I'm suddenly a bit interested in these "choose your own adventure" books. I found an old copy of "Bloodfeud of Altheus" which really fits my current interest in Greek history and mythology. It is actually pretty well researched. Nice illustrations too.
I also remember being a bit fascinated by another one as a kid. I think it was Forest of Doom (but with a different Norwegian title).
Do you have fond memories of any such books?
I have very fond memories of the Joe Dever Lone Wolf series of adventure books. My local library had them when I was a kid, and I probably went through 10-15 of them over the course of a summer. Come to think of it, they're probably the reason I got introduced to roleplaying. I got my best friend at the time into them, and the fact that he was reading them is probably why his parents got him the D&D starter set, which he in turn introduced me to.
I don't remember a lot of the details now, but IIRC it was a bit of a Star Wars plot. Young man's village gets attacked by forces of darkness. He learns he has the potential to become the last of an order of mystic warriors, goes on a bunch of adventures and saves the world. The neat gimmick was that they were meant to be played in sequence with the reader carrying over their character sheet from book to book, so if you could get all of them you had something like a full campaign. From what I hear, the setting started out as Dever's homebrew campaign world for his D&D game. Mongoose eventually released a D20 era Lone Wolf game, but I never got to play it.
I've been thinking about trying to find them again, now that it's become so difficult to find a group game to play in.
Quote from: ForgottenF on July 07, 2024, 10:26:00 AMI have very fond memories of the Joe Dever Lone Wolf series of adventure books. My local library had them when I was a kid, and I probably went through 10-15 of them over the course of a summer. Come to think of it, they're probably the reason I got introduced to roleplaying. I got my best friend at the time into them, and the fact that he was reading them is probably why his parents got him the D&D starter set, which he in turn introduced me to.
I don't remember a lot of the details now, but IIRC it was a bit of a Star Wars plot. Young man's village gets attacked by forces of darkness. He learns he has the potential to become the last of an order of mystic warriors, goes on a bunch of adventures and saves the world. The neat gimmick was that they were meant to be played in sequence with the reader carrying over their character sheet from book to book, so if you could get all of them you had something like a full campaign. From what I hear, the setting started out as Dever's homebrew campaign world for his D&D game. Mongoose eventually released a D20 era Lone Wolf game, but I never got to play it.
I've been thinking about trying to find them again, now that it's become so difficult to find a group game to play in.
Never heard of this one. Thanks for the tip!
I think my current book (Bloodfeud of Altheus) is also campaign-style. At least, I know there are two sequels. The whole series is called the Cretan Chronicles.
Steve Jackson's Sorcery series is definitely a campaign, starting with The Shamutanti Hills and ending with Crown of Kings. I've heard great things about it.
I have a big collection of FF books.
Very reccomended are Joe Dever's Lone Wolf series and his lesser known Freeway Fighter series.
TSR had a brief fling with real gamebooks with the Super Endless Quest books and theres dozens of wanna-bes. A sherlock Holms series I have one book of. A Narnia series. Probably more.
Also have a look at Steve Jackson's Sorcery series of 4 gamebooks. I have the complete set.
And finally there is the lesser known set of adventure books for the Adventures in Tekumel line. I have 2 or 3 of the set.
Tunnels and Trolls solitaire adventures are basically the same thing. They're a bit of a mixed bag and certainly not at all politically correct. Mercenaries Spies and Private Eyes had at least one.
TFT, D&D, Runequest, GURPS, all had some solitaire adventures. One of GURPS first edition's stated goals was to have T&T's appeal to solo gamers.
I played some of the Fighting Fantasy books and Endless Quest. There were some Middle Earth ones by ICE that eventually led to their demise as Tolkien Enterprises considered them as fiction rather than games. They're supposed to be pretty good.
TFT, D&D, Runequest, GURPS, all had some solitaire adventures. One of GURPS first edition's stated goals was to have T&T's appeal to solo gamers.
Was going to mention the Tunnels & Trolls adventures. I have a fair number og them but have onlt cone through a few. What was "objectionable" in them? So far its been pretty bog standard.
The The Fantasy Trip ones are pretty complex. I have one. The Unicorn Gold one with the RL treasure hunt that was never solved.
There are also several such solo adventures for Call of Cthulhu.
Quote from: Omega on July 08, 2024, 07:13:45 PMI have a big collection of FF books.
Very reccomended are Joe Dever's Lone Wolf series and his lesser known Freeway Fighter series.
TSR had a brief fling with real gamebooks with the Super Endless Quest books and theres dozens of wanna-bes. A sherlock Holms series I have one book of. A Narnia series. Probably more.
Also have a look at Steve Jackson's Sorcery series of 4 gamebooks. I have the complete set.
And finally there is the lesser known set of adventure books for the Adventures in Tekumel line. I have 2 or 3 of the set.
Thanks! Sorcery is on my list to buy, and now also Lone Wolf. Sherlock Holmes sounds like something I'd like to check out (unless it's garbage).
Did you check out the Cretan Chronicles?
The Sherlock Holmes one I have, Black Emerald, is not bad really. The skill checks are sometimes sparse. But they do come into play. And the clues and conclusions you end up with can make or break the case.
If you want a totally freeform FF style Sherlock Holmes adventure then I strongly suggest the Sherlock Holmes Detective Story Game. Though despite the cover saying its based on Cogan's design, that is false. Cogan just re-arranged the system used in Barbarian Prince Which is also worth looking up as its a FF style game but done as a board game.
Cogan retooled the system to make the extensive Doctor Who Solo Story Game. Covered alot! But Cogan had a bad habit of putting up expansions only for a short time. Or requiring you to subscribe to get them. All gone now with Yahoo killing off e-groups.
The Sherlock Holmes PDFs though are still on BGG. May need to have an account to be able to download more than one file a day. BGG is like that.
Scroll down to files
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/140973/sherlock-holmes-detective-story-game
The Doctor Who stuff might be on BGG too. I have not looked at it since playtest.
There is also a western using the system. But cant find it. Found it. The Drifter.
Just got my hands on two Sherlock Holmes game books: Murder at the Diogenes Club, and The Black River Emerald. They look good, with some nice background info and a very quick character generation option. Only just now did I realize that they were published by ICE (same as MERP and Rolemaster).
Many Gamebooks have been converted as apps for iOS. I have the whole Sorcery! saga and several others on my iPad. They maintain the spirit of the originals, with dice rollings, character's sheets... (the app only automatically tracks the stats)
There are also games who are based on the Gamebook idea even if they are on computers. This way they can offer content beyond the limitation of a book's pages. "80 Days," a steampunk version of Verne's novel, is one of the all-time bests. I replayed it three times and I'm sure I still didn't see everything.
When I tried T&T solo adventures as a teen, they did not grab me. Decades later, I picked up a big digital bundle of them and approached them with a modern solo perspective (open world with an oracle/GM emulator) and I had a blast. I treated them as a Souls-like video game with a camp fire/respawn point mechanic. That broke the death/character gen grind and I actually got to explore and appreciate the titles more.
Isn't Troika based off the Fighting Fantasy system?
I have about one hundred of them, my favorite being the Steve Jackson's Sorcery series and the legendary House of Hell(that I adapted for a one night rpg adventure - alas in french only)
Quote from: Trond on July 02, 2024, 09:45:44 PMI'm suddenly a bit interested in these "choose your own adventure" books. I found an old copy of "Bloodfeud of Altheus" which really fits my current interest in Greek history and mythology. It is actually pretty well researched. Nice illustrations too.
I also remember being a bit fascinated by another one as a kid. I think it was Forest of Doom (but with a different Norwegian title).
Do you have fond memories of any such books?
Yes, I played Sorcery! as a kid, my favourite series. A UK based studio named Inkle bought the rights and made it into a phone/PC game. They implemented the rewind mechanic. Back then everybody was playing gamebooks that way anyway, keep a finger on each episode you are concurrently reading! They introduced that mechanic, taught the players to use it and love it, and broke it. It was the perfect execution I've seen in a game.
The last book
removes the rewind mechanic at some point, making everything more challenging.
I bought the re-print of the 4 Sorcery! books recently and had fun replaying them, then analyzing them to create a cheat map. I made 3 and had problems with the castle, the descriptions and directions are truly confusing. I alter found this guy - https://x.com/alnaro_8 The dude is a superfan. He has the original books, reprints, collects different prints in different languages. His collection is perhaps the most complete Sorcery! and FF collection in the world. And, he did the challenge to create maps for the Sorcery! series, they look amazing. Go check them out. Of course, spoilers, only use the maps after you have played the game enough ;)
I also developed a rules light system that's FF compatible, but had Fighter, Cleric, Specialist, Magic-User. Fun times. I might go back and finish it one day.
Quote from: David Johansen on July 08, 2024, 11:18:24 PMThere were some Middle Earth ones by ICE that eventually led to their demise as Tolkien Enterprises considered them as fiction rather than games. They're supposed to be pretty good.
I had one of those Middle earth books, and it was indeed good. Came with its own miniature color hex map.
I got warlock of firetop mountain when I was in 4th grade and I was obsessed with it. I never did get past the maze though. Also my first monster manual for dnd was the fighting fantasy one.
Fabled Lands was a good series. There were supposed to be 12 books, initially only 6 got published, and a 7th came out many years later. Each book covered a region of the series setting, so if you went too far in one direction in one book it would tell you to go to section xxx in a different book. No real overarching plot, but a bunch of interesting adventures you could get into. Pretty sandboxy.
I will also say that, out of all gamebooks I have played (and I've played a lot), this is one of the easiest to port the system directly to actual tabletop play as is.
Edit: little brag, my wife just got me books 1-12 of the most recent Lone Wolf reprints for Christmas. Super excited about these, as LW was one of three entry points for me into TTRPG gaming (the other two being WEG Star Wars D6 and the Ultima pc games)