What is an interactive adventure book?
An interactive adventure book is interactive fiction in book form: a story cut into numbered sections where, at the end of each passage, the reader chooses what happens next and turns to the section indicated. The same book can be read many ways, with several endings. Many add a character sheet and dice; others are choices alone.
The genre goes by several names: gamebook, branching story, interactive fiction, or choose-your-own-adventure book, after the American series that made the format famous. In print, the reader turns the pages; online, the book is read in the browser and the page keeps the accounts. That is the form you will find on JDR Ninja.
Where it comes from
The genre was born in English. In the United States, a series launched in 1979 gave the format its everyday English name; in the United Kingdom, Fighting Fantasy, by Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone, began in 1982 and added a character sheet and dice-driven fights.
In France, the collection Gallimard launched in 1984 first translated those series; its title, “Un livre dont vous êtes le héros” (a book in which you are the hero), became the everyday French name of the genre. Lone Wolf, by Joe Dever, began the same year and added a hero who carries on from one book to the next.
The genre never went away. The founding series are back in print, new titles appear for children and adults alike, and the format has settled online, where the page keeps the accounts in the reader's place.
Reading one online
On JDR Ninja, interactive adventure books are read in Fatum, the catalogue of adventures published by their authors. You open an adventure in your browser, you read, you choose: the page keeps the character sheet, rolls the dice when the book asks for them and saves your run at every choice, so you can pick it up later. No account is needed to read.
Looking for a short solo role-playing game to play tonight instead? That is not a book written in advance: the game draws situations and you write the story. Those games have their own page on JDR Ninja. Fabula's solo role-playing games
Writing your own
Writing an interactive adventure book starts with drawing branches: every scene opens onto choices, paths split and meet again, and every ending has to stay reachable. Then comes deciding on a system, or doing without one: a character sheet, items, dice tests, or choices alone. Last comes reading every path the way a reader will follow it.
On JDR Ninja, Fatum's workshop is built for that: you write the scenes and the choices in your browser, you declare your own rules if your story wants them, you test, then you publish under your name.
Would you rather read first what the engine can do? Read the Fatum guide
Glossary
- Gamebook
- A book you read by playing: the reader makes choices, sometimes keeps a character sheet, sometimes rolls dice. It is the generic word for the format; this page mostly says interactive adventure book, the same thing in plainer words.
- LDVELH
- The abbreviation of “livre dont vous êtes le héros”, the everyday French name of the genre, common among French-speaking readers and collectors. It names the whole genre, not one collection.
- Interactive fiction
- A story whose course the reader influences, on any medium: a gamebook, a text adventure on a computer, a branching story online. It is the broadest term, and the most common one in English.
- Solo role-playing game
- A role-playing game played alone, with no game master: the game draws situations and questions, and you write the story as you go, where an adventure book is written in advance. On JDR Ninja, those games live on Fabula. See the solo role-playing games
How it works
The book is cut into numbered sections. Each one tells a moment of the story and ends with one or more choices, each pointing at another section. Paths split, others meet again further on, and some lead to an ending, good or bad.
Many adventure books also keep a state: a character sheet with a few values, an inventory, scores or code words noted as you read. A choice can then depend on what you carry, or on what you did earlier.
When the book asks for it, a dice test settles an uncertain situation: a fight, an escape, a stroke of luck. Endings are many, and a lost run starts again from the beginning or from a chosen section.
Read in a browser, the book takes care of everything that distracts on paper: the page keeps the character sheet, rolls the dice, applies the rules and remembers the section you are on. All that is left to you is the story and the choices.