Item - Slaves of Rema

After a decent-enough first entry, followed by a tedious and crushingly difficult second offering, Tin Man's third GA app is a huge improvment. You are an Orlandrian who has been taken as an arena slave to the region of Rema, where slavery is still actively encouraged. Using a plot premise with more than a few overtones of Ridley Scott's Gladiator movie, you start in the arena, join an escape plot, and then set out to return home to Orlandes. There are at least three distinct paths to victory, each having its own unique features, with one even involving you acquiring the ability to use magic spells. Plotting is extensive and there is a lot of cause-and-effect in play as even seemingly minor initial choices will then drive what happens later in the adventure. Once you have escaped from Rema itself, the adventure starts to take on the feel of a Greek epic as you encounter cameos lifted directly from classic sagas, which adds greatly to the variety and enjoyment value of this app. Even an unavoidable key encounter in the final stage has numerous solutions and ways through it which shows just how much effort has gone into designing this gamebook. The difficulty-level is much more balanced than either of the first two offerings, with enough challenge to make you want to try to beat it, but it never becomes unfair. The black and white art is this time rendered from the first and third person perspectives depending on the image which can seem odd, but here it is rather more "painted" in style than the earlier apps and the paint almost seems caked-on in places giving a semi-dreamlike appearance. Overall, this feels much "bigger" than the previous two apps and is easily the best of the series so far, offering variety, interest, and considerable re-playability. Highly recommended.

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