Ahoy guys !

How do you do ?

Originally I wanted to talk about the Harry Potter’s new play but hadn’t enough time to finish it so I had to plot something else… Therefore I remembered I read an amazing book which was called « Curse of the Mummy ».

Wait, no, not so fast it’s not an usual book with a demoniacal mummy that wants to kill ya. Nope, that’s a Fighting Fantasy Gamebook, in other words « a book where you ARE the hero ». It sounds interesting doesn’t it ?

All the things you need to start your adventure is a pencil and a dice. (Yeah sorry we still can’t use swords or magic wands to set sail for an adventure… – I wish I could.) And of course the most important thing is « luck » otherwise you’d die (Because your character has differents stats : Stamina, Health and Luck. You established them at the begining of your journey with your amazing and magical rolling dice.)

With that said let me tell you more about this book. If you know narrative games or visual novel it works approximately the same. You are reading the story but at some moment, you have to select where you want to go, how to fight your ennemies, what you want to buy, etc… You have several options, and for exemple, let’s say you take « option 1 » you’ll have to turn to page 220 for exemple. So you are travelling all across the book but if you are sent to the last page it doesn’t mean that’s it’s the end of the story… To be honest I have never reached the end (for the moment !) and never met a mummy. But i’m pretty sure it’s awaiting for me to come and show how unskilled I am.

All joking aside I find that it’s a cool way to read a book. Indeed, you have to face ennemies (even if you are fighting them with a dice and numbers) and have to make choices to save the country -or your life.
What I loved too is the way other characters are dying : it’s so fierce and your character is just like « oh that’s sad, I will cry for a minute but then let’s resume this adventure as if it had never happened. I’m going to beat’em all yahouu » no time for apologies or sorrow ! Er, of course it’s an hyperbola but it’s almost that… !

Seriously if you have time (since using a dice isn’t as easy and fast as using a sword) and if you are eager to live your own epic adventure, you have to read/play one of these books. That’s really funny and you’ve got many different storys (with wizards, dragons, or mythology, etc) that you’ll inevitably find one you could love. Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson are the two main guys behind these books and trust me, they’ve done an incredibly good job with this series. Their worlds are often dark – but you are here to enlighten them after all – serious and there’s always an interesting story in which you can easily integrate yourself.

So now go grab one of these books, and start your adventure (while sitting on your bed) to beat’em all and become the hero of your own story !

That’s all for me guys, see you next time ! 😀