Fighting Fantasy Falls Upon the Mobile World

Remember the old-school Fighting Fantasy games? They were a lot like Choose Your Own Adventure books with a dash of tabletop RPG mechanics thrown in to make things more interesting for older readers.​

If you said no, then you can get a taste for that classic genre on your favorite mobile device. The guys at Tin Man Games, makers of Gamebook Adventures, have teamed up with Fighting Fantasy to bring legendary FF master Ian Livingstone's Blood of the Zombies ​to iOS and Android.

​I love seeing this sort of project flourish, especially with the backing of such legendary figures in the history of printed game books. As a long-time fan of game books and of computerized interactive fiction, it's great to see the genre entering such a revival in the mobile space. I've long thought that game books were perfect for the Kindle, and while they seem to be doing a lot better on the iPad, their adoption on the tablet side does mean they benefit from fantastic multimedia presentations that (for now at least) the Kindle simply couldn't provide.

Check out the HD gameplay trailer for more if you're not sure you get the concept of a book that's a game that's a book, and let me know what you think!​

Fighting Fantasy: Blood of the Zombies by Tin Man Games Fighting Fantasy, the world famous interactive gamebook series returns for its 30th Anniversary! Ian Livingstone and Tin Man Games present Blood of the Zombies on iOS!! "Insane megalomaniac Gingrich Yurr is preparing to unleash an army of monstrous zombies upon the world.

From a Certain Point of View

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about perspective and how it applies to writing, what I prefer to read, what I prefer to write, what other people prefer to read.

This was mostly prompted by discussions at Goodreads in The Sword & Laser’s discussion forums. The book they’re currently reading, Rule 34 (affiliate link), is done in the rarely-used second person form.

Second person is common in game-books, which is a form of writing I enjoy, but when it comes to reading a story or novel that I’m not in some way “participating” in, I just can’t enjoy it. More than anything it’s the synchronicity of the experience. Since I’m supposedly an observer experiencing this story of someone else’s, my mind rebels at the idea that it’s in present tense, happening RIGHT NOW. How can I be reading a record of events happening as I read them?

Some people can get past this, but I can’t seem to. I’d been eager to read the Spellsong Cycle by L. E. Modesitt, Jr. but when I realized they were second-person perspective, I abandoned them before I even started.

If you’ve checked out any of the fiction I write in the Fiction Fragments or Draft Stories sections of the site, it’s pretty clear that I favor 3rd person limited for the most part, though now and then I find myself drifting into 3rd person omniscient.

Do any of you have very strong feelings about particular points of view in writing? I know I’m not alone in my feelings on 2nd person present tense, I’ve discussed it with some others. Any of you disagree? Feel free to let me know, I’m very curious about how people get around the simultaneity issue and why it’s not an issue.