The Gaming Den

(Note: since this is a single-person review/playthrough I'm assuming it's OK in IMHO.)

So, some have suggested that I drunken review some of the more frustrating and/or less playable Fighting Fantasy books on my hands, and since I have both UK Steve Jackson's two most difficult titles to make it through... and a lot of booze on my hands, now I will.

I'll start with House of Hell, mostly because that one doesn't literally require a fucking cipher to interpret it (unlike Creature of Havoc, which will be very hard to convince me to do,) and assume you all know by now that Fighting Fantasy were a series of solo adventure gamebooks from the 1980s that were mostly bullshit hard stuff (they were competing with Gygax's AD&D and early Nintendo games, recall) that generally have a simplistic writing style (some authors more simple than others) and very linear structure. They run off a rather simple 2d6 system (opposed rolls for combat, roll under for stat checks,) and if you want more info I'll shamelessly promote the Let's Plays from the series that I (and recently angelfromanotherpin) have been running.

House of Hell wrote:Taking refuge in the infamous House of Hell has to be the worst mistake of your life!

The dangers of the torrential storm outside are nothing compared to the blood-curdling adventures that await you inside. Who knows how many hapless wanderers like yourself have perished within its gruesome walls? Be warned! Tonight is going to be a night to remember...

House of Hell is notable in that you are a human from (then) modern day Earth (so 1980s Earth, then, which is why we don't have a cell phone; the 80s ones would kill quicker than the nastiest of UK Steve Jackson's insta-deaths,) and that you have a FEAR score, which is essentially another HP track that more than makes up for the relatively easy combats in this book (if your FEAR points exceed your FEAR score you die.)

While I really like the concept of Resident Evil-style claustrophobic horror, this book does not do it well, which I unfortunately learned many years ago...

Now, despite the lying introduction claiming that you can make it through with minimum rolls, I recall you need at least 9 FEAR points to survive, and I'll probably enter the cheat code for unlimited FEAR so we can have proper Scooby Doo adventures as opposed to "Ruh roh Shaggy, my FEAR score is at 8, if I see one more painting talk I'll literally die of fright!"

Like all horror gamebooks, you're probably imagining that this is going to lead to lots of terrible deaths, but it's really just leading to lots of rather dull ones (Beneath Nightmare Castle is actually decent fantasy horror that has really long and drawn out deaths, but I respect that one too much to Drunken Review it a new ass.)

All we know about our protagonist is that he/she/it (I'll say he) has an important appointment to make it to, and got some sketchy directions from a creepy old man before having his car break down while driving in a terrible rainstorm near an old house that has a small light on inside. Being a reasonable person, he decides to see if that house has a phone to call AAA. However, he doesn't notice in the darkness that there are no lines running to/from the house! Goddamnit this looks like it was made for Scooby Doo, but this is more House of the Dead. Also our character needs a name and more of a motivation. And since I already mentioned House of the Dead, G is on his way to meet his friends at the AMS but happens to have some car trouble on the way. He also forgot to bring his gun, and is thus unarmed (-3 SKILL in combat until a weapon can be found)

My habit of rolling well continues:
G SKILL 12 STAMINA 19 LUCK 12 FEAR 10

(EDIT: Looking at my rolls on d20 dice bag, I drunken typoed my STAMINA, it should be 19. Fixed. Still really good stats; only Dirk von Facestabber III could take G down.)

The FEAR might not be enough, if I actually want to succeed, but whatever.

To quote the book, "Tonight is going to be a night to remember..."

NOW TURN OVER

(waiting a bit before actually starting up)

Darth Rabbitt wrote:House of Hell is notable in that you are a human from (then) modern day Earth (so 1980s Earth, then, which is why we don't have a cell phone; the 80s ones would kill quicker than the nastiest of UK Steve Jackson's insta-deaths,)

Just buy this one:

Or this one from '82

Weighs only 21 pounds. So can function as an improvised weapon too!

(Alas, ishy, G isn't that well prepared. Hopefully what I do remember of this book, because Steve Jackson loves his metagame knowledge, plus G's killer stats will get us through.)

So, it starts.

So this is the house that G walks up to, and he is not particularly amused. Zombies won't fight themselves. There's a light in the back, but he decides against it because this is a UK Steve Jackson book and that probably kills you or something. Instead, he knocks the door like a civilized person.

A man in a butler uniform greets me and lets me in while he gets his master. I'm really hoping that this is Riff Raff and he's going to call over Frank-N-Furter, because Tim Curry is sexy as hell awesome. It turns out that this place is well decorated on the inside. Now there are a bunch of Scooby-Doo paintings and there's no fucking way that I'm not investigating one of them.

I look at the portrait of a beautiful young woman wearing a tiara, which a plaque informs me is Lady Margaret of Danvers: 1802-1834. The painting starts talking and tells me that many Bothans have died in this house and a guy named Lord Kelnor is plotting my demise already. She tells me to avoid the white wine if I don't run. UK Steve Jackson really hates his white wine, doesn't he? I get 1 FEAR point for the Scooby Doo painting but decide not to run for the door because it probably leads to scary painful death that isn't really that scary or painful.

At this point Franklins, the butler who greeted me, comes back with Lord Kelnor, "the Earl of Drumer." He wears a purple smoking-jacket and so G can only assume that he's a pimp who is evil and plotting to kill him. He offers me some brandy and since that's not white wine I figure it's safe. It is and makes me lose the FEAR point I gained.

So he offers me dinner and a night's rest, as he tells me that his telephone line is down (OMG THAT'S WHY IT WASN'T THERE!!!!!112) and he'll help with the car in the morning. Then it's dinner time, and I'm offered my choice of white or red wine. Just like the Gypsy woman painting said! I take red wine, as I know Steve Jackson's love of it. I'm then offered lamb or duck for the main course, or nothing. I don't want to be rude, so not eating is not an option. One dish probably kills me, but not remembering which is which I decide to take the one made from an animal that has a ginormous penis. It is delicious, and now the Earl and I make small talk.

He tells me that he is the last survivor of his family, and owns a once prosperous estate. His sister died at 32 under mysterious circumstances with marks on her neck, and the tenant farmers decided that it was a curse and left his estate for (literally) greener pastures.

He offers me dessert, and I decide to take fruit, coffee and brandy because brandy has done wonders earlier in this book, and I want more. I also want booze IRL, and will take another drink. Amazingly, nothing here has poisoned me, and I'm taken by Franklins to the Erasmus Room, where there's a bed for me. Unfortunately, Lord Kelnor isn't lying there seductively for me, and G hates Renaissance Catholic Humanists, and tries to get out of his bedroom, only to find it's locked. I decide to try breaking down the door because of my fucking awesome stats, and despite making a successful SKILL roll, I am informed that my shoulder hurts and I take 2 STAMINA damage, but the door doesn't budge.

It does draw attention though, and I decide to hide behind the door to ambush them, because this is a Steve Jackson book and no one is to be trusted. There's an illustration but since this is a drunk review I'm only grabbing the shit I can find on Google. It's a little hunched over dude who has a glass of something for me, and I decide to lock him in because I don't trust the bastard; he's ugly and I think he's slipping me a roofie.

Now I'm given a choice between right and left, and since right is always right on these I go right. And I come across this:

She asks me to follow her, and I decide to trust her because G has a soft spot for bitches. I get 1 FEAR point, because ghosts are apparently only as scary as talking Scooby Doo paintings. She passes through the door and I am reminded that I "must use more traditional methods; you turn the handle and walk into the Apollyon Room." That's actually pretty funny for UK Steve Jackson. If only he was more fair and less smug, I might even like his books in more than basic concept. But now we get exposition.

I am informed by the Ghost of Exposition Past that Kelnor is the Master, and a "powerful Black Priest of the Night." He is a servant of the Demons of Hellfire and is going to sacrifice a young woman tonight. So basically he's someone from a Jack Chick tract who isn't Jack Chick. He is only vulnerable to the Kris knife, which he conveniently keeps somewhere in the place where he lives. OK, that sounds more like Fighting Fantasy. Some ghostly Great Danes attack the ghost before she can tell me where she thinks it's hidden. Of course they do. I can't touch them, and they can't touch me, so they just disappear once they're done with her. Since the ghost seemed nice and all, I decide to carry on her legacy and destroy the Master, as I don't want Super Mutants to overrun Britain. My last bottle's near empty, and we're at a convenient breaking point, so I'll take a break now.

Adventure Sheet:
G
SKILL 12/12 (9 in combat)
STAMINA 17/19
LUCK 12/12
FEAR 1/10

EDIT: see previous post

Kris knife, huh?

Well, I guess if it's good enough for Dracula, it's good enough for the Master...

Edit: Derp, I misremembered. Kukri =/= Kris.

Careful. Since we are talking about the UK it might be: The Master; he can regenerate.

Schleiermacher: Well, the plural contains "Kris," Wikipedia's page on Kukri has Kris in its "See Also," and it's from only a few countries to the northwest. So it's perfectly understandable, and I suspect the Kris was selected as the plot device weapon because Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone really love name dropping things from Thailand (see my Deathtrap Dungeon Let's Play for more on that.) I'm such a shameless self-promoter.

ishy: Hopefully he doesn't have a TARDIS here, or else I'm screwed.

Since I am at school (waiting for classes to start) and therefore neither have booze nor much time I'm not writing another chapter in The Misadventures of Agent G... yet.

So far I'm doing surprisingly well, though; I think I'm setting down on the One True Path already. My memory serves me well!

I love this.

This was always one of my favorites. Seems like it was one of the influences on my early proto-D&D games before we had rules.

That illustration of Lord Kelnor... man, he looks like a cross between Louis Jourdan and a muppet. John Blanche's characters had that problem too... that weird clamshell mouth. I'm sure Frank will come up with a convincing pathology for it.

Side note: here's the dude who gave me a drink, I found the illustration online while looking for the next one:

So I go into the Azazel Room, because I want to meet Nightcrawler's father.

There's all sorts of priceless antiques from the last century, but I know that Rick Harrison won't give me more than a penny for any of them. I'm looking for something cool to defeat the Master, and expect the Skeleton to try and attack me, but it doesn't. So instead I decide to drink from some test tubes. I drink a yellow liquid that turns out to be Lemonade and thus heals 70 HP will allow me to ignore the next two hits I take in combat. Then I hear some guys talking about the Master outside, and while they fortunately walk off, I decide that it's probably time I wasn't here.

Now, I can enter the Mephisto room but I decide against it since it'll probably bring up bad memories for LAGO regarding Spider-Man selling his soul. Now I get to another junction where there are two doors, one leading to the Balthus room and the other is unmarked. Since I don't want to fight Balthus Dire when there's no sunlight, I go to the unmarked door and see a Diabolus room and a window. Decide to check the window because I haven't seen any in this house before. It's barred, but has the phrase, "Mordana in Abaddon" written on it in addition to the reference number 88.

Find another unmarked door and decide to go into it. It's a storeroom and I loot a clove of garlic (useful for vampires,) and a long sharp knife that counts as a WEAPON. I ignore the mysterious white liquid that's obviously poison. I find a third unmarked door and am suspicious that this one will kill me and skip it. Turn right again and ignore the Tuttivillus room too because it's misspelled. Turn left, as it's the only way to turn, and find the Abaddon room, amongst some others I don't care about. I decide to enter the Abaddon room because I got a hint regarding it earlier. And I'll leave on this cliffhanger...

Adventure Sheet:
G
SKILL 12/12
STAMINA 17/19
LUCK 12/12
FEAR 1/10
Items: Garlic, Long Sharp Knife, Lemonade (ignore next 2 hits in combat)

Gotta say that I find this one entertaining. The translation I read had been screwed up and made no sense (there wasn't an actual path to victory in it, all choices ultimately led to death.)

MisterDee wrote:The translation I read had been screwed up and made no sense (there wasn't an actual path to victory in it, all choices ultimately led to death.)

That's not very far off from the English then, in which case there are at least two infinite loop or die sections. I'm mostly going off memory but I think I'm on the One True Path to Victory (if it turns out I screwed up I think I'll go "Debug Mode" on this book's ass, and if I actually manage to make it through successfully I'll gladly put up highlights of what I missed.)

So I see an old woman in a bed, and assume this is Mordana. I go over to wake her up, and find out that she is dead, but then her eyes open and she moans. (+2 FEAR) I decide to wait, as by now I remember more or less what the hint means, and she tells me to leave without moving her lips. Holy shit, she's a ventriloquist! I stay put, knowing that her mouth tricks will not work on me, and ask her for information. She responds by releasing the hounds. G fights the GREAT DANES one at a time; one is SKILL 7 STAMINA 6 and the other is SKILL 6 STAMINA 6. The first one manages to get one bite off on G, but the Lemonade protects G from any harm, and I easily butcher them with my knife.

I stay to search the room, and when I get to her prized potted plants she freaks out and I'm able to convince her to give me information in exchange for leaving her plants alone. I ask about the secret rooms in the house, and she asks me to give me her name or she'll refuse to answer anyways... which is a massive fuck you to the average player who's probably taken a lot from this encounter already, but since I've been freakishly (and probably unfairly) lucky I know it's Mordana and turn to 88. Oh UK Steve Jackson, how you love your numbered section puzzles! She tells me that there is a secret room beneath the cellar stairs, which I can look for by deducting 10 from the numbered section that is "under the cellar stairs." There is also a password, but she doesn't know it. She says someone named Shekou does, though. Seriously, UK Steve Jackson probably got a chubby just writing this part.

Pretty sure I've found everything of worth, I head downstairs and try to open a door to my right, but find it locked. I try to the left instead and I find a drawing room with a decanter and a fireplace. I decide to take a drink, as it's brandy for 3 STAMINA points, take the rest in a hip flask and decide to search the rest of the room. On the cornershelf there is a dagger that is worse than my Long Sharp Knife and go to investigate the fireplace. I find a clock that has some letters jammed behind it, and find a catch on the clock, but first decide to read the letters. The only letter of note is a warning to the Earl of Drumer to change his password from Goathead to something that will remind him of "the sound advice of a good friend." It's signed by "Count Pravemi," which is an anagram of "vampire."

Now I decide to undo the catch and some really ugly FIRE SPRITES pop out. I decide not to fight them in direct combat, as G is aware that bosses in House of Hell, like House of the Dead, have convenient weak points. Rather he backs off to the windowsill and throws the dirt from some potted plants on them, killing them instantly. Potted plants are apparently the solution to every problem in this book. Now I decide to press the button. It opens a trapdoor beneath me, and I fall in.

I fortunately land on something soft, but the fall still rustles my jimmies and I get 1 FEAR point. I Test my Luck, prove Lucky and don't get hurt otherwise. I'm in the basement and hear footsteps. I decide to hide behind the door again since that worked well in my bedroom. Ironically, it's the same bent double guy who brought me a drink! Turns out he's a good-hearted hunchback, which makes Lord Kelnor Frollo's British cousin by association. That does explain his love of hellfire. G hopes that he doesn't remember that he locked him in his room and decides to chat him up. G jogs his memory, but fortunately doesn't jog it as hard as Andre the Giant would have. His name is Shekou and he's very glad that someone wants to keep him company. Poor guy. ): I give him the rest of my brandy, since Mordana has told me he knows the password, he offered me a drink and the guy doesn't have any friends.

Shekou tells me that the password was changed yesterday from Pravemi to something "like the name of the house, but mixed up! So an anagram. The house is named "Drumer," so I'm assuming that the anagram is "Murder." Shekou realizes that G is laying the charm on him now, and runs off before he can give away any more information. G decides to head to the stairs and searches under them, but not before being scared by some bats for 1 FEAR point. So bats are as scary as friendly ghosts, falling down trapdoors, or Scooby Doo paintings, but not as creepy as finding out an old woman is dead, and then having her come back from the dead. Seems legit. Doing another stupid number puzzle, I deduct 10 from the reference under the stairs and am asked if I want to look for secret doors. Of course I fucking do! I find one and dial Murder for Password. A secret door opens away from the hollow area I found (IIRC the other passwords lead to a deathtrap) and enter the room. There's a box on the table and inside I find the Kris knife, complete with instructions:

The Kris Knife wrote:A blade fashioned for the glorification and pleasure of the Demons of Hellfire - our true Masters. To be used only by Initiates. Never to be wielded in the presence of the Master.

Why would you have your Initiates use the one thing that can harm you? That's really fucking stupid. But whatever, I have the plot device now, and it restores my LUCK to full. Suspecting a trap, I head upstairs immediately, and next time G will finish up his adventure, one way or the other...

G
SKILL 12/12
STAMINA 19/19
LUCK 12/12
FEAR 5/10
Items: Kris Knife, Garlic, Long Sharp Knife, Lemonade (ignore next hit in combat)

Is Fear rolled or set at 10? Because it sure seems that a low Fear roll would bone you quite severely.

Fear is 1d6+6, and IIRC 10 is the minimum required to survive the book.

So I'd probably have set it at 10 if I had rolled lower.

I'm really tired but not at all drunk ATM so I'll write House of Hell Part IV: The Final Chapter when I wake up for realz.

Lightweight.

So, now is the final chapter of this. In honor of G's protective Lemonade, I'm drinking Mike's Hard Lemonade for this review.

G heads up the stairs and I'm given a choice of some more unmarked doors. I decide to head to the door opposite me and come across a reception room with a mirror that casts no reflection. I get 1 FEAR point. What. I can apparently go through it, but first I search the room and find a leather box. Hearing footsteps, G decides to hide because his FEAR is at 6 and he'll probably die if he sees a few more scary things. Taking the case, I dive through the mirror. There's a small room behind it, and G opens the box to find a Golden Key. Not wanting to risk stepping back through yet, G goes to a right-hand door, because I know that if there's a choice between left and right, left is always the wrong direction in these books. The door is locked, but can be opened with a key. Fortunately I have a Golden Key, and I try it. Inside is another key! It has the number 27 engraved in it, which I'm sure will have to do with a numbered section. Of course there's a key puzzle, it's a Steve Jackson book. I get 2 LUCK points for the find (which doesn't matter since G is at full,) and leave the chamber. I risk stepping back through the mirror, but fortunately anyone who was there is gone, and I leave the room.

There's another door, but it's locked and no number adding or subtracting, nor turning to 27, opens it with my Iron Key. I go down the hall and I find two doors, one left and one right. This time I decide to go left, because the last locked door was technically to the left and I suspect that it was a dummy for this door. I was right! This door is locked, but I have a cast-iron key and am prompted to deduct 27 from the reference I'm on. I do so and enter. I'm in the dining room again, but this time it's empty. I decide to ring for the butler because it's time to kick some Master ass!

Franklins comes in and I tell him I want to talk to the Master of the House. The Earl of Drumer is pissed at being woken up so late, and G tells him that the jig is up, and he's here to kick some demon ass. The two advance to attack, and I'm given a choice to fight either one first. I decide to attack the butler first, since taking Kelnor on first is obviously a trap. Franklins starts running, but I continue to pursue him, and finally force him to fight. For a coward, he's rather strong at SKILL 8 STAMINA 8. Fortunately I get +3 SKILL while fighting him (I believe this is on top of the normal WEAPON bonus in this book since it doesn't mention the bonus for any other WEAPONS. I wound him once, and then he screams, which turns to a bellow of pure rage as he demonstrates his power to melt...

What? FRANKLINS is evolving? Congratulations, your FRANKLINS evolved into a HELL DEMON! I add 3 FEAR points for seeing a dude's face melt and turn into a demon who looks like he's shouting "Ten the hard way!" However, G has the Kris knife, the one thing that can harm this monster. I am informed that if I cannot defeat the demon, it will certainly kill me. So G must kill the demons. But what if G is the demons? The HELL DEMON is one of the nastiest opponents in any Fighting Fantasy book at SKILL 14 STAMINA 12. But I get to add 6 (!) to my SKILL while fighting it. So the mighty SKILL 14 HELL DEMON is unable to touch a SKILL 18 G, barely managing to tie once. I didn't even need to finish off my Lemonade.

The monster crashes backwards into the furniture as he dies. His head slave runs over to his dead body and hugs it, sobbing pathetically. Fortunately, there's no guys with guns to get in G's way, and as the chandelier has fallen to the ground, a fire has started. Apparently the carpets and curtains of the house are made of oily rags, and they start burning like wildfire. G makes it out of the house and watches it burn for an hour, seeing no survivors. And then we get the last line of the book:

A fitting end, you think, for a house of hell.

WE HAVE A TITLE!

Final Stats:
SKILL 12/12
STAMINA 19/19
LUCK 12/12
FEAR 9/10
Weapons: Kris, Long Sharp Knife
Food: Garlic, Lemonade (drank, ignore next hit in combat)
Keys: Iron Key, Golden Key
Opponents Fought:
First GREAT DANE SKILL 7 STAMINA 6
Second GREAT DANE SKILL 6 STAMINA 6
FRANKLINS SKILL 8 STAMINA 8 (for one round only)
HELL DEMON SKILL 14 STAMINA 12
Total SKILL lost: none
Total SKILL gained: none, unless you count the RNG-breaking boosts from the Kris Knife
Total STAMINA lost: 2 (from trying to break down door)
Total STAMINA gained: 3 (from drinking brandy)
Times Hit in Combat: 1 (from the first GREAT DANE, no damage taken because Lemonade)
LUCK tests: 1 (to avoid taking falling damage, successful)
Total LUCK gained: 5 (but only 1 actually restored anything)
Total LUCK lost: 1 (from LUCK Test)
Running total of FEAR points: 1 from painting, -1 from brandy, 1 from ghost, 2 from Mordana, 1 from falling through a trapdoor, 1 from bats, 1 from seeing no reflection in a fake mirror, 3 from HELL DEMON = 9

I was freakishly lucky, this book really is full of bullshit. Again, FEAR is the real killer here. FDR WAS RIGHT THE ONLY THING TO FEAR IS FEAR ITSELF. Also there are some infinite loops that all lead to bullshit auto-deaths that I managed to miss, or getting the wrong password. I'll cover the infinite loops in a bit, along with my final thoughts on this book. I'm out of booze, so I'll have to do it sober.

EDIT: posted too early, had to fix a link and add a sentence.

So...what happened to the MASTER?

Franklins was the MASTER, posing as Kelnor's servant. The MASTER was killed with the Kris, and Kelnor died in the fire, presumably.

I can't prove it, but Kelnor said at dinner time that his sister died at the age of 32, and soon after rumors spread of black magic performed at his estate, and the talking Scooby Doo portrait was of a woman who died at age 32, in 1834.

So my guess is that Kelnor was a demon-worshiper (the ghost said he was a "Black Priest of the Night") who sold his soul for eternal life, had built a cult and provided sacrifices for the MASTER for the last 150 years, who in turn masqueraded as a simple servant; killing his sister was probably a loyalty test or something like that.

It's hard to tell, because UK Steve Jackson isn't a very good writer, and you also have to ignore exposition for victory in this book.

So where was the girl they were going to sacrifice in all this?

-Username17

Oh, yes, I'll get to that now, as there are quite a few interesting things about it. Now I'd have arrived here if I went through the left door behind the mirror, I believe? Something like that. Not bothering to look at the specifics.

Here's an illustration of the girl (apparently about to be sacrificed by Prak's avatar,) and is one of the few pieces of artwork in a FF book to be removed (the other one I'm aware of is from Beneath Nightmare Castle, which is a much better horror gamebook.)

Now first of all is the smugness of this book at full power. For if you try to rescue her from this, you get this gem:

House of Hell wrote:You leap into the center of the ceremony with a loud war-cry. The young woman looks up at you hopefully. Your daring rescue is commendable for its bravery, but unbelievably stupid. For how can you hope to stand your ground against forty opponents. They surround you, grab you and the priest cuts your throat with his knife. You deserved to die!

Did I say "gem?" I meant "turd." Also, lol typo. Was this book written by Lord Mistborn?

The whole sacrifice scene gets even more infuriating; earlier in the book, you may find a pentacle which you can use to command the demon-worshipers to back off if they spot you during their ceremony, but it won't hold them off if you try to rescue their victim or if you come across a couple of the demon-worshipers elsewhere (they gather in groups of two and four, usually, except for the ceremony where there are forty. The guys who come in twos can be fought but the four at once are always auto-death for you.) Apparently you can take on two attack dogs with your fists, but not four guys wearing goat masks with a magic dagger. I fucking hate this book.

So even if you get past these guys, you're led to one of two possible ends, neither of them good. Either you jump through any number of hoops to get to a bell-pull which stuns you and calls over the Earl of Drumer and his men, or you get to this guy who looks like Mark Hamill on crack:

He's apparently a disgraced follower of the MASTER. If you choose to help him, he betrays you, and if you don't, he either kills himself and you have to go to the path that ultimately leads to the bell-pull, or you leave him be and the same happens (changes slightly based off of dialogue.) FUCK THIS BOOK

Also, if I had gone to the right door at the end of the book, I'd have been brought to the kitchen, which is impossible to survive. Either you can grab some keys over a stove that you don't notice is on and the keys are red-hot until you pick them up, burn your hand, and four goat headed guys come along and grab you, taking you to your demise. Or you go into the pantry and fight a GHOUL:


Now it gives out 2 FEAR points when you see it, so you could die in that matter. Or you could die from losing STAMINA. Or you could die from being paralyzed if it wounds you twice and that doesn't kill you. OR you could defeat it, but it falls over into a pile of pots and pans and it summons those Four Horsemen of Scripted Death and they again take you to your end.

Now, this is by far one of the harder Fighting Fantasy books. It's also insufferably smug, even by UK Steve Jackson's standards. Creature of Havoc is the only title I've tried that is harder (that one has literal coded messages and even more insta-deaths than this or Deathtrap Dungeon.) And it's really a bunch of random horror movie cliches stuck together (there are skeletons and zombies and vampires too, but you can't really have the Scooby Doo adventures that they would suggest, because of the FEAR score and all the auto-deaths.) It's a place of stupid grimdark where everyone and everything wants to kill you, except for those that are killed by someone else and you can't help them or get you killed in the process of trying to rescue them.) This book really just the experience of being a Last Girl in a horror movie that happens to be directed by Gary Gygax, which isn't really that fun to play.

On a more positive note, it's said that when you encounter the Zombie:

House of Hell wrote:Its wide eyes stare at you, yet through you. Its jaw gapes open to reveal a mouth filled with rotten teeth. It wears ragged clothes. And it is advancing towards you! Resolve your fight with this ZOMBIE:

ZOMBIE SKILL 7 STAMINA 6

If you defeat the Zombie, turn to 114.

Also, in a Let's Play somewhere, the person running narrated the fight as:

OMG! You stabbed it right in the dick - a dick that looks AT you, but THROUGH you. It's on it's last legs now, tottering about even worse than usual for a Zombie.

That made me laugh so hard that I saved the phrase as a text document, which is why I could bring it to you now.

One last note: Argus Filch is apparently a prisoner in the house:


That expression in the second image also sums up my opinion of the book. The one genuinely scary thing about this book is that UK Steve Jackson wasn't fired for writing it; in fact, he went on to write more. I give this book one ZOMBIE out of 10, and that's more than it honestly deserves.

EDIT: Fixed image like ishy suggested.

Oh man, gold.

I aim to please.

However, it did strike me that it shouldn't be surprising that a gamebook written by a co-founder of Games Workshop would be stupid, frustrating and needlessly grimdark.

IN THE GRIM FUTURE OF FIGHTING FANTASY THERE IS ONLY WAR

You might want to remove the <br/ > from the img tag after :

So even if you get past these guys, you're led to one of two possible ends, neither of them good. Either you jump through any number of hoops to get to a bell-pull which stuns you and calls over the Earl of Drumer and his men, or you get to this guy who looks like Mark Hamill on crack:

in the one true path, it really looked like there were maybe six people in the house tops. What with it being an abandoned looking estate that had fallen on hard times and you having only met 3 living people in your journey. Where the fuck were the other forty people in goat masks during all of this?

-Username17

So the girl, those prisoners, the talking painting lady, the helpful hunchback and any others we missed all burn to death at the end? And that's the good ending. Yikes.

Darth Rabbitt wrote:Franklins was the MASTER, posing as Kelnor's servant.

So what happens if you decide to fight Kelnor first? Instadeath? Or do you still fight the MASTER later?