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Post by Ofecks on Apr 16, 2004 7:43:54 GMT
I love the Grey Star series. Excellent offshoot to the original, with some pretty unforgettable scenarios. Only problem is, they're filled with cheap shots. Death lurks around literally every corner. There seems to be a way to instantly die in every single step of your quest. You can off yourself within 3 sections of book 3. That's gotta be some kind of record.
Take book 1 for instance... if I make it past Lake Shenwu with more than 5 EP left, I consider it a miracle. I usually do pretty well until the Kleasa fight, which 2/3 of the time kills me outright. Even if I survive I have to worry about the Quoku, the Lake, and the Mantiz horde, all with minimal EP in reserve. Yes, I have died from the various 1 point EP losses due to Shenwu's vapor.
Obviously, reading this series can be very stressful, but I think the tension is part of their charm. The demon horde chase in book 4 is one of my favorite parts of any Mangnamund-based adventure, especially since your plan devilishly kills two birds with one stone.
If LW books were video games, the Grey Star series would be the shoot-em-ups. Super fast-paced, the danger doesn't let up. Your thoughts on the series?
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Post by Relenoir on Apr 17, 2004 5:33:56 GMT
Responding to this thread requires much thought, and I didn't really have time enough to think on it till now. First off, I have never liked it as much as the original, but I do think it is very good regardless, compared to most other gamebook series. Every time I read them after having not done so for awhile, I get to the fight with the Kleasa and say to myself, "Oh my God! Look at this thing's combat skill!" I then proceed to use Willpower to increase my damage so I actually survive. ***WARNING! POSSIBLE SPOILERS IN THE NEXT FEW PARAGRAPHS!*** The first time I played them, I was about 15, and I had to cheat (go back and make new choices) a lot. After not reading them for years, I picked them up a few years ago, and the Mantiz horde got me at the end by making the wrong choice. Except for the final book, the last section always seemed to offer no clue as to what might be the right choice, and the choice that seemed best usually got you killed. Try to beat the Mantiz? They overrun you! Try to destroy the Kleasa with the rod? It blows you to smithereens! Finally defeated the Jhaksa? I don't think so! Last time, I actually made it through the encounter with the basilisk without getting killed- by some miracle. I totally agree with the point about death lurking around every corner. I actually think the final book was in many ways the easiest, which made things a bit anticlimactic. I really wished there had been a different map for each book, because some of those really neat places you explore were never detailed in this way. One thing I really liked was that in many movies and books, the coolest secondary character gets butchered, leaving the protagonist to travel with "the other one." This was the case in the Grey Star series, but unlike most stories, "the other one" gets offed later and the cool one is rather plausibly brought back to life. I really enjoyed that plot twist. ***END OF SPOILERS SECTION*** I guess if I were to compare Lone Wolf to a video game series, I'd match Lone Wolf with The Legend of Zelda and Grey Star with a game called Shadow Gate. Interesting, isn't it, how this first person castle adventure video game that can slay you at any point has the same name as a prominent mystical portal in the world of Magnamund? I'm probably dating myself horribly by mentioning this game, which I used to have for the original Nintendo system. It was very unforgiving, much like Grey Star is.
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Post by Banedon on Apr 17, 2004 13:31:06 GMT
I actually played Grey Star before Lone Wolf...it is a lot harder, I beat LW Book 1 on my first try (but died a lot in Book 2), but I only ever beat GS Book 1 once, and I ended up with something like 4 EP and no WP at the end.
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Post by Elix Nosferatu on Apr 17, 2004 15:38:31 GMT
I find that the most difficult part of the Grey Star series is the EP total. Granted, being killed instantly is very annoying, but it is even worse when you come out of a battle with 5 EP left. He doesn't have anything like the healing skills that come in so handy with LW.
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Post by Ofecks on Apr 17, 2004 17:36:48 GMT
I get to the fight with the Kleasa and say to myself, "Oh my God! Look at this thing's combat skill!" I then proceed to use Willpower to increase my damage so I actually survive. Really? It's easier to kill it outright using willpower than to just survive four rounds? I might try that next time. I guess if I were to compare Lone Wolf to a video game series, I'd match Lone Wolf with The Legend of Zelda and Grey Star with a game called Shadow Gate. That's a good analogy. I love those hair-pulling, highly illogical point & click adventures. I need to track down that LucasArts Classic Adventures comp for PC. Back OT, That thing with the final Mantiz battle of book 1 is just unfair, same with the final battle of book 3. Dirty, dirty tricks. How the hell would any first-time player make it through book 1 unless they were so dangerously low on EP they had to evade? Friggin' cheap!
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Post by Banedon on Apr 17, 2004 18:46:46 GMT
Yeah, that was really messed up at the end of Book 1...nowhere in the LW series that I know of is it REQUIRED to evade a combat...
Although the worst part of the GS books was the fact that it was so hard to increase your WP or EP (or money, for that matter). In LW I always get Healing in Book 1, that makes things so much easier.
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Post by Relenoir on Apr 18, 2004 0:47:59 GMT
I usually put up the Sorcery force-field using those seeds to cover the WP cost, and if you have a decent CS you can take that thing down with a few good rolls if you put 3 WP into the damage... at least that has worked for me in the past. That way you only take a couple rounds of damage and have EP left for later.
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Hal
Kai Lord
Posts: 44
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Post by Hal on Apr 18, 2004 14:09:11 GMT
Strange enough. I remember that books #1 & #2 were really hard with great moments and revelations but that, at the contrary, books #3 & #4 were pretty obvious and linear. Book #3 was a bit stressful at the end (when Chaos birds chase GS) but that's all. For the rest, it was just irritating to have continuously to go from one point of the world to the other just to save your ever-snivelling girlfriend (I don't even remember her name). LW book #12 ("The prisonners of Time") based on the same "I am lost in a parallel [poopy] world" idea was far better IMO.
GS Book #4 was even more simple and linear IIRC, with too much ways to avoid the most dangerous situations (I remember for instance that, at the end, you don't even have to fight the Jakcha. You can just go on your way and ignore him ! Weird.) As a matter of fact, books #3 & #4 don't have impressed me as much as others Dever's gamebooks and I don't remember of them really well. The GS universe is still great, with some kind of "exotism" which is absent from the LW one and not as much manichean.
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Post by Ofecks on Apr 19, 2004 5:55:42 GMT
Not only are the instant death sections abundant, but a lot of them are really awful. Like, imagining the events really give me the creeps.
Ouch. I can only think of nature shows that have gruesome footage of a pack of hyenas ripping into a zebra.
That one freaks me the f*** out.
As does that one, the complete darkness adds sheer terror.
pwned.
Just... wrong. *shudder*
And how could I forget the dirtiest trick in the entire LW/GS series:
Bastard Mantizes!
And then there's this one that doesn't even kill you:
And all of those are just from book 1. The worst one I can think of in the main LW series is the instant Rhakkos death in book 7. Messed up, but those kinds of endings are few and far between.
I'm convinced that Ian Page is one disturbed individual.
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Hal
Kai Lord
Posts: 44
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Post by Hal on Apr 19, 2004 7:52:07 GMT
Yes ! I remember all of this now. As I said, books #1 and #2 wre pretty hard and the instant deaths you quote are exactly the ones that impressed me so much and that give to the GS books such a peculiar feel, especially the ones in wich you become insane rather than dead. It's the same in book #2 but, once again, IIRC, such things are absent from books #3 and #4 that are much more easy.
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Post by The Wytch-King on Apr 23, 2004 23:13:20 GMT
Dare I say that I've always been spellbound by them? Can't really put my finger on the reasons, but I have a faible for playing mages, the background story was interesting, the lands fascinating (even the map in itself was a beauty!), and I love many of the characters. I must have been about Grey Star's age when they were released in my country - 1989, I think. That made empathizing with that young mage rather easy, and walking in his boots was fun! To my eternal shame, it's been several years since I've played them, and my memories of how it was to play them are somewhat fuzzy by now ... Therefore I cannot really comment on difficult spots in the series. (As I don't recall being terribly frustrated by them, I probably cheated from time to time ... just to preserve the joy of playing them, of course! ) But as soon as I've finished replaying the Lone Wolf books (as of now, the Danarg awaits), they are toast! (Have to admit, I'm really curious to see how they measure up to my memories ...) The Wytch-King, eager to take up the battle against ... err ...
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Post by Archdruid on Apr 29, 2004 5:17:34 GMT
What was the Rhakkos death? I don't remember that one at all. Castle Death was, however, the first book in the LW series I actually owned.
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Post by Relenoir on Apr 29, 2004 6:35:47 GMT
The Rahkos was the disembodied hand that you may have come across after Zahda tries you and they put you into the maze, if I'm correct. It only happens on one of the two paths you can take. I've read the death scene: very grisley indeed!
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Post by Archdruid on Apr 29, 2004 7:42:24 GMT
POSSIBLE SPOILERS AHEAD:
OK, now I've looked through the books and found the ones that affected me the most. For some reason, I remembered this one even after all these years:
Then here's what happens when Grey Star attempts to be nice and pull the Quoku off of Shan:
And this one has a certain understated irony to it:
And the Rhakkos death:
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Post by Ofecks on Apr 29, 2004 17:03:40 GMT
Yeah, the Rhakkos death is nasty. As mentioned in another thread, I find two of the Yawshath-related deaths in book 6 to be equally disturbing. Here's one of them:
*screams* I've had nightmares about this kind of sh1t before.
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