Fighting Fantasy Gamebooks

Stinger88

Great article in the new IFX magazine about the Fighting Fantasy books.

Arguably the books were the biggest influence in my youth as an artist. So many good memories of these books. I didn't realise they were still going tbh. The latest book is about Zombies. Might have to start reading again.

Oooh, also, news of an IOS and android fighting fantasy game with Jackson and Livingstone. Sounds cool.

I'm sure a few old school PCers will remember these. Has anyone read any of the more recent ones?

http://fightingfantasy.com/

seth.

Forest of doom was my gateway drug.

Loved the ff books when I was a kid. I quickly learned the technique of bookmarking several pages with my fingers while reading

shotgun

I suppose early PC games were my entry point, but art-wise these were much superior (vs EGA gfx...)
Loved the shit out of those books, def set my mood for years to come







the shit--> http://www.gamebooks.org/

marks

Something I didn't know - the cover art for almost all of the early FF books was done by Iain McCaig - who also worked as one of the main concept artists on the Star Wars prequel trilogy.

shotgun

I just got McCaig's Shadowline artbook last week, wonderful stuff

almighty_gir

oh man, steve jackson and ian livingstone. those guys gave birth to so much (in my life) it's unreal!

loved those books growing up!

Stinger88

Here's all the original covers.

http://www.fightingfantasycollector.co.uk/book_covers.htm

I recall my favourite being City of Thieves. I also read The warlock of firetop mountain and Talisman of Death an awful lot as well.

Found this box set that I might have to purchase on Amazon. Shame they aren't the original book covers though. [ame="http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1840464976/ref=s9_simh_gw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=1NSRXRT3TYPD765W3SJP&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=317828027&pf_rd_i=468294"]Fighting Fantasy Box Set: 3: Gamebooks 1-8 Warlock of Firetop Mountain, Citadel of Chaos, Deathtrap Dungeon, Creature of Havoc, City of Thieves, Crypt of the Sorcerer, House of Hell, Forest of Doom: Amazon.co.uk: Steve Jackson, Ian Livingstone: Books[/ame]

Irreal

I'd consider these books to be my first exposure to fantasy gaming. I remember ordering "The Citadel of Chaos" from the school book club when I was around 8-9. Loved everthing about it. I also used to cheat like a mofo

Basically, whatever the cover art was for the book, that is how I imagined the world to be. I think House of Hell was the last one I bought.

shotgun

Each page or each couple of them used to have a cool ink drawing, love those too
I'm amazed to think how 'real' and immersive those books felt, i guess innocent minds are more susceptible

Target_Renegade

Awesome books, definitely looking forward to the mobile versions. Tried to play honestly most of the time, but it was pretty hard and based on dice throws, so couldn't be bothered to start over again. House of Hell as I recall was possible to complete really quickly I think. You entered the house went upstairs or something and then got out again - it's been so long I can't remember, and I was really young.

blankslatejoe

Yeah, Deathtrap Dungeon was my favorites of all time... it was so awesome. Also, all the interiors of that one were done by McCaig as well--he was one of my favorite artists before I even knew who he was!

As for the LoneWolf books (as per shotgun's post)--you can actually play through them all for free, legally, digitally, at projectaon.org. It's a pretty impressive preservation effort, endorsed by Joe Dever, and theyve even been able to gather rights for most of the art too.

Stinger88

I remember copying a lot of the illustrations to help learn how to draw. This one in particular. Wonder if my mother still has them boxed up somewhere...

Hazardous

I had at least 20 or so of these, freaking awesome. Then migrated onto dragonlance / forgotten realms and RA Salvatore and his biblical effort with Drizzt.

Stinger88

Yeah, I progressed to Dragonlance as well. loved Dragons of Spring Dawning particularly. I never got around to reading the Rastlin and Caramon trilogy (Legends) though for some reason. Raistlin was my favourite character as well. I'm going to have to find those books.

Then I went on to Pratchett.

Hazardous

Stinger88 wrote: »

I never got around to reading the Rastlin and Caramon trilogy (Legends) though for some reason. Raistlin was my favourite character as well.

Blasphemy! One of the greatest tales ever!! Raistlin is up there as one of my favourite characters ever. Highly recommended!

shotgun

Yea the Dragonlance Legends series was better than Chronicles, with Raistlin vs Caramon and that hot priestess... that was the shit!

almighty_gir

Raistlin was a badass. period.

i loved the paradox of his personal story.

Paradan

wow, totally forgot about those, actually still have some in storage. one of them is a spell book that went with them. love the art, had that Calgon effect.

Calabi

These were great, always cheated at them although there was one book no matter how I cheated I could never complete it I had to skip parts I could never get it to work and could never find the decent ending. Creature of Havoc.