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VulcanVerse #4
The Wild Woods
Arcadia. The garden of the gods of Olympus. Once they walked its sylvan paths, sipping ambrosia, drinking the wines of Dionysus, and filling the arboreal groves with their laughter. Satyrs and centaurs gambolled in the sunlit groves, sprites and dryads tended to the trees and flowers. Even mortals, those chosen of the gods, enjoyed the revels. Everywhere life blossomed with joyous abandon.
But Pan plays his pipes no more, Artemis hunts not in the deep forests-green, dryads and nymphs dance no longer in dappled moonlit glades to the music of the spheres. Silence reigns over the weed-infested garden walkways. Ancient trees, long untended, clog the forest trails, roots rise up from the ground to topple the statues, fountains and sundials, cracking open the conservatories and summer houses. The great rivers, babbling brooks and simple streams have long since dried up, nothing sleeps in their beds now but desiccated earth and bleached bones.
Yet what is to be done? The gods sleep, so it must be the mortals, feeble though they are, pitiful even, to whom the task must fall. Who can restore the wild woods to their glorious, arboreal splendour? Who can rebuild Arcadia and wake the sleeping gods? Who but you?
* * *As you explore you will forge friendships, meet companions, make enemies - all of whom have long memories and will help or hinder you throughout your adventures. In this vast open world you will find hundreds of amazing quests, make choices with lasting consequences, win glory, cheat death, and face challenges at every turn.
Every decision is in your hands. Start in any book, be whoever you choose, go anywhere you please, and do anything you want. The only limit is your imagination.
But Pan plays his pipes no more, Artemis hunts not in the deep forests-green, dryads and nymphs dance no longer in dappled moonlit glades to the music of the spheres. Silence reigns over the weed-infested garden walkways. Ancient trees, long untended, clog the forest trails, roots rise up from the ground to topple the statues, fountains and sundials, cracking open the conservatories and summer houses. The great rivers, babbling brooks and simple streams have long since dried up, nothing sleeps in their beds now but desiccated earth and bleached bones.
Yet what is to be done? The gods sleep, so it must be the mortals, feeble though they are, pitiful even, to whom the task must fall. Who can restore the wild woods to their glorious, arboreal splendour? Who can rebuild Arcadia and wake the sleeping gods? Who but you?
* * *As you explore you will forge friendships, meet companions, make enemies - all of whom have long memories and will help or hinder you throughout your adventures. In this vast open world you will find hundreds of amazing quests, make choices with lasting consequences, win glory, cheat death, and face challenges at every turn.
Every decision is in your hands. Start in any book, be whoever you choose, go anywhere you please, and do anything you want. The only limit is your imagination.
- GenresGamebooks
190 pages, Paperback
Published October 16, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
April 2, 2022
The Vulcanverse series, which this book forms part of, is an open-world adventure set in a fantasy land that is heavily inspired by ancient Greek and Roman mythology. There are relatively few overt game mechanics. In fact, there are just a couple of pages of rules to be read before you begin. Your initial choices will determine your starting levels in four skills and provide some possessions. There are no rules for combat. Instead, any fights are handled with skill tests, possibly resulting in your character becoming wounded – neither are there hit points or anything equivalent. However, there is a lot going on ‘beneath the hood’. Your characters interactions with these unseen mechanisms are handled through possessions, code words and tick boxes. The result of this is not simply a case of having different encounters at individual locations when visiting them a second time. Whole sections of a book can change over time, in response to your character fulfilling a ‘major plot quest’. Each of these quests may mainly take place in one volume, but will also require you to visit areas in another volume to acquire possessions or gain code words.
After starting the series with The Hammer of the Sun, written by Dave Morris, I moved on to this book by Jamie Thomson. It has a significantly different feel and atmosphere, as you might expect given the author. But, despite having much fewer paragraphs than (only 830 compared to 1700), The Wild Woods seems almost as complex in structure as The Hammer of the Sun. It is a greener and more inhabited land of woods, farms and vineyards. However, a series of quests in the form of ‘contracts’ revolves around, first, restoring two rivers, and then fulfilling other requirement. After you have done this, then many locations change in nature enabling to reexplore the environment.
After starting the series with The Hammer of the Sun, written by Dave Morris, I moved on to this book by Jamie Thomson. It has a significantly different feel and atmosphere, as you might expect given the author. But, despite having much fewer paragraphs than (only 830 compared to 1700), The Wild Woods seems almost as complex in structure as The Hammer of the Sun. It is a greener and more inhabited land of woods, farms and vineyards. However, a series of quests in the form of ‘contracts’ revolves around, first, restoring two rivers, and then fulfilling other requirement. After you have done this, then many locations change in nature enabling to reexplore the environment.
October 4, 2024
The authors responsible for most of the best series from the golden age of gamebooks return with Vulcanverse, a series of five books steeped in Greek lore and mythology, flavoured with many other influences. The first four books cover different interesting settings, with the final book split between Vulcan City and a lengthy final quest, which is unlocked once 12 main tasks across the rest of the series have been completed.
The quality of writing is first class across the whole series, generating an immersive atmosphere with just the right balance of humour. Whilst the open world style of the series is more in keeping with the same authors Fabled Lands than linear gamebooks, the many tasks to complete result in a nice blend of both styles, with the final quest in the last book also giving players something to aim at. The paperbacks are more robust for repeated plays, with the hardbacks nice as collector items.
The size of Vulcanverse is enormous, each book being several times the size of a standard gamebook, with the clever codeword and tick box design mechanics maximising page space, increasing the size and scope of the adventure further still. Be aware that a significant time investment is therefore required. Note taking is recommended, and especially useful for when you pick the series back up each time after a break.
Although mapping isn’t essential, you’ll love the books if you enjoyed 1980s computer games that required mapping out. They also reminded me a bit of those point and click type adventures, such as the Magic Knight and Lucasfilm series, where completing a section or puzzle opens up more of the game. In summary, Vulcanverse is superb. I hope the series finds a wide audience given the quality of writing and care that has clearly gone into them.
The quality of writing is first class across the whole series, generating an immersive atmosphere with just the right balance of humour. Whilst the open world style of the series is more in keeping with the same authors Fabled Lands than linear gamebooks, the many tasks to complete result in a nice blend of both styles, with the final quest in the last book also giving players something to aim at. The paperbacks are more robust for repeated plays, with the hardbacks nice as collector items.
The size of Vulcanverse is enormous, each book being several times the size of a standard gamebook, with the clever codeword and tick box design mechanics maximising page space, increasing the size and scope of the adventure further still. Be aware that a significant time investment is therefore required. Note taking is recommended, and especially useful for when you pick the series back up each time after a break.
Although mapping isn’t essential, you’ll love the books if you enjoyed 1980s computer games that required mapping out. They also reminded me a bit of those point and click type adventures, such as the Magic Knight and Lucasfilm series, where completing a section or puzzle opens up more of the game. In summary, Vulcanverse is superb. I hope the series finds a wide audience given the quality of writing and care that has clearly gone into them.
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March 7, 2024About the collection
Vulcanverse is an ambitious collection of Open World Gamebooks by the authors of Fable Lands. You can start in any Vulcanverse book and travel between books having adventures. Even if each one can be read individually, this collection is more enjoyable when read as a whole. Each book has plenty of references to the others and is full of plots that are intertwined between each of its installments.
About this book
The land of Arcadia with is forests and fairies await you. This installment of Vulcanverse is, probably, the most difficult to complete of them all. In this book you will be tasked to bring back the splendor to Arcadia, which is not an easy task. It is also a task that will require you to travel through all the Vulcanverse to achieve it.
The locations on this one are full of luxury and life, and also full of dangers. As in Hammer of the Sun you will have an epic task to achieve, but in this case it will be more explicit and less hidden than in the other.
The writing is very colourful and it presents long and detailed paragraphs full of descriptions. Also, the humor will be present in this book as it is in the others.
It is my second favourite of the collection
Vulcanverse is an ambitious collection of Open World Gamebooks by the authors of Fable Lands. You can start in any Vulcanverse book and travel between books having adventures. Even if each one can be read individually, this collection is more enjoyable when read as a whole. Each book has plenty of references to the others and is full of plots that are intertwined between each of its installments.
About this book
The land of Arcadia with is forests and fairies await you. This installment of Vulcanverse is, probably, the most difficult to complete of them all. In this book you will be tasked to bring back the splendor to Arcadia, which is not an easy task. It is also a task that will require you to travel through all the Vulcanverse to achieve it.
The locations on this one are full of luxury and life, and also full of dangers. As in Hammer of the Sun you will have an epic task to achieve, but in this case it will be more explicit and less hidden than in the other.
The writing is very colourful and it presents long and detailed paragraphs full of descriptions. Also, the humor will be present in this book as it is in the others.
It is my second favourite of the collection
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews