Gamebook Friday: I ♥ ACE Gamebooks

It's Valentine's Day and nothing says "I love you" like buying your sweetheart an ACE Gamebook. With that in mind, there is currently a sale running over on the ACE Gamebooks Roleplay page on DriveThruRPG this weekend.

So, if you're missing a book from your collection - such as the new The Box of Delights RPG - now would be a great time to rectify that situation.

Love you guys!

The Box of Delights - The Roleplaying Game

Physical copies of The Box of Delights RPG are now available from DriveThruRPG.

To grab your copy, follow this link. To check out the print proofs of the book, watch the video below.

Gamebook Friday: Can You Solve the Murder?

This week, I was excited to receive an advanced reader copy of Antony Johnston's new interactive crime novel Can You Solve the Murder?

I was fortunate enough to be a beta reader for this last year. Since then a few changes have been made to the story, including the gender of one of the main characters, so it will be interesting to give it another read now.

Here's the publisher's blurb...

There’s been a murder at Elysium, a wellness retreat set in an English country manor. You arrive to find the body of a local businessman on the lawn – with a rose placed in his mouth. It appears he was stabbed with a gardening fork and fell to his death from the balcony above. But that balcony can only be accessed through a locked door, the key is missing, and everyone in Elysium is now a suspect…

Gather the evidence and examine the clues. Choose who to interview next, and who to accuse as your prime suspect. But remember that every decision you make has consequences – and some of them will prove fatal… 

Do you have what it takes? Can YOU solve the murder?

The great thing about Can You Solve the Murder? is that while it isn't a gamebook in the style of Fighting Fantasy or ACE Gamebooks, it isn't simply a branching narrative like a Choose Your Own Adventure story, where everything is revealed at the end.

There are clues to be collected and a puzzle to be solved. At the end, in classic murder mystery style, you have to declare who you think the murderer is. But you can't just guess who it might be - you have to have the evidence to back up your suspicions.

I met Antony Johnston for the first time last year after Fighting Fantasy Fest, despite having both worked for Abaddon Books when the imprint started out, and he is a huge gamebook fan. In fact, he wrote a glowing review of Dracula: Curse of the Vampire.

Can You Solve the Murder? will be published by Penguin Books* in June 2025.

* Parent company of Puffin Books, who originally published the Fighting Fantasy series.

Gamebook Friday: AireCon 2025

Six weeks today, I will be attending AireCon in Harrogate for the first time. It's actually on from Thursday 13th - Sunday 16th March 2025, but Hall M won't be open on the Thursday.

Talking of which, you will find ACE Gamebooks at Booth A11 in Hall M. From the plan, it looks like there are two main thoroughfares through the hall, one of which goes straight past my stand, which will be sandwiched between Mantic on one side and Red Mug Crafts on the other. 

So, if you're in the North Yorkshire area and fancy popping along to AireCon over the course of the weekend, do stop by Booth A11 and say hello.

Gamebook Friday: The Prince of Darkness Over Arkham

I have two pieces of gamebook news for you this week. The first is that Sound Realms' audio adaptation of the sixth ACE Gamebook Dracula: Curse of the Vampire is coming to Backerkit on 1May 2025. You can check out a sample of the audio below, and register your interest in the crowdfunding campaign here.

The second piece of news is that my first Arkham Horror Investigators Gamebook, The Darkness Over Arkham, is now available from Chameleon Comix in Hungarian.

Gamebook Friday: Nosferatu and the Curse of the Vampire

At the weekend I went to see Robert Eggers' Nosferatu. I had been looking forward to this ever since I first saw the trailer and went to see it as soon as I could so as not to have the film ruined by spoilers on social media.

Now, be warned, this post contains a few spoilers about the film. So, if you have yet to see it but you want to see it, do not read on any further.

Still here? On your head be it, then.

For those who don't know, Eggers' Nosferatu was inspired by the original Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror, from 1922, as well as Bram Stoker's gothic horror novel Dracula*. Eggers' film looks stunning - the locations, sets, and cinematography are incredible - but it isn't actually scary. The jump scares are too obvious and well signposted. On top of that, the story is just too well known to terrify. There's some gross stuff but, knowing it's not real, means none of it will actually make you jump out of your skin.

I don't mind that, but I'm still not entirely sure what I think of the film. It's good, but not amazing. That said, I have found myself pondering it over and over this last week, so it has definitely made an impression on me. There are some fantastic images in the film, and probably the most disturbing elements involve what the mere mortals do when their minds cannot cope with the horror they have been subjected to.

It seems the most contentious things about the film involve Count Orlok's appearance, specifically his moustache and the fact that he is naked at pivotal moments in the film. I don't see what all the fuss is about. Dracula had a moustache in Stoker's novel and the undead Strigoi in my Dracula-inspired gamebook haven't bothered to get dressed either.

Count Dracula and an undead Strigoi by Hauke Kock, from Dracula: Curse of the Vampire.

But it is the look of the film that has really stuck with me, so much so that I am considering publishing a new edition of Dracula: Curse of the Vampire next year, with darker and grittier artwork, and a more gothic look altogether.

For now, if you have yet to check out my own take on Stoker's classic, you can order a copy of the sixth ACE Gamebook here.

* The original Nosferatu was effectively a rip-off of Dracula, and Stoker's widow won a copyright case against the filmmakers. All copies of the film were supposed to have been destroyed but, just like the vampiric Count Orlok, it rose again from the dead. 

ACE Gamebooks Winter Sale Now On!

The ACE Gamebooks Roleplay Winter Sale is on now, over at DriveThruRPG.