RPG Book Review – GURPS Y2K
In fact, the introduction of the book goes into some detail about the Y2K panic and the use of the book. The book’s compiler (and the GURPS line editor at SJG) Sean Punch explains that the book is, categorically, not about the Y2K bug. Instead, it is a compilation of futuristic disaster scenarios that simply used Y2K as a starting point. There are plenty of ways to inject worldwide disaster, panic, and devastation into your roleplaying without having the whole thing revolve around computers unable to count past 1999.
So let’s put that aside and delve into the meat of this book.
Essentially, GURPS (Generic Universal Role Playing System) Y2K is a collection of ideas of the various bangs and whimpers that may cause the end of the world, and how you as the person running a game can capitalize on this and put your players through both figurative and literal hell. GURPS Y2K consists of 10 chapters written by nine of the best and brightest from GURPSdom including Steve Jackson himself. Each of the chapters highlights various forms of millennial panic, from alien invasion, computer malfunctions, World War III, survivalist compounds, cure-resistant diseases, and, of course, the Biblical Apocalypse, complete with the Four Horsemen, seas turning into blood, and the rule of evil over the face of the earth.
Fun stuff. What’s notable is that in the GURPS catalog, Y2K is listed under both the “post-apocalyptic” category and the “humor” category. This, more than anything, should be indicative of the way the minds at Steve Jackson Games work.
As always, the most impressive thing about GURPS Y2K (and most GURPS books in general) is the level of research that went into it. Anecdotal evidence of pre-2000 millennial nonsense is included, and ways that this can be used to presage later events. For instance, there were cases where new food products were immediately sent back to warehouses in 1998 because the expiration dates were after December 31, 1999. The computers assumed the food was 100 years old instead of new, and the stock was sent back.
Even more than the level of research is the depth of detail to which the authors go. Survivalists are detailed down to what books they are most likely to have on their shelves, and the various ideologies that might keep them going after the big crash. Statistics are offered for the plague of locusts after the Judgment Trump. Explanations of various calendars (Japanese, Mayan, and Muslim, for instance) allow game masters the ability to explain why pestilence, plague, and devastation fall sometime in 2010 instead of 1/1/00.
As always, there are myriad examples given for ways to tie millennial panic and worldwide cataclysm into ongoing campaigns of other sorts. Want to throw in some plagues and nuclear wars into a superhero campaign? See Chapter 9. Want to unleash hordes of restless undead on the world? Chapter 10. Want to run a modern Cold War campaign? See Chapter 7, which also indicates more Western, Renaissance, and other possibilities for society to model itself after the crash. To further assist the harried gamemaster looking for ways to incorporate the known world into the game world, the book offers suggested movie viewing to help get the feel of disaster films and to help bring that feel to the game table.
Naturally, GURPS Y2K is designed to be played with the GURPS system, but like most of the really good and great GURPS books, there is enough material here that is genre-specific rather than system-specific that it can be used to fuel campaigns in any roleplaying world. This is worth noting, because GURPS is notoriously rule- and stat-heavy, and can be a difficult system to learn for new or inexperienced gamers. The thing that makes GURPS books so interesting to read is the same thing that makes GURPS a daunting system to learn and play. It’s easy to be overwhelmed by it, and since Y2K offers only ideas and suggestions of where to lead, it can quickly drown someone not used to the idea. For the experienced player, GURPS offers limitless possibilities and freedom, which is what makes it so attractive. Starting out with a book like this that can be (pardon the term) cannibalized for use in simpler systems is a great way to get involved with one of the preeminent roleplaying systems without jumping in with both feet.
In short, Y2K may not be all it was cracked up to be, but the uses for this book go far beyond the computer malfunction heralded in the title to make it essential reading for anyone interested in post-apocalyptic gaming. Don’t be put off by the name here: GURPS Y2K was fully compliant when it was written, and it’s just as useful now as it was then.
