board77

This is an offshoot of the "Gateways to Wonder" thread.

Choose your own adventure stories! The idea was that you would read a paragraph or page and then be given choices about what would happen next. The first I ever read was a story about a cat called lucky who ended up on a Pirate ship from what I can recall. (doesn't sound very lucky to me)

Of course, these soon game rise to the "Fighting Fantasy" series of books. I'm pretty sure the first one was "Warlock of Firetop Mountain" but the first one I played was "Deathtrap Dungeon". Yes, played. These weren't simply books, they were mini RPGs. You had to keep track of your hit points and in some cases more stats. Depending on your decisions you would occasionally have to fight creatures and these fights were carried out using simple dice rolls.

I remember playing a few games in the "Lone Wolf" series. These were really cool cause they had printed dice in the top corner of each page so you could just "flick" for a random dice roll. Perfect for playing on long car trips!

The coolest version of these were the "Combat Encounter" series. These were books that came in pairs and you competed against a friend or sibling. Each of you had a book, either the Black Baron or the White Wizard. You looked at the picture of the corridor in front of you and decided which was you were going to move. Each move had a number under it. You would call aout your number, your friend would call out their number. Now here's the clever part. If the number he called out showed up under your number you went to the number under that! This meant that by clever crossreferencing they allowed you both to play in the same dungeon and hunt each other. It was brilliant! I still have them at home. I wonder are they collectors items yet?


Oh, and I also have 3 Middle Earth Solo Gamebooks. These were like the Fighting Fantasy books, but set in Middle Earth. I think they were published by Iron Crown Enterprises. I have "Mines of Moria", "A Spy in Isengard" and "Treason at Helms Deep"

I love these books!!! I used to read them all the time as a kid

Fighting Fantasy!

Yes Brilliant stuff. The first one I played when I was around eight years old. If you wanna wallow in nostalgia then clickie here...

http://www.advancedfightingfantasy.com/index.htm

I'll post some more here about my experiences when I have time.

My first "Choose your own adventure" was the Grailquest series "Gateway of Doom", but I remember playing the less Monster laden: "Choose your own adventure" books too: The one I remember the most are one were you were the kiddie president of a country out near America way,and one were you drove a Rally car in a big race.

I had a blast with the Fighting Fantasy stuff when I was between 8 - 14. Then Computer games shuffled them off to the second hand book shops...

I used to take those out of my school's library all the time...didn't really read much else. I loved them so much...sadly, I don't own any of my own. And that school, that was the French School in Ireland. I haven't heard of any books like that being published here in Poland.

I swear next time I'm in a foreign language bookstore...I'm looking for those.

If I see any I'll post some to you. They turn up in bargain bins all the time here.

I knew Irish people were the best!!!!!!!!!!!

My school librarian scolded me once because I kept checking these things out instead of "real" books.

I would never stoop so low as to actually check those things out.

I just get my fix right in the library while my son is picking out his books.

It's very rare for my character to see a happy ending for some reason.

Funny I found it really hard to do well in the "Choose your own adventure" books too. I dunno maybe I played it too safe.

Dave_LF ~ Hey at least you had them in your school library...