Gamebooks (Choose Your Own Adventure Style)

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  The Lost Jewels of Nabooti Alternate Endings Part 9


Clearly trying to fight the helicopter kidnappers isn't the answer.  I'll cooperate with them in CHOICE #9 instead.  My captors are much more conciliatory toward me in this timeline, and offer to "pay you anything you want".  One of them explains that the Jewels of Nabooti can be "used for good or evil."  He claims the people I was dealing with before (Molotawa?) were really the evil faction, and my captors on the helicopter are really the good guys.  Any attempt at moral complexity will probably be ridiculous coming from the author who wrote 2 CYOAs starring a villain called the Evil Power Master.


We're currently "scurrying" above the French countryside.  A strange verb of a helicopter to perform.  CHOICE #13 is to either stall for time, or join forces with the kidnappers.  The former leads to another branch, so I'll go ahead and post the latter option that leads to an ending.


"As you gaze down at the green country below you, you see an orange flash.  It looks like a Fourth of July rocket.  But it is speeding toward you!  BALOOM!  SCROSH!  It's all over.  The rocket hits the helicopter.  You are finished.  The End".


The Star-Spangled Banner is probably playing as background music right now.  No timeline where the kidnappers are telling the truth about being the real heroes?  An illustration shows a rocket pointing downwards toward the reader, with many lines going toward the edge of the picture.  (Probably to indicate speed.)

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  The Lost Jewels of Nabooti Alternate Endings Part 10


Stalling for time in the CHOICE #13 helicopter makes me ask for proof that the kidnappers are really the good guys.  "For all I know, you are all bandits".  Their leader tells me to have faith, but I think about the time they shot the car with machine guns earlier in the story.  A surprising amount of continuity for an RA Montgomery book, if events a few CHOICEs before are consistent.  I beg for the kidnappers to take me back to America because I don't want to look for the Jewels of Nabooti anymore.  They oblige.


This experience takes me. . .to page 9.  The same page that would have happened if I had asked for more time in CHOICE #1.  Our hero must either get over the trauma quickly, or have rapid-onset retrograde amnesia.


I tell Peter I don't know what's going on, and he says he doesn't blame me.  We go to his house taking detours to avoid potential pursuers.  Peter says his father wasn't intimidated by messages demanding that the Jewels of Nabooti be returned to the tribe they came from, and was killed in a "tragic accident".  Was RA Montgomery inspired by the Wilkie Collins novel The Moonstone, where melodrama is caused by the British stealing a sacred diamond from Hindus in India?


Supposedly, this accident involved failing to step onto a sailboat and a dock and being crushed between them.  Lucy adds that he knew the jewels had magic powers, and that's why he chose not to give them up.


Peter says he was supposed to deliver the jewels to a rug merchant in Tangier, but someone tied up up and stole them first.  A nearby window is suddenly destroyed by a shotgun blast!  Peter's phone rings, which he thinks is odd because no one outside the family knows that number.  "Give up now or else.  This is just a warning".  We all stare at each other and are confronted with CHOICE #14:  Give up, or look for the Jewels of Nabooti.  


As strange as it sounds, quitting doesn't end the story.  In fact, it leads to CHOICE #15.  The hero recommends sending Beech Muzzwell, an "adventurer, a private detective, and a good person to have around in an emergency".  CHOICE #15 is to either contact him, or think it's "too difficult" to find him.


Failing to contact Muzzwell doesn't mean the protagonist gives up either.  In that timeline, Muzzwell is too busy climbing the Hindu Kush mountains to help with the Jewels of Nabooti quest.  Instead, I'm. . .sent to the airport and CHOICE #2.  In a book that has no time travel device so far.  Looks like RA Montgomery had experimented with time loops well before The Race Forever, the CYOA most famous for that CHOICE structure.


To review for any readers who have trouble keeping track:


CHOICE #1:  Take plane to Paris
CHOICE #2:  Accept taxi ride
CHOICE #3:  Sit near door in cafe
CHOICE #4:  Take nearest exit when attacked in cafe
CHOICE #5:  Get into fingernail-less man's car
CHOICE #9:  Go willingly with helicopter captors
CHOICE #13:  Stall for time on helicopter
CHOICE #14:  Give up after shotgun blast destroys cousins' window
CHOICE #15:  Decide you can't contact Muzzwell
CHOICE #2:  Accept taxi ride to continue time loop, or refuse taxi to break it


To end this post, I'll put up the ending players will get for trying to contact Muzzwell.  He doesn't live up to his reputation.


"Peter and Lucy are not happy with the delay involved in getting Beech Muzzwell to Boston.  Yet, you are convinced that Muzzwell is essential to your success.  Over a lunch of tacos and refried beans, the three of you discuss the problems of the global search for the lost jewels.  The telephone's ring interrupts the calm of the moment.


'Hello, this is the FBI calling.  We are sorry to report that a Mr. Beech Muzzwell has been kidnapped from the East Side Air Terminal in New York by a gang of jewel thieves.  A note was left with one of the bus drivers saying that he will be killed if you continue your search for the Jewels of Nabooti.  I think we had better get together for a talk.  I'll send a car out for you right away.'


'That's it.  It is too much for us.  Let's quit while we're still alive.' Peter and Lucy look at you and nod in agreement.  The End".


Beech Muzzwell the incompetent adventurer is drawn in profile in this ending.  He has a mustache whose sides appear to reach down to his beard.  His eyes look like they're closed.  He's wearing something like a fedora, although I'm not sure that's the right term for his hat, because its brim looks too wide for that.


Results So Far


0 Good Endings

2 Deaths

2 Bad Non-Death Endings

2 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

4 Wait, This Isn't an Ending!

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  The Lost Jewels of Nabooti Alternate Endings Part 11


Instead of "giving up" in CHOICE #14 and entering a time loop, let's continue the search for the Jewels of Nabooti.  We get a call on a rotary phone shown in an illustration saying "We weren't kidding.  Next time you won't be so lucky".  This is the follow-up to the shotgun blast that destroyed the window.  CHOICE #16 is whether to talk to the police, or leave without their help.


Lucy thinks the police will "cause us more trouble", so my cousins agree that I should go to the airport without the authorities.  A compact car may be following my vehicle, but it's hard to tell because it's early in the morning.  CHOICE #17 happens when "three squarely built men with crew cuts stand by the counter" at the airport.  The player can then either go to Paris as planned, or try to dodge pursuers by flying to Spain first.  Paris is the bad option, as hinted on the CHOICE #17 page.


"Running the risk of going on the Paris flight doesn't work out.  The three men surround you, and one of them jabs a needle with a knockout drug into your arm.  When you wake up, you are in a cabin deep in a forested area surrounded by low hills.  Your hands and feet are securely bound.  You are cold and stiff and hungry.  A large POIsonous snake creeps out of a pile of leaves and heads for you.  There is nothing you can do.  It's all over.  The End".


The capitalization of "POIsonous" doesn't exist in the original book, but no one familiar with King's Quest 5 can avoid thinking of Cedric the Owl whenever the phrase "poisonous snake" is mentioned.  The illustration shows a snake moving out of leaves, but I can't tell what species it is.  It's definitely not a cobra, and probably not a rattlesnake.  (Its tail can't be seen.)


Venomous snakes can't be the most efficient murder method in real life.  You'd think they'd slither off somewhere else and look for food rather than waste their venom on an immobile human.


Results So Far


0 Good Endings

3 Deaths

2 Bad Non-Death Endings

2 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

4 Wait, This Isn't an Ending!

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  The Lost Jewels of Nabooti Alternate Endings Part 12


Flying to Spain in CHOICE #17 is sufficient to throw off the three crew cut men at the airport.  I don't go anywhere in Spain, but instead have CHOICE #18 to fly directly to either Paris, as Peter and Lucy recommend, or Morocco.  Flying to Paris leads to a new melodramatic branch, so instead I'll go to Morocco to post one last ending for the night.


"You decide to rent a car, drive to the coast, and take a boat from Gibraltar to Tangiers [sic].  The drive is uneventful, but once aboard the hydrofoil speeding across the Strait of Gibraltar, your calm is disrupted when the cabin speaker asks if there is a passenger named Nabooti aboard.


The familiar shudder of fear ripples your body.  You remain quiet and look at the deck, studying the drops of spray that collect on the smooth wooden planks.  Someone is on board who can only mean you harm.  The hydrofoil completes its trip to Tangiers [sic].  You don't get off, but you buy a return trip ticket to Spain.  You hope whoever it was will realize that you have decided to give up your search.  It was a wild-goose chase after all, you tell yourself.  Peter and Lucy can take it from here.  The End".


Another The Abominable Snowman style "you abandon the quest" Neutral Ending.  The illustration is a first-person view of a hydrofoil speeding toward a rocky coast.  You can't see a whole person, but you can see pale arms and hands holding onto the controls.


I wonder how many of the "early CYOA" flaws exist mostly because writers were still experimenting with the format.  When I look at something like The Lost Jewels of Nabooti, I sometimes think it could work well with an Ultimate Ending kind of structure.


Results So Far


0 Good Endings

3 Deaths

2 Bad Non-Death Endings

3 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

4 Wait, This Isn't an Ending!

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  The Lost Jewels of Nabooti Alternate Endings Part 13


"The plane to Paris is hijacked exactly eleven minutes after it takes off.  Five people wearing masks and waving guns announce that they are taking the plane to China!"


This must be the most 80s plot in the book.  Hijackers demanding the plane be taken to another country instead of using it as a weapon in a terrorist attack?  This would never have been written in 2006.  I get to this point by flying to Paris in CHOICE #18.


However, there isn't enough fuel to go to China, and the plane must stop in Athens.  Police and military surround the plane after it reaches Greece, and the hijackers demand a hostage.  They say the volunteer will be let go once they reach China, and the other passengers will get off the plane at the Athens airport.  CHOICE #20 is to become the hostage, or stay quiet.


Silence isn't golden in this ending.


"There is silence in the aircraft.  No hands are raised.  The hijackers look from face to face.  The leader speaks again.  'All right.  You have exactly five minutes to produce a hostage.  Then we will choose.'  He looks at his watch.


You think about volunteering, but you still can't get your hand up in the air.  Minutes tick by.  The leader speaks.  'We are losing precious time.  We will take all of you with us.  The plane will be refueled.  You had your chance.'


It is as he says.  The plane is refueled.  It takes off and heads toward China.  Two escort planes fly behind it.  What a mess!  You are never going to get to Morocco.  Not only that, but what are your chances of getting off this plane alive?  Sit tight and hope for the best.  The End".


The "sit tight and hope for the best" makes the ending Inconclusive.  No drawing for the ending, but there's a picture of a hijacker dressed in black with a balaclava pointing a pistol up next to the CHOICE #19 page.


Results So Far


0 Good Endings

3 Deaths

2 Bad Non-Death Endings

3 Neutral Endings

1 Inconclusive Endings

4 Wait, This Isn't an Ending!

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  The Lost Jewels of Nabooti Alternate Endings Part 14


Volunteering to become the hostage in CHOICE #19 means I am taken in a car toward another plane.  The male kidnapper "reeks of garlic",  while the 2 women are "firm and businesslike".  Before I reach the plane, a Greek military officer tells me "Run for it.  We've got you covered".  CHOICE #20 is whether to take him up on his offer, or remain a hostage.


Refusing to escape results in this ending.


"It is too dangerous to attempt an escape.  You follow the other passengers onto the plane, wishing all the while that you were going back home.  The plane takes off, heading for China.  The leader, a beautiful woman with brown hair and intense green eyes, sits down next to you.  Leaning forward, she whispers 'I can read minds.  It is a gift.  I know that you are searching for the Jewels of Nabooti.  You must give up the search.  The jewels will destroy those who seek them.'


You stare at the woman, wondering if she is mad.  Does she really want to help you or is she your enemy?  Terrified, you shrink down into your chair and close your eyes.  You drift into a nightmare in which the leader's eyes turn into gorgeous but deadly green snakes that slither around your throat choking you.  You gasp for breath as the plane hurtles through the air to China.  The End".


Why do the hijackers want to go to China?  You'll never find out in any of these endings!  They're not Chinese according to the drawings, and they don't have any apparent deal with the Chinese Communist Party.     


The illustration for this one is of a woman with long dark hair with a snake slithering out of her right eye.  It's also the drawing on the title page.  Another Inconclusive Ending.


Results So Far


0 Good Endings

3 Deaths

2 Bad Non-Death Endings

3 Neutral Endings

2 Inconclusive Endings

4 Wait, This Isn't an Ending!

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  The Lost Jewels of Nabooti Alternate Endings Part 15


The Greek military is competent in The Lost Jewels of Nabooti, so the soldiers shoot out the tires of the kidnappers' plane.  My character is sick of adventures for now, so CHOICE #21 is whether to stay in Greece for a while, or go back to America.  The Greek ending is the first one that can be added to the Good column.


"Greece is beautiful.  Clouds sail above the Acropolis; the sea is golden in the afternoon sun.  You give up the frantic chase for the fabled jewels.  You even decide to take a job in Athens working for the English language newspaper called the Amphora.  The End".


Enjoying the scenery and getting a job in Greece seems to be a better decision than pursuing the Jewels of Nabooti.


Results So Far


1 Good Endings

3 Deaths

2 Bad Non-Death Endings

3 Neutral Endings

2 Inconclusive Endings

4 Wait, This Isn't an Ending!

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  The Lost Jewels of Nabooti Alternate Endings Part 16


The America ending of CHOICE #21 is also a positive outcome, if a silly one.  Peter and Lucy aren't at home in Boston, but they left a note on their kitchen table with an address.


"The address turns out to be the Museum of Fine Arts.  A large sign out front announces the exhibit of the fabled Jewels of Nabooti-a recent loan to the museum by an anonymous group.  You notice four or five children outside the museum wearing Nabooti T-shirts.  They are listening to music and doing a strange dance.  The music blares 'Do the Nabooti', a new hit dance tune.  The End".


The Jewels of Nabooti are safe, and their museum exhibit somehow starts a dance fad.


Results So Far


2 Good Endings

3 Deaths

2 Bad Non-Death Endings

3 Neutral Endings

2 Inconclusive Endings

4 Wait, This Isn't an Ending!

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  The Lost Jewels of Nabooti Alternate Endings Part 17


Contacting the police in CHOICE #16 is not worth the effort.  "What are you, some kind of kook?  You putting me on about jewels and Africa and all that bunk?"  Another reason the story belongs in the early 1980s.  By 2006, the cops would think I'm talking about a blood diamond smuggling scheme.


After that fiasco, I decide to enlist the help of my friends Ramsey and Anson.  These characters are named after RA Montgomery's sons, who also wrote CYOAs (e.g. The Mona Lisa is Missing!, Escape From the Haunted Warehouse).  Anson's the one who responds to my call, but Ramsey is "on a secret mission in the Himalayas".  This mission isn't The Abominable Snowman, since he doesn't appear in any continuity in that book.  Anson wants to meet me in Morocco, but I prefer Paris because that's closer to Lucy and Peter's idea.  Where to go is CHOICE #22.


Skipping Paris to meet Anson in Morocco like he suggests is once again the wrong move.  This ending would fit well in La Isla de los Dodos because it's a Death for a reason unrelated to the CHOICE.  Before that, Anson is stuck in traffic in Tangier because "A donkey cart and a car have collided".  I enter a "whitewashed house" alone not knowing where Anson is.


"You take a cautious step into the hallway.  It is noticeably cooler inside.  Another step, then two more.  There is only the sound of your shoes on the red tiles of the floor and the whining of the fan.  The door behind you closes on oiled hinges.  You stop, look about, and then peer into a room off to the side.


Then it happens!  The floor falls away under you, and you spin dizzily down and down, coming to a nasty crash on a sodden, damp earthen floor.  It is pitch-black.  There are no exits; there is no food, no water.  You are doomed.  The End".


RA Montgomery is a harsh dungeon master.  Ignore his Paris quests, and your character falls through the floor in Tangier.


Results So Far


2 Good Endings

4 Deaths

2 Bad Non-Death Endings

3 Neutral Endings

2 Inconclusive Endings

4 Wait, This Isn't an Ending!

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  The Lost Jewels of Nabooti Alternate Endings Part 18


The "Paris quests" and "harsh dungeon master" comments in the previous update were not fair to RA Montgomery. . .because it makes his books seem more lenient to their players than they really are!  Here's what happens when I try to meet Anson in Paris in CHOICE #22.


"It was a mistake to suggest Paris as the meeting place.  Anson got off the plane and went to the address of a cafe given to him by a person posing as an agent of Nabooti.  He drops out of sight.  POOF, VANISHED!  You are once again on your own.  This is too much.  Your friend Anson is more important than any jewels.  You decide to give up this search for the jewels and find Anson.  The End".


Was the person who deceived Anson the little girl with the exploding robot dog?  The "search for Anson" line suggests further adventures that never happen.


Results So Far


2 Good Endings

4 Deaths

2 Bad Non-Death Endings

3 Neutral Endings

2 Inconclusive Endings

5 Wait, This Isn't an Ending!