book, game, memories
Every once in a while I stumble on something that produces a swell of long-forgotten memory inside me. It’s like a long laid-aside bit of my past is brought back into sharp focus by whatever it is I’ve stumbled upon.
It was this sensation that assailed me when I visited Demian’s Gamebooks site (go here) yesterday.
For those of you unfamiliar with the term, “gamebooks” refers loosely to any book which has interactive or roleplaying elements in it (as opposed to a normal novel, which you simply read from beginning to end, noninteractively). The most famous example of these types of books is probably the childrens’ Choose Your Own Adventure series, where the reader has to make decisions at different points in the narrative, causing the plot to branch. These books were rudimentary versions of gamebooks — others, such as the Fighting Fantasy series, were much more complicated and involved, requiring the use of dice and numerical statistics, much like Dungeons & Dragons. They were also known as solitaire adventures, since the player didn’t need other players in order to enjoy the game. The book itself became the opponent.
I had completely forgotten about these gamebooks, or the fact that they had been greatly enjoyable to me during their heyday in the mid-80s. Stumbling on Gamebooks.org, which is a database of all known interactive books complete with photos, powerfully reminded me of days long gone, holed up in my room, rolling dice while I struggled through one grand adventure or another. And, because the game is played alone, the experience is much like that of reading: the quiet, the stillness, the insularity of experiencing something that lives only inside your imagination.
Steve Jackson’s Car Wars series of books: “Oh my god, I played those!” The Fighting Fantasy series from the other (UK-based) Steve Jackson: “That book was awesome!” Stumbling onto the lists and pictures of these old series brought back fabulous memories: Be An Interplanetary Spy, others.
Of course, remembering one aspect of that era brought a flood of other memories from the time back; those were my skater years, when finding a new bank parking lot with a cool concrete curb where I could perfect my ollie-180 grinds was a momentous event. A time when I must have watched The Search for Animal Chin like a hundred and fifty times.
And in between the skating were the games: Car Wars, Dungeons & Dragons, Warhammer. Trips to the gaming store to drool over all those metal miniatures arrayed like so many commemorative statues beneath the glass counters, which were always warm and a little greasy. And those weekend games of Shogun (later renamed Samurai Swords), from the Milton-Bradley Gamesmaster series, with my brothers, which sometimes lasted six hours, but were worth every minute. I still remember the thrill of a successful ninja assassination strike, crippling my opponent by robbing him of his daimyo.
Then weekend family trips to Carmel, or Mendocino, or Point Reyes. The smell of restaurant grills mixed with the ocean air, and then devouring awesome science fiction and fantasy in the motel rooms — The Foundation Series, the Han Solo Adventures, Eddings. Walking the forest trails along the coastline, imagining I was in one of those wondrous fantasy settings.
It can be dangerous to live in the past. But every once in a while, letting a wave of memories overwhelm you, to just let go and allow yourself to be transported back to another time, with its own cornucopia of scents and experiences, and places.
All of this triggered by a little, low-res photo of an old and forgotten gamebook at a site accidentally discovered. How amazing is that?