Game Books
EDWARD PACKARD AND HIS LEGACY ON CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE GAME BOOKS SERIES
The most popular game books series in the world
The genre game books series originate from two most prominent figures, Edward Packard (b. 1931) and R. A. Montgomery (1936–2014) created the Choose Your Own Adventure game book series in 1979 (Martin, 2021). Edward Packard had an idea to create the book series after writing a story to his daughter on her bed after came home from working as a lawyer in New York city. His daughter, Andrea Packard asked him if the story can have a different ending than the last one, from that Packard wrote several different endings to answer his daughter’s questions. He came up with his first title Sugarcane Island after answering his daughter’s questions. He searched for a publisher to publish his first title, and finally met R. A. Montgomery on the way to search for a publisher (Secret Galaxy, 2021). Montgomery found interest in the Packard concept story, and both of them ended up signing the deal with Bantam Books to publish books after 9 rejections.
The game books series Choose Your Own Adventure was given a name by Bantam Book and took legal action to become their trademark. In 1979, Bantam Books published the first three books of Choose Your Own Adventure, entitled The Cave of Time by Edward Packard, Journey Under The Sea by R. A. Montgomery, and By Balloon to The Sahara by D. Terman. The book series Choose Your Own Adventure grew into the phenomenon that has spawned more than 500 books, sold more than 250 million copies, and has been translated into 38 different languages (Chooseco, 2016). Edward Packard changes the books genre with his contribution and influences in Choose Your Own Adventure game books series, he introduces the world a genre books called game books.
The books from series Choose Your Own Adventure or CYOA are called game books because the reader can choose whatever the story progresses, every page has a footer that directs the reader to open another page, commonly the footer has at least two choices that direct to the different ending. The CYOA is the only book series where the reader can read the book straight from page number one to the last page (Martin, 2021). The feature invented by Pakcard allows the reader to choose what story that they want to know first. After the reader knows the first ending, the reader can find out another ending with different choices they make from the last one. The books consist of several different types of ending, the reader can end up with a bad ending, good ending, and not satisfied ending. Only the reader can choose the ending, the reader can be lucky to choose the right path to result in a good ending or the reader can be bad luck to choose the path that leads to a bad ending. The books used You word to refer to the main character, they used You word to make the reader feel that they are the main character that makes the decisions (Secret Galaxy, 2021).
Packard’s contribution in the CYOA changed the books world forever, before CYOA released in 1979, no one knew about games books, after the release the CYOA became the one of most popular genres. The target of CYOA was the children and the young audience at that time, the fact that CYOA being the most successful children books in the 80’s and 90’s is the reason why the books series became the fourth most selling children books all time in the world (Secret Galaxy, 2021). Packard write the most popular title on the CYOA like The Cave of Time, Your Code is Jonah, Hyperspace, Who Killed Harlowe Thrombey?, and Deadwood City. Packard influenced children and young audiences that time till today to train their critical thinking to make choices and how they learn from mistakes. His books became so popular in the 80’s and 90’s that every elementary school in America has one or two books of CYOA in their library. Not only contributing to children’s books, Packard also contributed to pop culture in America. His books contain stories of time travel, aliens, dystopia, space, and monsters (Jamison, 2022). His books influence pop culture from 80’ till today, he inspires everyone to make their own story especially on time travel like Cave of Time. The triple A game title Detroit Become Human is one prime example of CYOA having a major influence in pop culture. The game features the player making different choices to result in different endings like CYOA and time travel like Packard did in his books.
The genre of game books in CYOA still lives today even though not as popular as in the 80’s and 90’s. Edward Packard’s contribution to the CYOA is the reason why the books series became popular and changed the books world forever. Packard influenced the world with his title in CYOA that made people always think that CYOA is the term that is used to present a story that has several types of different endings. The CYOA lost their peak popularity after the year 2000, the reason is the children have lost their interest in reading a book because of the rise of the internet (Chooseco, 2016). The CYOA still remains today as one of the most popular children’s books in the 80s and 90’s. Packard continued to write books of CYOA till today, he started the company name U-Ventures to publish his own title of CYOA and created novel apps based on his book that feature more immersive experience when reading it.
People who were born in the 80’s and 90’s know how Edward Packard became an essential figure that makes their children memorable. His works continue to live today as one of the books that influenced both the children’s books and pop culture. He became the founding father of the established genre game books and his major contribution on Choose Your Own Adventure. The book critics agree that if Packard does not take part in CYOA, the book series may never become so popular and successful today even though the book lost its reader due the popularity of the internet (Martin, 2021). Only few authors in the world that can make a genre in the literary world and Edward Packard is one of them that changes the book world forever with his Choose Your Own Adventure game books series.
REFERENCES
Chooseco. (2016). THE HISTORY OF CYOA. Chooseco LLC. Retrieved December 22, 2022, from https://www.cyoa.com/pages/about-us
Jamison, L. (2022, September 12). The Enduring Allure of Choose Your Own Adventure Books. The New Yorker. Retrieved December 22, 2022, from https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/09/19/the-enduring-allure-of-choose-your-own-adventure-books
Martin. (2021). A Brief History of Gamebooks. Games Vs Play. Retrieved December 21, 2022, from http://gamesvsplay.com/a-brief-history-of-gamebooks/
Secret Galaxy. (2021, October 14). The Rise & Fall & Rise of Choose Your Own Adventure Books. YouTube. Retrieved December 21, 2022, from https://youtu.be/B-f5YelgmMs
