Item - The Vietnam War

I found the historical material presented in this book very interesting. I also appreciated the fact that it strives to be neutral about the conflict it describes, and that it succeeds at it most of the time (I have serious doubts a gamebook which so openly questioned the U.S.'s role in Vietnam would have been approved for American publication back in the eighties). However, the book suffers from the same flaws as many other You Choose historical entries: the three adventures presented are way too short to be of much substance, and the choices are just an excuse to lazily paste together a series of disjointed events instead of providing an engaging gameplay experience. Considering the author is responsible for the decent World War II Spies, this really should have been a whole lot better.

More reviews by Guillermo

As a child of the 80s, I know the US has a complex relationship to the Vietnam war (or as it's known in Vietnam: the American war). On one hand you have introspective films like Full Metal Jacket and Born on the 4th of July, while on the other hand you have First Blood part 2, which is basically John Rambo going back and winning the Vietnam war by himself. Fortunately, this book takes a rather balanced approach.

The three choices at the start are to be a US volunteer soldier, a young South Vietnamese student deciding which side to be on, or an American student protestor.

The US soldier doesn't try to glorify the character, having to make tough choices about orders and war crimes.

The South Vietnamese student, a perspective usually ignored, has to make both ideological and survival choices and might be the most interesting path.

The student protestor is confronted with legal questions about draft dodging and college deferments.

It suffers from paths which are far too short as they try to show the variety of options. And it includes some violent deaths. But this is a standard problem with the format of this series.

Overall, I'd say its a relatively balanced introduction for young people to a complex political time and safer than showing them Full Metal Jacket.

More reviews by Kveto