Statistically Speaking

In the year 1982, Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone devised the basic combat system for the very first Fighting Fantasy adventure gamebook, The Warlock of Firetop Mountain. This system would require the player to keep track of three statistics which measured their combat SKILL, STAMINA, and LUCK -- whilst the 'luck' statistic could be used to decrease the stamina the player lost, or increase the damage done to their enemies, it would also be used in situations outside combat where the player had to Test their Luck to see if the gods of fate were smiling on them or not.

As the range went on, and was opened up to other authors once it became apparent new titles were needed faster than Jackson and Livingstone could possibly hope to write them by themselves, the basic system held, but many writers wanted to add more to it, and a common way of innovating with the format was an extra statistic which measured something unique to the book. The most common of these was a stat that kept track of the passage of time, which has appeared in around a fifth of the books published to date. But here is a look at some of the other things various authors in the franchise have required the player to keep a record of.

Ghost Light

Last month, I was investigating Number 13 -- the British comics answer to The Munsters and The Addams Family, which was drawn by John Geering and ran in the Beano on an increasingly irregular basis from 1987 to 2002. Going back and reading that is... pretty much vital to this follow-up. But the short version is that, as per the sometimes frustrating publication The Official History of the Beano, the strip appeared just three times after 1997, and the book only gives a date for the last of these; namely the 14th December 2002. This is particularly notable because that happened to be some three and a half years after John Geering died.

I had that very last strip, but didn't even know when the other two ran, and wasn't able to make a more informed guess until I'd seen them. Well, we're halfway there, because I've located one of them in the issue of the Beano dated 19th June, 1999:

Take Me Back

Some not-awful photography from the HAIM concert in Cardiff last night.

The Drawing Board

The following board game, which could probably not be published today, appeared in The Bash Street Kids Annual 1995:

That last page in particular has been really stuck in my head for the better part of three decades. I found "the spinny thing that rarely works", and advising the reader to just buy a dice instead, incredibly funny, have always referred to them as such since, and was very pleased to rediscover its origin when I bought this book in a charity shop the other week. I wondered why this childhood memory lodged itself in my mind so firmly, and I think it's because it was probably my first experience of a work taking the piss out of its own idea.

The Shadow of Death

Holding the Spear of Doom up high, you shout your war-cry and charge. The Spear is not meant to kill Voivod; as the Horned God said, it returns life to the dead. But Voivod is death itself, so the Spear may not have enough Life-force to affect him. Fight each Attack Round of combat as normal; but once, at the end of each round (whether you win the round or not), you can attempt to give Voivod life. Roll two dice: if the total is equal to or less than the Spear's current Life-force, turn to 400; but if the number you roll is higher, you have failed. If you fail, deduct 1 from the Spear's Life-force, then fight another round of combat, and so on. Because you are trying to wield the Spear, you fight Voivod only in defence: if you win a round, he loses no STAMINA; on the other hand, Voivod thrives on your death, so if you lose a round, you must add any points of STAMINA that you lose to Voivod's current total. If the Spear expends its Life-force, you must try to defeat the Voivod in normal combat -- only then will your telling blows cause him to lose STAMINA points.

VOIVOD        SKILL 10        STAMINA 10

Should it be that you win in normal combat, turn to 303.

So goes the final combat of the 44th Fighting Fantasy gamebook, Legend of the Shadow Warriors by Stephen Hand (published 1991). It's around this point you can tell that the authors are aiming the range at adult collectors as much, if not more, than the series' original target audience of teenage boys. This eventually came to be seen as a problem by Puffin Books, who felt the series had become too unknowable and needed to get back to its roots, but a planned 'back-to-basics' relaunch in 1995 blew up on the launchpad and no revamped books were ever published, despite the fact the first one had been completed.

And maybe they had a point there, and maybe the new 21st-century books thread a needle which the range didn't manage to in the nineties, innovating with the format whilst keeping in mind who the target audience is. But Legend of the Shadow Warriors boasts a rich backstory, an immersive writing style, high replay value, experimentation with the series' basic rules including an innovative system for equipping different weapons and armour, and possibly the best-written 'boss battle' not just of the range, but of any gamebook.

The Monsters Are Due on Beano Street

According to The Official History of the Beano, the above strip -- from issue #2346, dated 04/07/87 -- is the first appearance of Number 13, a story about preteen vampire Boris and the rest of his family, as drawn by John Geering. Well, that book at least considers it the first official appearance. This begins our look at a comic strip with a rather confusing beginning and end.

The Most Esoteric Game Over in Interactive Fiction

In the superhero-themed Fighting Fantasy book, Appointment with F.E.A.R., you can get mugged whilst in your civilian identity.

The cool air is refreshing and allows you to gather your thoughts. You must anticipate the F.E.A.R. meeting if you are to prevent their master-plan from succeeding. If only you knew where it was to be held, and... Thump! You feel a heavy blow across the back of your head and you drop to your knees. A rough accent says: 'Just get the money and let's get going. Quick!' A hand searches through your pockets for your cash. Though groggy, you know what is happening. You are being mugged! You could, if you wished, fight back, but that would mean you having to reveal your secret identity. Or you could let them think they have knocked you out -- you have very little money on you, anyway. Will you fight back (turn to 230), or let them rob you (turn to 279)?

Triple Dog Dare

Last time, I was looking at Bananaman strips from the late 90s adapting episodes of the 80s TV series, which were drawn by John Geering -- who had created the strip and drawn the vast majority of it up to that point, but had no known involvement in the series. It would be worth going back and reading that piece if you haven't already, as that way this one will make sense.

But in short: the last strip adapting a TV episode is from the issue of the Dandy dated 3rd July 1999, and a week later a wholly original strip appeared for the Dandy's world-record-breaking 3007th issue, dated the 10th July. On the 20th July, John Geering died. (Some sources list his death as the 13th August, which is the date his obituary appeared in his local newspaper, the Warrington Guardian; I am presuming the date given in the Independent's obituary is correct.) However -- as was often the case when an artist passed away -- he had a buffer of strips built up, and new stories by him continued to regularly appear in the Beano and the Dandy for around two months after his death.

In issue #3004 (19/06/99), another strip drawn by Geering had started appearing in the Dandy: a revival of Puss and Boots, the very first characters he had created for D. C. Thomson in 1969.