Certificates

"Please, have a seat."

You find yourself in the usual cubic space. Across the room a man sitting behind a desk hands you that strange invitation.

He points at a chair in front of him.

He's about 50 years old and he's wearing a suit and tie.

You approach with caution and stop a few steps from the chair. He looks at you a little impatient and, with an emphatic gesture, points you back to the seat.

You sit down, ready to be pierced by a thousand poisoned spikes while a safe hits your head through a secret trap door, but none of this happens. In fact, the chair is comfortable too.

"I'm Mr. Zemeckis. I'll take care of you."

"What do you mean?" you ask.

"In the sense that I'm the one who has to give you the certificate."

"Uh, what certificate?", you're slightly disoriented.

"Uh, what are you doing at the Adventurer's Training Center? I'm just meeting some very, very strange people lately. I'm here to give you your certificate. You've juggled a number of pitfalls with skill and proven yourself, congratulations. Now you know what a gamebook is."

You're beginning to understand. "So, you and Mr. Lugan..."

"Lugan the wizard, thank you. Yes, we are colleagues. He's at the reception, and I'm in charge of the certificates. We've been working here in Infinity Mundi for a while. We're not doing too bad.

Anyway, congratulations again.

Let me give you a few more pointers if you don't mind. Gamebooks aren't all as short and simple as this tutorial. Let me explain better: as for normal books, there are short and long, simple and challenging works.

Even the settings are of all kinds: from classic fantasy to detective thriller, passing through a horror story or a beautiful love story... in short, the only limit is fantasy!

Sometimes there are many choices to be made in a single page and very often there are special rules that make a particular book really unique!

And sometimes gamebooks are part of a series, just like a TV series, and it's great to accompany your hero through all his vicissitudes...

Ah, that's a big deal!

We make Infinity Books here, they are apps for smartphones (and tablets) that allow the reader to play a gamebook, but there are several features that make the experience even more exciting".

"For example?"

"Well, for example, there's background music, special effects, 3D dice throws, exciting fights... without neglecting the practicality of having an interactive story always with you on your smartphone. But it's okay, you look dazed, it's normal, don't worry. You've just entered a fantastic and wonderful world, take some time to explore it. This is the certificate, here you go. And that's the door there, you'll come home from there, come back and see us!"

Zemeckis offers you his hand with a sincere smile, he really lit up when he started telling you all these stories about gamebooks.

Who knows, maybe one day you'll be so enthusiastic about it too. We hope so!

♾️ ♾️ ♾️

Mr Zemeckis is in fact the impeccable Commissioner Zemeckis of Fortress Europe, an investigative Infinity Book set in dystopian London.