"The modern master of the gamebook format" (Rob Sanders)... "Can do dark very well" (Jonathan Oliver)... "Green gets mileage out of his monsters" (SFX Magazine)... "It takes a firm editorial hand and a keen understanding of the tone of each piece to make a collection this diverse work, and Green makes it look effortless" (Starburst Magazine)... "A charming blend of camp creatures, humour, and genuine horror" (Set the Tape)
If you're a fan of Fighting Fantasy, gamebooks, Knightmare, theatre, The Lord of the Rings, YOU ARE THE HERO, Dungeons and Dragons, or the movie Labyrinth, then you need to back this Kickstarter today.
I shall be at Nine Worlds Geekfest this weekend (7-9 August 2015), at the Radisson Blu Edwardian, Heathrow.
The reason for posting this news under the 'Gamebook Friday' banner is because I am there in my capacity as an author of gamebooks and games designer.
On Friday night I shall be taking part in Knightmare Live,at 8.00pm in Commonwealth...
Following which I shall be attending the Rebellion Publishing Party (Books, Booze & Kazoos) in Royal B from 10.15pm (should I survive the dungeon, that is).
On Sunday, after a signing session in Commonwealth East (11.00-11.30am), I shall be moving next door to Commonwealth West to take part in the debate TV vs Books vs Comics vs Games: FIGHT! (11.45am-1.00pm) during which I shall be championing the cause of Games (unless things change again before the weekend is over).
On top of all that, a number of GAME OVER contributors are appearing at Nine Worlds this weekend and are planning a meet-up on Saturday evening. So do come and find us (in a bar probably) and chat to us about what's going to be in the book.
Today, thanks to YOU ARE THE HERO backer James Aukett, I caught the tail end of AdventureX 2013 at the University of East Anglia (in London, of course), and more specifically the talk given by creator and producer of 1980s kids' TV adventure gameshow Knightmare, Tim Child.
Ted Child and Yours Truly
I was able to chat to Tim briefly afterwards about Knightmare, Fighting Fantasy and Dungeons and Dragons, and then got to talk to Jon Ingold of Inkle Studios, briefly, about Sorcery! 2. It was all over after a couple of hours, but it was an interesting experience and I can tick off another of my childhood heroes that I've been fortunate enough to meet.
If you were a child at the end of the 80s or start of the 90s, then you probably remember Knightmare. It was, for its time, an innovative virtual reality adventure set within a magical dungeon world, and it was on children's television.
Being a loyal devotee of the cult of Fighting Fantasy it seemed obvious to me that the programme was born off the back of the success of the gamebook phenomenon (and RPGs like Dungeons and Dragons of course).
It was a much tamer experience than your average FF adventure. There were no orcs to gut or horrifically described death scenes, but there was still the wandering around a labyrinth of gothically-decorated rooms, weird quasi-medieval characters to chew the fat with, and even some monsters (like the green-screened pet tarantula).
For those of you who remember Knightmare and the dungeon master Treguard (the fantastic Hugo Myatt), then the following will probably fill you with feelings of nostalgia. If you were born after the advent of real VR interactive gameplay and the phenomenal rise of the games consoles, then you don't know what you've missed.
Except that you can find out today (and tomorrow) at 2.00pm on CITV!
