Bloodbones

Bloodbones is tough to rate. Compared to your average Fighting Fantasy gamebook, Bloodbones is well written with creatively made gameplay elements, as opposed to the more linear Livingstone style. Some parts of the game allow you to explore different areas in a more sandbox style as opposed to walking down the slightly branching road. I would say Green brings plenty of interesting ideas to the table.

Nevertheless, this game is also fiendishly difficult, with plenty of dead ends, checkpoints which will happily annihilate you if you failed to find the one key item and enemies with very high stats, some impossible to avoid. You'll probably want to cheat on dice rolls here since the game stacks the deck against you anyway, and is one gamebook I have never completed legitimately due to the difficulty.

Otherwise, the game is well written, with free exploration elements we really ought to see in more gamebooks. The plot is a somewhat basic revenge plot, but I loved the pirate and tropical setting. Just be prepared for the fiendish challenge. (And anyone who wants to cheat in this game should feel free to do so.)