The Estate Of Baron Archambaud is a 32 page one-player house-crawl that feels a bit like a gamebook and a bit like an rpg.
It feels a bit like Bluebeard's Bride or House Of Hell---but without the unbelievably punishing difficulty of HoH or the frequent what-if-kink-but-scary encounters of BB---and there's some genuine notes of comedy in Estate to even out the eerie moments.
Basics-wise, Estate is played played with a deck of cards and some d6s. The cards are used to build and populate the estate-dungeon, guaranteeing pretty solid replayability, and the dice are used to randomize success chance for attacks and things like that.
There are multiple character classes you can choose to play, something I haven't seen in many gamebooks before, and you can choose to bypass encounters with social skill instead of force---another neat change. Admittedly, the mechanics are the same as for fighting, just with higher stakes, but it feels like it fits the setting better to have a social option than it would to simply make all encounters fights.
The writing is noticeably strong, and the layout is both stylish and makes everything easy to read. The art is fitting and abundant.
Overall, Estate surprised me a ton. It's easily one of my top ten favorite gamebooks or solo adventures. If you like those things, or you just like good adventure writing, or if you like victorian-eerie settings, I would heavily recommend picking this up.
Minor Issues:
-Page 7, South Courtyard, "its smelled you" it's
-Page 7, Baron's Wardrobe, you can't take items without discarding items? This feels a little weird.