Rebel Planet

You play the part of an agent of SAROS, the Terran resistance movement
against their imperial alien overlords, the Arcadians. Disguised as a
merchant, you will fly your ship, the Caydia, to three different colony
planets — Tropos, Halmuris, and Arcadion — to rendezvous with underground
freedom fighters and gather the intelligence you require to destroy the
central computer of the Arcadian hivemind, liberating humanity!

An adaptation of Robin Waterfield’s Fighting Fantasy gamebook #18, published
the previous year, this computer game version rejects the Choose-Your-Own-
Adventure gameplay design of the book in favour of a more open-ended text
adventure model, albeit one with a restrictive text parser. Most elements of
the trademark Fighting Fantasy RPG system, including the randomness of even
simulated die-rolls, have been streamlined out, leaving only metrics for
damage taken and hunger (hitherto untracked in the books.) Carrying limits,
while atypical in FF gamebooks, are enforced here as in the original book.

A further new dynamic includes the strict timetable of the space traffic
control towers — you need to have wrapped up your business planetside before
your launch window comes up, otherwise you’re out of luck. In keeping with the
game’s sci-fi setting (in both rural and urban flavours), you will find
extensive use of objects such as your limcom, nutritious hcaps (tasty like
dead Zorkons, num num!), and the indispensable lite-kube. Combat has been
largely phased out in favour of an extension of the gamebook’s espionage theme
of ciphers and passwords, magic words with the power of plot advancement.