Lapozgatós könyv franchise-ok 37. - Choose Cthulhu

The Call of Cthulhu (#1 & #0)

The original edition was written by Victor Conde, and became the opening of the series of books called Choose Cthulhu. The writer for unspecified reasons left the franchise, and I assume for legal reasons the book was rewritten by Leandro Pinto. By his bibliography, LP was a sufficient choice for replacement. I'll get more into the differences later here. I accept the changes of life, though I'll miss Mr. Conde, he was actualy my favourite writer in the 1st Series.

This leaving-process effected another book (The Dunwich Horror), and the treatment of that title ended up being the same: the titles were passed to Mr. Pinto. This happened during Series 2, so I assume Leandro worked out for the team.

The Call of Cthulhu is a classic, central story of Lovecraft's mythos, even though - as was pointed out a million times - Cthulhu is not the strongest, or most used or whatever being from that universe. On the other hand, the story is good, well known, and as someone who read through all the original stories, I can tell you, Cthulhu is ca. exactly halfway between humanity and the really weird stuff, so it is a good middle-ground for all.

The story: Is this a one-on-one translation of the not-that-short story, just played through the eyes of its protagonist, Francis Wayland Thurston? It is not. The original writing had the core character sit around and read all kinds of articles about weird stories from all over the world, and actualy resided in relative saftey for the entire story. Choose Cthulhu created a more active protagonist, who actualy lives through the events - and when that's not satisfying, or simply doesn't serve the format, they invented up a couple of things, drawing from other HPL-shorts, resulting in a unique experience.

The format: the plan for the book-series was to branch up from the roots of the gamebooks, and walk through the evolution of them, what resulted in the closing title of Series 2 at the moment: Escape from Rlyeh. So they started with the Choose Your Own Adventure franchise's (created by Edward Packard) 100 sections, no character stats premise - but while most gamebook-creator stick to their nails into the round numbers, Choose Cthulhu let the number be elastic, resulting in 111 pages for this title (both editions).

The format stack to the CYOA format, meaning these are pages, not directly sections. Some sections overflow to new pages, but once a page is taken by a section, it won't hold another section, so the actual number of section would be a bit of work to count. But as explained, this is the original formula, none is cheated. Hack, I even checked how long the first CYOA title was, and it has 115 pages of adventure - starting with section 2! (so actualy 114 pages)

On the sidenote: the numbering also includes illustration-pages - what Choose Cthulhu managed to evolve into a feature at one point of its run.

Features used: While character-scores are not inherent to the property, they can and did appear at some titles. They are also not the only thing that can be a feautre for a gamebook, so I'll list what I found here.

- unlocking items and events (you don't need to keep score, the story will do that for you for now)

- multiple endings

- multiple storylines (most result in the same ending, the character locked in an asylum)

The appendix: You can find an appendix at the end of each volume of CC. These give you a brief idea of the content, and explain a bit more on the appearing character. A gamebook is different from a plain book, so this is welcomed. Only the Delux Editions have the appendixes illustrated though.

Even just from the appendix, the reader can see, there are differences between the Conde and the Pinto versions.

Vintage vs. Delux: aka. softcover vs hardcover. But it's not just that. There's a difference between the cover-illustration, the size of the books, and the afformentioned illustrations for the appendixed exist only in the Delux version. I find the delux-versions more appealing for their size, and potential to last longer, while the vintage edition is sized so you can literaly take them as pocket-editions: you could fit a volume in a pocket, and read it while traveling!

Endings: one of the basics for  Choose Cthulhu, as a concept, was, that there will be multiple endings, and winning should not be a goal fitting to the lovecraftian theme. So while there are multiple endings, not all of them good, but you don't necessarily die either.

This resulted in something unique and refreshing. You could sit down, follow a certain storyline (because there are more than one story that can unfold), and learn how this wolrd works, learn about the horrors and monsters lurking around, but you never felt cheated from victory, like ina fighting fantasy, where you had all the rings, and all the codes, and all the passwords, and all the gems - but failed, because you did not have the bronze hour-hand, or the green unremarkable vase.

Replayability: because you can - as explained above- choose your own adventure, the replayability is high. These books won't just collect dust on your shelves being collectors' items. You'll read them through agaiin and again. This is where the size is also an advantage: you don't need to sit down and spend hours creating, or at least following charts and diagrams and whatever trope is ruining gamebooks because of traditions. You can sit down, and just read it. You have five minutes in the bus-stop, or a couple of hours on a plane - doesn't matter, you can do it. And you get a full adventure.

The english version: I do not speak spanish, so I have no opinion on the spanish. I am from a third-language country, speaking english on a pretty solid level (higher intermediate if anyone cares). I found the langues smooth, the volabluary wide but not overwhelming, and just for the sake of fun compared some of the stuff with the original english Lovefraft-text, and they are pretty complementing to that.

While at times I felt these books were not written by native english people, I had no trouble understanding them, neither noticed anything that harmed my experience reading them. I'd rate the books on .. there was a series of publications around here that published stories for language-lerning purposes. They were handy. So I'd rate these book around 6 or 7 on difficulty and complexity. I'd say that's pretty good, and even a person who has lower level of knowledge in the language can consume these games. Those who still want to complain for any related issues, I'll just direct you to Magus (a 2008 film), go and check out the official DVD-subtitles through opensubtitles org. You'd assume that particular person sees Choose Cthulhu like that thing, which is nowhere true! Could they benefit from a prime time translator? Sure. Do they have a real problem? No.

On an other aspect, there are no wrong or missing links, missing data, unreachable sections, you can collect all the key items (speaking of later volumes), and generaly avoided all editorial mistakes aside the occasional typo in the text.

The story: The story starts as in the book: you inherit a bunch of press cuttings, a manuscript, and a statue of Cthulhu. Whichever you choose there will be things to unfold, and while you can cut these branches short, hopping to another lane, it's interresting to follow them through.

Spoiler section:

One possible path to follow is to travel to the land of the innuits (their old western name was eskimos), and encounter whatever they whorship there. This was the result of my first playthrough, and I was astonished, I didn't mind ... dying? Losing? You go and figure out. Definitely not winning. Though obviously things turned out ok, as there was no apocalyptic scenario I heared about.

On another branch of this mini-multiverse you can play the ultra-skeptic, and face whatever is coming through the depth of dream and  space. Absolutely loved it. You perish, but it's absolutely logical consequences of your action in the Lovecraft-universe. This is not some World of darkness/Ars Magica thing, where the paradox-demons will jump to your help in the face of confronting magic!

And of course you can go through all the ordeal reaching the rising Rlyeh, and facing Greath Cthulhu himself. You might get lost during the travel, not knowing the correct location. You might turn back, loosing courage. You might simply hesitate too much. Or you pick the wrong ship, and and up on ... Skull Island of King Kong? Nope, it's the Yiths doing some time-traveling experience! Some readers found this last option distracting, I on the other hand found it hilarious and fun. The depressing world of HPL can use a kick in its side at occasion if you ask me.

 

#0

I already mentioned the different appendix (officialy Bestiary, but it's not just about the monsters), but even more evesome, there is the different set of illustrations! Amazing the company, the illustrators put all this effort into it.

One thing I was curious how much rewrite happened. Just freshing up things, or something deeper? I won't lie, I got a bit worried when I saw the number of sections is a same. But that's just a trick! The flowchart of the sections, the structure is entirely redrawn, in a crazy-complicated way, in which you can jump all over. So definitely a lot of work went into this.

As for the story, it certainly looks to have less of the shennanigans - on the other hand, on one branch Randolph Carter shows up. And talking about a more genuine experience, at one point genetics is mentioned - I'm not aware HPL being aware of genetics. Maybe that's just me of course.  Then there is the ending, which for the original was so iconic, providing an alternative solution reaching the "True Ending" (aka. the final paragraph of the book) is something that sure creates controversy. But is it better or worse? Sruely it is a different experince.

 

 

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 The Making of Choose Cthulhu (extra collectible)

This little thing was a crowdfounding extra for the 2nd Series. The 1st had an illustrated collectiblepiece: Ulthar, which I got lucky enough to get from gentle source. These being extras, none of them are gamebooks, but we still can learn from them about the team and project CC. Not one of the two feels just plain obligatory, neither is drawning in jargon - tendencies many such publication end up being. So, aside rising the collection's value, these are fun in themselves.
The Making of... has a ton of illustrations. We live in the era of the illustrators, after the actors, novelists, film-directors now these people try to have a shot. I cheer for them if this is the result.
The overal layout is: the name of the person of one of the crew, a photo of the person, then a short description on their participation in the project - what did they contribute, how the work effected them artidticaly, what they do outside of Chose... etc. Some shared more, some shared less, it was always good to see how drawn-in someone was, like Daniel Azconegui, who didn't use many words, I still learnt a lot about where he came from.
Now the cover worth a couple of sentences too. It's obviously digital art, feels like one of those pulp sci-fi magazines. Lovecraft publicated in those, so perfect choice! The cover illustration is also detailful, and the medium serves the theme: where the aliens start, and what is machinery? Creates an alien wibe. The same time the back cover is plain and simple, with carefuly chosen design-elements - lasts an impression.
One of the reasons I dedicated an entire review for this booklet is, it is 2nd Series, and it being entirely its own thing, there is no attempt imitating any style. So we can judge the translation. While hunting for this topic, I met a tiny piece of information I totaly forgot about: one of the inspirational source for the brand is the Call of Cthulhu p&p RPG. That can explain some of the things how the stories are structured and created. That aside, there are instances where you can see this was definitely not written by someone who speaks english natively*. My main example of exhibit is found on page 50, in the discussion about the vintage cover for The Call of Cthulhu by Leandro Pinto, I quote: "I knew that buildings were not my forte." I never met any instances where this would be the used phrase, and given I live in a small country of rare language, I almost exclusively have to rely on english mediums for entertainment. But is this "just broken english and Lovecraft buzzwords"? Far from it! One: what do I know, and this might be some highly sophisticated english, like the time I met with Erich von Däniken at a convention, and barely understood a word he said. But let's assume it is an irregular use of words. Is this a problem? Far from it! For one, this is not an impossible sentence. Highly unusual to my experience, but I know enough to tell, it is not impossible. Second, it creates a more genuine, more personal experience.
And finaly I've reached the part most interrested me: the part about Escape from Rlyeh! I contributed with a pregenerated character to the story, so I was excited to find out more about it - I have to confess, out of anxiety, I've not yet opened this adventure to this day! Though a friend of mine shown, that my character is in there. Now imagine my surprise, I saw a painting about her right here! I knew I posed a serious challange to the creator team, with it because I am male, and the character is female, so using a picture for it was hardly just me sending in a photo, slapping it on the character sheet, and done. I ask your forgivness for this, Mr. Ryker.
Where the idea came from? Well, everyone is doing male characters. And I'm imfamous for my wyrd character creations from my RPG-days. So I thought, why not now? My nickname (Gage) is unisex enough anyway. The inspiration came from an english period-sitcom: You Rang, M'Lord? There was tomboy industrialist daughter of the head of the family, who could serve as the core here.
We were only working with what info was given during the campaign publicly, so I thought: how would I arrive to the plane? I opted for owning a car. But what would I do on this island, with all these people, I probably never heard of? I also wished to add some personal details, because despite the current state of the State, I am a hungarian. So 1920-somethings, Hungary, that also includes the autrian connection, that's quasi-Germany, let's combine that with the occult, and we are very close to a certain ugly influence.
Then started to add hints of possible ideas, which can be trimmed down, or built upon: let her be a magician, but maybe as a last resort, add her a gun - a concealed oneshot weapon maybe. Walking-sticks were a thing that time, but adjust that for a female, thus have an umbrella instead, James Bond-style. Or how about a chance influencing a certain historical event, because this is Rlyeh, and that's big news? There was an immigration element, alcohol-snuggling, and so on, and so on. My goal was to provide a solid enough core for the character, but make it elastic enough for artistic liberty, so everyone will be satisfied with the result.
And here it was, running away from some eldritch horror - or with it? Because I was going for a more interresting backstory than just plain heroic archetype, when I got a long list of possible professions in the emails for inspiration, when I spotted "cult leader", I knew that's what I need for a darker, greyer characterization!

 

*This example, combined with the case of Heroes of Urowen paints a sad picture on the spanish professional translator, who seems to be standing on a strong mid-school level with english. That is not a professional level, just a good amateur.

 

 

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At the Mountain olf Madness (#2)

 

The second book was written by the head coordinator of the Choose Cthulhu project: Edward T. Riker. Interresting aspect writing these stories as historical fiction, what Mr. Riker specialises in.

The original story is one of the most developed writings of Lovecraft, especialy not counting the Dream Cycle. So much so, this was the first title for a series of anthologies in Hungary which successfully popularised Lovecraft in the country.

It is also considered an inspiration for John Carpenter's The Thing.

 

The story: The book covers the entire novellette, starting with organising the expedition to the South Pole, the splitting of the crew, finding the disaster-struck camp, searching for the lost members, to the point of the giant albino penguins. There are some branchings, and based on the decisions you might end up learning different informations. Or at times run into game overs (with the right choices, you might alter your fate though). Considering The Call of Cthulhu, for me the familiarity of death in freezing environment got a bit dull to be honest, but you surely don't meet with all these options in one go, not to mention things get more variety later on, so it's ok.

The first part of the story - until arriving to the camp - is, where it should help if you read the original story, the writing being wildly accessible due to expired copyright, and I did turn up the part where you fly through the mountain with the plane - and this as far as I remember turned out to be a weak-point of the book. Or I'm just complaining because I could not fly wherever I felt like, but this part about the flying is short anyway, so I stop here.

One other complaint towards this volume was at the end of the open world part of the book. Yes, there is an open world part, and it's intriguing. But to be honest, I could have passed with a bit less names. Yes, it is a realistic size of people, and the names were in the original, still, using 10% of the gamebook version just on this single choice was a bit of a downer. I wonder what others thought when reaching here. Some options even lead to... One leads to an illustration-page, so consider this section bugged? The traditional line "if the text doesn not continue in a sensible way" (or whatever the phrase is) could have solved the whole situation.

On an other note, the events are cool throughout the adventure. Plus, you'll live through much more choices and events than in either of The Call of Cthulhu (not counting the loops in Leandro's version).

The book also features a different kind of ending, where all your experiences culminate in a very Mythos-like way!

The structure: one of the stylistic choices here is, that if you have a longer chunk of the story without a choice, the pages you have to read are not right after each other in this one. So you'll feel more closely to a 400+ section gamebook with dices, because you'll flip the pages more than for a more traditional Choose Your Own Adventure / Endless Quest / Time Machine gamebook.

 

If X, then turn left/right: One of the most tyring trope of gamebooks is the barebone end of their sections: "If you do X, then turn to Y, if you do Z, turn to W". Insanity inducing. Read enough of it, and you'll certainly end up in The Dreaded 77. All gamebook-designers should take a look at the CC-franchise just for this.

 

The Dreaded 77: This feature is absolutely gimmicky, and was a constant for Series 1 (I'll read Series 2 first for these reviews). It could have turned out boring and repetitive, instead it is simple fun. Sure, you'll know if one of the choices is 77 you should pick something else, but the "if X, then turn" lines are written with such creativity, it compensates for the predictability of the choice.

On the sidenote, this is the first occasion a writer for CC doesn't hide the result of the choice behind other sections. Both versions of The Call of Cthulhu first makes you read another page.

 

Features used:

- open world portion (elimination puzzle)

- one section is an illustration instead of traditional text

- a new type of ending. consider your expectations subverted!

- equiment list you have to keep track of 

 

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The Shadow Over Innsmouth (#3)

The original story was about the deap-ones, and the story was adapted to a very competent movie, titled Dagon (the diety the locals worship), and was also made by Spain. There's potential to make the story an adventure-game, because elements like the tinkering with the lock in the hotel is straight in the original!

The story: The protagonist travels to Innsmouth, but first stops in a town with a museum, having a piece of innsmouthian curiosity. Then arrives to Innsmouth, which is an adventure in itself, things go haywire, and along survival will discover all kinds of secrets related to the place. I'm not sure if everyone is familiar with this one, so I'll avoid spoilers just in case. But you'll investigate the place's history, your personal relation to the place, and more. The visitation is planned because of the protagonist goes on a journey of self-discovery.

The structure: Dude, this has looong texts without any decision-making! Let's hope this is a curiosity for what is coming, because when you are writing a Choose Your Own Adventure-like game of 100 pages  (111 in this case exactly), you simply can't have 15 continous pages - creating 1 section in actuality - without rising questions in the audience. (If you want to see this yourself, start with 3 in the book).

Additionaly, unfortunately, most of the choices do not lead to alternative routes, but simply skip over certain pages. In a 400 section book with dices such instances can be created for skipping potential losses, but here it's just transforms the adventure to a "find the longest journey, that's the One True Path" experience.

Even the endings I find a thing to complain about: many of them is simply "I had enough, I quit" endings, leaving the adventure at a midpoint, never finishing it. Like you just closed a book halfway through.

Not that the writing is not fun, the structure is though just something that could be improved upon. Especialy as I've found a giant loop...Or mention The Dreadded 77 gimmick is not present in this volume?

 

Features used:

- there is a map on one of the illustrations. Sadly, it doesn't help that much.

- all gloom and doom ending

 

NOTE to the publisher: on page 92 the illustration's inscription goes "Queer creatures..." referring to the evil innsmouthians. this is an unfortunate translation because of the whole LGBT-situation. Yes, Lovecraft used the phrase in relation to the fish-people a lot, but this is not a direct quote, and the average audience is not a Lovecraft-scholar.

 

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The Nameless City (#4)

 

The story: This one's original was so short, you naturaly expect some creative involvment (that's how Ithaqua shows up for exmaple). Or maybe it's just this is very similar in themes to the Mountains of Madness? The core of course remained: go through the desert, discover the city, descend into it.

 

The structure: While this one also has a Giny Valris' many-pages section, here that works way better. Perhaps because this writing of HPL is more about the mood, the atmosphere than the lore. Also, the editing is much better here, no illustrations show up discontinued from the reading and such. Not to mention, the "long section" is at the beginning, almost like a traditional "Background" section, plus it has real alternatives.

The open world design also works much better, as there are only 6 places to go, and each have very distinct things to do. Sure, you'll have to visit most if not all places, because we are collecting key items - not the first time in the series -, but that's beside the point.

The death-sections are also creative, a joy to read if I may say so.

But the endings are what truly crowns this book. It's fast to get through, it is fun to just read, and there are absolute peak endings, serving moral dilemmas.

On the sidenote, there happened some editorial/translation issues, like on page 80 the direction is left spanish. Or the puzzle on page 11 is just going over my head. I can't decide wether I'm just exceptionaly bad at this puzzle, or the translation is wrong. Whichever it is, I give my feedback on it, along the statement, this is one of my favourite volume of the first series!

 

Features used:

- illustrated double-page section, serving as hub. The majority of the book is pretty much open world.

- riddles

- inventory you have to keep track of

- laser gun

 

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The Dunwitch Horror (#5, Victor Conde)

This is most likely the most action-packed writing of HPL, and is in the creature-feature subgenre. CC even expands on the ending, letting you choose instead of the original's theme of combining science with magic (because magic in Lovercraft is just a different kind of science, practiced as ritual, the meaning lost in time). I had a blast blowing up the monster with magic, and blasting them with military hardware in an other playthrough.

The story: in the original, the protagonist(s) went into this village, filled with mysteries, gathered information, tracked the shady figure of the place, heared about the farm and the stone cricles, and more stuff, but in traditional Lovecraft way, this was mostly information-gathering. Chosse Cthulhu offered actualy going to these places, and make first-hand investigation. In the meanwhile they did not forget to include such remarkable details as the birds chirping signing the soul leaving the body and stuff.

This book doesn't really introduces any new mechanics, only it is a well-rounded volume.

Because you can win in so many ways, one might feel this adventure is a bit on the easy side, I don't mind that for the freedom of roleplay it offers in exchange. And the writing is also realy well done. I even wonder if someone will find inspiration in this to expand to a 400 section adventure with dices, CC proved there's plenty of opportunity in this.

 

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The Dreams in the Witch House (#6)

 

This is the first Choose Cthulhu book which uses character stat! You also collect items, but the big news is the Cult Points, which very much like works as the good old Sanity score, and comes to play during the ending.

I bet this was a tricky book to write, as the original story is very wage on its events, but the writer (Mr. Riker himself) pulled it out. You basicaly get the original story: you're in a wyrd house, in your dreams come the with and her pet rat, you get deeper and deeper into the occult - then you get the chance to destroy the world. Finaly, where you can be truly on the evil side! This even leaves a permanent mark on you...

My only complaint is, it is just too easy to get rid of a large amount of the stat-burden, that had needed some more subtility. On the plus side, we get some pretty interresting other residents in the house. This volume could have worked much better with a larger number of pages. Maybe 250.

The illustrations are also a next level thing in this. Whoever drawn them, must have had an especialy inspired day.

All in all, the elements are good in this one, the weak point is how the stats are impleneted, the system is not balanced out, gettiong the good ending is way too easy, and that left me with less excietement than this could have achieve.

Still, the fact you can go all cvultist, worth a notch.

 

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The Arkham Madhouse (#7)

 

I have to clear something before going into this: my expectations were different than what was in the book.

The length was delivered of course. 256 pages, plus Bestiary. That's substantialy longer than the other releases until this point, almost feels like a gamebook with dices. It is so long actualy, you would kinda expect that to happen, but you only get an inventory you have to manage. There is a new element introduced, the "flip a coin". I feel this is a missed merchandising-opportunity. The CC-team has excellent merchandises by thew way. I'd be curious how the straightjacket goes (don't share financial secrets guys! Let me imagine it goes by the hundreds!).

Now the whole thing - as the title implies - plays out in a mental hospital. Yes, you guessed right, all kinds of lovecraftian htings are governing this facility. So it was not an unreasonable expectation, especialy with the Dreaded 77 gimmick, that we play, or at least meet with the other books' protagonist(s). The 77 is nicely carried over, but this is entirely a meta-gamebook, where the player is the one incarcarated.

 

Another thing I missed from this #7 is, during the campaign it was advertised if you have all the covers, you can get some clue that will help you in your adventure. I either failed to solve this puzzle, or it simply was not implemented after all.

But this was always an extra adventure, and it was a solid one, stretching the limit where the average no-dices/no stats system can expand, it had multiple endings, and the "True" Ending was even hidden, not placed to the last page of the adventure!

With all its faults, this volume definitely made me interrested where these people will be able to advance out?

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The Colour out of Space (#8)

 

The story: everyone know the core story thanks to the 2019 adaptation with Nicholas Cage the least. There is a meteor, contaning a bizarre item of weird colout from Outer Space, lands on a farmer's land, starts mutating everything, a lot of people dies or disappears, everyone gets mad, finaly the thing goes away, "but it is still out there".

For a Lovecraft-story it has quit a lot of characters and events to work with.

Obviously, while in the original story the Water Inspector arrives after the fact, we'll arive during the happenning.

The first thing that struck me is, this book feels thick in comparison the first series, which I've just read in quick succession. And I was right. While for the first series of CC 100-110 pages were the norm (not counting the (Bestiaries), , for the second go, most volumes are around the 150 pages!

For the covers the improvement in quality can be traced to the colouring. It shows sometmes you simply need more time for things - the same time all due respect the crew's dedication to always do their best to keep as close to the deadlines as possible.

 

Wow, this has its own dedicated page of rules! Let's see... It promises open world (doesn't happen), there is a score to keep track of*, a warning where not to go, and a Game Over section, which is pretty neat actualy. Adds new depth to the cover-illustration. Not to mention the world-building! Yes, it actually happened, CC added a bit to the Mythos.

The ideas, writing and flow is good with this (to the point it rises my interrest for Mr. Rykers novels), but I can not dismiss such instances when in one section I'm told to write my report, while hushing up an indigenous cemetary, just for the very next section tell me I'm all out against the whole project, developing some phobia and whatnot. Who playtested this for the connection of the sections? did some things left to desire.

The Hardcore Challange is a Find The One True Path oldschool challange, appropriately frustrating. But given the second half of the book is a giant "run for your life" it does not become a chore, though finding the key gave me anxiety.

My final score for this challenge was 63.

 

*The score pretty much functions are time-progression. It's not exactly that... Or it is. It measure how much time you spend on irradiated land. The potential problems of this system is obvious: you can easily see if you can (and for the sake of the Hardcore Challenge you should) skip a certain portion of the story. This happens at the beginning of the book. Then there's the problem when the player will just check the various ways to solve a situation, and again easily can be spotted the path where the radiation poisoning accumlates less ("less time passes"). Again, this happens. Then there's a long section you simply can't deviate from the One True Path. But all this  will only come together/becomes appearent when you go for the achievement, and NOT in a normal playthrough. For me the part finding the key tingled my nerves, as I got very close to the margine of failure with it. I suggest running the book "blind" for the achievement, but useing the 21 finger rule.

PS: if in any gamebook ever was a passive protagonist - this has one.

 

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The Festival (#9)

 

The original story is very straightforward: the protagonist arrives to the hometown, visits the relatives, goes to the church, descends the stairs, reaches the tunnels. Collaborating this, this volumes is one of the shorter Series 2 books with its 100-110 pages. After the surprisingly hefty previous book, this is actualy a relief. #8 felt like twice the length of the Series 1 volumes.

 

There are no rules now, instead there is a proper Introduction-section! First time under the brand.

 

features:

- inventory

- codes

 

The gamebook remains pretty close to the original story, with some side-events added. It creates a very strong atmosphere, that's for sure.

In the gameing experience it felt... The price for sticking to the core story was a low replay value, until I closely examined the endings. The endings are actualy different enough. The road to them though is still narrow. Maybe pick this off the shelf time to time, and play it through in a new way to get a different ending.

The best news is, the whateverhedron is not obligatory, so the book does not fall to the One True Path trap. For a moment I ot worried about that.

I could go into more details, but I'll limit myself for now. In conclusion, I like this book. Strong atmosphere, complex route for the maximum solution, but still can get even to the True Ending by choosing your adventure. Jen D. Pine might not be the writer I'll revolve the most, and it's a shame the items from the cemetary don't come to play outside of it (what  a bummer), but this is a strong horror.

PS: at the initiating quote's translation found a punctuation error which made it hard to grasp what the sentence want to say, found a couple of minor typos (still annyoying), a missing word, and on page 36 the directive remained spanish. This last one is as annoying like when gamebook-atuhors forget to insert combat statistics for the enemy. It's not a typo which is harder to spot, it is a very appearent thing anyone who flips through the gamebook will notice.

 

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The whisperer in darkness (#10)

 

This is one of the rare stories of Lovecraft where the protagonist is actively participating in the events. It is not some scientists stumbling into millenia-old abandoned cities (with residents), neither learning the case from newpapers, articles and personal testimonies.  Niether does he arrive after the fact just to face the culmination of events. This time he is there while the things are happenning. Sort of. And unlike in Shadow Over Innsmouth he is not blind to the circumstances, but actively researching it. So in concept this could be easy to adapt to a gamebook.

Let's see what Giny Valris, responsible for the "worst" and "best" book of the first series made out of it!

The Bestiary has pretty low amount of entries, but on this note the "introduction"-section is a second entry on your character. Very interresting to see how the perspective of the description influences the content and creates immersion.

You are pretty much James Randi, with an attitude ;)

Just flipping through this book reveal, in best lovecraftian fashion, the narrative is broken with newspaper articles, diary entires, personal letters and other such things. This formating makes this book visualy interresting.

Another "useless trivia" is, for the last section, which is double-page, there's no "from page X turn to page X+1" text. This never happened before in CC as far as I've noticed, not even for a True Ending section.

I decided I like this book. It's good paced suspense. Highly recommended.

features:

- cross-book references

- directions hiddeen in illustraition

Note: on page 52 the directions  are NOT missing, you are supposed to examine the state.

 

Errata: there is some editorial error on page 91, where you can choose to go for the Necronomicon, but instead examine a photograph of a carved stone.

On page 6 Pluto is recognised as a planet by atronomers, but otherwise is called unknown, aka. undiscovered. Editorial mistake?

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The haunter of the dark (#11)

 

 I'll be totaly honest with you: there are a couple of very similar stories for this gate-to-the-outer realms in a temple setting, and the one I'm most fond of is not of HPL, but August Derleth. Thus I'm very curious how the team of CC solved this story.

Hey, we again start the adventure with Page 1! Let's see in the Bestiary what the Big Bad Boss will be this time... Wait, WHO is THAT!?!

With that, I flipped through for the illustrations, and with HIM, and an appearent reference to In the Mouth Of Madness, seems this one will be more close to the first series of CC, taking more liberties with the source material. Another weird fact related to the illustrations is, there's no illustration for the last 50 pages.

So how the team solved the adaptation? Well, Leandro Pinto gave a second meaning to the title, mixing stories and real-world events, and some meta-narrative, that's what.

features:

- invemtory you have to keep track of (but then again, these items are only used to enter and exit an area, which is its own location)

Pinto's style is a bit mechanical to me (don't know why this word sparks into my mind), but I can't but admire what he accomplished here. Chose Cthulhu is definitely advancing in the path of gamebook-exploration. Where can they reach, none can foretell. Will they inevitably write a 800+ section book? One can wonder.

Errata: on page 27 (and elsewhere) the translator forgot to translate. Yes, it is latin, but I don't speak latin, why isn't a footnote here?

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The thing on the doorstep (#12)

The original story unfolds through visitis, raids, and reading various old records. It was actualy two stories: one of the present, and one happened like a century ago, and culminates using a method we can consider time-travel. But unlike for the Yith, who tarvelled back in time, the force of this story travelled forward to save himself. I always found the concept of the Yith curious, as over time, everything become the Yith, and they actualy are always fighting themselves.

The story is the sister-story of Charles Dexter Ward by the way, but has a darker cliffanger ending, unlike for CDW where the protagonist clearly wins.

This is one of the shorter (closer to 100 than 150) volumes of the second series, and just like #11 also written by Mr. Pinto.

 

This book to be honest looks pretty barebone. It is like one of those romance novels, with a triangle, though this is about who lives and dies and in whose body instead of who marries who. But this doesn't offers anything new either in the story or in design. There's even a Truly Happy Ending where the evil is dead and burried, while you and friend live happily.

This is just weak. Though I liked the Shubby-ending. And this was the second time I looked up who made the illustrations - they are pretty energetic, kudos for that.

On defense for Leandro, he had a pretty busy schedual, sorting out CC #0, writing 2 new books for series 2, plus writing yet another version for #5 (which I'll discuss in an upcoming review). So let's say this was an adventure, and move on.

Errata: on page 40 the translator forgot to translate "Fin" to "The End", lol.

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The shadow out of time (#13)

You know, if Lovecraft had had an agent, he would have suggested to combine this story with The Nameless City, The Thing On The Doorstep, and start developing a novel.

Btw, doesn't the illustration of the race of Yaddith look a bit like race 8472?

Though there was an aspect I never liked in this story: the Yith were liars, and their lie made the entire story kinda pointless? If you read the story, you remember the hostage-minds were allowed to research the library of the Yith, kind of a compensation for the whole procedure. Sure, there is the whole mind-migration part, but that's inevitable. But then - and this all hostage knows - any memory gained during captivity is erased, so the question arise, why do those people cooperate?

Woah, we starting strong. Twilight Zone/Outer Limits intro for Background-section, do we?

Also, pretty unique rule here. Though to be honest I started to worry if I'll recognise when I'll need to search for the application of the coding system - turned out while flipping through the directions on the bottom will guide you, there is no "pixelhunting". Veryery cool concept, and a bit of edutainment aspect.

From the bestiary, it is interresting to see CC mixed Robert E. Howard's world with HPL's. I know they exchanged letters, but have no knowledge wether HPL got influenced by REH in his works, aside maybe the mention of some locations. A quick browse tells the influence reached their creatures too.

Can be interresting to dig into this.

Whatever this book is, the flowchart is beautiful. It'd be interresting to see what's the longest route to follow to the True Ending wihtout entering a loop.

On the event-identifications: great picks. I'm proud I could identify each without relying on mapping, though definitely did need the internet for some. Great challange-value!

Also love that alternate ending.

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The Case of Charles Dexter Ward (#14)

So, his is the twin-stroy of The Thing On The Doorstep, so I won't waste any time recapping the story, maybe only mention at the end of the original, the protagonist wins. Over the evil force. Charles will be gone. Still counts.

There's also no myth-diety in this one, just ... mutated zombies? That's the only term I find fitting.

Now the unique rule is pretty new attempt, here is a quick rundown: sometimes "in the text" - this can mean the choice-options too -, will be adresses given in capital, which serve as returning option to the locations.

But don't rush thinking there's a 88, so all the 78, 68 ... 8 sections are all returning to the same location. This almost immediately becomes obvious when mapping (good job, team!). So only hop to another location when you reached a dead end.

And yes, Dead End means you get no pages to turn to, neither a The End sign.

You should also follow instructions, I assume? For the two starter locations you get direct link between the two like you visited first time. Just to keep in mind. Whatever the intention was, the two starting locations have enough side-alleys to support the return, but for the sake of this, mapping is advisable.

Do not, under any circumstances though, on a whim, in the middle of a sentence change location! That'll cause problems in the continuity.

My "real" compaint is the map, which suggests, 6 locations were planned, but somwhere along the creation process this was dropped.

All in all, the locations won't pile up, but the system does work, because eventualy all option will lead to a single point, or your doom. Or the occasional "To Be Continued".

Because of the nature of the book, a live contest would have been fun on discord, or something.

Errata:

- on 146 you likely should have been given the full adress (88 Prospect Street).

- page 13 can not be accessed? (NOTE: it can be. Imagine, it turns out the CC Team created numbered flowcharts for their books - most gamebook-creators somehow don't. I still keep this here, because this turns out to be a different code-system than the address-finding.)

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The Dunwich Horror (#5 by Leandro Pinto)

One thing these rewrites do super-cool is adding new illustrations (the rights of the illustrations are not contested, only the text as far as I understand).

From the aspect of how many choices you can make before inevitably concluding the reading, is astonishingly low here, it is like every time a choice could be made the graph would split in two. This is absolutely remarkable, I've never seen such solution for design. This is achieved by writing long sections - pages of content without any option for choice. The danger of this is to devolving to a 50 section gamebook, which is the amaetur format, and usualy not deemed commercialy viable.

I give you this is professionaly built up, but I still have my reservations.

There are clear deviations from the original story too, giving much more agency to the Whateleys.

It is clear I'll not be Mr. Leandor's greatest fan in CC, but that should hold back nobody. Keep it on.

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Escape from Rlyeh will get its own separate post. It's longer (400 sections), has a dice-rolling system and just takes more effort and details.