This is a card game version of three gamebooks with a top down 3D environment simply for illustration.

There are many FF games on Steam, from book ports, to game versions like this. FF Legends is based on the books City of Thieves, The Warlock of Firetop Mountain and Citadel of Chaos. Firetop already has a game version on Steam, the game mechanic here is different, you're not making any movement choices in combat, it's your card vs. the opponent card and you roll against each other for the outcome.

Originally these are dice and choice books, FF Legends keeps these elements, so when you decide to go one path, that's it, you might be able to circle back the other way later, particularly if you die, but it's still a version of turn to page X for this or to page Y for that. And the cards are the enemies you fight and items and spells you pick up.

Unlike the four part version of Sorcery on Steam, you don't get constant access to the world map, or any rewinds to undo poor decisions (you can avoid perma-death though through game options here). On the other hand, here you build up your dice the whole time to increase your chances when it comes to fights and tests of luck. So once you become more powerful, you're less likely to be dying at the hands of common criminals in the port, for example.

If you are happy with that mechanic, then this is a fun way to open out the text. My only personal preference would have been to retain the original book art for the relevant cards, as many of the other game adaptations on Steam have in one way or another - but if you're not attached to those, then you won't miss them.

BOTTOM LINE: as others have said, it's fun to play and attractively priced - you will only be let down if you don't know what to expect and think this is something other than a card based version of gamebooks played with dice.

Firstly, there is relatively little text in this game, so in that sense it is not like a Fighting Fantasy book.

It does faithfully recreate the events of City of Thieves in the Port Blacksand section, but the way it works seems very much a grind. There is no way to save game or retrace steps, which means if you wish to try turning left rather than right at a given intersection you must return to the start of the city and complete the earlier section again.

There seems to be no way of scrolling around to look at the city and check where you have been before. This makes it tempting to get out a pen and paper to make sure you don't take a wrong turn, and have to start the city yet again. It seems like a time wasting mechanism, rather than good game design.

If you happen to die you receive penalties to two of your dice. To cut a long story short, this makes your slim chances almost impossible, unless you spend 20 gold to remove these penalties. 20 gold is a lot, so to get it you will have to grind random encounters. The other alternative is to fight random monsters until you increase experience and become unbeatable, aslo by grinding random encounters.

In short, the game felt too random and repetitive to be fun.

As a 40-something that remembers these gamebooks fondly, this game is a real treat, even more so than the Tin Man gaming reproductions of the books that have been available here on steam for a while. This book ties in 3 of the first 4 fantasy game books from the early 1980's into one long quest quite well. It is an amazing buy for 10$ and I am left hoping that they will quickly add other books to the existing system.

Having gown up in the golden age of Fighting Fantashy I looked forward to this game, and I wasn't disappointed in the slightest. This is an amazing game it brought flooding back teen days working my way through Warlock of Firetop Mountain and Citadel of Chaos sheer bliss.

In itself the game does what it says on the tin a journey round a part of Titan meeting the bad guys from the books simple to play but lots of choices to make which can affect the outcome of play. The achivements also fit well with the game.

For modern gamers used to multiple save points this will be a challenge but that was the joy of the books slowly unwrap what the adventure had to hold by trying failing amd learning to do better.

Brilliant Adaption this should go far and with a huge range of Books to base more content this would never get old.

Like many, I grew up reading the Fighting Fantasy series. Each book taking you on an adventure where you would battle ferocious monsters and try to defeat villainous tyrants. You might not always win but that was the point. The next time you read the book you could make different choices and learn from your previous mistakes.

Playing Fight Fantasy Legends evokes exactly that same feeling, except this time, you are on a huge adventure to defeat three of the Fighting Fantasy series' greatest villains. You get three books for the price of one.

Playing the game and reading the text took me right back to how it felt to read the gamebooks. Nomad have done a terrific job in capturing the feeling of the Fighting Fantasy series.

It is beautifully designed too. As you play you'll notice lots of detail in the landscape and locations. The textures and animations make it very pretty to look at. Sound and music again are top-notch. I appreciated the individual character walk cycles too. You can see the weight and slight waddle to the dwarf as he walks and the sprightly strides of the long legged elf. There's lots of attention to detail here.

As I played I was continually surprised by game mechanics and the way that specific choices and actions would have consequences later in the game. Again, it echoed playing the original game book series perfectly.

As has been said, this is the closest you will get to playing a Fighting Fantasy book. Nomad have designed and produced a brilliant game. New players can look forward to a really fun fantasy based RPG taking them on a fantastic adventure where YOU are the hero!.

Ok. This probably sounds contradicting.
Yes, I have spent hours playing this game. I completed it once. Still, I cannot recommend it.
Why? Because it is frustratingly random. The mechanics, the story - everything is bizarre. I walk into a tavern and approach the barkeeper. He draws his dagger shouting he doesn't serve strangers. I attack. He opens a trapdoor behind the bar and a troll jumps out. I kill the troll. The barkeeper apologizes and offers me a free drink.
Seriously?
Very few options, some with absolutely bizarre outcomes. "Do you want to be pleasant or demand answers forcefully?" - Be pleasant. - "He is enraged by your pleasantries!"
Most annoying is the fact that most of the time you cannot go back. E.g. there are multiple, always linear ways to cross a city. You have to do this multiple times, leaving and entering the city again, to get to all the points of interest. With no map to help you! Very frustrating. Oh - and do not hesitate to attack and kill every shopkeeper you come across and break into every house that sparks your interest. Sometimes it's an easy and cheap way to get the items you need. And no worries, you will be forgiven all atrocities and become the cheered hero nonetheless.
In the end I kept at it just to see what kind of bizarre ideas I would come across. Like the golden flower that turns into gold coins when it touches dog blood.

When you die the game makes you repeat a lot, and I mean a lot of steps that do not pose any challenge and is just a waste of time. It is not very fun.

If you like Ian Livingstone & Steve Jackson's classic gamebooks then you will most likely love this new format game.

It takes the basic elements of their classic books "The Warlock Of Firetop Mountain", "The Citadel Of Chaos" & "City Of Thieves" and builds them into a combined trilogy adventure, but with various twists.

The combat system uses different style dice, which can be upgraded/penalised and the encounters in many locations are drawn from a random card pack (monsters/events/items etc).
You have the freedom to travel around the map of Allansia searching for items from the various locations which are required to overcome the evil Zagor, Balthus Dire & Zanbar Bone in their respective lairs. You may need an item from one location to help defeat a villain in another.

Choose from three different player-characters (i like the Elf) & various skills/bonuses that you can start with.
There are also three difficulty levels (adventurer,hero,legend) and each of these levels has a "hardcore hero" option, where you have only one life. (Try and defeat all 3 archvillains on legend difficulty in hardcore hero mode! It's a challenge, but i got there.)
There can be a certain repetitiveness if you play long enough to complete all achievements etc, but the game is so enjoyable and the rules are so simple that it is great fun and the developers have certainly achieved the most important thing of all - they have perfectly captured the nostalgia of the original books.
I sat on the fence for a while before finally buying this game and i am soooooo pleased that i finally did buy it. It is superb v.f.m.
I really hope that Nomad Games decide to translate some more of these gamebooks to this format either as DLC expansions or newgame trilogies. Thank-you!

Ok, I've never heard of 'Fighting Fantasy' before I picked up this game, but watching some pre-release video of the game made it look interesting. It's a fun time-burner at a $10 price point, but after about 20 hours or so sunk into the game there's nothing left to do.

Basically I'd describe it by calling it a Choose-your-own-adventure book meets an RPG. The combat system is dice-based, but encounters are card drawn. As you progress in the game, you earn more faces for your die, improving your odds of overcoming combat or luck resolutions.

Once you complete all three level of difficulty there's not much replay left, aside from hunting down achievements. The developer, Nomad Games, is good about listening to player feedback and bug reports, and so far has been fast on the hot fixes.

If you have a household where more than one person will be playing, I'd definately reccomend it. A couple of kids who want to play it when you're done makes the purchase more than worthwhile.

If the game has any other major downside though, it's that you can't have multiple save games at a given time. You only have one save slot available to you.

I really liked this game at first. I really got the vibe of reading those old "choose your adventure" books so long ago. However, that vibe was ruined by a huge pacing problem; namely, using stupid trial and error as a core game mechanism. You could say all those old books used it to an extent, but it is really bad in this form, as you cannot just flip back to the page before you took the bad action.

Problem is, at many key points in the game, the only way to progress is to stumble upon the one solution the game decided will work, and if you don't choose right, you get to run through the dungeon again! Because you can't turn around (not kidding)! Sooo, have fun! Enjoy having the exact same encounters, clicking the exact same dialogue choices, putting up with the few random event tiles you pass as you repeat ad-nauseam the same exact dungeon until you make one of the very limited choices the game decided was right.

Trial and error as the core game mechanism. Oh ya!

What'd you say? You want to use acid to melt through that metal combination locked door? Nop, good luck finding the combination (hint: go do another quest). You say you gotta fight a rapidly regenerating monster of myth and legend, don't you DARE try to burn it with fire using magic or an oil lamp! You have to "use your Head"; meaning do what we decided was the correct thing to do. You have to kill some nasty hard-to-kill dude, but your quest-giver forgot what combination of items to use to kill him? Sucks to be you, hu? Trial and error for the win (enjoying running though the dungeon again)!

This design is acceptable in a book, but not in a computer game that is unbound by nearly all of the same restrictions. It is lazy to not take advantage of the medium, using it to surpass what came before.

What I thought I was buying was a better version of a classic "Fighting Fantasy" book, and it is what I and alot of other people were expecting when they saw the claim that "Thousands of choices ensure that no two game are ever the same". That is not what I got; instead I got what some might call a "faithful" adaption; speaking blunting, that means a lazy cut and paste job.

My 6 hour play time is it for one complete play-through, so not sure if you consider this a good investment. Additionally, I did some unintended grinding looking for something below the city, and wandering around the most dangerous port city ever conceived (remember: no turning around)!

Immersion is almost non-existent. Really, poison-gas traps on the city streets? Why are people even living here? Not to mention the hordes of guards I slaughtered just walking through this hell-hole; even working here is hell. Also, some of the events are total BS. Beyond gas in the streets, there is a strangling rope, just "there" for some reason, and you can get beaten and robbed by dwarfs, without an opportunity to even fight them if you make the luck check.

After beating the game, I unlocked hard difficult. No thanks. This game was not hard, it was lazy, and in many cases, did not respect me, my time, or my thoughts on the situation, disregarding them and forcing me to play though it until I did as it wanted. As such, it was extremely annoying to play thorough.

If you want an immersion game that with engaging combat, do not play this. Instead, play "The Warlock of Firetop Mountain", which takes you through a FAR better version of Firetop Mountain that this game offers you.