Lost Worlds is a "combat picture book game" designed by Alfred Leonardi and originally published in 1983 by Nova Game Designs. The game has had many publishers, including Chessex, Emithill, Flying Buffalo and Greysea. In 1984, Lost Worlds won the Charles Roberts/Origins Award for Best Fantasy Boardgame of 1983.
A minor resurgence in published books occurred over 2004-5, with 5 new titles published in 2004 (4 of them by a new licensee, 1% Inspiration Games), a further 2 published in June 2005 (both with photo illustrations rather than graphics), and another early in 2007/ There is also a further series of books, of emphatically female fighter-types and under the collective title of "Queen's Blade", published from late 2005 by Hobby Japan. These books (currently 12 released and 4 more in production), have proved however to be in general new (hentai-ish) illustrations to existing combat matrices, rather than "new" characters (although at least one doujin has utilised what appears to be a "new matrix", and one of the latest HobbyJapan volumes is said to be an original matrix). Most recently (December 2007), a second series, Queen's Gate, has been announced, featuring characters from Japanese visual media.
The Leonardi move-matrix system has also been "borrowed" by other publishers, notably "BattleBooks" and Games Workshop as the engine to drive their own combat picture book games.
Gameplay
Play requires two players and at least two "visual combat books", with each player choosing a character (i.e., a book) from those available. At the start of play, each player removes the character sheet for that character from their book and hands the book to his or her opponent. The character sheet lists the various combat actions which the character can take during the battle. The combat book lists the effects of the attacks in tables, and serves as a visual reference for what the other player is doing. Hence, each player views entries in the book from a first-person perspective, seeing only their opponent and not themselves. During each turn or combat phase, players secretly select an action from those shown on their card, possibly influenced by the results of previous turns. Players then simultaneously reveal their intended action, by number, to each other. Using the character sheet to cross-reference their action with that of their opponent, players then turn to a specific entry in the book they are holding in order to determine the results. These effects may include hit point loss (i.e., a wound), as well as any restrictions on the opponent's next move (which is read aloud to them). The first character to reduce their opponent to zero hit points wins. To add complexity and variety, certain characters have special abilities -- the Cave Troll and the Unicorn, for example, can Regenerate; several characters (beginning with the Fighter-Mage) can use Magic Spells (although there are now 3 different spell systems, formulated by different publishers); several can infect an opponent with either poison or disease, which then cause damage automatically in every round of combat. Some characters can fly; others have magic weapons. In addition to Magic (represented by cards), there are also cards for Tactics and Luck, with characters having differing access to these, depending on their statistics.
External links
- Flying Buffalo's home page for the game
- Gamebooks.org description of the game and list of available game books
- Lost Worlds at BoardGameGeek
- Queen's Blade official site and secondary site (Japanese)
