One of my big nerdjoy moments recently was when I found a virtual Choose your Own Adventure book while adventuring in Skyrim, titled Kolb and the Dragon.
And that got me remembering all the big predictions and promises at the dawn of ebooks and tablet computing about living, interactive books.
And that made me think of all the awesome IF games I used to enjoy, such as Zork and Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
And then I ran downstairs to our library and grabbed a handful of my “interactive” books, pictured above.
There are, of course, the classic CYOA books, like Space Vampire, and the awesome new breed of CYOA books, like the Choose-o-matic series from Matt Youngmark.
In fact, he did create one specifically intended to be easily played on your tablet or phone: U, Robot.
Some CYOA books, such as Wizards, Warriors and You, present an option in the story itself to choose between a set of characters, and then continue the adventure as the chosen character, increasing the variety of readings.
But there were also books that tried to take it even further, incorporating character stats and other RPG elements.
