot of the much later Star Trek: Voyager series It's similar, but not quite the same. It's not a black hole in Voyager. An extremely powerful alien pulls the ship across the galaxy and Janeway has to destroy the means of returning, leaving them stranded. The crew also know exactly where they are and how to get home, it will just take them a very long time unless they can find a few shortcuts.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Apr 1, 2024 19:32:23 GMT
Has anyone here played any of them? They've released 4 so far so they must be selling well. I own one of them, but haven't quite got round to trying it yet. It looks very good from a quick flick through.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Apr 1, 2024 16:02:20 GMT
As a grown-up, I did not have it in me to read through the whole thing to explore every different narrative, but I browsed through it and read all the ending references, and I appreciate that the concept is more about telling a story than about "winning". I like this about the series. Quite often your decisions shape the narrative to the extent it can go off in completely different directions. Whereas in FF the narrative is essentially fixed with your decisions being limited to what corridor you want to explore or how you want to bypass the five-headed ogre. The series that I think best represents a nice combination of the more gameplay-heavy aspects of FF with the ability to actually impact the story with your decisions to a significant degree is the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons gamebook series.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Apr 1, 2024 15:55:29 GMT
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 29, 2024 8:23:12 GMT
On February 16th, Ian announced that he began writing a new Fighting Fantasy book and then announced on March 28th that he has written The Dungeon on Blood Island. How plausible do you think it is that the book he referred to on February 16th is NOT The Dungeon on Blood Island? Feb 16 to March 28 strikes me as a super fast completion time for a 400 section adventure. Barely over a month. If he locked himself away and worked at it many hours a day with hardcore concentration then maybe a short period of writing time like this would be possible. Your thoughts? Either way, exciting news though! If he'd already done all the planning and mapping before 16 Feb and assuming there's still further refining and playtesting to be done, it would be hard work but doable.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 28, 2024 19:09:26 GMT
Wow! Here is the synopsis from Amazon: Book overview Are YOU brave enough to enter the Dungeon of Despair? Jealous of the fame and fortune that Baron Sukumvit's Deathtrap Dungeon has brought him, his brother Lord Carnuss spends five years using an army of slaves to build the ultimate dungeon challenge on Blood Island. Offering a prize of the Golden Orb of Fang, he challenges all-comers to risk their lives to find the Golden Orb and escape with it alive. Filled with deadly creatures, lethal traps, and horrific surprises, danger lurks at every turn. So before he tried to embarrass his brother by finding someone to beat his Dungeon, Carnuss first made his own I Can't Believe It's Not Deathtrap Dungeon?
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 28, 2024 14:49:16 GMT
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 26, 2024 21:22:11 GMT
I believe the Doctor dodging bullets is comparable to another Star Wars reference: Ha, I love that scene. That and the sofa bit are just brilliant. The New Hope and the Empire Strikes Back spoofs are great. Pity the Return of the Jedi spoof was a bit lazy and didn't make so many clever observations about the absurdities of the original films. I also wish they'd done the prequels even via The Cleveland Show.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 23, 2024 13:01:41 GMT
Just dropping to say a few weeks ago I finally finished my series watch-in-order that I started way back in 2013. Any final thoughts?
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 16, 2024 20:18:53 GMT
I was really into Xena at one point, I still have the box set. Xena and Hercules are my two favourite TV shows. I've never found anything quite with the same vibe as either one, that mix of camp and melodrama with everything turned up to 11, the ease with which they can slide from goofball comedy to black drama, the lighthearted scripts, the easy-going charisma of the leads, the endlessly inventive costumes, the elaborately ridiculous action. Both shows could barely even be considered cult hits anymore (and Sorbo has done Hercules' legacy little good with his Twitter rants), but they'll always have a special place in my heart. I liked that too. I like when superhero films try to do something a bit more out there.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 16, 2024 19:09:51 GMT
Joss Whedon's writing has never really grabbed me I have to say. Yeah, it's sharp and witty but it doesn’t sound very natural to me. But he and Buffy are both very popular so probably more my issue than his! A lot of people whose opinions I respect love it, so happy to conclude it is indeed a worthy show even if it's not for me.
I think back when it was on, it used to bug me that Buffy stole Xena's limelight as kickass fantasy heroine!
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 15, 2024 7:09:53 GMT
Is it actually possible to beat the last book while playing as a Warrior? It's been a while since I dusted off my copies of the Sorcery! series, but my memory was that finishing Crown of Kings was dependent upon using the ZED spell. Yes. The She Satyrs give you a genie in a bottle who is able to teleport you out of the prison tower.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 14, 2024 20:07:49 GMT
It's sort of the blindfolds. The cover is the character's eye view of the arena - but the character cannot see it... The picture is actually not of the group the player character is in, it's the one the Southerner is in as it depicts 3 of the other combatants mentioned as being in that group: the man-orc, the warrior woman and the dwarf.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 11, 2024 20:49:51 GMT
This was another aspect of ToT that never occurred to me as a kid. I was the opposite, got to the end with 2 or 3 dragons, fully confident I had won. How naive I was to think Ian wouldn't expect me to collect all of them.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 8, 2024 16:55:49 GMT
Not like when my brother nipped out during one Disney Star Wars fest.
I don't think I've ever come closer to an unfortunate accident than during the finale of The Last Jedi. In the end I had to sprint to the toilets in the middle of the Luke stand-off. And that's probably enough of my cinema-based urinary anecdotes for this forum.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 8, 2024 10:36:51 GMT
I fell asleep in the cinema during the first one. That's not really a comment on the quality of the film, more of an indictment of my own stupid aging and decaying body and brain. For the second one I think I'm going to need to wear a big badge or something emblazoned with the phrase: 'Wake me up when there's a sandworm'. I didn't fall asleep in the first one but my bladder couldn't take it. Nipped out at a 'quiet moment' only to come back to find a massive sandworm on the screen.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Mar 4, 2024 11:00:13 GMT
Anyhow I survived all that business and found myself climbing some steps to a door that left me stranded outside Vatos! Then Malbordous flew over on a dragon laughing to himself and all is lost...
But hold on! This means that Malbordous has decided to make do with just the fifth and final dragon artefact (which he has already brought back to life with that simple incantation) despite the Dark Elves' test being to find and collect all five of them. 🤷🏻♂️ Talk about leaving a job 20% done. Did he get bored and give up looking for the rest of them? Will the Dark Elf Lords still give him their knowledge/ancient powers when he brings back just the one? Perhaps, if I survive that long, I'll see him fly back over the walls tomorrow, suitably chastened, to try to collect the rest.
That's always bothered me too. While him having 1-4 dragons would still be a bad thing, preventing him finding even one artefact means you've severely scuppered his plans
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 26, 2024 15:54:49 GMT
Looks fun!
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 23, 2024 14:11:47 GMT
Someone should write a fan adventure that begins in that one place where you're almost allowed to go outside. Sounds like the kind of approach best saved for someone who lacks the skill and imagination to design their own dungeon and characters.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 23, 2024 10:18:58 GMT
I must admit that the first few times I got inside, I found Vatos to be a little disappointing, after the great overland, Port Blacksand, sea and desert sections, Vatos feels like a dungeon crawl rather than an exploration of a lost city. (At least as far as I've explored.)Yeah, you seem to mostly be in the tunnels under the city rather than the city itself for the most part.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 17, 2024 8:25:57 GMT
Before she dies, she tries to blackmail the Doctor about some secret she possesses about him. Not too sure what this could be or how on earth Lady Peinforte could have discovered it. I guess time will tell... I hadn't remembered this, but according to IMDB's trivia it was something that was supposed to be going somewhere but didn't. Ah, well that's annoying!
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 16, 2024 20:23:04 GMT
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 16, 2024 15:00:50 GMT
Series 25's tone was all over the place, but it was not without its highlights. And unfortunately, its lowlights.
Remembrance of the Daleks
After Series 24's wackiness, it's quite a shock to suddenly be in a rather gritty Earth-based story. Even the Doctor is more gritty, calmly destroying his foes and mocking them as he does so. With all the military and scientific types about, this feels like a return to the UNIT days though sadly none of them really have the charisma of the Brigadier or Liz (I did like the Doctor calling Gilmore 'Brigadier' though). There's also a couple of good firefights, Ace going nuts on a Dalek with a baseball bat, some cool Dalek artillery that we've never seen before, a very creepy schoolgirl Dalek, a few Nazi sympathisers, some nice references to the First Doctor, the return of Davros and the continuation of the Dalek Civil War (where Davros seems to have turned the tables significantly from when we last saw him). All good stuff, but there's just too much of it and it's not helped by things slowing down to a crawl in the second episode where the Doctor debates the impacts of time travel with Geoffrey Butler. Part of the slowdown is because the Doctor is trying to hoodwink just about everyone going so there is a feeling of 'why is he doing this rather than that?' throughout the early stages. And sadly the game is revealed too early, meaning there's no real excitement in the climax as we know Davros is being tricked. Another element that didn't really work for me is a sort of romance Ace has with a soldier who turns out to be an unwitting agent of the Daleks. The age gap seems a bit creepy and even if he didn't know he was helping the Daleks, he was quite clear he was a Neo-Nazi! Not sure if I was meant to feel sad when Creepy Schoolgirl went all Emperor Palpatine on him. And I really wasn't pleased to see the return of the long absent 'enemy blows up because it can't cope with a logical contradiction' trope. One thing that really did work for me however was the Episode 1 Cliffhanger - who knew a Dalek climbing stairs could be so terrifying?
The Happiness Patrol
After a more down to earth story, we're back to wackiness with a capital W. Way back when I reviewed The Sun Makers, I complained that such a repressive government would never last more than 5 minutes. Well, compared to the government here, that in the The Sun Makers is chilling realism. I can live with an unbelievable high concept when writers really commit to it, but that's not the case here. The sets should be more garishly cheerful; the methods of enforcing happiness should be more than blobs of bright paint, sweets and lift music; and the ways for capturing sad people should be more insidious than an undercover agent who doesn't really reveal anything that the culprits weren't doing already and seems unnecessary given the Happiness Patrol can just kill anyone who isn't smiling at anytime anyway. The Doctor shouldn't be able to get away with so much by just yelling at people and a lot of the events just seem to be the Doctor having the same conversation over and over intercut with Ace being nearly executed, captured then nearly executed again. The Doctor is extremely annoying throughout while Ace is utterly dull here. The villains are a mixed bag. I actually thought the Happiness Patrol grunts were pretty entertaining and had good costumes. Helen A was well-played but her character was all over the place - the script couldn't decide whether she genuinely wanted to force people to be happy or if it was an excuse to lower the population and neither really makes sense as presented here. Her crying over Fifi could have been interesting if it was her undoing, but she was already beaten by that stage. Fifi was at least pretty creepy. The Kandy Man was just ridiculous - a sort of demented Bertie Bassett, and also pretty pointless. All he did was yell, get stuck in lemonade twice then melt himself with his own trap. His inventor had his moments, but he felt underdeveloped and I don't really know why Helen's husband abandoned her to flee with him - it doesn't feel there was enough setup to this. Oh, there's also some goblin-y things who serve next to no purpose and seem a waste of a good costume and a guy who plays a harmonica in lieu of having a personality. To be honest, I was pretty much done with this one by the time the Doctor started singing 'As Time Goes By' - three episodes certainly seemed to drag on.
Silver Nemesis
This one feels quite similar to Remembrance of the Daleks with the slightly more gritty tone, the modern(ish) Earth setting, some Neo Nazis, dangerous Time Lord technology, and one of the Big Two villains. Even Ace points out that the climax is near identical. Is this a sign that the writers are running low on ideas and can't even be bothered hiding the fact? The most unique element and the most entertaining are a pair of time travellers from the 1600s. Every scene these two are in is really fun with their confusions about the modern world. I particularly liked Richard who was very funny and manages to be quite complex despite his limited screentime. And that's the real problem here, these two just don't get enough screentime because they have to share three episodes with the Cybermen and Neo Nazis. The latter feel very underwhelming and probably should have been saved for a different story. The Cybermen have their moments though and I particularly liked the action scenes of Ace slingshotting gold at them. I also liked that Ace got to show a bit more fragility. The Doctor though seemed a bit too laidback about such a massive threat. There's a few scenes that just didn't work for me like the Doctor almost meeting the Queen. The Mexican standoff finale also doesn't really work as the Cyberman leader could just blast everyone quite easily though I did like that Richard got to save the day in the end. Lady Peinforte merging with the Nemesis was quite odd. Before she dies, she tries to blackmail the Doctor about some secret she possesses about him. Not too sure what this could be or how on earth Lady Peinforte could have discovered it. I guess time will tell...
The Greatest Show in the Galaxy
It took a while, but the Seventh Doctor finally gets a stand out story here. This is surreal and creepy, every character feeling a bit off. Even the woman who wants nothing to do with the Psychic Circus is weird (and quite amusing too). I like that both she and the dilapidated robot end up coming back into the plot in the end rather than just being discarded by the writers. All the circus crew are memorable and I like that they all have varied motivations: the creepy clown who quite happily serves the Eye, the ringmaster who does so a bit more grudgingly, the fortune teller who does so out of terror but is more goodhearted, and those who have tried to break away and have been psychologically damaged in various ways as a result. The patrons are also interesting: a Mad Max wannabe, a nerd, a werewolf and one of the best Doctor Who characters so far, the utter scumbag that is Captain Cook, a perfect critique of the nineteenth century explorer - a hilarious bore who's much more dangerous than he first seems. The tension is kept high throughout the story and the plot is slowly revealed as it becomes more clear that the 'audience' is nothing of the sort. There are unfortunately a few bad action scenes - how on earth did the Doctor and Ace not see the car bearing down on them? The finale where the Gods of Ragnarok get their lasers reflected at them is also a bit weak. My biggest beef with the story though was the Doctor himself. He's a complete jerk to Ace at the start. Of course, earlier Doctors could also be quite unpleasant to their companions, but it's especially galling here where Ace is quite rightly trying to warn him he's blundering into danger. His capering for the gods at the end and excessive rolling of Rs were also trying my patience ('Rrragnarrrok'). Oh well, still a fantastic story.
Series 25 ranking: 1. The Greatest Show in the Galaxy 2. Remembrance of the Daleks 3. Silver Nemesis 4. The Happiness Patrol
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 9, 2024 23:55:46 GMT
Nice detective work!
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 9, 2024 13:56:15 GMT
Instead of endless attempts to redo Star Trek and Lost In Space I'd rather they came up with original concepts, that's where really good sci-fi is at. The high budget of sci-fi productions makes studios nervous about investing in anything that's not an established brand.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 1, 2024 22:31:42 GMT
It'd very hard to know who to believe. I think that's the real problem with North Korea. On one side, the media often just completely fabricates stories about the country (remember when Kim Jong Un had been deposed by his uncle?) and because the whole country is so secretive, generally these stories have long gone cold by the time they're falsified. But then on the other hand, N Korea pumps out its own propaganda that people understandably sympathetic given Korea's division following WW2, the Korean War and the US blockade are perhaps too ready to believe. The truth is doubtless somewhere in between, but where exactly is hard to know. Having said that, I think Yeonmi Park's take can be safely discounted. She's basically paid by the likes of Fox News to come up with increasingly bizarre stories and even fellow defectors and critics of the regime have debunked many of her stories.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 1, 2024 19:53:20 GMT
Also: I don't think I've ever seen a variant with that random star before. Considering it extends outside the book cover, there's about a 97% chance it's just a watermark. Haha, time to get my eyes checked perhaps!
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 1, 2024 10:07:41 GMT
I like this book, but having to figure out you have to give the jar of ointment to the ganjees surely could be improved, as it's so completely random. Also, this cover just won't do (what were they thinking?): I don't think I've ever seen a variant with that random star before. I do wonder what possible use ganjees could have for ointment.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,472
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Feb 1, 2024 9:50:56 GMT
Was there an episode that ended with Bonnie Langford screaming because of a killer neon cabbage, or did the chippy drop acid in my supper that evening? Yes, that was Terror of the Vervoids. Bonnie sure did more than her fair share of screaming, possibly overtaking Susan in that regard.
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