Tag - CYOA

Something a little different this time, a modern take of an old concept, realised in a retro way. I guess you could call it retro adjacent. It’s a throwback to those choose your own adventure (CYOA) books that were all the rage when I was a child. I hope you find it as interesting as I did.

The device is called ‘Audio Adventures’ and is basically an electronic version of those CYOA books of old. What caught my eye though was the gloriously old school way the device has been realised. It could so easily have been just another app to download onto your phone or even just a web app, but then you wouldn’t be reading about it on this blog. No, this is a proper bit of hardware and once I had seen it pop up on my social media feed (over and over) I couldn’t resist picking one up for myself. Who says adverts don’t work?

It arrived in attractive cardboard packaging with a nice photo of the product on the front of the box…

…along with an explanation of what it does on the back.

The outer sleeve just slides off revealing a plain white box inside it. The first thing I was greeted with upon opening it was a hand written thank you note inside from ‘Truman Toys & Games’, signed by ‘Lee’ which I thought was a lovely touch.

Underneath that was an instruction manual and the Audio Adventures device itself.

Hiding under the manual was a USB-A > USB-C charging cable and my chosen game cartridge.

The photo below shows clearly everything I received inside the box.

 

The Audio Adventures Player

The device itself is about the same size as an iPhone but about twice the thickness.

It’s an attractive and pleasantly tactile device. The front panel has a speaker grille, 4 buttons to control the game (labelled A, B, C and D), a power LED and a little window so you can see which cartridge you have loaded.

On the rear of the device are four security screws and a TrumanToys.com holographic label that is sneakily hiding a fifth…

The left hand side has a USB-C charging port and a standard 3.5mm headphone jack.

Moving to right hand side we have the cartridge slot and the power button. This was covered by a little piece of masking tape whilst in transit which was easily peeled off.

The case has been 3D printed but it’s been printed to a high standard and most people probably wouldn’t even realise. I noticed because 3D printing is one of my hobbies so I naturally spot this kind of thing. There’s a good heft to it too, it doesn’t feel flimsy or fragile and indeed it weighs 118g.

 

Instruction Manual

The instruction manual is pretty short, in fact it’s more of a folded sheet than an actual manual but that’s because the product was designed to be intuitive and simple to use.

The most useful bit of information I gleaned from it was that you can pause a game by holding A for two seconds and that volume can be adjusted with B and C in the same manner.

Why they didn’t incorporate a dedicated volume knob is a bit of a mystery as I personally would have preferred to have one.

 

The Inner Workings

Being naturally inquisitive and having spotted the screws I couldn’t resist taking the back off to see what was inside.

This involved making a hole in the holographic sticker to remove the fifth screw so I guess that’s my warranty well and truly void before I’d even turned it on!

The bottom of the device is dominated by the audio speaker and a small 3.7V 1500mAh Rechargeable Lithium Polymer battery. You can also see the ribbon cable which connects the action buttons to the circuit board.

The top half of the device holds the PCB which appears to be custom made for it. The bottom of the board has headers for the speakers, buttons and battery. Directly above these are four multi-coloured LED’s which illuminate the squares above the action buttons to indicate which ones are active at any given time.

The left hand edge contains the headphone and charging ports whilst the right hand side hosts the sliding power switch.. The top of the board is quite bare as it needs to leave enough space to accommodate the cartridges.

 

The Game Cartridge

I chose one game to start with, entitled ’The Psychotronic Mind’. The cartridge came in a very attractive and appealing looking cardboard box.

It featured game artwork on the front and a nice synopsis of what the story was all about on the reverse.

The cardboard box was a little tricky to open, mainly because I didn’t want to tear the flaps but a little perseverance paid off.

There’s a cardboard insert that holds the game cart safe inside and the whole thing just slides out. Reminded me of opening up a Gameboy game…

Speaking of which, the game cartridge itself is about the same size as a Gameboy Advance cart.

The shell is 3D printed and features the artwork and game title on a glossy label on the front. It looks slick and professional despite the method of its construction. I couldn’t see an obvious way to open the shell without causing damage so I didn’t attempt it. The only thing visible was an edge connector with 6 finger contacts.

The other thing of note on the end of the cartridge was some braille lettering. It says ‘PSYCH’ which is the first five letters of the game title. I cannot read braille but the process of deciphering it led me down an interesting little rabbit hole…

 

Who are Truman Toys & Games?

I just bought the product because it looked interesting to me, I had no idea about the company behind it or indeed the reason it even came to exist. Well the British company behind the product is called Truman Toys & Games and was founded by a chap called Lee McGeorge in 2023 after he was made redundant during Covid. He was heavily influenced by his love of text adventures and CYOA books (sounds familiar!). He taught himself electronics, and the whole system was designed from the ground up to be accessible to blind and visually impaired players “so everybody can play”. This is why there is braille on the cartridges so they can be identified by touch alone, even while inserted in the console. The manual even describes how you can add your own control buttons should you need to increase its accessibility still further.

 

Playing a Game

The instructions recommended ensuring the battery is fully charged before use so I plugged it in and let it charge. It took a couple of hours before the red charging LED on the front turned green.

I only bought one game to test the unit out in case I didn’t like it. The game I chose was called The Psychotronic Mind – it’s a WWII adventure in the style of vintage radio thrillers, involving psychic powers and a Nazi base rescue mission. If you are old enough to remember ‘Dick Barton – Special Agent’ then you’ll have an idea what to expect. I’m not but I remember my parents telling me all about it enthusiastically. The box says it’s for ‘adults and older children’ – that’s definitely me then!

The cartridge slid into the player easily with a very satisfying tactile ‘click’ as it slotted into place.

The game artwork is visible through the little window and the braille writing is still accessible on the end of the cartridge so that visually impaired folks can still read what’s inserted too.

Switching the power on with the slide switch is equally tactile and triggers a dramatic intro to the game accompanied by flashing lights and the instruction to ‘press any button to continue the adventure’. This is accompanied by some pretty decent and period appropriate music which helps set the scene for the story ahead.

At the start you are told there are three episodes in the adventure, and you can start whichever you like by pressing A, B or C. Pressing D allows the entering of a six letter password.

The episodes are like proper dramatisations complete with music, different character voicing and plenty of sound effects to help the story come to life such as footsteps, elevator noises, engine sounds, you name it. I did have a good chuckle to myself when I heard the Wilhelm scream used in the first episode too!

There are quite a few characters you’ll meet in the game, some friendly, some slightly deranged and some downright evil. I’m pretty sure Lee did most, if not all of the male voices himself and seemed to be having a lot of fun doing so. The voice acting of Lisa, the woman you need to rescue, was a little stiff but I guess for a low budget enterprise I can forgive that and I soon adjusted to it.

There are plenty of choices to make that affect how each episode pans out. Choices are explained clearly and in the case of action based ones, are repeated so you always know what you should be doing. Episode one and two are pretty easy and mostly fairly laid back but things really ramp up in episode three as you have to explore an enemy base, use disguises and rescue the hostages before making your daring escape.

There are apparently seven different endings to the first episode and ten for the second. I’m not sure how many there are for the final episode but I’m pretty sure I got the worst one because I was scolded during my debriefing for having to use a checkpoint (I failed the final mission first time around). My reward for completing the mission? Some fish and chips in Brighton! Definitely need to complete that episode again without getting blown up near the end and see how it affects my reward!

I did manage to get two characters of the secret password at the end of episode one though but none from either of the other two. I’m assuming you are awarded these for getting certain endings so I guess that’s an added incentive to replay them, besides just experiencing more of the story of course.

You can pause the game at any point and it will respond with; ‘We interrupt our scheduled program’ and when your resume it says; ‘We now return to The Psychotronic Mind’ which I thought was a nice touch and in keeping with the vintage radio drama vibe. It’s worth pointing out that if you turn the device off, you lose all progress. However given each episode is less than half an hour long (the second was only fifteen minutes) I didn’t find this to be an issue.

 

Conclusion

The Audio Adventures device is well made, easy to use and is fun and engaging to play. The sound quality is really good from the built in speaker. At one point in the game there was the sound of an aircraft and you could feel the rumble of the engine in your hands which really added to the atmosphere. The games are nicely presented and very ‘collectable’ which I liked.

I was a little disappointed that I completed the game in about an hour. I had no prior knowledge of what to expect when buying the device but I expected the game to last longer than that. Perhaps there’s a hardware limit restricting the length of a game or maybe it’s a budget thing, I don’t know. However there’s a lot of replay-ability baked in so I think I can overlook that. At £49 for the player and an included game I think it’s fairly priced. Additional games are priced at £22.99 at the time of writing or you can buy a bundle with all the games included and save yourself around £20.

I think the biggest endorsement I can give it though is that I ordered all the rest of the games currently available for it immediately after finishing The Psychotronic Mind as I was eager to play more.

 

More games!

The extra games, pictured above, actually arrived just as I was finishing this review so I’ve not had a chance to play them yet. I’m really looking forward to doing so once I’ve unlocked the password protected level on The Psychotronic Mind and got a better ending!

There are five games currently available with a sixth, entitled ‘Bank Robbing Bunnies’, promised for this summer.

Here’s a complete rundown of the games available:

• Bewilder
• Hotel of Secrets
• How Close is the Ghost
• Ice Cold
• The Psychotronic Mind
• Bank Robbing Bunnies (coming summer 2026)

All in all, it’s a great little system and if they can keep expanding the collection of games for it I think it’s got a bright future. It’s not perfect – I think the games (if they are all a similar length to the one I played) are a bit on the short side but apart from that it’s hard to fault and provides a thoroughly engaging and nostalgic gameplay experience.

If you’d like to find out more you can head on over to the Truman Toys & Games website here.