Worlds of Power is a junior novel series from the elementary school-friendly publisher Scholastic that is reminscient of standard book fair material recommended for grades 4 to 6 (Ages 9-12). WOP weaved narratives through the use of popular NES video games as backdrops, prequels, or continutions of the software's story and honed in on kids' recognition of the characters for the sale. It makes sense if you think about it; there was an obvious connection of digital media to be made for the sake of concerned parents wishing their children to read more. What better way to combine the fun of video games and reading then this unholy digitalized literate union? Remember, this was before mainstream games were as text-heavy as some, for example, RPGs are today. Young gamers didn't have time for anything other than instruction manuals and Nintendo Power. If I had to venture to guess why they chose to buy these books, it was not to read them, but probably on account of the vibrant covers and out of their love of the games. This is the age when buying Garfield books might have looked strange, so, why not stare at the busy covers of your favorite Nintendo games instead! Whips, blasters, swords, a ninja, a gargoyle were much more mature than some fat orange cat and his sexually dormant owner. Hell, you could almost forgive Scholastic for removing the gun out of Snake's hands on the front cover of Metal Gear. On a side note, WOP was available in both the US and Great Britian.

Reading a few chapters of a WOP book is like thumbing through a children's picture book; you can expect the writing to be thin and light. The vocabulary and literary style is, as expected, simplified and the plots are too. Readers will not be changed in any way after finishing a title because, really, this is juvenile pulp fiction. To place things in a business perspective, it was yet another attempt to extract the sweet milk of Nintendo's showcase cow, without paying Nintendo for any of the rights. (Inside of each book it is made very clear that: "This book is not authorized, sponsored, or endorsed by Nintendo of America Inc.")

As if Scholastic predicted gamers wouldn't have enough ambition to finish each chapter, featured inside each book are upside down, useless game hints that show up at the end of every few chapters. One such half-assed tip: You must defeat each Underboss in order to advance. lt was as if Scholastic were mocking the literally-challenged young NES readers with this trite. A trading card is also included attached as a cardboard page in the middle of every WOP book. These cards also contained half hearted attempts at game tips, and you had to be either fluent in reading Hebrew or use the traditional method of holding them up to a mirror to read them because they were printed backwards.

The pen name, "F.X. Nine," is accredited as the creator of the series of books, although in actuality a number of people were involved in writing the various pieces of game literature. Whether or not the abreviated is an unintentional misspelling of "Ninendo" or an intentional misspelling of the name for legality reasons is unclear. Despite the super rad name, Mr. Nine has all the coolness of a librarian with glasses because all WOP novels end with a closing letter from the man offering book recommendations for other works. I kid you not, the following is an actual excerpt from such a letter:

Dear Reader,

I hope you enjoyed reading Ninja Gaiden. Here is a list of some other books that I thought you might like:

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

Coming from a 120-page "novel" about Ninja Gaiden to move on to a 500-page French classic is a bit of a stretch, F.X. Nice try.

Two books were included in their own sub-category called "Junior Worlds of Power." The titles, Mega Man 2 and Bases Loaded II: Second Season, essentially sported a book size larger in dimensions than the others and were even more accessible to children by having fewer number of pages. (And inasmuch accessibility as a child would have to want to pick up a Nintendo baseball simulation-to-novel adaptation.)

When all is said and done, Worlds of Power manages to provide a mere hour and a half of simple minded entertainment. You couldn't ask for anything more than that from a company that continues to publish Magic School Bus and Goosebumps. Damn, RL Stine, how many sequels to evil dummies coming to life or evil haunted masks will suffice for you?