Library Classics… ‘Out of the Pit’ – Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone, Edited by Marc Gascoigne (Penguin)

It doesn’t seem like all that long ago but it was actually back in July last year that I took a look at the Fighting Fantasy background book, ‘Titan, the Fighting Fantasy World’. I love that book, by the way, but I’m not going into all that again. Have a look at my post, over Here, if you haven’t seen it already (or even if you have, I don’t mind).

‘Out of the Pit’ was the companion book, that went with Titan, and at the prices I’d seen previously, on Amazon and the like, I’d pretty much given up on ever owning a copy of my own. That was until I went into the British Heart Foundation shop, just before Christmas and saw a copy, sat on the shelf, and at a price I could afford 😊 And it went to charity so everyone won 😉 My copy is the smaller paperback edition but I'm using the larger cover art here as you can see more of it and it's worth it.

I’ve been dipping in and out of this book, over the last few days, and have fallen in love with it all over again.

From the darkest corners, from the deepest pools and from dungeons thought only to exist in nightmares come the Fighting Fantasy monsters…

Two hundred and fifty of these loathsome creatures from the wild and dangerous worlds of Fighting Fantasy are collected here – each of them described in minute detail. An indispensable guide for Fighting Fantasy adventurers…

Whereas ‘Titan’ was the book that I could spend all day in, as a kid, ‘Out of the Pit’ was the book that I would dip in and out of, reading a few pages here and there and then leaving it for another day. This is down to the format more than anything else, ‘Out of the Pit’ is every single monster that you could come across, in the lands of Titan, alphabetically arranged and with a little information on each; temperament, where they  live and more importantly, their skill/stamina scores (just in case you were thinking of setting up a game yourself, which gives me a couple of ideas…) As such then, it’s very much the reference book it was meant to be, there’s no story or history to follow.

What it does have though are two hundred and fifty entries that are really detailed and leave you in no doubt as to what you are facing. You won’t get much of a feel for Titan (not like you do in ‘Titan’) but some of the more descriptive passages do give you a nice little sense of a wider world for you to explore (and meet all these monsters). And adding to that, there are even little hints on how certain monsters may be slain; nice little bits of information for people who were either yet to read particular Fighting Fantasy books or who might want to create games of their own in that setting. I used to love reading this book for a feel of what might be happening in the less well known areas of Titan. Like I’ve said before, I love a bit of worldbuilding and ‘Out of the Pit’ gave me the opportunity to do just that.

Another ‘classic’ for the shelves then. Fighting Fantasy fans will doubtless have this book already but if you haven’t, keep looking. This book does pop up here and there, and it’s worth picking up when it does.