Japan Pickups: Gamebooks

  • July 6, 2023

It was a bounteous trip to Japan as far as gamebooks were concerned, and I think I brought home more than ever before.

With the above 8 (the last one is Slaves Of The Abyss) I now have Japanese versions of 17 of their original run of 32 Fighting Fantasy (FF) books. These are all in great condition, and Crypt Of The Sorceror even includes a separate character sheet:

These were bought at Mandarake and Yellow Submarine, and all but Slaves were fairly inexpensive (<$20) by vintage FF standards.

Here we have Sorcery! books 3 and 4, which means I now own the complete original (1980s) and reprinted (2002) editions. The other set of books in the above pic is Clash Of The Princes, the unusual two-player FF gamebook set. I was extremely surprised to not only find this but to find it for so cheap (about $8) since I had no idea it had been released in Japan!

Speaking of, the above is a recent Japanese edition of the first FF novel. It’s as beautiful as the reprinted gamebooks and includes the original art. It seems the retro reprints of old FF material are continuing in Japan?

This book – about the same size and length as a typical FF – is a genuine oddity. Google translates the title to ‘How to play game books’ but it’s entirely FF focused (that cover art shows Livingstone and Jackson) and seems to be a collection of articles from the Japanese Warlock magazine as well as dozens of pages of complex gamebook maps! The pic on the right is part one of a four-part map for Starship Traveller.

Speaking of Japanese Warlock magazine, can you believe I found one. It was peeping out from between AD&D manuals in a Surugaya store in Akihabara, and only cost an astonishing ¥200! As you can see it’s issue 37 from 1990, which was after the last FF had been published in Japan.

It includes articles on game books, lots of (solo) Tunnels and Trolls content, several pages on computer RPGs – including two pages on Wizardry – and a fairly lengthy adventure that uses an unusual numbering system and seems to be about preparing for a new years celebration. Another fine acquisition for the collection, and I’m very relieved to have found it since it lessened the blow of Mandarake being unable to find the one they allegedly had in stock!

Lastly, I picked up this manga collection of articles from an RPG magazine on how to play Advanced Fighting Fantasy. Skimming through it with a translator it certainly seems aimed at women gamers, which may explain why AFF is shelved with Call of Cthulhu in Japanese shops? But the riddle of why ‘TRPGs’ are so popular with female gamers in Japan is probably a mystery best left for another time!

I bought a few other Japanese gamebooks as well, including examples from the Golden Dragon, Grailquest and Tunnels & Trolls series. I even saw others – an AD&D one, another based on the game Landstalker – that I passed on because they were pricey and not FF. As I said it was a bounteous trip as far as gamebooks were concerned, and I’d be surprised if I found this many again on a future trip.

  • Posted in Books
  • Robert

Fireworks 2023

  • July 5, 2023

Happy July 4 for yesterday! As usual we went to Rochester for a combined July 4 / JAF Birthday, which included setting these guys off:

The neighborhood was echoing with booms last night, and many nearby neighbors invested in much bigger fireworks than we did. But we had a lot of fun with our modest selection:

It took many hours to set them all off, and here’s some highlights in a short video:

Another successful July 4 backyard fireworks display then. See you again for more in 2024 🙂

  • Posted in Miscellaneous
  • Robert

Fireworks Shopping

  • July 2, 2023

These past two weekends we’ve driven interstate (to PA and NH) to buy fireworks for our annual backyard (in Rochester) celebration. As always, it’s a lot of fun seeing the variety of product available and imaging the fun of setting it off.

The above – 16000 little firecrackers (what we used to call ‘crazy jacks’ in my youth) – is about as big as the wheel on your typical car. Imagine the noise and smoke as this thing went off. Wouldn’t it be incredible?

And the above – an $860 assortment – is 60 shells that would produce effects similar to what you’d see at a professional show. It still amazes me that in some states you can just buy this stuff and let it off in your backyard. While we bought a few launching fireworks, they’re very tame and neither go high or produce much noise.

Speaking of noise: 750 missiles! This thing takes more than two minutes to fire all the missiles, and each missile whistles and then bangs in the air. While it would be spectacular, I imagine this would be the sort of thing that may have the neighbors calling the rozzers in our suburb (since these sorts of things are currently illegal in our county).

The packaging of the bigger fireworks is always wonderful, and here I focus on a few of the genre ones (although in 2023 a reference to the ‘Majestic 12’ is a bit esoteric). Here’s a few others:

Can you spot the blatant copyright infringement on two of the above? If it’s not obvious, here’s some that is:

The label designer obviously have fun with these products (which, remember, are designed to be set on fire), and every now and then there are head-scratching examples like this one:

We bought a bunch of items from several shops, and our ‘show’ promises to be a good one. At Joyce’s request we tried to only buy low-noise fireworks, and that included this selection of fountains we’ve got:

We’ve had one or two low noise fountains before (they mostly make a low hiss due to the sparks coming out) so it will be interesting seeing what these are like.

That said it’s possible that some of the fountains we got may make a few crackles, but for obvious reasons how could we pass on…

…a skull and a spinning snake?!? Imagine if such things had been available when we were kids?

I also can’t resist a good sword (handheld fountains, basically) and you know there was no chance I’d pass up this lightsaber firework!

And this is just a selection of what we’ll be lighting up on Tuesday. As usual I’ll try to catch the excitement in pictures and maybe video and follow up later in the week 🙂