1/2
Lone Wolf and Grey Wolf were my absolute favorites when I was a kid
The best ever series. Too bad it was short lived.
Yes! I loved those and played them many times over! I only had 2 of them though.
I was a Fighting Fantasy teen. Choose your own adventure mixed with hit points and dice rolls. Steve Jackson and Ian Livingston I think from memory did all the first books.
Omg I forgot all about Ian Livingston! He wrote another series that I mentioned in this post but couldn’t remember the name. Cavern of the Snow Witch. I think that was part of a series
Their stories were so cool!
There is an app in which you can play some of them. Definitely worth checking out if you enjoyed the books as a kid
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tinmangames.ffhub&hl=en&gl=US
Or Apple
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/fighting-fantasy-classics/id1261201650
Wow. Holy crap. Thank you sir. I'll be spending some time on this!!
Fighting Fantasy sounds very familiar. I think I had a couple of those books, too. I probably still have them somewhere, but who knows where.
Bout these from a friend. Spent weeks going through them all
First book that scolded me for cheating!
Ah yes, a fellow ugly toad.
Love these. Still have a few.
There's an excellent app for playing through them on an Android device.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.GDVGames.LoneWolfBiblio&hl=en&gl=US
There goes my weekend!
There’s been a reprint, Amazon sells the first five as a package. I got them for my 10 year old and he loves them. He didn’t touch a phone or TV the first week he had them.
I did too. I remember random scenes from them too. There was a tough dragon fight. I remember paying for a luxury room and it came with an overpriced bath that just made the whole room muggy. And the combat grid for your "die" roll. Good times.
Inside UFO 54,40
That was my 2nd favorite
Lone Wolf was next level, making it an RPG.
There was a Lone Wolf phone game that was ok but didn’t feel true to the books
They did make a ttrpg a few years ago. Wasn't too bad. The atmosphere was great.
Oh by far the TIME MACHINE SERIES from the mid-80’s. I had them all. Here is a link to the first ever book in that series.
https://www.abebooks.com/9780553236019/Secret-Knights-Time-Machine-Jim-0553236016/plp
I still have and still read regularly the CYOA Dungeons and Dragons series.
Return to Brookmere was always my favorite.
Endless Quest
Can't believe I had to look so hard for an Endless Quest mention
Holy smokes - this all came right back. This had the page at the back where you “rolled” by closing your eyes and pointing to a spot on the page to get a number, right?
Yes! You also had supply slots, limited weapons, and if you didn’t get the Summer Swerd you had to go back two books to get it. I’m 50 and still mad about that
Same, this was a memory unlocked experience. Thanks OP!
FYI, Looks like the original creator allowed the series to be digitized. You can play\read through the entire story as one character here:
https://projectaon.org/staff/eric/
Having a digital character sheet looks like a good time :)
Oh I have to dust off my Kai lord cloak and get into this
Amazing, thanks!
OK, I pulled out my copy of Flight From The Dark, and there was a page missing near the back. That's probably what that page was.
Lone Wolf was amazing. Loved the four part Grey Star series, but then the absolute marathon of the mainline. I got up to 14 before I tapped out. Exhausting but a lot of fun.
Be an Interplanetary Spy is a really underrated one that doesn’t get much love or discussion anymore. Another long story that has a great thread of continuity though the 11 or so that I recall.
But tried and true - Time Tunnel and Time Traveller. Traveling through time around actual events to solve mysteries. Tunnel was the mainline with everything from Medieval to dinosaurs to pirates to samurai. And that’s just the first four. Traveller was the junior books, but the Columbus and Franklin ones were solid.
Good memories, man.
I never heard of Be an Interplanetary Spy. I do remember another fantasy series but the name escapes me. All I can remember was the cover art style was very D&D and the borders were white
I vaguely remember a D&D choose your own adventure book around ice caverns, but that was blue, not white.
Loved the D&D series, and especially the illustrations!
Also, the Time Cave or Time Traveler samurai on introduced me to The Book of Five Rings.
Ah Time Machine 3: Sword of the Samurai.
Long memory.
I have found my people.
Wizards, Warriors, and You were my favorite, no doubt. Haunted Castle of Ravencurse was my first. I liked how you chose weapons or spells to take with you on the adventure, and it could have a result on the outcome. Read them all as a kid. I'd re read them today if I had them. Great memories.
Wizards warriors were good. Did you ever have or hear about the TIME MACHINE series a choose your own adventure from the mid 80’s. This was the first book that ever came out in this series:
https://www.abebooks.com/9780553236019/Secret-Knights-Time-Machine-Jim-0553236016/plp
Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone FIGHTING FANTASY GAMEBOOKS. 100 percent the very best. They even released TTRPG books. The game system was lite but effective by covering everything needed (skill, stamina, and luck). Moreover, when reading the solo books, you realized you could add others too. My favorite was FEAR, MAGIC, and HERO attributes. The TTRPG's that I ran over in those years were not all TSR Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. Great friends and good times. 1980s had so many entertaining books, magazines, and movies.
I still have my copy of Flight From The Dark, but it is missing a page near the end. I'm not sure what that page was or why I ripped it out. I also have a couple of Tolkien Quest books too that I enjoyed back then. I know I had other which way books, but I don't remember what they were. I loved Dungeons & Dragons and didn't have friends who were into that, so I bought the which way books when I got the chance.
They did make a Lone Wolf video game a few years back. I think you can download it on your phone and play some of the books with it. I think it's called Lone Wolf Saga. I don't know if they are new stories or if they're the original books converted. I know they made console versions of the games, too.
I just wrote a little article about these books a couple of months ago- so many really interesting and unique examples, and I love them all.
I want to find one of these so bad.
Check eBay, friend. Years ago I bought the entire series only to lose it in a move
I will look on Ebay,thank you for the advice
eBay is where I found mine, as well
They are still in print, new. Check Amazon if your local bookstore does not have them.
I liked the ones with Indiana Jones
I loved these.
I still have Lone Wolf Books 1-16, I believe. How was the wizard series? Loved those Lone Wolf books!
Lone Wolf and Fighting fantasy were by far the best.
I still have the whole set!
If you're a fan of Lone Wolf and Greystar, you should take a look at Project Aon, a legal repository of all the books sanctioned by Joe Dever. There is an app mentioned in my other post using this project as a source which, imho, is the best way to play them.
Fighting fantasy... Freeway Fighter was my favorite
User deleted comment
17d
There is a fighting fantasy app???!!! What the what?
User deleted comment
16d
What a terrific recommendation! Thank you
I read all the lone wolf books in 5th 6th grade
It was my favorite read in elementary school
Oh man, Lone Wolf was my gateway drug into all things Fantasy RPG! Loved those books!
I was reading at a higher level than my class in grade 3, I would get sent to the library whenever we were doing reading because I was a disruptive little shit.
Once I found choose your own adventure, I read every single one I could get my hands on. Love these books so much .. I can still see myself curled up in a corner of the school library with three or four beside me while zooming back and forth choosing my own adventure.
Don’t forget the notepad to keep track of your health and stamina points, items, and weapons
Totally! And I would also draw out characters on those same sheets later
Oh my drawings were all done on my notebook dividers. My favorite (besides Kai lord Lone Wolf) was my D&D character who was a super thief whose weapon specialty was daggers.
I also had another character for a GI Joe role playing group during our lunch period who was a bomb expert. He was so adept he could probably disarm a nuclear weapon lol
I never got into D&D funnily enough, my brother who is a year older was an avid player and would never allow me to join lol.
Never seen this series before. Was it good?
This series turned me into an avid reader. I have really fond memories of it
Ok. Thanks. Weird that I ve never heard of it before. Just shows that it was a really big world, even back then .
There was one that never ended. I know because I cheated and it had no lead -in to the happy ending. Inside UFO 54-40. Man that drove me nuts when I chose that damned adventure.
Mystery of Chimney Rock (sorry l got in at the beginning and am a purist.)
Zork
Man that was so long ago that I don’t remember the ones I read.
Who Killed Harlowe Thrombey!
Dude on the first one looks a heck of a lot like Steve Coogan.
I remember borrowing a book from the library called The Third Planet From Altair over and over when I was little.
Wow, haven't thought about these series for years. Thank you for posting.
I thought Lone Wolf was the coolest damn thing and a few of the books.
I somehow got the Mexican Revolution one, with Zapata for some reason
I liked the G.I. Joe books, Wizards & Warriors, and of course, the main CYOA books.
I loved the Lone Wolf books. And the Steve Jackson/Ian Livingstone Fighting Fantasy game books.
Don't forget the related Sorcery!, by the other Steve Jackson.
Oh I loved those as well. That was like the Lord of the Rings of this genre. Epic.
Many fond memories. The Zed spell!! Abril, no idol of mine..
Fighting Fantasy?
Oh yeah the Lone Wolf Series! I remember reading several of them on a road trip from Texas to Washington and back. Mid-80s if I remember. So fun!
For Somerlund and the Kai!
I had two Spider-Man CYOA books as a kid.
EDIT: City Of Darkness and As The World Burns - part of the Marvel Super Heroes Choose Your Own Adventure series. When I looked them up just now I saw there was a Dr. Strange one! I would have loved that too.
Sagard the Barbarian and 1 on 1 Adventure Gamebooks
https://gamebooks.org/Series/200/Show
https://gamebooks.org/1on1list.htm
I guess gamebooks are a different genre, but there are decision trees.
These books got me into playing d&d
Epic Adventure: Lone Wolf Most Immersive: Steve Jackson's Sorcery! series Single Adventure: FF's House of Hell
Super Endless Quest books from the makers of Dungeons & Dragons. The bookmark was a character sheel.
The cave of time
Wizards, Warriors, and You!
The covers were the best part of these books.
Time Machine 3: Sword of the Samurai. Didn’t read the series, just the o e book over and over. I enjoyed it even more because I acquired it on my international travels. Technically it was an afternoon across the bridge in Windsor, ON while we visited family in Detroit when I was 10, but I counted it as me being a world traveler.
Be an Interplanetary Spy