Item - The Rings of Saturn

Like much of this series, the writing is pretty good, although sometimes it's a little childish here, as in your average CYOA book. The story can also seem a little flat. However, there are some neat science tidbits and some peculiar, interesting side trips, and some well-designed mechanics that loop you back into the story and away from the final ending. Unfortunately the ending is just OK, and not as satisfying as it could have been. One interesting note is that some of the jumps in the book are in space, not in time. Incidentally, there is a huge ripoff of Isaac Asimov's Laws of Robotics on page 40. You can see my map of the book here.

More reviews by DavidSky

This is probably the most unusual book in the series. The option of visiting the future is certainly a change of pace from the rest of the series, though the book manages to maintain a similar style to the other books - the future world feels almost as well developed as the historically-based pasts of other volumes. There aren't any entirely new ideas here, but this is still one of the best sci-fi gamebooks I've read by far.

More reviews by Demian

I thought this story was pretty good, giving the reader what seems like a number of potential paths to your goal. I actually like the ripoff of Asimov's 3 laws of robotics, they seem like a good set of rules to live by and something that the young reader might find familiar when they get older and read Asimov. Star Trek is kind of ripped off, with a reference to "dilithium crystals," and this time travel story does a good job of not allowing you to take something from the future (previously unknown) back to your time.

More reviews by Dtar

Being the only Time Machine book to take place in the future rather than the past, The Rings of Saturn is a little hard to peg. It's more like a sci-fi Choose Your Own Adventure book, although there's still some of the "feel" that sets Time Machine apart from CYOA intact.

Although the world of the future was well-conceived in a cheesy comic book kind of way, I should complain that at times the book's internal logic baffled me (spoilers ahead). When confronted with a choice of two people who might be able to help you get into space, the correct one is indicated by... the fact that he has a bracelet with a rocket ship on it. More so than that, once you make it through space academy you're offered your choice of posting, on Mars or Venus. The correct choice is Mars, because... it's closer to Saturn. I guess the author thought that would equate to being closer to their goal in a young reader's mind, but not having the benefit of reading the book as a child, I didn't see why being posted geographically closer necessarily meant I was more likely to be assigned to a mission to Saturn.

If the logical hoops don't bother you, go ahead and give The Rings of Saturn a look. There's certainly nothing else in the series like it.

More reviews by Fireguard

[Rating: 1/10]
[Recommended? NO]

While the promising potential of the premise in the Time Machine adventure "The Rings of Saturn" is at least partially well-handled, there were particularly few redeeming components to save the quest from its prominent, pitiful weaknesses. It's unfortunate how the dangers are kept at arm's length even though the era's appealing visual-oriented choice-based design system fares well as far as reader immersiveness goes. The writing drifts from uninspired and clunky to very much aware of the narrative's potential, but - as with the majority of the books in the series - I think the adventure would've been more enjoyable had it avoided limiting itself to a single correct path; the inventory selection at the start is a bit arbitrary, I might add, and less seamlessly woven into the story compared to the databank, use of setting and handling of "characters". While the year it takes place in may be the then-distant year of 2085 AD, you won't find too many pointers suggesting a whole lot of imagination was put into the writing of this quest apart from what had commonly been covered in existing documents/research books or documentaries at the time this was written (in this case, theoretical observations made in science fiction were the most used "documentary" body of research, to be sure); though the research isn't exactly dated, per se, retrospectively there are parts scattered about here and there which feel a bit incomplete.

These books, which in all truth are merely self-indulgent and hard-to-find excursions into a different point in time, appear hyper-focused on their short-lived novelty value - a real shame, since the design and the execution of the linear quest itself isn't all that great to begin with. With the exception of collectors of the series or the most ardent of pseudo-history buffs, I'm afraid I can't recommend this title or any of its time-traveling trepidations. ^^

(Mysteriously disappears into the shadows.)

More reviews by Shadeheart