We don’t usually do news around here, unless it’s Brexit or Trump or other End Times scenarios, but there was some recent discussion in the comments about Scholastic UK’s re-release of the Fighting Fantasy gamebook series, and I kind of like the covers, so why not?
What’s good about them, first of all, is that they’re simple. These covers will have taken a fraction of the time of a full painting like Martin McKenna’s (very striking) image for Bloodbones. So they’ll be cheap, and that’s smart thinking.
On the other hand, cheap would be counter-productive if it looked cheap. Try the cover below that was proposed to me for Down Among the Dead Men by a mainstream publisher. ‘But… but…’ I said. And, when my brain regained control of my mouth: ‘It’s about pirates, not cowboys. And also it’s not a funny story for eight-year-olds.’
Thus it is that I know how utterly slapdash and dire a ‘professional’ attempt at a cover can be. By contrast, these FF covers are bold, modern and eye-catching. I can imagine them convincing today’s eleven-year-olds to give gamebooks a try.
But will those kids want to roll dice and wrangle their way through all that character-sheet arithmetic? Will the puzzle- and plot-driven adventures hold up? Will the creaky purple prose of thirty-five years past still compel attention in a videogame era? I don’t know. I just think they look pretty.
I find it rather humorous that these books were given far more complex and ominous cover illustrations in the 1980s than they are given in their 2017 re-re-re-release.
ReplyDeleteInterestingly, those illustrations were among the main reasons the books had such a draw on 80s' kids. And yet, I agree with you: the new covers are simple, and indeed they're eye-catching in their simplicity. Those colours are... tablet-like, we could say? Elementary, bright, high-contrast. At last, something that doesn't seem made to sell the books to the children of yesteryear.
It's unfortunate that it's always the same titles that are reprinted, though. But it's not hard to understand why. Copyrights and royalties apart, there's no room in today's book market for a 50+ books series. A pity though, as some of the latest FFs are still very interesting gamebooks, and still in dire need of a second chance they will probably never get.
I should ask Paul Mason and Steve Williams whether they sold the copyrights in their FF books. If not, we could bring them back in a slightly revised form.
DeleteBtw Efrem, what do you make of that proposed DATDM cover? Was the art director trying to tell me something? Maybe I pillaged his castle in a past life or something :-)
DeleteI don't know, I kind of liked the DATDM cover. It's simple with the four ships and the pirate skull, but it tells me enough. In truth, the cover I look at when checking out a book (game or otherwise) is the back for the story lead-in summary. That's what's going to get me on-board or not.
DeleteYou've got the admit the font is a curious choice, though, John? It's a 16th-18th century pirate story, but that font is late 19th century Wild West. Which would also make a fine setting for a gamebook adventure, but The Good, the Bad & the Undesd rather than this book.
DeleteSee, I really didn't even notice the font until you pointed it out, which shows how little I pay attention to the front covers. Really my best guide comes from "author branding." If I know an author does good work,I'm much more inclined to check it out.
DeleteDown Among the Dead Men is about pirates. Generally (especially after five Pirates/Caribbean movies) I find pirates a bit crap and played out. But, I know Dave Morris as a good writer of gamebooks, so I'd check it out and it was good.
I did like the first PotC movie, though it's hard to remember that now after the sequels. Anyway, I just realized I usually couldn't tell you what's on the cover of whatever book I'm currently reading. I just don't look at it. Like you, John, I'm mostly swayed by whether I like the author's other work.
DeleteI think they're rather garish without being attractive. And while they might be cheap, they're also cheap-looking. Not actually bad, just not that good. Any child who is interested in old-fashioned gamebooks can find them cheaper with better covers secondhand, with very little effort.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I wasn't aware of these new editions, and I see that The Port or Peril is a new title from Ian Livingstone. Bring on that purple prose! It's far superior to the grey stuff!
I very much doubt if Ian has personally written the new book any more than James Patterson writes the books with his name on, Robin. He's a busy man these days, what with his games learning initiative and so forth.
DeleteI would not be surprised if you're entirely right, Dave, but then again you never know. Fighting Fantasy is probably as important and memorable to him as it is for many fans, so maybe he experiences a need to indulge his nostalgia every now and again, too!
DeleteRemember, Robin, I know most of the people who ghost-write this stuff. So there's an element of "insider info" at work ;-)
DeleteDidn't I read somewhere that your wife is a ghostwriter Dave?
DeleteShe has done some ghostwriting, Michael. But no gamebooks -- not yet, anyway.
DeleteI met Ian Livingstone at UKGamesExpo and, while he was signing my books, he seemed pleased when I told him they'd brought me a lot of pleasure over the years; asked which was the first one I'd read, and which one I'd enjoyed most.
DeleteDon't keep us in suspense, Andy. Which were they?
DeleteWell, as you're asking :)
DeleteThe first one I read was City of Thieves, which I found in our local library. Suffice to say that 10 year-old me didn't complete it on the first attempt. Of Ian Livingstone's books I'd have to say that's probably my favourite. I like the story in Crypt of the Sorcerer but the book is ludicrously difficult.
I'm not sure I can pick out a favourite overall. Dead of Night probably; I enjoyed Night Dragon but you are constantly having to update the Time score, which gets old very quickly. Creature of Havoc was good, apart from the notorious mistake that made it unplayable. It's a pity Seas of Blood wasn't better executed, as I think it's a great idea. Chasms of Malice has the distinction of being the only book where I really did roll 12/24/12 (and on the first read through) but it's another one that could have been handled better!
(Good thing I checked - I almost replied from my wife's account, which would have been confusing.)
I did play part of City of Thieves. A classic fantasy concept with a real Lankhmar feel to it. Maybe Ian isn't to blame for the flaws in Crypt of the Sorcerer -- at #26 in the series, it's possible that one was ghost-written. The others I'm not familiar with at all, though I'm going to have to look into that time-scoring system if only to try and figure out a better way to handle it :-)
DeleteI just looked at the summary of Dead of Night. Sounds like it anticipated The Witcher by over a decade!
DeleteDave, I'm not sure I dare tell you that my favourite FF book was Freeway Fighter! I was actually going to ask your blog-ites what the best of the later FF books were, as even though I've got all the originals, the last one I remember reading (or at least enjoying) was Crypt of the Sorcerer and I haven't got the energy to read them all again. Other Andy has helped me greatly in that department.
DeleteI've nothing against Freeway Fighter, Andy, just that it seems an irksome choice for Titan to do a comic book about, given that it was only ever intended as a Mad Max, er, homage. And that there might be other comics more worthy of their funding -- but then, I would say that!
DeleteAs you allude to in this or a previous post, people/publishers operating within their safety net, not prepared (or able) to push any boundaries. Still, some moving and funny posts on here. I don't know whether I keep logging back on for those or for my fix of the garish FF covers.
DeleteI'll give an honourable mention to Talisman of Death, which I almost included in my previous post. Interesting setting, some memorable encounters, and 'save' points so you don't have to restart from the beginning. And it was a birthday present from my parents!
DeleteIt's too bad that Jamie and Mark sold the copyright to Talisman of Death to Ian and Steve, otherwise we could have released it as a standalone. I expect it won't be one of the Scholastic titles, seeing as it's set in Orb rather than Alansia... or do I mean Titan?
DeleteAs for the new covers, I also think Robin is right: to me they do look cheap. However, I also agree they're "bold, modern and eye-catching", so hopefully they will do the trick.
DeleteThey probably won't republish Talisman of Death. I bet they don't republish Dead of Night either, which is a pity as, apart from the glitched infinity loop, it's really good.
I think a big factor will be gamebook fans with children who are around 10. Since the 10 year olds of the 80s are in their late 30s/early 40s now, there will rpobably be a few. I have personally met 3 child gamebook fans. I think 2 of them were introduced by their parents and I don't think the other one was. Not a big enough sample to be representative, which might be a worrying sign. We'll see how many children are at Fighting Fantasy Fest.
ReplyDeleteAnother way to go might be to try grown-up gamebooks for 30- or 40-somethings, the way Battlestar Galactica came back as a much more mature and interesting show than its original '80s incarnation.
DeleteI do have some friends who've introduced their kids to roleplaying via Blood Sword and Fabled Lands. The appeal seems to be playing in a team with their parents and friends rather than in solo gamebooks.
I have bought my seven year old daughter Warlock of Firetop Mountain, and she has been playing the heck out of it - keeping it on her bedside table in a plastic packet, together with dice, a pencil and a rubber...
DeleteThat's great. Nothing beats discovering something like gamebooks at that age, unlocking a whole universe of the imagination. And does she like the new covers?
DeleteSome interesting comments on here, most of which I agree with.
ReplyDeleteSome of those early FF covers I think did draw people into the books. The Forest of Doom being an obvious one. I remember The Chasm of Doom doing likewise for Lone Wolf and Usurper for TWOTT. That's enough Doom for one paragraph anyway. Just out of interest, did Leo do any of the FF covers, Dave?
I still can't make up my mind on the DATDM cover, David. First thoughts were, it's so bad it's actually quite good! That turned to just completely rubbish. Then I thought you were a bit harsh, it's not that bad, just on the wrong book. Now I'm back to rubbish again. Perhaps run a competition for who can come up with the worst cover for your new book, with the DATDM cover as the benchmark to get under.
The new FF books aren't a patch on the old ones but if they get more kids reading and into the genre then great. I do think that the plot and puzzle elements will hold up though. Over the last few years, I've suggested gamebooks to various parents who have kids of Junior school age. Surprisingly, more times than not, they've already done it. For those with kids who don't much like reading, gamebooks are the only books that they'll actually read. Surely a case for putting them on the national curriculum (maybe in place of Shakespeare!) If they don't want to use dice etc, they don't have to.
As far as I know Leo didn't do any gamebook covers, Andy. Plenty of maps, of course, and some interior art.
DeleteI'm sure the original FF covers did the job back in the day. It's like Alan Craddock's paintings for Dragon Warriors - lovely and striking, but very much of their era. Personally I prefer the DW art that James Wallis oversaw for the new edition. Of course, it's apples and oranges, as nowadays DW is selling to adults (if they can find it anywhere) rather than kids.
I don't know about the argument that because gamebooks encourage kids to read, that automatically makes them a good thing. If kids go on to great literature then, sure, it's worthwhile to have had that gateway drug. If they don't, then what's so special about them reading books at all? Reading books is not axiomatically a good thing. Growing up I read a lot of "wonderful trash" (comics, pulp stories, cheap SF) and I'm glad of it, but if that's all I ever read in my life then I might have been better off watching TV.
That DATDM cover is getting a more charitable reception from readers of the blog than I ever expected! Maybe we should have a competition at that. So: if anyone can produce a cover design I think is worse than the one above, they'll win a signed copy of the Morris gamebook of their choice :-)
Interesting point. I haven't any evidence to suggest English grades improve dramatically as I result of a binge on Golden Dragon, but I don't think it did me any harm (although I did have to look up axiomatically)! Whilst I'm sure you're right that most kids won't go any further on the pathway from gamebook to great literature, a few will that otherwise wouldn't. Treading on thinner ice, isn't great literature subjective? I read Pynchon's V and it felt like pulling teeth, so give me the wonderful trash any day of the week!
DeleteA cover for one of your books, Dave? The possibilities are endless! Whichever one I pick, they'll be Ninjas on the cover and plenty of 'em, you can count on that. Probably zombies too I would imagine. I'm sure I can fit that all in with Heart of Ice somehow. Tagline, He Kissed Her Then Killed Her. I just need to find someone who can draw slightly less worse than me and work out how to upload stuff and I'm a shoe-in. I'll have The Walls of Spyte please (£563 on Amazon if you don't have a spare copy).
There's a big question -- what is great literature? It's subjective, of course. I don't think I'd care for V either, though probably I ought to try it someday. But I'm indebted to Stan Lee and Robert E Howard not just for their own great stories, but for being the keys that unlocked for me the likes of Nabokov, Tolstoy, Bronte, Hemingway, and so on.
DeleteHe Kissed Her Then Killed Her... hmm, I might actually read that. But so far you're out in front with the ninjas and zombies. Walls of Spyte, you say? Never say never.
Delete(I go on a bit here! Please forgive the ramble.)
I must admit that Alan Craddock's art didn't appeal to me much back in the 80s, either (although the Lands of Legend cover isn't too bad). Leo Hartas' black and white illustrations for The Elven Crystals, on the other hand, were particularly evocative for me.
Back in the day, I bought just about every gamebook I found in the bookshop. However, I do remember my first purchase of a gamebook. I'd seen a copy of The Forest of Doom on a fellow pupil's bed during a multi-activity holiday in a place called Carnoch in Scotland. I'd always been interested in ghosts, monsters and UFOs, so the monster caught my eye. When I was next in a bookshop I looked for it. At the time, there were only three FF books, and I did make a sequence of purchases based on the covers: Forest first, then Firetop Mountain, and finally Citadel of Chaos, which had a rubbish cover, but fantastic illustrations by Russ Nicholson. After that I was hooked. Even poor covers didn't stop me buying every new series. I've over five metres of shelving devoted to them now. Mind you, I'd burnt out before the FF series ended, but I picked up a heap of missing FF and Lone Wolf titles in a charity shop a few years ago. I just wish I'd bought Revenge of the Vampire, which sells for silly money on EBay.
It may sound sad, but gamebooks changed my life. They triggered an obsession with books and reading and art, so I now have over 100m of book shelves in my home. Gamebooks led me to roleplaying, and through that to the smartest and most interesting group of friends I've ever had. Because of them, I became involved in trying to create an RPG using real-world magical practices. And because of my knowledge of real-world magical practices, I had a common reference point with the woman who's now been my partner for seventeen years. Without her I wouldn't have my beautiful daughter.
Literature or purple prose, it doesn't really matter. If I have to pick the pivotal moment of my life, it's seeing that gamebook belonging to a kid whose name I can't remember. Because of it, I have my family.
It's also cost me a bloody fortune in shelving!
No need to apologize, Robin - long comments are always welcome. The fun of this blog is in the conversations.
DeleteRole-playing changed my life too. If not for picking up a copy of Empire of the Petal Throne in 1975 or '76, I wouldn't have met about three-quarters of the people who are now my closest friends, nor would I have written gamebooks and RPGs. And in fact I married my wife in a role-playing game before we got engaged in real life.
And as for shelving - oh yes, I know what that's like :-) Our books are now two deep on most of the bookcases.
Book shelves ain't doing their job properly unless they are creaking !
DeleteGetting married in an rpg before real life is an interesting variant on the idea of moving in together before marriage. Best to find out early your partner's habits and minor vices, such as sharing or shirking the housework, snoring, or opening trans- dimensional portals into the chaos vortex...
I have to confess I did actually cheat on her in the game. Well, sort of (it was a polygamous culture) -- and never, of course, in real life!
DeleteWell Dave, you know what they say : "What happens in Tekumel, stays in Tekumel"
DeleteAnother, slightly creepy, variant is meeting, dating, and eventually moving in with a female character played by your male best mate. The first meeting, in a nightclub (Shadowrun), is the most memorable session I've ever played in. All the more remarkable because, contrary to my expectation, it wasn't planned - he was winging it because it made a good story. The other player was his real-life girlfriend, who found the whole thing very amusing.
DeleteI don't usually encourage players to gender-swap because they're so crap at it. (Maybe if Jaye Davidson was in the group I might have a different take on that.) Of course, when you're the one running the game you have no choice. I've frequently had to play out romantic scenes between a male player-character and a female NPC. It's... mind-expanding, I guess.
DeleteHi Dave,
ReplyDeleteI'd converted Sweet is Revenge to a little more portable word doc and pdf. May I post it up on the RQ *(BRP) forum at https://basicroleplaying.org/topic/6458-sweet-is-revenge-a-previously-unpublished-old-school-rq-scenario/ and/or email to you? My email is styopa1@gmail.com.
THANKS!
-Steve
Please do, Steve. And very flattered I am too. You can send it to info[at]fabledlands.net if you like, but seeing as I have the forum link I could just download it once you've posted it there. More Questworld snippets coming up over the next few months btw.
DeleteI just noticed that somebody on the forum said, "I like the puzzles, the maps and drawings. But I hate that you can kill everybody and still be the hero."
DeleteWhich is interesting. Who would punish you, after all? The gods of RQ aren't really into moral guidance for the most part, are they? (Not traditional Judeo-Christian morality, anyway.)
As John Jones pointed out, it's quite like a Legend scenario in that respect. Oliver and I don't tend to write scenarios that dictate right and wrong to the players.
Dave - given the amount of comments this blog has gathered it looks although the statement that the new FF covers are eye- catching has been proven. Of course, people may come for those primary colours and bold designs, but they stay for the conversation !
ReplyDeleteGreat minds think alike, John -- I was just speculating on whether putting those covers at the top had drawn in more readers. Or it might just be that search engines have brought FF fans to the blog. If it's that and they stay to find out what Fabled Lands and Dragon Warriors are all about, I'll be happy.
DeleteI linked to Sweet is Revenge on the Runequest forum at BRP Central and recognise some of the new commenters from there, so that's probably my fault.
DeleteThere'll be more from the Questworld book coming up over the next few months, Simon, and for the benefit of those newbies maybe I should reprise my 485 BC Spartans scenario, which I ran using RQ.
DeleteI don't suppose that they are looking for new titles to include in the reprints, and if so, whether they might consider some of the missing FF books like The Keeper of the Seven Keys? Or would that be considered too complicated for a re-release of the classics
ReplyDeleteAs they already have 50-odd FF books to choose from, I'm guessing they don't need to commission new books from anybody but Ian L or Steve J. But if the Scholastic editors call, you can bet Jamie and I will pick up.
Delete