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House of Hell

Started by biggytitbo, July 02, 2010, 02:47:27 PM

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Geraint

there's a torrent floating about with pdfs of the whole lot, I found it on btjunkie but obviously wouldn't recommend anyone infringe copyright by downloading them

Tokyo Sexwhale

I'm surprised no-one has thought about converting them to web-based games.  They'd work very well, and you probably wouldn't even need much coding skill to do it - just hyperlinks to the relevant page.

The Masked Unit

Now there's a project for a shut in. I'd play.

Ignatius_S

A lot of information here - http://www.gamebooks.org/index.php

I.C.E., which did a Tolkien RPG, did a couple of Middle-earth solo books – I had one and I remember the mechanics were rather more complicated than the usual one.

Quote from: biggytitbo on July 02, 2010, 03:59:04 PM
Livingston was behind the Tomb Raider...
He was the M.D. of Eidos for quite a while – think he's still connected.

Quote from: Santa's Boyfriend on July 02, 2010, 05:53:17 PM
Is there still a market for these things?  Now computer games are so big (I'm playing Heavy Rain at the moment) I wouldn't be surprised if the whole thing has died out.
Well, quite a few FF books have been republished and continue to be so, so I guess there's still a market.

Quote from: El Unicornio, mang on July 02, 2010, 09:40:36 PM
I loved Freeway Fighter, but I think it would be considered too much of a Mad Max ripoff if they made a film version
Oh, totally... still I have my memories....

Quote from: Tokyo Sexwhale on July 03, 2010, 01:27:44 AM
Scorpion Swamp was my favourite in the series - it seemed more atmospheric, and had the bonus that you could go back to areas you'd already visited.

Most of the early ones are very good though - but after the first 20 or so, they started to get a bit samey.

"Choose Your Own Adventure" was the real gateway series though.

Does anyone remember another book series which consisted only of pictures.  You would have one gamebook and play a character and a friend would have the other.  The purpose, I think was to kill the other, but it never seemed to work when I played it.
I think it was Scorpion Swamp, you could choose what quest you wanted to – either a good, evil or neutral one.

CYOA certainly started it off but the two I played were rubbish. There was one based on the TSR RPG, Top Secret, where you played a young boy who spurned company your own age in favour of meeting three old persons in the park... somehow you got involved in undercovering Russian spies . One of the endings is that you cause a foodfight in a baker's to attract the attention of the police – the spies do get arrested but not the owner of the store won't let anyone leave until the mess is cleaned up, which was accompanied by a lecture about all the starving people in the world.

I think the two-book one is Clash of the Princes – from what I remember it really needed older players (and was probably aimed at those). I did try it as a solo player experience when I was a little bit older and thought it was actually very good, far better than the initial disappointment.

Quote from: Viero_Berlotti on July 03, 2010, 02:44:39 AM
Surprised there's no mention of the Lone Wolf series so far. In my opinion it was the the high peak of fantasy game-book literature. 28 consecutive story books, and you could continue your character from the last book into the next. It was a truly brilliant interactive fantasy epic, that although not perfect, did things with gameplay and narrative non of the others quite managed.

Apparently there was a Lone Wolf next gen console game in production, with Joe Dever directly involved. However it has now been cancelled, and as with all these things the film rights have been sold, but unfortunately Magnamund will probably never see the light of day.
Actually, my memory was jogged by that link Biggy posted and had to meant to mention them. I certainly played several, but I've a feeling that I thought they went off the boil – I'm sure there was a law of diminishing returns for me.  I had a quick look at the site I puts above and it mentions that they started to become very linear with no much in the way of choices and I suspect that's probably the reason I went off them. Did love the first one though.

Shame about the game and film.

Quote from: biggytitbo on July 03, 2010, 01:05:53 PM
I seem to remeber the Cretan Chronicles was a bit more mature - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cretan_Chronicles...
Play 'em – I was very into mythology and can't remember if that's why I enjoyed them or whether they were good!

Quote from: Pinckle Wicker on July 03, 2010, 06:44:07 PM
Has anyone actually tried playing (is that what you would call it?) a FF book recently? I have my collection still, in the attic, and am kinda tempted to see how long my attention would last on one of them now. Think i would need to be in an Xbox free zone though, a jail cell or a desert island maybe!   
Quote from: biggytitbo on July 03, 2010, 06:49:25 PM
Well for you iphone berks cool dudes, you can download versions of some of the books from itunes. Not sure I'd have the patience to play through the books again now though.
Because of this thread, I downloaded the iPhone Citadel of Chaos – the text and mechanics are lifted from the books and the system I thought was sound... certainly it was nostalgic, but I still thought it was a decent way to kill time.

On the downside, because you can't retrace your steps and you need to access certain areas to complete it, the way to win is a bit too trial and error, and linear for my taste – I've a feeling that CoC had a tendency to that than other FF books.

Still, I can't grumble at £1.79.

Quote from: Tokyo Sexwhale on July 06, 2010, 11:10:12 PM
I'm surprised no-one has thought about converting them to web-based games.  They'd work very well, and you probably wouldn't even need much coding skill to do it - just hyperlinks to the relevant page.

There are quite a few fanfic ones - http://www.ffproject.com/links.htm



Big Jack McBastard

Oh christ we had so many of these I am nostalgiaing hard here. The cover of Creature of Havoc got me particularly.

I remember raiding the library for the first time in years when I was 2 books into a series and couldn't find the third one for sale anywhere this was many years ago.

I'm seriously considering a .pdf hunt but I dunno, something about it being in your hands made it more engrossing.

dr_christian_troy

I've got to dig mine out now. Loved these, especially the more creepy ones.

Glebe

City Of Thieves and Deathtrap Dungeon were my first couple of books, and with Ian McCaig's art plus the fact that they were both exciting, imaginative and a little scary, they remained firm faves. And of course Steve Jackson' Sorcery! books with John Blanche's wonderful illustrations. Anyone familiar with Ratspike? It's a collection of art by Blanche and Ian Miller, and it's pure eye candy. I also have a non-FF Livingstone/McCaig book entitled Casket Of Souls, which consists of a puzzle you have to solve in order to win some competition.

I actually kind of gave up trying to win the FF books.. a friend of mine got really into them and bought a lot of the later books too. He actually reckoned at first that House Of Hell had some kind of flaw in it where you couldn't really win it, or something. He also loved drawing dungeon maps for FF role playing, which we used to love too... the proper D&D and MERP systems were too complicated for us!

Man that Ratspike book looks fab, pity its min of £40 on Amazon though :-(
On another note was there not a poster in here who lived in Steve Jackson's old flat/house? (maybe i dreamt/imagined it!)

Glebe

You mean Steve Jackson's old flat/house of hell?

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: Pinckle Wicker on July 08, 2010, 09:34:48 PM
Man that Ratspike book looks fab, pity its min of £40 on Amazon though :-(
On another note was there not a poster in here who lived in Steve Jackson's old flat/house? (maybe i dreamt/imagined it!)

A couple of the later FF books sell well on ebay, a month ago I sold book 56 for £28. I think it's the ones that haven't been reissued lately, though I'm not 100% sure.