That's mostly true of Tomb of the Golden Skull, Ian Livingstone's latest addition to the Fighting Fantasy series, coming 44 years after original classic The Warlock of Firetop Mountain. If you're counting the books in order of first publication this is book number 73 in the main-line FF dynasty.
SPOILERS FOLLOW
The premise here is that a big bad spider demon has returned and has laid a load of eggs that are going to hatch into plague spiders and turn the populace into zombies. Another end-of-the-world threat to Allansia, it must be a Wednesday.
The book begins in good-old Port Blacksand where good-old wizard Nicodemus gives you your quest and a good-old list of items you need to acquire. Then it's off on a ship to the city of Kaynlesh-Ma to begin your adventure and your shopping trip.
After progressing through the city, the book opens up a bit, covering a range of different locations and terrains including jungles, islands, lakes and scrubland. Enemies are scattered throughout and are mostly standard monsters: think pirates, goblins and a variety of "giant" creatures. There are a few interesting new monsters too, including a THORNBACK FIEND and a TERRORHAWK.
With a few mid-game enemies having skill of up to ten, you're best off rolling some high stats to start with. That said, the difficulty of the whole book seems to be set at an acceptable level.
I almost completed the book on the first playthrough, probably having a bit of luck in finding nearly all the key items needed. I was finally defeated due to using a key item too soon. Stamina was running very low at that point too, despite starting with 20 points, so it's advisable to look for ways to replenish your health throughout.
Having read ahead after I died, I worked out that an additional item was needed to complete the book. But I knew where it was located, so a second playthrough is likely to result in success.
What's good?
I had fun playing Tomb of the Golden Skull. It's an enjoyable romp through the wilds of Allansia, slightly challenging and full of old-school nostalgia.
Not too easy, not too hard
The difficulty balance is just right. It's not Crypt of the Sorcerer or Blood of the Zombies level impossible, nor is it Forest of Doom or Island of the Lizard King easy mode. Depending on the luck of the dice, I see an average player getting through after two to four playthroughs, with plenty of little side quests and corners of the world to find that make replaying interesting and worthwhile.
Gameplay
There are some nice gameplay elements too. I liked the fact that you could buy two rings of fire (a key item): one from a dodgy man outside a pub, one from the town crier. Guess which ring ends up turning out to be a fake. I also liked that you have to search for clues to find items such as the Arrika Root and Dragonblade, often being sent off in the wrong direction before you work out where they are.
No stupid instant deaths
All the deaths in the book are fair and reasonable, coming either from bad/wrong decisions or unlucky dice rolls. There are no unfair insta-death sections, like being impaled in a pit of spikes because you made the blind choice of turning left instead of right. To please gore lovers, Livingstone puts in a fair share of nasty deaths too, like being speared by the city guard and arrowed to death by bandits.
What's bad?
Disappearing choices
While there are no game-breaking errors in the book there is an incredibly annoying feature that consistently appears in Fighting Fantasy gamebooks. I call it the illogical disappearance of opportunity, or "why can't I do everything I want to do?!"
Explained simply, at a certain paragraph you might be presented with three options, say visiting the market, the inn or the palace. Choose one of these options, see it through, and then the author gives you the chance to visit another of the listed locations that you haven't been to yet. But if you choose badly (not knowing that the choice matters), you instead won't be given the option to visit the other places, and are just pushed ahead in the story for no logical reason.
Breaking the lore
Back to Kaynlesh-Ma, one of my main complaints is the way that the city is written. In Tomb it's just another Port Blacksand with no real identity of its own aside from that of a general medieval fantasy city. It's also inconsistent with Fighting Fantasy lore. Titan - The Fighting Fantasy World, the series' effective history book, travel guide and atlas, describes Kaynlesh-Ma in a completely different manner and with a unique character which hasn't been explored at all here.
The people of Kaynlesh-Ma are said in Titan to be "highly religious and learned, but also hardworking and physical". Its big bad head of state, equivalent to Lord Azzur, is supposed to be a character called the Overpriest, who was apparently "treated with incredible deference and loyalty by his subjects".
Livingstone seemingly recognised this break in lore in a chat with a ship captain, the character saying "...it used to be a city of scholars but in recent times there's been an influx of merchants and traders along with swindlers and pickpockets...". Still, there is no evidence whatsoever that the Overpriest exists. But, like the famous City of Thieves, there are numerous urchins and pickpockets and other ne'er-do-wells roaming the streets.
Bad editing
There are a few examples of sloppy editing but here's a notable one. In the How to Play section you're told "You begin this adventure by being given a sword." Well you are given a sword but it's not right at the start. This is relevant because before the text explicitly says you're given a sword, by Nicodemus, you get the option in paragraph 1 for an early side quest. During this diversion, if you end up having a fight there's a minus 3 attack strength modifier due to having no weapon; you find out later on that your sword was taken from you by the city guards. This harsh penalty makes the fight quite tough against some otherwise weak enemies. For someone who read the game rules first and had already added the sword to their equipment list on the adventure sheet, that would be confusing.
I highlight this example because errors with starting resources have appeared before in Ian Livingstone books. In the 2017 adventure The Port of Peril you're told you start the adventure with enough provisions for ten meals. But in the background section you're billed as a down-on-your-luck adventurer who's forced to scavenge for scraps of food. Paragraph one then has you rooting through the bins to find some squashed tomatoes and a chunk of bread - which you greedily devour.
Questionable title
Tomb is a book you can't judge by its title. In The Warlock of Firetop Mountain you fight a warlock who lives in Firetop Mountain. In The Citadel of Chaos you're in a pretty chaotic citadel. In The Forest of Doom etc. etc. But in Tomb, the main story is all about hunting down and fighting a demonic spider.
Astonishingly, about half the words in the book title have something wrong with them.
- The golden skull item referred to actually turns out to be a "tiny" golden skull charm.
- The golden skull charm isn't found in a tomb; it's in a temple. There is a tomb which is said to contain golden skull charms but you don't actually find any in there and only visit the location briefly.
- In conversation with the goblin pictured on the front of the book, you find out that there are many such golden skull charms; there isn't a specific "the" golden skull as in the title.
Why couldn't it just have been called Invasion of the Plague Spiders?
RATING
Story & plot - A standard "enemy of the week" adventure. 6/10
Illustrations - Nice work from Karl Kopinski. Fantastic front cover and nice internal drawings. 8/10
Gameplay system - Standard Fighting Fantasy battle system used and no messing about with additional stats. Annoying elements remain, with some choices disappearing for no reason if you decide to do something else first. 7/10
Writing - As you'd expect from Ian Livingstone, evocative fantasy prose and some decent character descriptions. Let down by a few passages which seem rushed, especially the bad ending section where the end of the world plays out in two sentences. 7/10
Atmosphere - The various settings in the book have their own distinct features. The atmosphere is let down a little by there being no overarching threat posed by the big villain, only a showdown at the end. 6/10
Nostalgia & subjective enjoyment - Great to have another Fighting Fantasy book to play through! 8/10
OVERALL - 42/60
Read my solution to Tomb of the Golden Skull HERE
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