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Daily iPhone App: Steve Jackson's Sorcery is interactive e-book bliss
I have to say -- the iPad is a terrific platform for interactive e-books, but so far, I haven't been very impressed by the options out there. I do use my iPad for reading a lot, but the vast majority of my reading is done in either iBooks or a comic book reader. It's very rare that I will pick up an app that's designed to work as just one single book, no matter how many extras or interactive features are included. However, I'm happy to say that Steve Jackson's Sorcery! is a clear exception to the general rule. It's excellent, and mostly because the book it is based on (actually a "gamebook" released back in the '80s) was already interactive to begin with. Add in iOS interactive touchscreen, some excellent graphical flairs and a whole lot of polish, and what you end up with is something very akin to playing a Dungeons and Dragons game, where the few game elements present are really just intended to ignite your imagination, and get you role-playing in the game's world. Sorcery's story is pretty basic: You're a hero who sets out into a dangerous world, hoping to either save or conquer it. And the combat gameplay is extremely simple as well -- you essentially guess whether your opponent is attacking or defending, trying to mirror their actions to do damage as you can. But the real meat of Sorcery! is in the inbetween. You travel from town to town, talking to various NPCs and even solving a few puzzles, all while exploring this world through the game's scrolling text. I really have no problems at all with this app -- I was fascinated by the story's well-written text, and while the gameplay isn't extremely innovative, it's paced well enough to keep the action rolling. The one hitch might be that you need to use your imagination on this one, so if you're expecting a game like Skyrim, that will draw out the world for you, you might find this a bit boring. But as a die-hard pen-and-paper RPG player and a fan of Steve Jackson's work, I think this is an excellent adaptation that's well worth a purchase. You can pick it up from the App Store for US$4.99 right now.
Sorcery! on iOS reincarnates Fighting Fantasy books for tablets (video)
If you're going to bring the well-loved, 30-year-old Fighting Fantasy book series to digital screens, you'd better do it right. Fortunately, Sorcery! does. The game is based on the original choose-your-own-adventure series written by Lionhead Studios co-founder Steve Jackson, with a few modern adjustments. The iOS game sidesteps the need for organic books and (unfortunately) our tried-and-tested multi-fingered bookmarking system, digitally keeping note of all your decisions along the way -- in short, no cheating. Making use of the new medium, there are now touch-based sword fights to help break up the wordy play-by-play descriptions of what you're doing. The initial installment is available now for $5 at the App Store, with the remaining three parts expected to follow later this year.
Steve Jackson's Sorcery! gamebook coming to the App Store
Steve Jackson's Sorcery! is an old series back from the early 1980s where you "played" through a sort of Choose Your Own Adventure-style story, except that instead of just flipping pages, you actually cast spells, fight in combat and do other fantasy-based activities. These books were reprinted back in 2002, but it's been announced that they're coming to iOS soon, as fully interactive books to play with. Most interactive books on the App Store are either meant for children or show off only a limited amount of interactivity, but these seem different -- they're heavily dependent on text, but they do offer some nice interactive touches from the original books. There's even some fun procedural stuff: When you do combat in the game, the book creates custom-made text for you to read about the outcome of the battle. It all looks very cool, and it's a nice throwback for those of us who played with these books all those years ago. Steve Jackson's Sorcery! is set to be submitted to the App Store right away, so we should see it for ourselves very soon.
Fighting Fantasy games leaving the App Store
Big Blue Games has released four games based on the Fighting Fantasy series of roleplaying books by legendary game creators Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone. Now that the licensing agreement is about to expire, they're leaving the App Store forever as of tomorrow. Creature of Havoc, Citadel of Chaos, Deathtrap Dungeon, and The Warlock of Firetop Mountain are all set to expire, so if you have wanted to pick them up (or are just hearing about them), now's the time. They are all set at US$2.99. Tin Man Games is reportedly going to be handling the license for these books from now on, though it's not likely that they'll re-release these same titles. So if you've got fond memories of "playing" these, or just want to see what the Big Blue versions are like, grab these now. Even though they'll disappear from the App Store, you'll be able to keep them on your iOS device. You just won't be able to redownload or reinstall them (except, of course, if you sync them with iTunes on a Mac).
