Right, finally got around to the Happily ever after ending!
Gavin Sat Nov 26 12:35:14 2022
Due to New Day Rising one ending is now canonical, though prior to 2012 I would have preferred the Preacher ending. However like Eddie Vedder with Alive, the meaning of my own work changed for me.
jacob mccracken Wed Apr 19 00:43:44 2023
its great i love it
Josh Wed Jun 7 16:22:47 2023
I think this is probably the best amateur gamebook I've ever read.
Gavin Sun Jun 11 07:31:47 2023
Thank you
YARD Tue Aug 8 14:55:27 2023
So, this story was written nearly 25 years ago, huh? Back when the author was a little younger than me?
On one hand, I'll admit that the very fact of a playable story persisting like this, in this corner of the internet, for this long, is amazing in and of itself. On the other hand, it makes it even more remarkable that, according to all of the preceding discussion, no-one else has said the things I'm about to say now.
Basically, I discovered the FFProject quite recently, after not playing these stories for well over a decade, and was immediately hooked. After I got to Outsider after binging a handful of shorter stories first, I initially blasted through it in a single evening, getting to the ending
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where you become the next Defender and cleanse Altgarten
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in the early morning. I realized that the fact
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you cut down Eddora
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, as well as the lack of a blue footer which the best endings in other works on here have, clearly meant it was not intended to be ideal, and that I still had plenty more outcomes to try and discover.
After taking a break from FFProject, I came back and finally got (one of) the blue footer, "Congratulations" endings.
I still by far prefer the ending I got then.
Moreover, back when I first finished it, I was really torn between which FFProject I preferred more on here - this one or A Princess Of Zamarra.
By now, it's no contest. I think A Princess Of Zamarra is far superior.
I know, I know, it's not very fair to compare works done 20 years apart, with one more of a trailblazer and the other getting a massive benefit of hindsight. Yet, I must say that the more I tried to get the intended endings, the more things I found to actually, truly hate.
I hate that
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you still get blown up by the stick grenade even AFTER killing Eichlan and seeing his journal explain how it works and what it does. (I suspect you'll get killed by the sulfuric acid in the same way as well, but I haven't been interested in wasting the rare high-rolled characters capable of putting down that abomination just to test this.
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I hate that you get healed 6 points after completing the Copper contract, (or every time you
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cower in that tavern after Nightshade Phantom got a hit on you
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), yet you do not get healed at all between the necromancer contract and the Lasombra one, even though "weeks" pass between them? For that matter, you do not get healed in most other instances a lot of time passes between contracts either (i.e. between the Copper contract and the necromancer one, even though it's again a whole lot of time, or between Lasombra and subsequent contracts) but in those instances, you can at least heal somewhat by waiting to use psychic powers (even if you then choose the guild as the safest or the streets as the more potentially rewarding option) or just getting a ton of provisions, while in that case, you can at most use up precious blue potions.
I hate that after discovering the correct way to do the Lasombra quest on the first try
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drugs, take uniforms, go straight to the manager after the fight
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, before I got the Defender ending, the subsequent attempts of that quest to see if there was anything else had simply shown what a moron Black Aria really is. The supposed reader of philosophers cannot think of any better way to investigate
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gambling
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than whatever that entry was supposed to be? Nor think of anything more sophisticated to say to
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Morrigan
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than just blurting things out? Or indeed, just think to wear gloves (why wasn't he wearing them in the first place if he already stole the uniform!)
I hate that you can outright kill Copper's son, and
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he can still show up decades later when you search for the defender. Incredibly, according to the comments here, the game recognizes if you fled from him, but not if you actually killed him.
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I hate the one-scene zero-context walking plot device named Ariane (seriously, who is she? The only reasonable guess would seem to be
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the werewolf in the valley
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, but then why does she still show up regardless of the path you take to reach the count?)
I perhaps do not hate, but I am disappointed that no interaction with Morrigan (or with anything else) seems to matter the second time she potentially shows up in the story.
I am even more disappointed that
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the zombie servant is such an afterthought. Wood elves do not care about its presence, and neither do the castle guards at Perrereich, apparently. Worse, it somehow ends up in that psychic battle from the past (and basically always gets killed if it makes it that far). Coming from the skeleton tooth of A Princess of Zamarra, the contrast is shocking.
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YARD Tue Aug 8 15:29:49 2023
Outsider is so long, and so complicated (in all senses), that I need multiple comments to fit all opinions on it!
Anyway, yeah
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neither the elves, nor the father & daughter next to the unicorn, nor the guards at Arielburg (or something. Just remembered that it's certainly not Perrereich, as that is Prince's land) nor any other encounter takes note of that zombie. It would have been cool if while approaching the Lasombra drug den, attempting stealth forced you to leave the zombie outside, and he wouldn't have joined the fight until a few turns in.
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I am also disappointed in that
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no combination of past actions seems to have any bearing on that shadow elf, with the choice to approach her in different ways apparently completely meaningless.
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Same as the contract, really, which only seems to drain your luck, unless you are trying for that achievement.
For that matter: I am disappointed that
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when doing that contract, you get a reference to footpads attacking you in 632, where you are testing your luck, regardless of whether or not that actually happened.
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I also have no idea if "manage to manage it" in the same was intentionally written like that or not.
I should note that 25 (?) years on, there are still undeniable typos in certain entries (326 has "try to interrogation" and 828 misspells "psychic senses"). Hell, in the
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lead-up to the main endings, at 126, shouldn't it be "burn down the mansion" rather than "fire the mansion"?
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Perhaps not surprising in a story of this length, but unfortunate nevertheless. The second sentence in 324 is...maybe it was intended to read like that, but it's really weird, and I wonder if some other word was intended instead.
Finally, when I simply got the Defender ending, I thought that
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Eddora getting butchered
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was a downside. Now, I consider it yet another benefit.
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Simply put, I don't believe in their cringe romance. Aria's insistence on how he totally will never ever sleep with another woman again grew grating soon enough, and absolutely nothing about Eddora once she actually shows up makes this look remotely warranted. The whole speech about finding the beauty in sunrises is funny when she slits her own throat five seconds after you pick what should have been completely predictable response from her block-headed beloved. (Her being supposedly 93 at that point makes this even weirder.) The more canonical alternative is possibly the worst scene in this gamebook. It's incredibly dumb, same as the endgame it exists to enable. Simply throwing all of those assassins at the Prince as cannon fodder would have bypassed the whole prison bullshit with all those instakill forks and removed the whole basis for "third-best ending" to exist.
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I have to be honest, everything about the current ending is so dumb in context.
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Kandron finds out that the two strongest assassins in the world, and those with the best odds of killing him, have just broken out, and his reaction is...to immediately teleport HIMSELF in front of them, right before throwing away years, if not decades, of alliance-building work on a temper tantrum, and threatening the guy he had then turned his back to? As opposed to, you know, keeping quiet and teleporting some more guards/warriors into the dungeon first (the same guards who had potentially already managed to bring down both Aria and Eddora after all) and only then joining the fray?
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Then again, it's probably nothing next to the fact there is effectively no narrative reason for
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Aria and Eddora to even attack the Prince in the first place! The Prince wants to destroy assassins in general, and Aria opposed him because being an assassin was all that he had left outside of Eddora. But after he himself had disbanded his own guild on a whim, there is literally nothing keeping him (let alone Eddora) in Altgarten anymore! In fact, in both endings, they immediately leave the city anyway, never to return! Yeah, perhaps the Prince would have tried bringing them back into the city to get executed for his bow-wrapped victory proceedings anyway, but not only do they not know of his plans at this stage, they obviously have way better chances against inferior assassins or dark elf raiding parties or whatever then against hordes of guards on their home turf. The fact that in the canon endings, you let a Necromancer who had butchered untold number of people live and learnt from him for months, even though you knew he wasn't even your father, also gives lie to the idea either of you cared about what the continued vampiric rule would do to the city.
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YARD Tue Aug 8 15:43:22 2023
There are also timeline inconsistencies between endings. I don't really get how come
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the army of Arielburg, arriving soon after you burn down the mansion at night, apparently fails to do anything about your execution the morning after if you fail to break out. I certainly don't get how come they do not show up in the YEARS which elapse between Eddora's suicide and Aria's own after he says no to her. Further, if the Count was able to find out where Aria really was in Altgarten, how come Eddora does not find Aria in Arielburg in the ending where he never returns to the assassination business and assumes the role of the heir right after saving Alfred from a boar? She claims she left in the first place because she was afraid of Aria turning to darkness: if she is not lying, then how does him becoming a count not allay her fears?
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Another subtle, yet ridiculously large inconsistency:
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That whole conversation in the jail cell, with Aria screaming at Eddora that the dark elven eschatology is wrong and there's not going to be anything after death, is a blatant example of what TVTropes calls Author Tract. It's not that I would disagree in the real world: it's that this position makes ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE in Titan - and there 0% chance Aria could say that with a straight face if he faced the wraiths in the tomb, or if he had summoned his mother's spirit.
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Lastly, I simply do not believe that
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a moron who killed his apparently most promising follower for mentally doubting the value of the organization he himself then outright disbanded on a whim HOURS later, before their own greatest fight, and the spouse who murdered two random whores FOR NO REAL REASON right before their meeting would do anything good for Arielburg, Right-Hand Side (which apparently failed to restrain Aria in any way, since there is zero difference between his behaviour if he turned away from the Defender's path and if he never met the Defender) or not. Arielburg unbelievably transforming itself from a land "shackled in chains of poverty", with one stone building in the realm, to "one of the most prosperous kingdoms" in a few...years? since you have saved Alfred is a cherry on top. Not to mention that getting there REQUIRES Aria to allow a Necromancer who did unspeakable crimes to countless people of his city to keep doing that indefinitely (right before participating in it for months, of course) - not something I see a remotely worthwhile leader doing.
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....Yeah. Don't get me wrong, I still find a lot to admire about this gamebook, from the way it designs the combat encounters to all of the dry humour and the sociological observations which are consistently great. It strengths are indeed very strong - so strong that it seems like practically everyone to date chose to overlook its glaring weaknesses.
Gavin Wed Aug 9 03:33:15 2023
Ariane was a reference to Herman Hesse's Steppenwolf, and was pretty self indulgent admittedly. Aria's lack of tactics are due to the supposed lithe assassin being overtaken by his burly narrator, I wouldn't have any idea what to do either. At the time of the Asssassin's Guild he's supposed to be deep into alcoholic madness, which did not mirror what I was doing in real life at all. I miss the part where he refuses to sleep with anyone else? Does he actually say that? Not endingoing without a massive boss fight would be anticlimactic. Othe rise thanks for taking the time for such detailed analysis, the flaws and mistakes are true enough.
YARD Thu Aug 10 03:17:24 2023
Ah, so what you encounter in the valley is basically the opening scene of the Berserk manga in reverse? Likewise, it seems like some of the Defenders' moral code has actually been based on that of Apostles from the same?
I must say, one of the things I really like is the way you get a completely different impression of the Defender depending on how you approach him. People really can behave very differently depending on the context, even if the fiction can often forget it.
Likewise, Salome is very sympathetic if you approach her acting smart, and is little different from any other vampire if you pick the dumb options. Not that you can't work she is a vampire when she lets you use the library and explicitly refers to the Embrace, of course. That's one reason I do not feel bad about taking on that bonus contract, unless vampires in Titan actually have the self-control to feed without taking everything their prey needs.
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If they do, my impression of the Grand Councillor shoots all the way up from "Complicated" to "Actually pretty good".
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Speaking of
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When Salome says she might have to Embrace Fiorentino, doesn't this directly contradict Prince's claim that he has the sole control over Embrace?
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And yeah, in two out of the three Arielburg endings
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The one where you accept becoming Alfred's heir immediately, and the one where you defeat the ghost you irresponsibly summoned and forgot about but lose Eddora to poor dice rolls
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We are literally told just that. Every other time a woman besides Eddora turns up, he either looks on with outright disdain or goes "She reminds me of Eddora", and it gets predictable very quickly.
And I suppose my point is that the whole Master of Assassins plotline is cool when you first get there as a reward for finally getting past that difficult cat-and-mouse game, but logically it falls apart once you notice that you are supposedly waging this epic battle vs. the ever-growing law enforcement - all while still sitting in the exact same stinking tavern as always! It's like when in "bigger" video games, they are limited somewhat in the locations they can have the player visit - but here, there are no assets to render, and the written word can describe however many locations you like!
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Even if we assume the Prince, Councillor, et al. weren't sure of the full extent of the assassins' activities at Pied Cow (which seems unlikely when considering all the rich kids showing up, there would have been no doubt left by the time they got to Jorah. Once Aria killed the Councillor, the Watch would have had Pied Cow surrounded the next day/night (depending on whether the Prince himself and perhaps some other nobility decide to show up or not and probably just burnt the whole thing down if they didn't feel like taking losses.
Aria's first order after taking charge would have had to be to decamp ASAP, and then either somehow try to establish a new meeting place which their clients would still trust and wouldn't have gotten raided as soon as the Watch captures someone alive or (much more likely) just throw literally everyone who didn't get cold feet after losing the Pied Cow at the Prince in revenge and hope for the best.
At that point, you could work Eddora back in as well - perhaps she just coincidentally returns the same night (same coincidence as the dark elf trio showing up at the same time you disband the Guild) or perhaps she was already captured by Kandron and her knowledge of Aria and the underworld was passed on to the Prince and her existence used as a bargaining chip. (In fact, it would be more interesting if the Grand Councillor lied about where he got the information from, so that even if he loses, he still gets one final laugh by getting you to take out an integral part of the assassination business regardless.)
Either way, you would still get to an epic final battle, yet one which makes far more sense.
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YARD Thu Aug 10 03:29:23 2023
A couple more questions/comments.
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I am not sure if Titan's vampires are outright burned by the sunlight, but they clearly hate it regardless. So, when the Prince left Alfred unable to sire heirs, was it in a night battle? Or was he somehow not a vampire yet?
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Similarly
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Perrereich is very clearly much stronger than Arielburg when you first visit it, and I do not really buy that the count was suddenly so transformed by meeting you, he was able to improve everything so quickly in a few years. How, then, does the ending where Arielburg's army shows up to the city the night Prince dies and his mansion burns not lead to Perrereich waging war right after? That alone would have been enough even without the whole "making most wanted assassin our new leader" thing.
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I am also interested in what triggers the entry where you start searching for the Defender and find out that Anne and the beggar are now in way better place than before (while you lose 2 Luck). Is it a random dice roll, or is it connected to some of your preceding choices?
Gavin Thu Aug 10 03:35:07 2023
All the material about vampires was ripped wholesale from Vampire The Masquerade. In which context, vampires don't have to obey the prince, the Prince only has as much power as they can enforce, like a medieval prince. I had no norion of Berserk at the time and only know it from TV Tropes now. Otherwise you've put more thought into this than I did, though perhaps our assassin hero is just unimaginative.
YARD Thu Aug 10 05:34:15 2023
Yeah, I am not much of a manga/anime scene connoisseur myself, and I didn't read that much of Berserk (as opposed to about Berserk) but I do know it is probably the most influential manga of the 1990s, and it famously inspired quite a few things in Dark Souls. (As well as much of the original Drakengard, and many other works I can't name right now.)
Its creator, Miura, also started on it as a teen - I think he was a little younger than you were at the time of finishing Outsider when its publication began. Predictably, its backstory is very much what we would now call edgy, and the very first scene is of protagonist (named Guts, as his mother was already swinging from a tree along a dozen other people, heavily pregnant, before his actual "birth") fucking a blonde woman who transforms into a monster during the act before he shoots her with a gun hidden in his severed arm's metal stump. You can see why I thought there were parallels!
And imo, possibly the most interesting thing about otherwise not-that-distinct medieval Europe dark fantasy is how evil works there. There are four main evil deities there (at least, initially) and they are very reminiscent of Warhammer's Chaos Gods (had to check to make sure Warhammer was first). The thing is, serving any of them in Warhammer will almost certainly cost your sanity soon (along with deformities in some cases) and progression is not only very dangerous for life all along but the ultimate prize, becoming nigh-immortal Demon Prince, may well short-circuit and turn you into a gibbering Chaos Spawn. (serving all four as Chaos Undivided is a little less dangerous, but has no chance of becoming a Prince and will probably turn you into a weak and tormented winged demon once you die.)
Instead, all you are asked to do in Berserk is to sacrifice whoever is closest to you. Once you do that, you become an Apostle - a being that cannot die of old age and can either switch between a human and much stronger and more animalistic form at will, or at least always lives as semi-humanoid, semi-animal. Some can also convert humans into other beings loyal to them (Pseudo-Apostles). You are not asked to do anything afterwards - the only "rule" for the Apostles is Do as thou wilt. This is what makes it really disturbing - with such a low entry barrier, there is so much risk anyone you love can do that, and perhaps the pressure to do it first. In all, it is another overlap I found funny.
Thank you for the kind words! I hope that by the time I get around to submitting a gamebook of my own, it won't disappoint!
Gavin Thu Aug 10 06:22:01 2023
Baggy Anne and the beggar are always better off, I don't know the other two answers sorry
YARD Sat Aug 12 11:20:22 2023
Yes, but my point is that you do not always get to see that ref (866) telling you that they are now better off. I just went for a couple more short runs, and some of them do show it, but the others just skip straight to 671 ("You finally come to the realisation that the your usual contacts are unlikely to know the location of Defender. They are the kind of people whom he usually kills, and thus they would be inclined to avoid him".)
Perhaps I might get that yellow text from FFProject telling me the reason why this can happen? I experimented with doing a few things differently, but I'm still not sure what might be behind it.
Also, my previous message, about Berserk and its parallels with your work, got held up by the website's word filter, so you probably haven't seen it yet. If you are interested, you can scroll up a bit.
Lastly, does the Copper's house not have any windows? I just keep wondering how come you have no other option but to go through the front door - and concurrently, how come fighting an indefinite number of Watchmen outside it does not awaken anyone on the inside.
You see 866 only if you fail a hidden PSYCHIC/SKILL test and choose the 'information' option at 881.
YARD Sun Aug 13 13:18:26 2023
OK, thanks for that explanation.
I also wonder how the thieves' cut for the Fiorentino job was calculated. They ask 300 GP from you, but your actual fee was 2550? Is it because they also want a cut of the profits from his saber's jewels?
It also seems like you always give them 300, regardless of whether you complete it or not. (And if you accept the bribe, it's also 300, and not 1000).
All of those numbers are completely meaningless in-game, of course, but it's an interesting observation.
MPerera Sun Sep 17 01:20:08 2023
Completed all the challenges! It's been a while since I originally played this, so I needed a few playthroughs to remember everything.
Of all the gamebooks on this site, Outsider! in my second favorite (#1 is House of Horror, just because House of Hell was the first FF gamebook I discovered, and it's still my favorite because of that).
Paul Sun Sep 17 22:47:27 2023
There are things I can nitpick, parts that unbalanced and luck based but holy ****ing the writing is on another level compared to any FF book on this site or otherwise. The gameplay is good but a bit wonky at times, but the writing is leagues and leagues above anyting else