Broken Gamebooks #5 ½: Return to the Crown of Kings

Steve Jackson's Sorcery! has received a bit of an errata from the blog in the past. But here's something I missed out on the first time round, and I think is worthy of a post in its own right. (It would help to read the original article if you haven't already, naturally.)

If you happen to eat from the Mutant Meatballs in Throg's larder, then one of several possible mutations can happen to you (determined by rolling two dice). One of these effects is that your skin darkens and hair grows until you physically resemble one of the guards. This allows you to claim the same benefits as if you defeated all of the Seven Serpents in the previous book (by telling you what the reference modifier is), as you are now no longer recognised.

Unfortunately, this creates a bit of trouble later on, in the encounter with Captain Cartoum. If you use the modifier in that encounter, then you are told that "the obvious similarities between your races has come as a shock to him"... except that doesn't make sense if you found the reference modifier by eating the Meatballs rather than killing all the Serpents! Moreover - in some of the scenarios where you're not recognised, shouldn't whoever you meet presume you're one of the guards rather than a total stranger? What might have been quite clever in this situation is to introduce a second reference modifier - one that sometimes gives you the same benefits as the first one, but sometimes has a different result.

I suspect this came about because of an oversight on Jackson's part - by the time he'd got to the encounter with the Captain, he'd forgotten that it was also possible to get the reference modifier this way as well. Moreover, it is extremely difficult to actually get mutated in this matter at all, as there are eleven possible side effects of the Meatballs, and you roll two dice to determine what happens to you. In a similar manner to the use of the ZED spell described in the previous article, it seems likely that once Jackson thought of this, he decided to have a bit of fun with possible scenarios it is unlikely the player would manage to stumble into.

It is also probable that this was included at all to give the player an opportunity even if they didn't kill all the Serpents, or if they're playing the book as a standalone volume, not necessarily to still be able to win but to make the game more coherent - consider the bit on section 251 in the original article, where getting a vital piece of information from the Torturer is a bit contrived if you're recognised. Is it possible that for that reason, Jackson felt it was a good idea to give the player another opportunity to get the not-recognised bonus? If so, it's a shame it introduces another tiny error/sticking point in the process, really...

One interesting thing to end on which also concerns Cartoum and the not-recognised bonus is, as recounted on the Fighting Fantasy Wiki, that it can potentially be to your benefit to be recognised! Only by being recognised do you have the option to use the GOD spell on Cartoum or fighting him to get the key you need to pass from him; if he doesn't recognise you you either need the locket from The Shamutanti Hills (also an option if you are recognised) or win a SKILL roll. Jackson being sneaky? A mistake on his part? Jackson deciding to balance out the advantages of the not-recognised bonus by making it disadvantageous at one point? Maybe he figured anyone with the not-recognised bonus was such a diligent player they'd be more likely to have the locket? It's fascinating, and reaffirms my belief that I'd love to read a thorough 'making-of' from Jackson.

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One final note, concerning The Seven Serpents. I posited in the original article that the book may originally have been intended to be longer, and in that version it would have been possible to miss all seven Serpents, whereas in the finished game there are two (Air and Time) you will always fight no matter what choices you make, and two it is virtually impossible to miss (Sun and Water). The thing is that those are the last four Serpents in the game, they're all fairly close to each other and appear near the end! The beginning of TSS is far less linear than the end, and it is there that the three other Serpents - Earth, Fire and Moon - are lurking, and it is much easier to miss them. Does this suggest that Jackson started out planning to write a much bigger game, and had to fudge things towards the end when he ran out of time and book space?

There's also something really quite... inelegant (for want of a better word) about the placing of the Time Serpent, and the item needed to defeat said Serpent. Each of the Serpents has a specific weakness, which can be used to avoid getting into an extremely difficult battle with them when you meet them. So, for example, the Water Serpent can be destroyed by pouring oil over it if you happen to have found a bottle of it somewhere, or the Air Serpent will die if you destroy its physical body whilst it is in its non-corporeal form. The Time Serpent's weakness is a magic spell, which is also the only way to kill it. And the only way to get that spell is from a group of goblins immediately before you meet the Serpent (you literally meet it in the next section after meeting the goblins, not to mention that the very next section after the Time Serpent is the end of the game). Jackson certainly wasn't shy about making the game Unwinnable By Design elsewhere - it is possible to do something in The Seven Serpents which renders the game unwinnable in The Crown of Kings - so it seems odd the location of the spell wasn't put somewhere else. Is this more evidence of the game not being as Jackson originally planned?

Whatever the truth, there is certainly an interesting story behind the development and writing of Sorcery!, and it would be great if we got to hear it some day.