As they do with all their Gamebook Adventure authors, Tin Man Games have just published an interview with me, which you can find here:
An Interview with Andrew Wright
I start off talking about Catacombs of the Undercity, but you could also consider the interview a sort of background on just who is this Fantasy Gamebook character! In particular, with reference to the future of gamebooks, I say: "With the advent of print-on-demand sites like Lulu, we’re also going to get more gamebook content that way, and also as PDF digital releases as well."
Indeed, given more time, this is what I'd love to do, and will certainly post about here in future. Essentially I'd like to create a new series of fantasy gamebooks that I could upload to Lulu as POD products and also distribute as PDFs via RPGnow and Drive Thru RPG. I've already got the bare bones together, but it's going to take time, which is my rarest commodity right now, so progress will be slow. Still, when it happens, you'll here about it here!
Also, getting back to the interview and the future of gamebooks, in terms of digital devices, I note that
with devices like the iPad, the Kindle, and various Android tablets, we’re also going to have a bigger market for gamebook apps, and I think it’s here that we could really see some amazing things happen in the future. Most people enjoy reading and most people enjoy playing games. Gamebooks are an obvious synthesis of the two and the app marketplace has the potential to take interactive fiction in many exciting directions…
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| Enter the Undercity of Orlandes! |
Dave Morris (2011) has said, in terms of gamebook apps:
my objection to dice in egamebooks is that it's simply jarring to watch two dice clattering around the screen. What are they supposed to represent? I'm there in the moment, a tense confrontation in a foggy backstreet in Orlandes. And suddenly two big red dice are bouncing around, the result is added to a confusing string of numbers, I'm told "you miss!" and I tap to make the d--ned (little nod to EB there) dice roll again. Every moment I'm doing that is taking me further out of the story. Seems like the dice are only there because the originators of gamebooks in the early '80s happened to own a game store and they liked dice. Fine in a book (well, a necessary evil, I would say!) but kind of dotty on a phone.
I can see exactly where he’s coming from – one of the things I like about Andy Spruce’s Fighting Fantasy Project website is that combat results are generated instantly which minimizes your timeout from the story. However, I'm not a fan especially of, say, the diceless Choose Your Own Adventure interactive fiction style, and I've come to realise I like dice and combat systems and inventory checks and so on. What I like about egamebooks is that your tablet or device can do all this for you, which, considering an extensive book like one of the Fabled Lands, negates a lot of book-keeping.
What do other people think? Would you prefer dice and game-systems in gamebook apps, or would you prefer the more immersive interactive fiction approach? Let me know?
References
Morris, D. (2011, February 19). This Tin Man's got heart. Comment posted to http://fabledlands.blogspot.com/2011/02/this-tin-mans-got-heart.html#comments
When I read paper gamebooks, dice take away from the experience for me - yes it builds tension to roll the dice and see if you've won or lost a combat but I stop thinking in terms of story and start thinking in terms of numbers and stats. I would prefer if apps did them instantly - I would still have the tension bu non of the delay.
ReplyDeleteI guess they put dice on the screen so that people would relate the random number selection to real life things like we use the words file, folder and document for stores of computer data.
I have just bought a kindle because I had lots of pdfs that I wanted to read but not on a computer screen. I have just finished Heart of Ice on it which I enjoyed immensley and I can seee why it is considered the best gamebook of all time.
Coincidently, I asked Jonathan Green what he thinks the future of gamebooks is on his blog. He will post the answers on a video at some point so we can see what he says.
I'd tend to agree with Dave. I can also appreciate using the dice to get the "feel" of a gamebook, however. I guess my issue is more of the (high) amount of dice rolling needed than the actual use of dice.
ReplyDeletePerhaps there's a different way to translate this on the screen? For example, say a character has a lower to mid-range skill score. He's then told something like "You need to scale this wall. You have a 30% chance of success. Pick a number between 1 and 10". Basically, there could be 3 "successful" numbers, and the other 7 would lead to failure. The player, of course, has no knowledge of which number to pick and any task attempt is randomized by the game. This, to me, would accomplish the same thing without having to "roll dice" multiple times.
Gaetano
Diceless can be made interesting by letting the player have a limited surplus of "effort", "chits", "luck" that the player can add at critical times.
ReplyDeleteYou don't need *dice* but some element of randomness aids immersion and reality. And possibly replayability (if you die!)
ReplyDeleteIf you don't see the dice you may suspect the game is cheating you ;) But then in computer games you don't typically see the dice anyway.
It seems dice aren't all that popular! Wouldn't it be possible to have a sort of sliding scale for gameplay for a gamebook, where you choose how visible the rules are. So you could tick boxes for []Show me all dice rolls, []Show me combat rolls only, []Show me FITNESS tests only, or something like that.
ReplyDeleteI must admit I find manual dice-rolling tedious, mainly cos I tend to cheat, which is why I like Andy Spruce's Fighting Fantasy project or Jon Mann's FLapp, because they handle all that for me and I can concentrate on making decisions. I guess I have lowish personal expectations for gamebooks in that I want something to play and choose - the immersion is something I'm quite happy weaving inside my head to explain what's happening, as opposed to being generate by the text of the story. If I want full text immersion in a story, I tend to pick up a non-interactive book instead...
cheers
Andy
Myself, I don't have any concern with dice rolling in paper based gamebooks. Amongst a number of other things it is what separates gamebooks from other CYOA adventures and provides the random uncertainty that many readers enjoy in their combat encounters.
ReplyDeleteIt is part of the allure of gamebooks that a reader can conduct a roleplaying adventure alone and amongst the details of the story also become immersed in the stat management and dice based combat systems. I remember watching my boys playing AD&D and seeing how much of the fun of it was also wrapped up in the intensity of the game system itself. I believe that for many readers of gamebooks this same focus still applies. If anything there is probably room for many different styles of gamebooks, both paper and app based, dice rolling or automated, as well as other types as well not yet fully recognised.
I can see why a number of developers have gone with the dice rolling scenes in their apps. It does meet the expectations of many players and provides a visual connection to the old paper gamebook style of play. Nostalgia can be a powerful marketing tool and it would certainly provide a comforting connection between the old and the new for punters considering a purchase.
I can see a great future for app based gamebooks. Whether paper based gamebooks will find a true hold again is another thing, but it would be great to see a resurgence of the genre no matter the media.
Nice post Wayne - some thought-provoking comments. I think your point about nostalgia is a valid one as for me nostalgia is definitely a partial attraction. There's just something addictive about sending those cubes clattering across the table-top to see which way fate will turn this time...
ReplyDeleteThe blogger CRPG Addict makes the point that for early CRPGs which had minimal story and RPG potential, half the fun was making up your own back story and running dialog as your screen characters (a bunch of numbers and a generic portrait pic) wandered through adventures like Bard's Tale or Wizardry, and for me, this holds true for dice-heavy story-lite experiences like the Fabled Lands. I like imagining how the townsfolk of some small village react to my 6th Rank Mage wandering through with a Dragon's Head strapped to their pack!
As for paper gamebooks, there are definitely some interesting things happening still. I got Michael Ward's DestinyQuest 1: The Legion of Shadow today in the mail and it is HUGE! Mike told me in an email it's 145,000 words! It makes the old green-spined Fighting Fantasy books look like mere pamphlets. I'm going to play it in the next few days and get a review up hopefully some time soon!
cheers
Andy
I also remember making up stories about my character which filled in the gaps from the gamebook. It then leads to the question on how much description do people want from their gamebooks?
ReplyDeleteI've just ordered Destiny Quest - I'm looking forward to reading it.
Description, like dice, is one of those other grey areas. Some people like a lot, again, to immerse themselves in the story. Others prefer a smaller amount, so they don't feel constrained to re-read it every time they start the gamebook again. I tend to budget for 100 words per paragraph on average, but that's really just a figure I pulled out of a hat! Particularly with the internet age and the change in reading habits, you don't want to put people off with huge slabs of text, but you do want to offer them something interesting and substantial. What do others think?
ReplyDeletecheers
Andy
It's about quality not quantity of description
ReplyDeleteTrue, Gabriel, true. I always liked the interview with Stephen Hand on the old fightingfantasy.com where he said he tried to make every paragraph 'epic' so as to overcome blandness...
ReplyDeletecheers
Andy
I don't have any problems with rolling dice. But way to many times I have reached a "THE END" that the author accidently spelled:
ReplyDeleteGmork SKILL 7 STAMINA 12
I think that is why a lot of amateur gamebooks that I have seen recently (and one I'm writing myself) have opted for a resource management system instead of random combats.
What's wrong with a "Gmork"? Unless you mean it's supposed to be The End and not an encounter. But then how does resource management solve sloppy editing?
ReplyDelete(how would resource management in a gamebook work?)
Is resource management a case of what items you have and what items you don't have?
ReplyDeletecheers
Andy
I think a good version of resource management is Zachary Carango's entertaining book, Red World where you have ability scores and instead of rolling against them, you spend points in them in order to complete tasks.
ReplyDeleteIt is at
http://www.arborell.com/windhammerprize/redworld.pdf
I'm going to have to check that one out! Are you entering this year's Windhammer Prize?
ReplyDeletecheers
Andy
I enjoy Red World and I do intend to enter again. I always enjoy reading the other gamebooks and getting feedback to mine.
ReplyDeleteThe feedback is I think one of the best parts. It can be brutal but it lets you know where you need to improve. I'm thinking about entering this year after skipping last year, but I've got about three different ideas kicking about.
ReplyDeletecheers
Andy
By my Gmork example, I meant that I don't like rolling dice to see if I get to continue the adventure or not. I prefer systems (like Red World, pointed out above) where your decisions are what get you in trouble, not the dice.
ReplyDeleteThat's a good point Anjin. Dave Morris said he hated to use instant death and would rather 'bleed' a character's Life Points away, to reflect poor decisions or ill-equipped adventurers.
ReplyDeleteBTW What's a Gmork?
cheers
Andy