Item - Assassin!

The biggest problem with Assassin! is that it doesn't really have much of a plot - you are trying to get home and are constantly inconvenienced by strangers trying to kill you. There's some good segments, particularly the escape from Quench-Heart Keep at the start and a run-in with some troublemakers from Talisman of Death, but it does begin to get a bit tiresome after a while. Even the authors seem to get a bit bored with it as most of the encounters in the second half feel rushed and/or pointless. The battle at the end is quite well designed but it lacks any dramatic punch.

On the plus-side, there are quite a few paths to victory and the writing is tighter than that in Avenger!. The ninja-skills are also better balanced, with all of them having some use. However, this is all off-set by the harsh difficulty of the book. Even on the optimum path, you have to make quite a few lucky rolls and anyone who hasn't brought a few power-ups from Avenger! with them is going to struggle.

So while it is still worth reading for the good writing and setting, Assassin! fails to match the standard set by Avenger!.

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