Sky Lord

Background -

It is yet another late night at Puffin HQ.  Phillipa is pouring over a mass of manuscripts.  They are divided into two piles.  One is considerably taller than the other.  Sighing she calls on the intercom for her PA.

A young nerdy youth comes in.

Phillipa "Take these manuscripts will you.  This one is to go to the publishers.  Tell them to get it out now.  No mucking about, we are behind schedule and it has to be printer immediately.  The rest, take to the incinerator, they must never see the light of day!  Am I clear?

PA "Yes mam, ill get right on that straight away for you."

Phillipa turns around to look out into the night sky from her office as the PA puts the piles together and leaves in a hurry.  As he makes his way down the twisting corridors of beige he does not see Ian walking the other way.

They collide, sending papers everywhere.  Ian is aghast as the coffee spills over his nice shirt.

Ian "For Titans sake, watch where you are going!"

He tuts as he moves on in disgust.  The PA though just looks at the piles of paper.  He has no idea which one was to go to the publisher.

Picking one up he looks at the title, Sky Lord.  Well this would have to be it.  Hopefully it was not one of the ones that should have been burned.

It is summer of 1988 when Sky Lord came out and it is another new author, Martin Allen.  He has co authored Clash of Princes before but I doubt I will ever review those.  Now I remember Sky Lord from the cover, so I know I played it.  But I have no recollection of anything about it.  I was never a fan of Sci Fi ones but I am aware of this books reputation as being the one that finally killed of Sci Fi in Fighting Fantasy.  So I am not going in with high hopes.  Other than that, terrible books are actually easier to find comedy in.

Covers - 

Well the yellow background is certainly striking.  I do not mind it.  I think the jet bike thing has a lot of Star Wars about it.

The crazy black limbed, tentacled creature is certainly something.  His mouth takes up the entirety of his face.  I love how instead of hands, the tentacles are wrapped around the handlebars.

I remember seeing this one a lot at the library.  I think the colour scheme helped it stand out.

But I do have a problem.  Why is he wearing a red scarf?  For one thing, it is a clear safety hazard when riding a space bike! It could get caught on anything!  And why is it the only piece of clothing it is wearing?  Maybe the neck is the naughty area of these creatures.

Premise - 

The first section is called about your star system.  We start with finding out about yourself.  I have my own name!  I am Sky Lord Jang Mistral, an elite solar trooper and special agent of the 16th aeon!  A bold move to be named as it takes away a bit from it being you.  A pretty bad ass name though.  Oh and on a small side note I have four arms, no biggie.

My home planet is Ensulina and it is just one of the thousands of worlds in the Faluksh star chain, home to a wide array of worlds.  From baking hot solar flares to cold lifeless husks, home to galactic pirates and space desperadoes.  However there are plenty of nice worlds as well with diverse life forms. 

I belong to race called Ensulvars who have come from two ancient nations.  The dawn time Enzuls and the war like Ivars.  The Ivars invaded and eventually the two races mixed creating four armed humanoids and kept the best traits of each ancestor race.  We are very respected, especially by two armed humanoids!  Ha, look at those losers over there with just two arms!

During the 12th aeon though there were bad times as a vast galactic war broke out.  Two races had been secretly amassing vast fleets and their armies attacked each other.  They are the Fethps who are greedy two headed reptiles and the Deik, large purple molluscoids of unknown origins.  Both ravaged the galaxy and my lot were conquered by the Deik and forced to make weapons for them.

Eventually though in the 13th aeon the two aggressors had sapped each others strength and a rebellion led by the human Ari Skyfarer (not a Skywalker of course) using the weapons they had been forced to create, both races were driven from the star system.

For his efforts, Ari was made Grand Emperor (oh no that does not sound good) and in order to keep everlasting peace the council of Star Kings was formed.  Each Star King rules a world (ours is called King Vaax) and they meet every 500 days to work out any disputes peacefully.  If they need to sort out trouble they use the Imperial Guard (cough storm troopers cough) or heroic solar troopers, which I am one of.

On my planet of Ensulina you have to earn the title of Lord.  My exceptional skill and courage earned me my first title when I was only 20.  I have only got better as well and my most recent title is Sky Baron, earned after capturing Olaf Tharkin and his band of solar cut throats.  Now King Vaax has summoned me and the other lords for a a new mission.  But before we tell you what that is here is how to play the game. 

We will ignore that part and address it in the playthrough.  For now lets move on to the Mission Briefing.

King Vaax had a major-domo called L'Bastin.  He was basically running the Kings household staff.  But he gets into cybernetics and genetic engineering.  So he buys a lot of kit and scientific publications for his new hobby.  The only thing is all this costs a fair amount of money and L'Bastin gets himself into considerable debt.  Kind of like me with Warhammer.

So old L'Bastin goes to the King and asks for a pay rise on his current modest wage.  However the King tells him that nobody has had a pay rise in over 200 years and any pay rise would set a dangerous precedent and undermine the entire economy.  L'Bastin was very upset at his stingy ruler as the economy had never been better.  Sounds like Martin Allen has had this conversation in real life.

L'Bastin then comes up with a cunning plan.  He starts firing all the staff and replacing them with clones from his lab.  These clones give him their pay packet and he is able to clear his debts.  

Free of this financial burden, L'Bastin amuses himself by creating whimsical creatures such as the spider fly.  He gets a bit fed up eventually and decides he must create the perfect life form.  Unfortunately this would require a specific expensive piece of kit called a metramorphosal hydrolizer.  

In order to fund this L'Bastin comes up with another scheme and starts selling the Kings stuff.  Pawning it off, which is easy since its pretty much all his clones doing the work.  However it goes wrong when he sends Ben Frumpet to the pawnbrokers.

While the fake Ben is trying to sell a piece of art, the real Ben Frumpet shows up to pawn his own stuff since he is on hard times after losing his job at the palace.  Real Ben overpowers his fake and takes him to the police.  L'Bastin's schemes are uncovered and after a trial he is sacked, his lab demolished and he is thrown onto the streets.

Are we done with this madness?  Nope we still have time for another L'Bastin scheme.  This time he disguises himself as a famous plastic surgeon and offers the Kings wife, Broomhilda, some free treatment.  Being the devious devil he is, he gives her a massive nose, saucer discolored eyes and .... ahem... a large pineapple attached to her scalp.  This of course is not discovered until her bandages are removed 10 days later, by which time L'Bastin has fled the planet.

Our man has successfully hidden now for a number of years but word has come from a bounty hunter that he is on Aarok, a fortress of a planet that was once abandoned due to a massive radiation spill.  The bounty hunter captured a mutant who fessed up that L'Bastin had been experimenting on the locals.  Rumours say he has bred his perfect life form.  Dog headed super soldiers called Prefectas which he is in the process of cloning an army of.   

Fortress Aarok has a cacophony of defenses that make it invincible to a full scale invasion force.  But luckily for us Fighting Fantasy players a lone invader can sneak in and disable the planet defence system under the dome of marvels.  

Ok so get to the planet, sneak in, switch off the planetary defences, let the fleet land and get the bad guy.  And if I do all this they will let me rule the planet!   

Wow if that felt long, it was, and I have greatly truncated it!  The world building for the star system section was pretty good but the Mission briefing is wild.  L'Bastin just had scheme after scheme.  And grafting a pineapple onto the queens head, its gone from serious world building to comedy.  

Playthrough - 

Now we have a look at the abilities.  We start off with usual Skill, Stamina and Luck.  Nothing out of the ordinary.  We get provisions but in Sci-Fi standard we do not get Cheese and Ham sandwiches but instead provision tablets, which also happen to restore 4 points of stamina.  No word on their flavour.

We also start with 10 credits of money.  I have no idea if that's a lot or not.

We have two types of combats.  Personal Combat is just the normal battle rules but we also have rules for combat weapon clashes.

These rules are different where it has a rating number, lasers and shields.  It starts with rating where we roll 1-3 and your rating is 3 and 4-6 and your rating will be 4.  

We start a combat weapon attack by comparing ratings.  Whoever has the highest goes first.  The attacker then rolls a d6, if the number is less or equal to their lasers score then the defender has to reduce their shields count by 2.  Then the roles change and you take it turn until someone's shields are reduce to zero.  

If you win and your opponent had a higher rating than you, your rating goes up by 1.

My ship the Starspray in all its glory!

Skill - 9

Stamina - 18

Luck - 7

Rating - 4

Lasers - 4

Shields - 12

Well that was a poor set of rolling but at least I got the higher rating.  Also looking at the adventure sheet there is a section saying Oxygen supply with 10 units.  No mention of it in the rules but I can imagine it won't be good.

Blast off!

We get the big countdown from 10 before we take off and enter the warp lane.  I am told from this lane we must steer into a more appropriate lane for galactic travel.  Either time travel in the 4th dimension, or light travel in the 6th dimension.  Each has its advantageous and dangers over the other.  Which way?  Oh wait so you are not going to tell me what the advantageous and dangers are?  Even though I am a sky baron super agent dude and veteran of many successful missions?  Well do we go left or right, pretty much a fancy blind t-junction!    Ok do we go Doctor Who (David Tenant of course, why even ask?) and time travel.  Or do we go Star Wars and fire up the hyper drive and go to light speed?  Well time travel seems super dangerous so I am going for light speed.

Firing into the light warp and the universe fold in on itself and I can reach anywhere in a millionth of a second just by entering the appropriate portion of the colour spectrum.  Before I can reach Aarok though someone is shooting missiles at me.  A red rocket scooter appears from a higher dimension.  Its rider is black tendrilled creature that wears a scarlet choker the marks of the Fahbad Redneck gang!  They are from the 33rd plane and he gestures rudely at me before attacking.   Ah this sounds just like our friend from the cover.  Wow Redneck, see what they did there.

So why does the picture look like this and not the guy on the cover!!??

Well he is Rating 4 so as I do not exceed him it means he goes first.  Lasers 5 and Shields 8.  Wait so he goes first and only misses on a 6?  What the hell?  I have to not roll a 5 or 6 to hit.  Amazingly he misses, but just once and and I have lost half my shields on the first go.  I do not miss.  We have the same rating but I guess that does not mean he has a higher rating, even though he went first anyway, so no plus 1 for me!

The Redneck slams into my Starships tail which luckily still has some shields so I exit light warp early.  Wait I thought it only took a millionth of a second?  Anyway, back in real space I extinguish the smoking pods and clear the blood streak left behind.  About now I decide to use the less dangerous time-warp.... Yeah thanks for telling me that now.  Before I do though a monstrous black hulk appears and I get the option to investigate.  Keen not make this trip using light-warp a complete waste of time, I go for a look.

It is a big space station and it is emitting some kind of distress code so I dock for a look.  But there is an auto drone shooting at me.  It has rating 6 so its bound to go first.  Its lasers are 4 and shields 7.  Great so we are even but he has 1 shield more than me and goes first. 

I then proceed to roll the most amount of 5 and 6s in a row I've ever rolled in my life.  I can honestly say it went into double figures.  How this played out must have played out for any NPC watching must have been really cringe as we both keep missing each other.  It eventually blows me up though and its game over.  Ok I think the ship combat is completely broken.  Not the concept, but the stats given to the ships.

This would make a poor blog so I decide to restart without rerolling any stats and instead use time travel.

Time traveling is also a crazy wash of colours.  I think Mr Allen might have liked Pink Floyd.  Anyway it takes six minutes real time to reach Aarok but after two minutes I find some space weed growing in the time warp energy field.  It could spread and choke the thruster and blow up the spacecraft.  Do I ignore the fungus or risk exiting time warp to cut it away?  

Well after my last experience of leaving the warp I am in I decide to press on.  And the ship blows up.

Ok third time lucky but this is the last one.

I of course decide to stop and sort out the dangerous weed.  

It is just as well I stopped as that could have been really dangerous.  The fungus has grown to an enormous size covering the starboard thruster and has changed to a light blue colour.  I can leave the ship to cut it off or search for a planet to pass through its atmosphere to burn it off.  Well that sounds dangerous so ill go for a space walk.

Well turns out its alive and has Skill 8 Stamina 6.  It hits me once before I defeat it.  But apparently I only retreat back to the space ship and then decide the only way to do anything is to find a planet to burn it off.  Ok then....

I find a planet on my scanscope and its only 26 million miles away.  I set cruising speed and wait for 5 hours to get there.  But before I get there a silver sting ray shaped ship materializes from another dimension.  A ship used by thee Pelhon Rangers, a misguided band of galactic vigilantes.  They attack me.  Not sure why, I do not get to speak to them and if they are vigilantes why do they think I am bad? 

Oh Joy, another space fight.  They are Rating 5 so always going to go first.  Lasers 5 so they only miss on a 6 and shields 8.

I unfortunately miss a couple of times and it blows me out of the sky and I am dead.  It is not even that I rolled poor stats as my ships stats are given at the start.  Terrible, dead 3 times with only a few pages turned.  Not often the premise takes longer than the playthrough.

Notable Encounters - 

The space station I tried to land on is infested with orange jelly blobs.  One poor gent is being devoured by one and tells you its quite painless but that its a shame you did not turn up earlier.  He advises not to shoot your gun as the gas leak will ignite.  Would a gas leak not be killing you anyway?  With the gas?

If you make it to the stations sports hall you can play some snooker.  Glad to see snooker is such a universal sport.  Of course instead of continuing to flee for your life you decide to play a bit of a game and after breaking off and potting a red, decide to pot the orange ball.  Only to then realise there is no orange ball and its a baby jelly blob.

We also have Barty Baxter!  A good space sci fi name that....  If you shake his hand he turns out to be another orange jelly. 

Or flee from a blob on a scooter as it chases you on a motorized trolley.

The only way to stop the blobs is to feed it enough stuff so you can get away.  But not all stuff is equal.  It is pure luck what each item does, and good lord there are a lot of items.  Lets have a look at some of the best ways to avoid being eaten by a jelly orange blob.

Top things to feed a blob - 

Tibia Bone
Cinnamon Stick
Chewing Gum
Hypodermic Syringe
Oxygen Cylinder
Laminex Sheet
Leg of Mutton
Strawberries
Can of Beer
Poison

Top things not to feed the blobs - 

Wrist Watch
A Robots metal arm
Jar with a pickled brain
Flame Torch
Chair
Teapot
Cricket Bat (you can tell this was before Shawn of the Dead)
Weed Killer
Broom
Sonic Screwdriver 

These guys are farming energy from a star, not really caring about the millions of lives.

So the King sends you on a mission to save this star system from the Starfire Valoog.  You get a cacophony of options to fight this thing.  So many different moves but instead of barrel rolls they have funky names.  Most end with you being blown up and killed.  You have to take the boring options to find weak spots.  It could have been cool, like an epic x-wing v star destroyer but the options are odd.

Do you want to try your anti-detector defences, select the image intensifier scanscope, activate the atomic polarizer, press the flashing orange button or fly at Mach speed, etc etc.  There is a lot of these options which makes it sound pretty cool.  Well it would be if you knew what any of these would do.  But despite being a top secret space agent you get no indication at all on what each option is or would do.  They are glorified t-junctions.  

But this is still better than if you get sent after the pirates on the ship called the Grand Archipelago.  Here its the same battle against a large ship but instead of options like before, here you get stats of your pitch, roll and yaw (numerical values) and its compared to the enemy ship along with your relative speeds.  Then you are asked what you want to change.  Now the aim is to get all of them to match the enemy ship which means getting behind it.  But you only find that out after you do it, not before!  Which means you are just guessing.  For example at one point you get the option to increase speed to 4000, which of course gets you hit by a nuclear bomb.... 

If I had managed to get rid of the pesky space weed I would have crash landed on a planet after being hit by lightning.  No matter what you do the Star Spray is pretty much destroyed.  However by then you have picked up a droid which goes off to find its odd master called Krill which just so happens to be on this world.  Its very much Star Wars.  This version of Yoda can manipulate time though and if you help him fight the evil Shaine who is turning the locals into mutants, he reverses time and you get your ship back.  Why he can not manipulate time to sort out his Shaine problem though is not made clear....  Not that you will actually win the space fight with her ship at the end.  Oh and watch out for the jelly fish bounty hunters.

Crash landing in a swamp (a lot of crashing so far) and escaping into a bell shaped ship.  On board you can have your arm ripped off by a robot shaking your hand.  It then puts a tentacle on instead.  Closely followed by meeting some robots called bric and brac who try and blast you unless you answer a question which in my opinion the answer makes no sense.  The owner of the craft dies from all the excitement.  

Just wait until you get to the desert sky pirates naming schemes.

This fine gentleman is known as captain big ears, because he of course has big ears.  He is one of two captains that are fighting.  The other captain, is captain long nose.  His nose is so ling you see it peering over the ship before you see him.  Its certainly a choice.

You can avoid the pirates by being captured by space spiders.  These guys are intelligent and you have to escape a cocoon before becoming the queens next meal.  You get the option to feign death which it turns out you have mastered the art of, but you only find that out AFTER you pick the option.  You would think you would know this when making the choice.

We get the Sky Lord equivalent of the Star Wars Cantina with a visit to the Deiks inn.  We are hear to steal a brain and not wake the Deik up.  Of course we get some impossible choices such as going to the drinking pits and getting this choice to make -

Absolutely no idea, you will probably wake up the Deik.  Lets head over to the bar instead.

This guy is so startled he spills his drink.  And of course wakes up the Deik.

Lets play it safe and just stand next to the candle.  You are a candle are you not? Oh god stop screaming!  You will wake up the Deik.

So its pretty safe to say that you wake up the Deik.  I would love to describe him but I can not even begin to explain it.  Would have been nice to have a picture, but instead we have an alien dropping his drink and a screaming candle.

This leads into more madness.  The Sphere of three trials.  Where do I even begin.  Okay so the Deik has a magic sphere that sounds for all the money like a snow globe with a castle in it.  Well you get warped into it.

Raiden from mortal combat shows up to ask you how many stars there are in the system.

I could not find a reference to knowing this, must have missed it.  It can't be another random choice could it?  

Next challenge please!

You have to fight all four of his arms separately as you are clearly disadvantaged by the amount of arms... wait a minute do I not also have four arms? 

Anyway if you beat him its challenge number three and this is where it gets really wild!  So from what I can work out (and its not that easy to just read it) you and the Deik are in two bubble like vehicles that are slowly sinking and they have open vents so you will eventually drown.  You are both locked in and the key to each hatch is on each others vehicle.   Your bubble car thing comes with a grabber and a host of described weapons.  How does it work?  Well the Deik does not tell you and instead you get choices like these. 

There are loads more like this and its just completely random.  I can not even begin to describe how bad this whole thing is.

But why are you even looking for an alien brain?

Because it powers Zud's fancy wheelchair.

But why help this guy?  Well because when you meet him he somehow tricks you with a cylinder that goes into your chest.  Inside said device is a creature called Gnasha which apart from sounding like something out of the Beano, is slowly eating its way out.  

Of course he still tries to kill you after you give him the brain.  But luckily you were really clumsy and stood on the brain earlier so it does not work that well.

But getting it removed actually hinders you later on where Gnasha can actually free you from another situation. 

 

If you thought the writing has been bad already.....

These two are Kogo and Woderick.  You are meant to think Woderick is in charge but its actually the three eyed cat controlling the human.  Of course it does not work perfectly and has given him a really bad lisp.  Which even gets explained if it was not obvious enough.  

Anyway, these two easily overpower you no matter what you do and you get sent to the torture chamber where you meet the equally well named Dr Strangething.  The good doctor was the previous owner of the mansion that you are now imprisoned in and the two rouges have captured him and looking for the magic crystal Dr Strangething has created as it can teleport you instantly anywhere.  But you need the cursor to make it work which is hidden and they have not found it yet.

Hopefully you escape, with or without Gnasha's help.  And when you do, you and the doctor have to get across a really trippy puzzle which is found on the front cover.  Well it is on my book but apparently some versions did not even have it.

Watch the colours!

Each time you step on a tile all the colours change.  So you need to keep track.  Which would be fine on a console game, its really not that fun on a gamebook.  There is no real reason for it other than, its there.

Anyway get across and the Doctor climbs up his clock tower.  But the evil cat turns up and traps you and the doctor sends down one of the clock hands which is the cursor.  However he throws the wrong hand down and the bad guys fall for it and get zapped out of existence and you get to use the real one.

We also meet Sam the Snail, who looks like a slug (so not a snail).  He is another of L'Bastin's creations.  He has escaped and appears to be gardening these days in the abandoned city.  However L'Bastin has sent people out to hunt him so asks you to help out.  He gives you a clapped out boat while they have a nice sleek one.  So just like most vehicle combats its near impossible to win as they will go first and your shields are a lot lower.  However you get some rock salt for your efforts, which sounds terrible but its the key to winning.

But if you win you get treated to this scene, although I had to work out what it actually was as it did not really have any resemblance to the text.  No pic of Sam the snail! 

You do get another companion as well.  Marsatu is a trader that is wondering around the city.  He takes you to his mansion and he has a servant called Bok.  The first problem is you can accidently drink foot ointment.  Why he does not tell you what it is before hand I don't know.  You can have a wander around the mansion and get into lots of different problems.  Like putting on a suit and jumping between dimensions and ending up in the kitchens fighting the chef.  Marsatu offers you a selection of items to pick to help you.  What he does not say is that its a trade and just takes your Laser Sword from you.  And each gift he gives you is a disaster.  My favorite back fire is when the robo dog attacks you instead with you shouting at it to heel as Marsatu cries with laughter.     

Marsatu takes you to see Giant Jym Ego who controls a roundabout that can send you anywhere you need to go.  Ah so a Magic Roundabout....

Seems to be a lot of special transportation devices.  Of course though its another game, also on the inside front cover... sometimes. 

I forgot to mention we are riding a giant grasshopper, for reasons...

You have to joust the others but you have to move the rings, your opponents also have rules for moving circles and if there is clear path you can attack.  And to make it tougher you have to beat them in four turns.  Its all very complicated but I guess you could work it out.  However if you have the right item it can tell you the correct sequence.  Its a strange mini game.

Oh and Marsatu turns on you when you get past it, its should be a shock but its so obvious by then it is not a surprise.

Finally I will call out the Yappies.  These are the scientist currently breeding more of the super soldiers.  But if you given them a walkman tuned to the funkiest station in the galaxy you get lines like -

"Cool Man Thing, Rock my cosmic marbles"

"This is terrifco"

"Ok we will keep the beat box and you can space out o'here"

Yeah those are actual lines near the climax of the book.  

Artwork - 

Tim Sell is the artist for this one.  We last saw him back in House of Hell which I said was a mixed bag but overall thought it was quite good.  I do not think he was quite as into this one, but the sci fi art has always been poorer in my opinion.  The biggest issue here is that some of the descriptions are so wild we need some art to help us.  But I feel Tim went, erm nope and stuck with some safer ones.

The Starfire Valoog is my favorite and the jellyfish is quite good, but the rest we have seen so far have been poor.  

Here is me dying, happens a lot.  Forgot I had four arms.

Here is a Glip riding a grasshopper.  Very sci-fi...

Lets try again for Sci-Fi how about a fantasy looking beetle and scorpion hybrid...

Right how is this for Sci-Fi, its a spaceship but only from behind with a word clip art 97 background.

Look just copy War of the Worlds yeah?

Ok I think I get it, how about this?

Just go back to fantasy and give the thing a gun.

Big Bad - 

In case you are still reading or caring there is a twist at the end.  Just a warning in case you are going to play this book....

So things have gone south for L'Bastin by the time we find him as his super soldier Prefecta's have decided they do not need him and have put him in a torture tank.

L'Bastin?  Is that you?

Marsatu is shocked as well and we are all imprisoned.  The tank is a Crumps tank and it sounds awful.  Suspended upside down in a tank of liquid with a device for breathing and speaking (or screaming) into.  In the water are tinselfish which have metal teeth to eat flesh.  How much they eat depends on how deep quills are inserted into the machine.  It is diabolical and also a huge tone shift from the rest of the book.

Marsatu plays the role of bumbling flunky.  He is also one of L'Bastin's creations and he snaps and tries to kill him in the chamber.  You have to stop him and get L'Bastin out, that way he gives you an escape route and the way to save the day.  

Its quite a change around that you end up working with him and probably the best thing about the book.  But make no mistake about it, L'Bastin is a bad dude.  You get a lot about his backstory and it kind of resonates for a bit.  I feel the author put his own feelings into it with the lack of pay rise and it seems he is fantasizing about what he would do to his boss (in this case the king).  But he does go off the deep end and we see evidence of that on Aarok with his experiments roaming about trying to live their lives.  

But no final end boss fight, he just dies at the end after you get him out.  Its not a forgiveness arc though, he just hates the fact this has been done to him and wants his creations to pay and gives you the ability to stop them.

Menagerie - 

Well its Sci Fi and this book is trippy so you get a lot of madness here.  Most creatures are humanoid and most get named things like Bald-Headed Rogue or Feather-Faced Rogue or Foppish Dignitary.  Also what has Martin Allen got against Chefs?  You end up fighting two of them!

Guess the name of this guy?  Bet you didn't say Fog Farkin!

Where can I begin with Fog Farkin?  Well for a start we only see his head in the artwork, but apparently he has no arms and a couple of legs.  He is a Charg and he sticks his tongue on your face to suffocate you.  This is why you need the oxygen as its a race against time to get out and it plays a little bit like the cyclops fight in Seas of Blood.  Then if you escape its a normal fight.  Oh and he wears pyjamas.  

The Ogre Oid is a space Ogre.  But space ogres are only skill 6.

How about the Gooblepotomus?  Which its pretty much just a talking hippo.

The Brutes are described as warty brute and red nose brute.  Yeah red nose is clearly his defining feature, not the two heads......

If you try and hide in a ventilation shaft, you find a red hooded terrorist also hiding in it.  No word on what he is a terrorist of.  Might have even been on the same side but you just fight.

Yep Killer Krun and his gang are Cosmic Jellyfish.  With erm.... a very dated Mexican accent and calls you a Gringo.

The Gruesome Armatilda, whatever that is.

The perfect being!

The Prefecta's are the pinnacle of L'Bastin's experiments and why you are on a mission to stop them.  They show up in various occasions but to be honest they wouldn't even last five paragraphs in an Ian Livingston Allansia adventure.  But why Prefecta, prefects were older kids at school?  Why not Perfecta?

Entertaining Deaths - 

Shaking Barty Baxters Hand and he turns into a orange gelatinous cube and eats you.

Trying to outrace an orange jelly bob on a scooter.  It catches you and eats you as its a great trolley driver.

Getting nuked.  In many different ways.

Changing into a mutant and being led by a silver chain onto Schaine's crystal ship.

Jumping through dimensions and arriving in the middle of a reactor core, which of course was next to the kitchens.

Trying to Lasso a spider shaped craft, its crushes you.

Bending over to read an inscription on a tetrahedron and stumbling and falling over into eternity.

My favorite though is shouting abuse at a spider guard about his father being eaten by the queen to try and rile him.  Unfortunately this was true and did happen and he beats you to death with a rock. 

Pete's Corner - 

You had me at Pineapple.

Final Thoughts - 

Oh boy.  Where do I start?  Ok lets try a bit of positivity.  I liked the bit about the star system at the start and I liked the twist with L'Bastin at the end.

Well that's the positives out of the way.  For me the worst part is the combat weapon mechanics.  They are just flat out broke.  I can see the concept and idea and have no problem with it but something went horribly wrong here with the execution.  So many of them have the lasers score far too high.  Its almost like someone did not read the rules and thought it was skill so had to be a higher number.  I have never had such a bad playthrough experience because of this.  At least give us some missiles to instant kill.  Looking through the rest of the book it does not let up, and these are not optional, you have to have at least a couple of battles.  I know we have had insane difficulty before but at least its come later in the book, not killed you straight out of the gate.

Oddly though the normal combat is very easy.  All these weird and wonderful creatures but they are not much of a challenge.  So the difficulty is wildly skewed from easy to impossible, not much middle ground. 

At least when you get into a battle with a giant ship you don't have to use the dice.  Instead you have to make a series of impossible decisions!  At first I thought the Starfire encounter appeared as a really cool encounter.  Almost like an X-Wing going up against a star destroyer.  But none of the choices can really be made without guessing.  You are meant to be an experienced agent and this is your ship.  It could easily give you some information on the pros and cons or even risks of each decision.  Instead you get presented with some options with no clues.  One may be right, the other will get you obliterated.  The grand archipelago is worse, as its boring as well.  All the stats mean nothing to me but if we were told up front what you had to do it might have made it more interesting.  I guess people that play flight simulator would like it.  The worst offender of this though is fighting the Deik.  The random choices are just that, random.  There is no way you can know and each one is a complete guess.  That is three major encounters that are out and out guessing.

But the book is littered with guessing.  Even the choice at the start between time and light travel.  No indication giving the advantages of each form.  Its a glorified blind left or right.  But you are meant to be this experienced campaigner so you should know these things!  There is a section where you are in a restricted area with two handles and you have to decide which to pull and in what direction direction.  Again its just pure guesswork.  I am just scraping the top of the barrel, the book is full of a lot more examples like this.  An awful lot.

If that design is not bad enough, be prepared to rely on luck.  Not luck as in the in built game mechanism to test your luck, no instead you will be rolling plenty of dice to see what happens.  Again complete lack of control.  I would say maybe one of these is fine but it keeps repeating over and over again.  For example, roll too low and your ship never gets time fixed and the game ends.

We have come across unfair books before, and even broken books.  For example Crypt of the Sorcerer and the insane finish.  But it had a great story.  Unfortunately the story in Sky Lord is poor.  It starts off well with a really good background section.  But none of it matters!  Nothing you learn there is of any relevance other than meeting a Deik.  It then goes into L'Bastin's story which I found a bit lackluster.  What follows is a series of isolated set pieces which do not really add to the story until you get near the end.  But as I said I did like the end twist.  But I think what does not help the story is the odd writing style.  Its clear that its meant to be funny and not serious (well I guess it is meant to be for kids) but its absurd in places.  But the tonal shifts can be jarring.  All of a sudden we are talking about a horrific torture device.  But my word, the stuff with Woderick and the lisp, the racist jellyfish, the names of characters.  I mean come on, Big Ears and Long Nose, bric and brac!  It is the most childish of attempted comedy and its just not that funny.  Maybe to really young kids I guess, certainly not a jaded 44 year old.  And the Yappies, good lord the dialog with the Yappies.

I have just checked my notes and laughed as one of them was I forgot I had four arms.  So we get a character name and elaborate back story and the fact you have four arms.  It means nothing really.  The only thing from your past is the racist jellyfish know you and call you by your name.

The Mini games were an interesting attempt to make things different, but they were a bit boring.  The one where you had to step on the coloured shapes was like a rubbish spectrum game.  The magic roundabout jousting was better but its so out of place in a sci-fi adventure.  And twice we had magic mcguffins which would just so happen to warp you to the next place you had to get to.

Even the blob space station could have been good if you knew why you were collecting all this equipment.  But any sense of jeopardy is killed when you decide to have a quick game of snooker instead of running for your life.

When on Aarok, the author tries to make it sound large when you are walking around.  But you go one way and you meat Marsatu.  If you go the other way you walk for ages, meet Sam the snail and then Marsatu, did you just walk in a massive circle?!

Credits were a waste of time. I saw one place where you can use buy something and then another where you lose whatever you have left.  

You know how much importance I put on the interior art but I was left disappointed here as it was sub par.  For one I thought the choices of illustrations were wrong, and with the crazy descriptions of some creatures (looking at you Deik) we really needed them.  But I suspect the descriptions were far too wild for Tim and he just went yeah that's impossible you can have one of these instead.  But even the ones we got were no where near what he produced for House of Hell.  Some of the times I had to check as I could not work out which paragraph they were meant to be referencing.  This does seem that the author and illustrator were on different pages here.

L'Bastin was an interesting villain and we certainly get a lot of backstory which I normally like.  But are we really trying to stop him breed super soldiers or is it because he grafted a pineapple to the queens head?  His presence is certainly felt when you get further into Aarok with Sam the Snail but having to work together at the end was a nice unique change to normal Fighting Fantasy.   And I did like Marsatu, even if it was telegraphed that he was a traitor.

I don't mind the Fog Farkin fight to be honest.  Yes it could be labeled the same as the big starfights where you have to make random choices but it did have the feel of the cyclops fight of Seas of Blood and I felt the decisions kind of made sense.  Not that the Fog Farkin itself made any sense.  I do not want to cast undue aspirations but some of this felt like the author was taking some, erm, medicinal inspiration.     

This book is certainly a wild ride.  While mapping it out I was almost relieved I died early.  I can see what Martin Allen was going for and he had a lot of unique ideas.  But the execution is poor.  Everyone is different but the writing style was just not for me, I found it too childlike.  But its compounded by broken mechanics and far too much random guesswork meaning you can't even play it as a gamebook.  I know most of Fighting Fantasy involves a lot of guessing but most of it you can make an educated attempt at it.    

By the way, I could not figure out the message, can anyone help - 

I cant find any more ciphers for it.

But in the end we can be thankful for Sky Lord.  Why you ask?  Well because it killed off the Sci-Fi entries.  And I can see why!  Its lucky it did not kill off the series.  I was always a fantasy person first through so at least I can acknowledge its achievement.  It also made me laugh a lot.  Unfortunately not with it, but at it.

But is this the worst Fighting Fantasy book (at least so far)?

Yes.  

Glad I paid £23 on eBay for it.

Score - 1 out of 10.

Slaves of the Abyss

Background - 

The giant puffin shaped zeppelin powered across the clear blue sky.  From the gondola Ian looked looked out the window at the landscape below.  It was the same as far as the eye could see, a wind blasted Antarctic icescape.  The reflection of the white surface from the sun was actually blinding so he looked away.  Inside there were multiple execs from Puffin, including Phillipa, looking over a map that was spread out on a table.  The rest of the gondola was filled with security forces, armed to the teeth.  

An officer arrived from cockpit and announced to Phillipa that they were nearing their destination.  She gave him a simple nod.

Phillipa "Positions everyone."

With that instruction the security forces cocked their semi automatic weapons and took up positions by the windows.  Ian looked out the window again, and this time he could see it.  Where everything before had been white, he could now see a gaping black chasm in the shape of a massive hole.  It looked very dark and foreboding and not for the first time he wondered if the risk was worth it.

As the puffin zeppelin maneuvered itself over the terrible black hole, it started to descend.  Soon it was surrounded on all sides by rock as they entered the enormous cave.  Ian marveled at how round it was, it could not be natural.

After more than an hour the most amazing change happened.  The dour rock wall was replaced by a stunning vista.  They had emerged into a tropical paradise.  This hidden world underneath the earth was huge in scale.  Ian could see mountains in the distance, rising towards the rock celling.  It was bright, and he had no idea where the light source was coming from.  Strange creatures flew past and Ian took a mental note of their look for inclusion in future books.

The zeppelin motors roared back on and made its way above the jungle canopy.  It was not long until Ian saw their goal, the magnificent city of Agartha!

After they had landed, their entourage had been greeted by a welcoming committee.  Ian was shocked to find how similar they looked to themselves.  Maybe a little bit taller, but their clothing was very different.  More importantly their weapons that they carried looked a lot more advanced.  As they were guided through the city Ian looked around, mouth open in wonderment.  Phillipa leant over.

Phillipa "Stop gawking like a yokel, you are making us look bad!"

Ian shut his mouth.

Phillipa "Remember we are here to negotiate, and we need to appear from a position of strength."

The negotiations had taken a long time.  Ian found it difficult to mark the passage of time.  His new Casio calculator watch had stopped working as soon as they had arrived in the city.  But finally it was over and they were heading back to the zeppelin.  Except not everyone.  Two minor puffin execs were to stay behind and establish an embassy.  In exchange two of the Agarthan's were coming back to the surface world with them.  

As the Zeppelin was making its way back up the cave tunnel Ian was invited over to the table where the Agarthan's sat with Phillipa.

Phillipa "Ian, let me introduce Paul Mason and Steve Williams.  They are coming back to Puffin HQ with us.  Gentleman, this is Ian Livingston."

Paul "A pleasure to meet you Ian.  We can't wait to see your world!"

Ian shook both their hands.

Steve "Yes, there is so much I want to see and learn, this is going to be the start of a new golden era of cooperation for both our worlds!"

Paul "So Ian, what would you say your world could benefit most from?  Our technology?  Our medicine?"

Before Ian can reply, Phillipa cuts him off.

Phillipa "Its funny you should ask.  We at Puffin have done extensive research on the subject.  We have established that what the world needs.....is a gamebook!"

Steve "A what!?"

With Slaves of the Abyss, we get two new writers, Paul Mason and Steve Williams.  This came out in March of 1988 but they had done some work for Fighting Fantasy a few years earlier with the RPG Riddling Reaver.  Now I did read the Riddling Reaver but I was very young and had no idea what was going on as my only RPG experience was traditional fighting fantasy so unfortunately I have forgotten it.  But I do know that the setting of Kallamehr was established there.  As for Slaves itself, I have never played it.  Mainly because of the cover, which interestingly the authors fought for.  I would have loved to see what the alternative is.  New authors are always interesting to see what they bring but two authors at once?  We have not seen that since the excellent Sword of the Samurai I think. 

Covers - 

Well it's only the one cover but what a wild one!  When I saw this as a kid I did not go near it as I thought it was a Sci-Fi one!

It almost looks like the prison General Zod was in during Superman 2!  To me it looks like a bunch of humans in a space prison, maybe the aforementioned slaves.  The Abyss seems to be filled with spectral pterodactyls.

The real strange thing is the cone headed dude in the foreground.  Will be interesting to see who this is, with their fuzzy hair and scars.  

All in all it this is one of the more peculiar Fighting Fantasy covers I have seen.   

Premise - 

We are in the land of Kallamehr but all is not well.  Lady Carolina is the ruler after the death of her husband and its been nothing but problems.  There has been a sea war against Alkemis which cost many lives and now in the North, the armies of Bei-Han are preparing for an invasion.  Lady Carolina did not mess around and sent every single one of her armies to the mountain passes in the North, as they could be defended, but if the enemy got through to the plains beyond it then there would be trouble.

It is against this troubled backdrop that you arrive in Kallamehr.  The city is deserted with all the warriors missing.  This does mean the criminals are thriving so you bar the door to your room at night and sleep with your sword beside you in bed.  I hope you don't toss and turn in bed or that could be painful.

After a few weeks a wild-eyed messenger arrives in the city yelling to everyone about a new invasion from the East.  Kallamehr can not catch a break!  The messenger heads into the palace and less than hour later a servant arrives with a summons to appear in front of Lady Carolina, apparently your exploits as an adventurer have reached her!  Maybe she has been reading this blog. Well maybe not, if she had I doubt I would be getting a summons.  

Well it turns out that she was desperate as when I turn up there are another ten adventurers already there!  I know some of them, such as Sophia of Blacksand who you have shared danger with before.  Before we can have any banter we are ushered into an audience chamber. Sitting behind a huge black wood table is Lady Carolina herself with her sword of office in front of her.  But she is not alone.  She has her cousin Madhaerios with her who is described as fat with a nervous twitch in his nose.  There is Dunyazad of Ikhityan who is a small women but apparently the richest person in the land.  Sige the Silent is also there, an imposing women of ancient lineage.  I wonder if she is silent or if its an ironic nickname.  And finally Asiah Albudur, a stern faced judge.  So pretty much the five most important people in all of Kallamehr.  

Lady Carolina explains the situation where she fears an army of barbarian raiders from Kulak Isles are advancing from the east and all the armies are away to the North.  And even worse, her champion Ramedes the Invincible, the most feared warrior of all the southern lands, is away looking for a macguffin, erm a fabled relic.  I wonder if Ramedes has had to tattoo a unicorn on his head or find a strange selection of items?  But here is our chance to be heroes, by undertaking the defence of the city.  You may be few but that means greater glory.

Playthrough -

Apparently my sword is made from fangthane steel.  What does this mean, well it gives me a killing blow ability.  If I roll a double 6 in attack its an instant kill!  I have a sturdy backpack!  Not just any backpack.  But it only allows me 5 provisions.  Maybe I did not appreciate the quality of my previous backpacks that could hold 10!

Stats are the same as usual with Skill, Stamina and Luck.

I also start with 5 gold which I have left over from my last adventure.

Time is back!  This adventure is a race against time and you must keep track and tick it off when prompted.  And some of the boxes have paragraphs to turn to when you hit them.  Initially I could not see the time box on the adventure sheet, but that's because its not there, instead its on the inside of the front cover!

A jaunty looking hour glass, with a ruined city at the bottom showing what happens if you fail!

Look how jolly this dude is!

Skill - 10

Stamina - 20

Luck - 8

Well those are below average rolls but not terrible.  No potions for this one either.  Must remember that my sword decapitates on a double 6.

Everyone is up for the task as all the adventurers swear their allegiance.  Just for the reward of being an actual hero rather than a wandering adventurer.  The nobles set up the plan.  Someone needs to go and fetch half the army back, another needs to scout out this new force and the rest are to stay in the city and prepare its defence.  Well someone else can go and fetch the army.  Staying in the city sounds like a good way to find out more about it.  But really we have no idea what you are protecting the city from so I think ill go have a look.

This gets me a seat at the top table and waited on by Carolina's very own servants and page.  Madhaerious talks to me, basically saying don't do anything daft, just find out what we are facing and get back to tell us so we can prepare.  I also get advise from Dunyazad to visit the Temple of Fourga.  I get a light touch from the servant on my shoulder as he walks away and see a folded note that he has dropped on my lap.  Do I want to read it now or later?  I think ill wait until I am away from my present company.

Duyazad continues on and tells me to stick to the roads as even if they are a longer route they will still be quicker than going cross country.  After I leave the table I check the note which says "Beware - you are watched by a thousand eyes."  Thats a lot eyes!

I go to the stables to get a horse where I am approached by Sige the Silent who is described as very tall but with a quite voice, which is where the nickname comes from.  She wants to give me a magical item that will help on my journey, its a pomander of rare herbs.  If I wear it around my neck it will remove the need for sleep!  Well that is useful when we are against time.  It is handed over by a her servant who is described as a poor deformed creature who wears a hood and you guess to hide its piteously ugly face!  Now in 2025 I think that's terrible.  Putting my 1988 hat on though, something is not right and that normally means evil.  With no time to waste I mount up and and make my way to the grand gate.

I ride until nightfall and despite my magic item meaning I do not have to sleep, unfortunately my horse does...ah.  So I tether the horse and spend the night just milling around.  Luckily as I spot some approaching shadows as I feign sleep.  Do I want to wait till they are close and jump up now?

Deciding not to let them get close and I jump up and kick the embers of the fire at them.  Turns out its three black elves who decided to flee instead of fight.

Nothing happens for the rest of the night and the next day the journey continues.  I go through several different villages and get surly reactions from the villagers.  Even when I stop to refill my water they ignore me.  Maybe they do not like city folk out in the country.  I arrive at Hasrah and get the option to press on and spend a night in the open or visit the Temple of Fourga.  I also have to tick off a time box.  Well I got advised to visit the temple so lets check it out.

The wrinkly priests are not pleased to see me.

So it turns out Fourga is the god of pride.  I am admitted by a priest who is very cold towards me and takes me to the high priest.  He is even more unhappy.  "So, the lone dog dares to darken our portals once more with its presence!"  Not sure what my reputation is but someone has been talking smack about me.  The priest then asks me to empty my backpack.  Fair enough, nothing in there but cheese sandwiches.  

I am asked if I have a Golden Fist, which I do not.  The priests have a good rake through my stuff, clearly looking for the fist.  They demand to know what I did with it but I protest my innocence and tell them I am on an important mission and Dunyazad herself told me to visit the temple.  They decide to test my story.

The High Priest to me.

I am imprisoned in a cell and left to pace up and down for an hour wondering what has gone wrong.  Eventually he comes back and says he has spoken to Dunyazad and she has instructed for them to let me go.  He really, really despises having to let me go.  But they do return my possessions and I am on my way.

My next choice is to cut across country or stick to the roads.  Well the advice to go to the temple did not go well but they can't have all given bad advice?  Could they?  Ill stick to the roads.

What is going on here?!

The road is well used and I am surrounded by thick woodland.  All of a sudden an Ox runs past in the opposite direction.  We soon find out why as an upturned cart with a dead Ox is on the road further up.  My horse is not happy and a black swathed figure looks up but I can not penetrate the darkness to see beneath the hood.  With a shriek it runs off into the undergrowth.  Do I wish to chase it or examine the cart.  Well I do not fancy going after the strange shadow monster so lets check out the cart.

The Ox has been horribly mutilated with a grey slime eating into its flesh.  It is quite the foul sight but I notice something pink in the grass nearby so go and have a look.  It turns out to be a mask, of my own face!  Its made of wax so I destroy it.  This explains why everyone has been cold to me, someone has been pretending to be me!  Should have chased whatever it was down.

I have to tick off another time box so already up to 3.  I keep to the road alongside a fast flowing river before arriving at a stockade.  Curious villagers come out to greet me and this lot are friendly!  They even treat me to a meal to restore stamina but I have not lost any yet, or even been in a battle!  Everything is going well until I hear a commotion outside and some of the villagers go to investigate.  Do I want to follow them or stay in the hut?

I decide to go out for a look and it is twilight outside.  An old wise women is speaking to the villagers and then points right at me and says "The prophecy of the winged messenger is fulfilled!  Our Protector has come to save us from the creeping horde!  Tell us that you will stay with us and deliver us from evil."  Do I want to agree or tell her she is mistaken.  This is tough, I feel like I cant stay but they are the only people that have been nice to me so far.  

So I agree and everyone cheers.  Apparently there is a test to prepare for but the old women gives zero clue to what it is and the more I feel she is a bit mad (my in game character says so) .  I rest staring through the smoke-hole of the bright moon (since I cant sleep).

It is not a pleasant night.  The sound of the night is all river insects but eventually an unnatural rasping noise takes over.  Followed by screaming villagers.  Trying to leave by the door does not work as it wont budge, then a serpentine shape makes its way done the smoke hole.

 

Its only the Riddling Reaver himself!

Turns out the "serpent" is actually a rope.  The reaver gives me an expansive bow before introducing himself.  He tells me I have made a complete pigs ear of my mission so he is to here to save my bacon.  Apparently I should not waste my time on every peasant who needs help.  He points to the top saying it is the end of the line and disappears back up, just as the bar of my door scrapes back.  I decide to follow him.

I do not even have to climb and the rope fires up into the sky and I am whisked away from the angry villagers with their flaming torches.  Is the angry buzzing sound coming from the reaver?  We fly for some distance before he sets me down.  He gives me a bottle that is shaped like an ugly fish which he says he stole in his impetuous youth.  He advises to return it to its owner as I will meet him soon.  Apparently there is nothing so soft as a villain with a sense of humour.  With a wink he shoots back up the rope and drifts off.  I am now alone without my horse so I settle in for the rest of the night.  Wait how come, it was the horse that was holding me back since I do not need to sleep?  Maybe I still get tired. 

When morning comes I realise I am by the roadside and my horse is here.  There is a note that says - 

Ah a riddle from the reaver.  I do not have to answer it but I do get 2 luck points.  But I do have to tick off a time box.  I feel I should try and answer it though, in case it matters at some point.  This took me quite some time and even then I am not sure if I got it.  But vanquished by a word makes me think it could be silence.  Maybe.

I still have not rolled a dice in anger.  The wind from the east is bringing a sickly-sweet stench, no coincidence I guess that I am heading that way.  I find a settlement that appears deserted, the road littered with objects which makes me think they left in a panic.  I enter cautiously and hear a faint knocking sound on the right.  Do I investigate, go left or hurry out of the village.

Lets start by searching the buildings away from the knocking.  Should be the safer option.  

Puppets, nothing good can come from puppets!

I decide to ignore the puppets for the evil creatures they are and look for the other stuff instead.  I find a note - 

The brush bearers gloves, ok.  Do I want to look at the puppets?  Nope!  There are three potions I can have now or take for later.  They are all cloudy brown and are called Ghulsh, Arahl, Zazzaz.  So no idea how to differentiate them, but one will be good, one will be ok and one will be a disaster.  And since I am doing ok so far I decide not to risk it and leave them.  

I then leave the village, I was kind of hoping to get the opportunity to investigate the knocking but ok.  The next village is the same, signs of fighting but no sign of bloodshed or people.  I get the option to head back or keep going east.  Well I think they have passed me now, as heading east I keep finding empty villages, so they must be past my present location.  So I head back to try and find them.  

As I gallop back the horse rears up.  Something is amiss.  But I can smell something sour and musty,  We follow a steep path and I get asked if I have marked off more than 10 time units.  Just the 5 so far.

That black splodge in the distance is a massive invading army.

Yep I have found the army.  From a distance it appears as black lava but it is people.  More than the entire Kallamehr army.  Do I want to go in for a close look or make for the village on the left?  I really feel I need to know more about the army before I can report back, but I decide to head to the village to see if I can save them in time.

I am asked if Mema is with me, nope!  I make it to the village stockade and can no longer see the army.  The gates are shut so I hammer at them.  A face briefly appears before disappearing and tells me to leave.  I try and tell them that they need to flee now, but they hide instead.  The black horde appear in the distance so I abandon the villagers and ride off. 

The Black horde are left behind me, still many miles from Kallamehr but engulfing everything in its path.  I do not know any weakness but I decide to forewarn Kallamehr so they can evacuate.  I need to tick another time box (up to 7).  I can ride for Kallamehr or try and find out more about the enemy.  Or search for an enchanter if I recognize the name Enthymesis....which I do not.

I decide to head back to where I started.  I push the horse hard through the countryside of Kallamehr.  My horse is really struggling now and must rest as I get to the market town of Kamadan.  An Ostler helps me off my horse and I struggle to the inn and collapse into a rickety bed.  

But no matter how tired I am I still have Sige's pomander keeping me up.  The book suggests this is more a hinderance than a help as my body needs true rest, squirming in tortured agony.  Do I want to remove it?  Yes I love sleep so it has to go.  Plus that evil grotesque thing that gave it to me is suspicious.

I manage to lower my head and take it off.  I get hit by a wave of exhaustion and fall unconscious on the bed.  Adding another time tick.

Do I get a good nights sleep though finally?  No of course not.  I awake with a start gagging violently on acrid smoke.  The room is full of it and there is a red glow by the door.  I cover my face with the bedsheet and get to the windows and open them.  Outside the window is a hovering a black-clad figure.  I can not see the dark beneath the hood but there is a reflection of the red glow from the fire.  There is a loud buzzing as well.  I take a swing at it but it flies upwards.  Do I run for the door, go out the window or look for another way out.  Well I am at the window already so lets jump.

I grab my possessions and lob them out the window before I go to follow.  Lowering myself and dangling from the window by my fingertips, I sense a presence above me.  Do I want to look up?  No not really lets go right now!

I feel this was the right decision as when I land I feel my back being spattered with viscous liquid (not sure how I know that).  Ah its bubbling and hissing, a dead giveaway of viscous liquid.  I tear off my jerkin and throw it in a water trough and steam rises as it hits the water.  Looking up finally I see a black winged creature as it flies off into the night and disappears.

  

Myself and a growing crowd of locals watch as the roof of the inn collapses from the fire.  With no inn I start to wonder where I will stay.  It is then I feel metal against my neck and a gruff voice says "One move and you're a cut of beef, stranger."  Do I want to stay still, shout for help or try and disarm him?  Well ill just wait and see where this goes and I do as he wishes.

Apparently I recognize the voice.  Its my old blade master Barolo!  Of course it is.  We have a good laugh but I do notice a wooden stump in the place of his left leg.  He notices me looking and says he traded the old one in with a dragon.  He invites me to stay the night at his house.  Its flea ridden but I don't care.  Do I want to wear Sige's pomander?  No that can get in the bin.

I sleep well and get 2 stamina back, which I do not need as I still have not rolled a dice yet!  I go and pick up the horse which costs me 1 gold but it is in good condition.  Barolo gives me a nice buckler shield so I get +1 skill when in combat.  That will be excellent if I ever get in a fight!  Do I want to give Barolo a gift back, yes have this pomander.  I tick another time box.  

In the very next passage I make it back to Kallamehr and have to tick off another time box!  When I try and get to the palace though the guards call me a peasant and they have no need of kitchen hands.  Do I talk them down, or draw my sword?  Well I have got this far without throwing a dice so now its becoming a thing.  So I try and talk to them.

One goes off to check but it appears they are too busy with Lady Carolina's funeral arrangements.  WAIT WHAT!?  I did not see that coming.  They tell me to come back tomorrow and have a bath.  I can try and bribe, get the sword out or do as they say.  

I still have plenty time on the chart so I head back into town.  My character is very annoyed that I have gone from a life and death mission to being ignored.  Yep, another time box as I stay in a rooming house.  When I go back to the palace the next day there is a fair amount of citizens going through the gates.  There are rumors that she died from grief of her husband or demise to dark powers.  The body is lying in state and I see Madhaerios, Dunyazad, Asiah and Sige sitting there.

The Gangs all here!

I am in line to kiss the hand of the departed ruler.  I get to overhear a hilarious conversation in front of me where a wife is refusing to let her husband kiss her hand since he poached her swans and his guilt would turn her skin black.  The husband is like, don't be daft the tale is if the murderer kisses victim on the lips the body turns black as burnt parchment.  It comes to my turn and I kiss the hand, luckily it does not go black.  I see Luthaur who was one of the adventurer that stayed behind to get the city right and he is fidgeting with his sword and does not recognize me which is odd. Do I want to mount the platform and confront the nobles, hold up a scarlet locket (do not have one) or slip into the crowd and watch?  Something is clearly up here so I will hold back and see what is going on.

I watch for several hour until Madhaerios addresses the crowd by reading the service.  He says they will be executing traitors and the army had done well against Bei-Han.  Most interestingly he says as she had no heir, he is taking over as Baron.  Do I want to leave Kallamehr or do I stay and investigate.  Well at the moment I want to find out more.  I suspect all the nobles, with their dodgy advice about temples, funky pomander's and now taking over the city.

I notice that none of the other heroes who stayed to defend the city are to be found.  I go to the Parrot-in-a-Cage Inn and make inquires.  It turns out they have all met with unfortunate accidents.  One mysteriously vanished while walking the ramparts at night, another shot himself with a crossbow.  Another was found impaled on one of the swords carried by the statue of justice.  Mine is particularly bizarre as I am walking down an empty street when..... dam it!

Not one dice rolled.

Notable Encounters - 

There are plenty of notable encounter in this book, including some in my playthrough like the attack and fire at the inn, so apologies if I do not cover them all.

So those monks that did not like me on my playthrough.  If I did have the Golden Fist (picked up if you fight and defeat the black elves), it can get you in even more bother.  Even if you bypass the temple they will hunt you down in a later village if you have it.  They are so desperate for it back as if it opens up they get their youth back.  All in all, not a very nice priesthood.

You even become a responsible adult for a child.

Mema here is hiding where those spooky puppets are.  She is the apprentice to the enchanter Enthymesis.  She gives you vital information and a blowpipe.  You do have to get her back to her parents though in another village.  Also she is covered in green slime if you want to clean her up first.

The Forest of Illusion is interesting.  You have three paths which each correspond to a number (1,2,3) and when you have been in each one you have to use the numbers to go to the next paragraph, and then make your way through the rest of it.

The incompetent Goblins are very entertaining.

One of the encounters in the forest injects some comedy into an otherwise dark book.  Some goblins have set up an ambush but the first one who jumps out and fires his crossbow at you misses and hits his mate who is creeping up behind you.  As he advances to make up for it another goblin activates a noose trap that sends him flying into the air.  This third goblin then flees and just as you think you are in for an easy time an Ogre shows up to give you a tough battle.

Murkurons need your help.

So you stumble across these silver skinned guys desperately holding a door closed.  Now of course in most Fighting Fantasy they would be bad guys and you have plenty opportunity to attack them.  But they are holding the door against the real bad guys and if you help them hold the door it gives their wizard a chance to incinerate them with the fire spell.  They do mysteriously disappear straight away though.  

Hey Barlow!  How come you never taught me that?

So I did meet Barlow in my playthrough but if I had successfully disarmed him we would have stayed up all night being taught the Spitting Fly.  This technique allows you to throw your sword and instant kill your foe.  You can only do it when you get offered but there is the chance that if you do not kill then you have to fight without a sword at -2 skill.  So its a gamble.  But it worked on that poor rat. 

One of the best parts of the book is when you go back to Kallamehr and its clear things are not right.  I should have forced or bribed my way in as it was much more exciting.  As you are staying there you hear the buzzing and see the mysterious cloud leaving one of the rooms, indicating that someone in the castle is a traitor.  Like a peeping tom you sneak around looking through all their windows.

Asiah is having a conversation with the dead Carolina who is clearly not there.  Dunyazad is packing up looking to leave in a hurry.  Sige is meditating in front of a map of the land with pieces, almost like a war map.   Madhaerios is hiding under the bed and then throws away his food in suspicion.  It basically manages to point doubt on everyone.

Madhaerios just before the aforementioned chicken is thrown.  Not sure how he does not see you, I mean he is looking straight at you!

We find the hero Ramedes drugged and in prison, dangling above a horror.  If you do manage to defeat the monster, and kill the jailer you can bust him out.  Awesome we might have another hero to work with.  But when you tell him of Lady Carolina's death he gives you the talisman he found on his quest and proceeds to charge off and fight the entire castle in revenge.  Erm wait their Ramedes, the guards did not kill her.  I think Ramedes might be a bit of a nutter.  Very similar to the hero in Warlock of Firetop Mountain.  Maybe its just what happens to adventurers eventually. 

I also should not have slinked away at the funeral.  If I had made a scene I would have been able to accuse one of the nobles.  Now I did not have any of the information to make a decision and Sige only gives herself away really if you have the amulet from Ramedes.  But if you make them do the old mans ritual and kiss the corpse you can prove the traitor.  If you get it wrong though its all over.  What follows is a pretty easy battle with Sige.

That's for not letting me sleep!  

Sige story does not end there though.  In the Abyss itself you can find her as a crystal statue.  If you free her she thanks you and gives you some duff information.  Then when you get to the climax of the final battle she show up behind you and slits your throat.  Of course she can also get a victory by you beating Bythos but not unmasking her as the traitor and she ends up ruling Kallamehr.

And then there is this crazy lady and her snake!

Artwork - 

Bob Harvey is back for the fourth time!  Previous entries have been mixed (Talisman, Seas, Demons) where I have seen some excellent art but also some that was less so.  Here I would say it is average, we have seen a lot better from him but overall its not bad, just ok.  

From my playthrough, nothing really stands out as amazing.  I like the puppet scene and the army in the distance.  But the bar has been set high.

But there is an absolute beauty in here - 

The Hornet Assassin who is dogging your steps for most of the adventure looks amazing!

Ive looked better!

Tasbadh enacts a phishing scam Fighting Fantasy style.
 

He does draw a good Hornet!

This was one of my favorite moments.  But I feel its let down by the art.

How hard did you throw that sword!?

To be fair to Bob, trying to draw a battle between two creatures that have never been seen before is a tough challenge!

Big Bad - 

I don't recall any other Big Bads standing 50 feet tall!

So Bythos is the master of the Abyss.  He does appear on the mortal world as the slave master, being carried on his palanquin at the head of the army.  Bizarrely though he finds ugly fish bottles so funny he can not defend himself.  But that is just the prequel.  The real battle is in the Abyss itself where he is his massive self.

Bythos is no fool either, you can not go straight up against him or he will just laugh at you and dismantle you.  If you knock over his goblet, your dead.  If you spike his drink, your dead.  If you do not eat the herbs in your pomander he will turn you into crystal with his breath.  You need to play it coy and sneak a drink and not give him any indication that you are the hero.  

If you do that then you also grow to the same giant size.  It mentions your cloak tears but no mention of your other clothes, I imagine you are in the nude.  And then a chase ensues.  It can end in a straight fight and he is Skill 10 Stamina 10 which is quite reasonable for the end boss.  But you can also breathe on him and turn him to crystal to instant kill him since he has not eaten the protective herbs!  

Its quite an adventure of a battle which I like a lot.  But what about Bythos himself?  You start with knowing nothing, you do not even know what the threat is.  However, as the story unfolds we learn more.  Bythos is using the hornets whose sting send the soul of the victims to be imprisoned in the Abyss.  There bodies are still in our world though but they are zombie like slaves at the command of Bythos.  

So he is using them as an army to take over the world?  Well not really, it is more nuanced than that.  He is defeating places and taking their magic items.  Those magic items are sent back to the abyss where they are broken up into a liquid which is gathered and drunk by Bythos, and that is where he gets his power.  

Its really a lot more than the normal bad guy wants to take over the world. 

Menagerie - 

As you can see from my playthrough there is not a lot of enemies to fight here.  The ones that they do  have though have a large variety with a lot of unique monsters.

We get some Black Elves, Goblins and Ogre but they are rare and single entries.  Some guards as well as you would expect but the majority are a bit odd, especially when you get to the Abyss which as you would imagine are very fanciful.

There is an odd encounter in a wine cellar where a wretch is trapped in a wine flooded basement.  It does not say its a zombie but it certainly behaves like one.  If you escape you hear it still tapping at the cellar door.  A nice touch.

Better save this poor soul that's trapped in the ant nest.  Oh wait no its an Ant Symbiote made up of ants!

Kokomokoa are described as squat green lizards with evil yellow eyes.  They seem to be in a war against the Murkurons.  They are pretty low skill and you do not see them depicted but they sound like fancy named Lizardmen.

Look in the bottom left!

Yep that is the hero Ramedes just dangling up there.  The monster he is avoiding is the Quagrant!  It has one big eye, grey flesh and a great big gaping maw.  Its got a lot of stamina but only skill 8.  However if it wins an attack round you get sucked in the mouth and every attack round after you automatically lose 2 stamina.  Still I thought the god level hero Ramedes is meant to be he would just beat it up.  Well to be fair, he has no weapon and is drugged, so I will let him off!

The Maijem Nosoth is pretty much a Chaos Spawn.

He is skill 10, stamina 10, making him one of the toughest creatures to fight.  It really does not like a whistle though!

The gatherer is pretty much in charge of feeding Bythos and throw spears at you.

The Crystal Warriors are the most normal creature to fight in the Abyss.

The more fantastical are the spirit pterodactyl like, treasure hunting, spirit birds called Ectovults and the octopus like Anemorus help make the Abyss a more unique location compared to Allansia.

Entertaining Deaths -

Oh my, there is a lot of ways to die here.  Which makes my job a lot easier in this section!

You decide to stay and protect the city.  Next thing you know its the future and someone is trying to buy your sword from a merchant who pulled it from the ruins of Kallamehr.  My remains lie unmourned amongst the rubble.  

Dithering about in the wilderness and running out of time.  You flee Allansia in shame.

Drowning in wine.

Drowning in oily black water.

Drowning trying to retrieve a nice looking sword.   A lot of drowning in this book.

Getting trapped in the Abyss jail with everyone else.

Trailing the army and watching it burn village after village.

Calling the sage Aletheia Albudur by mistake, in a complete overaction she summons a giant snake to constrict you.  

Prioritising protecting a small village instead of the city.

Realising the pomander is slowing you down after fighting guards, taking it off and falling asleep and waking up in a cell.

Using your blow pipe to shoot up at a jailer, the powder floats down and covers you instead.

Following Ramedes when he decides to take on the entire castle.

Holding up a golden fist at Bythos who says most kind, throws it away and then uses his crystal breath on you.

Becoming lord of the abyss but Sige becomes the ruler of Kallamehr as an evil Tyrant.

My favorite for this one though is - 

Defeating Bythos but using the blue crystal potion to send yourself back from the Abyss.  You survive but at the cost of thousands of innocent people, you are no hero.

Pete's Corner -

Turns out it is best not to stay behind and protect the city.

Final Thoughts - 

I did not have high expectations here.  The cover does not impress me and I thought it sounded dull.  I was very wrong.

I will start with the general writing style.  You never know what you are going to get with new authors.  Paul and Steve (from now I will just say the authors as I do not know who does what) do a fantastic job with the information in their paragraphs.  They get the level of description just right and I never felt I has a bland left or right choice.  I felt I was able to make educated decisions based on the information given.  Do not get me wrong, some decisions are difficult but its better than previous installments.

And continuing the theme of the writing, is the story.  You do not get much information on what is going on, there is no massive info dump of history and an evil villain to go after.  But instead the story unfolds during the adventure.  There could be a threat to the east, might be nothing, lets go and have a look.  It starts with everyone not liking to you for no reason because one of the hornet assassins is pretending to be you and dragging your name through the mud.  Then you start finding the empty villages, leading to finding the mystery army.  But instead of answers its more questions, its an army of villagers.  Normally this would be the lead in to the end of the book but instead you are going back to the start to report back and the person who sent you is dead!  

I love the encounter at the inn before returning to find Kallamer in the state that its in and the great twist.  Plus I really love the traitor mechanic.  It is far from obvious as well with who it is and they do a very good job of creating doubt.  Another great job is building a world that has a lot of moving parts.  It feels alive with lots of characters in it, and they are doing their own thing independent of your actions.  Then you get through that and you are back in the world heading to the forest and finding out more information and piecing together Bythos's plan all the way to getting to through the Abyss.  Which takes me to the ending.

I have read that originally the authors wanted to have you sacrifice yourself by leaving you alone in the Abyss.  But Steve Jackson overruled them as people should be rewarded with lots of gold and treasure.  What they have done is allow you to get everyone back and you are stuck in the Abyss but instead the big snake teaches you and eventually you become a god that can time travel between the cosmos and planes of existence.  But that is another tale for another time.  Its a very different type of ending and I love it.

A fantastic story with great pacing.  But what about the technical part?  Well I like the instant kill mechanic, even though I never got the chance to use it.  There are no crazy impossible battles, a lower skilled person does have a chance.  And no crazy item hunt either although some are necessary.  The difficulty is in the specific set of things you need to do and the order to do them.  It can be quite difficult with a lot of instant deaths but with enough playthroughs the correct path can be found.  I was worried that the Forest of Illusions was going to be a dreaded maze but it was ok, and perfectible mappable.  

The herb puzzle near the end is odd though, it is a good anti cheat device but I am confused why Sige would give you the very thing you need to protect you from Bythos. It does not make sense.  Unless its just a quirk of fate that the thing she gives you to hinder you accidently helps you.

I also liked the idea of the time mechanic, especially with it triggering events.  But in reality it appears it would be very difficult to run out of time so the threat is not really there.  If the events were moved up earlier it would be better.

Bythos does not appear to get much love in the community but I really like him.  You do not get his motivations spelled out obviously but if you make it through the story it becomes clear.  And come on, he is a 50 foot super giant!  And his use of the Hornet Assassin to dog your steps is a nice touch.  The rest of the menagerie is suitably unique but some of them are a bit wild.  One random disgusting creature is enough but we get a few.

The only negative I have is the artwork.  I do not think its Bob Harvey's best work.  Do not get me wrong, it is by no means bad but this story deserved better.  And I really do not like the cover either.

But overall, this was superb.  It was different and felt a little less Fighting Fantasy during my playthrough but the story and atmosphere more than made up for it!  Looking forward to more from these guys.

Score - 8 out of 10.