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I visited my local comic book/gaming store the other day, and noticed Apocalypse sitting on the shelves. I remembered the title from having browsed BTRC's web site some months ago. Now, I have a couple of BTRC's supplements (Guns Guns Guns and More Guns, to be precise) and, being generally pleased with the quality of those books, I decided that I would like to throw a little more cash their way as encouragement.

Appearances:

Apocalypse is a slim black book of the standard 8.5" x 11" dimensions. The front cover title is done in flame-outlined black letters, while the back cover teaser text is done in flame-tinged yellow. This is actually a pretty striking look. I think it compares well with the classic red-on-black appearance of Traveller. Inside, we have a fairly densely-written book in clean, legible typeface, sparsely illustrated with generally useful illustrations.

Substance:

The book begins with a short table of contents, author's notes, and an introduction. That is followed by about a page and a half of background material explaining the supernatural powers lying behind the Apocalypse of the book's title. This manages to tie Judeo-Christian monotheism into every other form of supernatural belief quite handily. Then we get three pages of outline, covering the divergence of this world's timeline from our own, starting in 1941. The Juxtaposition, the key apocalyptic event which occurred in 1945, is described in more detail on the following page. It turns out that the Juxtaposition was an opening of many gateways to multiple dimensions at once, letting in all kinds of strange and terrible entities. This event coincided with terrible storms and earthquakes. Since then, not all the gates have closed. Then we get into the races.

Four subraces of an elf-like species called the Alferi have invaded the earth. These subraces correspond roughly to Asians, Europeans, Africans, and Native Americans/Mongols. Equipped with supernatural powers and taking advantage of the devastation wrought by the Juxtaposition, they invade every nation on Earth, adopting the local culture as their own and enslaving the native humans. These Alferi are capable of breeding with humans, producing half-alferi hybrids. To round things out, the dead have returned to horrifying life, there are various incarnations and avatars of the gods (referred to as Eternals) wandering the earth, and then there is a miscellany of mutants, monstrosities, and dimensional wanderers. The Alferi, half-alferi, humans, and Living Dead are described in some detail. We are left to our own devices to bring the others to life. Character Generation touches on the various characteristics, skills, advantages, and disadvantages already described in the CORPS rulebook as they apply to the world of Apocalypse, and adds some descriptions of Apocalypse-specific paranormal powers.

All this has taken us to page 48. The next 40 pages are spent describing the world of Apocalypse and daily life for some of its denizens. While every continent is touched on to some extent, most of the attention is lavished on life in the Kaiser Reich, the domain of the Silver Alferi. They appeared in Europe during the Juxtaposition, and took on the characteristics of Hitler's Germany, with all the attendant nastiness. Humans are enslaved within the actual confines of Europe. The northern coast of Africa is a Kaiser Reich territory, referred to as the P.I.T. (Polizei Imperius Territorium), where humans and half-alferi have more freedom. The city of Casablanca is the ultimate free territory, being ruled by an enigmatic Eternal who mandates that no country's laws may apply within the city. As it turns out, the Silver Alferi are the only Alferi which choose to use technology, and they are incapable of advancing beyond the level established in 1945. The entire world, since then, has been frozen at a WWII technological level. Humans are capable of advancing beyond this limit, but are brutally repressed by the Silver Alferi.

The next 15 pages describe 12 NPCs and 11 monsters that are common to the Kaiser Reich territories. These are reasonably well done, with an average of half a page spent on describing the character's background and how they would impact a campaign. Each entry is accompanied by some illustrative artwork. The artwork is reasonably good quality, and most of the illustrations seem to fit the text descriptions. As far as the monsters go, there really isn't anything unique enough to be worth stealing for another game, except maybe their take on mutant hyenas.

17 pages are used to detail two adventures. The first is an adventure for one character (included), introducing the setting of Casablanca and allowing the PC to interact with some of the NPC's described in the preceding chapter. As written, it's pretty much a railroad with only one track. The second adventure is more of a creature-feature, introducing some potential long-term opponents. Collectively, they add 2 more (potential) NPCs and 3 more monsters to what was already described in the book. Apocalypse ends with four pages detailing common weapons and vehicles, and a one page, photocopyable hexagonal map sheet.

Good Stuff:

I really like the setting of this game. It reminds of RIFTS (in a good way). Like RIFTS, the background allows you to bring characters into the setting from other campaigns. This makes it easy to run cross-over adventures, or take tired old characters into uncharted realms. It also allows the GM a free hand in designing all kinds of monsters to torment the players. Beyond these elements, however, an Apocalypse campaign can involve intrigue between the various powers, exploration of a devastated and changed alternate Earth, murder mysteries, military campaigns, you name it. Unlike RIFTS, Apocalypse offers a much more restrained and balanced power level. That is not to say that characters are created equal... the Alferi are innately superior to humans, but they are still mortal beings, and can be killed just as dead with a sharp stick as with a bazooka.

Bad Stuff:

Unfortunately, Apocalypse is not without some flaws. Nothing major, but enough irritating deficiencies to make me somewhat unhappy.

Starting from the top, my first complaint is that while Apocalypse is a supplement for CORPS, not a complete game in itself, it is not clearly labeled as such. I mentioned that I had learned about Apocalypse from the BTRC web site months before seeing it in a store. One could make the argument that I should have been a more informed consumer, therefore. Regardless, I did not remember that it was only a supplement, and the store which I purchased the book from wraps all its gaming materials in plastic (to keep the grubby little paws of children off them, I suspect). Going only from the information presented on the front and back covers, I did not know that it was a supplement. I was hoping that it would have the CORPS game rules included. I don't consider this a major flaw, as most stores don't follow the practice of wrapping their books in the same way, and it would only take a few minutes perusal to determine that it was a supplement. And frankly, I'm adapting the setting to the HERO rules anyway.

My other complaint is about the organization of the material. In general, the book progresses logically. However, it lacks an index, and it could also have used a glossary of common terms. While I was reading over the details on the Silver Alferi, I would run into acronyms and have a hard time figuring out what they stood for. For example, the acronym IAA stands for Imperial Affairs Agency. There is no heading in the text for Imperial Affairs Agency. Instead, this worthy group is described under Religion (which does make sense, the IAA is run by the Kaiser Reich church). There are a number of instances of this sort of thing. Example 2: Silver Alferi scientists suffer from a condition called the Syndrome. They go mad when trying to breach the 1945 technological barrier. Is this condition described under the heading Scientists? Nope... it's also under, you guessed it, Religion. These problems could be addressed, even without an index, by changing the way the text is arranged and using more descriptive subject headings, or even by accenting key words in the text in bold or italic. I suspect that the author and editor were simply too familiar with the material to pick up on problems that a newcomer would have reading through it.

It should be noted that there is a very strong attempt to remain PC with this material. Even though the Silver Alferi have turned humans into an oppressed sub-race, they believe very strongly in the equality of the sexes, as apparently all the Alferi do. While this isn't a flaw in and of itself, it does lead to some strange cultural paradoxes. For example, the Wild Alferi in America base their culture on that of the Native Americans. In Native American culture, there were great differences between the roles filled by men, and the roles filled by women. Now that the Alferi have come and everybody gets to be a warrior, who does the drudge-work? It just seems strange for an intentionally dark game to willfully ignore the misogynistic baggage of cultures both ancient and modern when it is willing to deal with prejudice in other ways. Oh well.

Finally, there are some gaps in the information. For example, it would have been helpful if typical ranks in the Kaiser Reich military and theocracy were described. It's easy enough for me to do an internet search on the WWII German Military for that information, but it would have been even easier for the author to do it and include that information in the text. In the equipment list, they decribe a number of common firearms in the setting. In the rifles, they list the Karabiner 98K and the Sturmgewehr 74. If, as a GM, I were to have a small platoon of Kaiser Reich soldiers as opponents for the PC's, which rifle would they most likely be armed with? I dunno. Does it make a difference? Maybe... the Karabiner does more damage per shot, but the Sturmgewehr is an automatic weapon with a large clip. It would have been nice to see some more typical 'grunt' NPCs with typical equipment. I suspect the problem here is that the book already contains a lot of information shoe-horned into 128 pages. I really wish they had decided to go with a larger size, so they could expand on the detail and provide more immediately useful information.

Final Thoughts:

Although I think it has some flaws, I liked this product well enough to decide to go ahead and adapt some material for it so that I can run a campaign. If you think you would enjoy running a more toned-down, RIFTS-like campaign with an even darker setting, then I recommend Apocalypse to you. Keep in mind, as it stands, there's a lot of work for the GM to do. For some people (including myself), that's actually a plus. There are still some annoying gaps, though. Perhaps if it sells well enough, BTRC will put out a sourcebook to fill in some of those gaps.

As an adjunct to a campaign you are already running, or a sourcebook of ideas, I can't recommend it as strongly. I think there are some elements of interest, but the book doesn't provide enough really unique characters, monsters, or circumstances to justify its cost for that purpose. Still, you may want to buy it as a financial sacrifice to the Gaming Gods, in order to help keep the industry afloat in these trying times.

Style: 3 (Average)
Substance: 3 (Average)

Apocalypse
Author: Ed Rice Category: game Company/Publisher: BTRC Line: CORPS Cost: $17.00 Page count: 128 ISBN: 0-9438891-36-1 SKU: BTRC 7104 Capsule Review by David J. Rhode on 10/31/99. Genre tags: Fantasy Modern_day Historical Horror Espionage Post-apocalypse Old_West Vampire	I visited my local comic book/gaming store the other day, and noticed Apocalypse sitting on the shelves. I remembered the title from having browsed BTRC's web site some months ago. Now, I have a couple of BTRC's supplements (Guns Guns Guns and More Guns, to be precise) and, being generally pleased with the quality of those books, I decided that I would like to throw a little more cash their way as encouragement. Appearances: Apocalypse is a slim black book of the standard 8.5" x 11" dimensions. The front cover title is done in flame-outlined black letters, while the back cover teaser text is done in flame-tinged yellow. This is actually a pretty striking look. I think it compares well with the classic red-on-black appearance of Traveller. Inside, we have a fairly densely-written book in clean, legible typeface, sparsely illustrated with generally useful illustrations. Substance: The book begins with a short table of contents, author's notes, and an introduction. That is followed by about a page and a half of background material explaining the supernatural powers lying behind the Apocalypse of the book's title. This manages to tie Judeo-Christian monotheism into every other form of supernatural belief quite handily. Then we get three pages of outline, covering the divergence of this world's timeline from our own, starting in 1941. The Juxtaposition, the key apocalyptic event which occurred in 1945, is described in more detail on the following page. It turns out that the Juxtaposition was an opening of many gateways to multiple dimensions at once, letting in all kinds of strange and terrible entities. This event coincided with terrible storms and earthquakes. Since then, not all the gates have closed. Then we get into the races. Four subraces of an elf-like species called the Alferi have invaded the earth. These subraces correspond roughly to Asians, Europeans, Africans, and Native Americans/Mongols. Equipped with supernatural powers and taking advantage of the devastation wrought by the Juxtaposition, they invade every nation on Earth, adopting the local culture as their own and enslaving the native humans. These Alferi are capable of breeding with humans, producing half-alferi hybrids. To round things out, the dead have returned to horrifying life, there are various incarnations and avatars of the gods (referred to as Eternals) wandering the earth, and then there is a miscellany of mutants, monstrosities, and dimensional wanderers. The Alferi, half-alferi, humans, and Living Dead are described in some detail. We are left to our own devices to bring the others to life. Character Generation touches on the various characteristics, skills, advantages, and disadvantages already described in the CORPS rulebook as they apply to the world of Apocalypse, and adds some descriptions of Apocalypse-specific paranormal powers. All this has taken us to page 48. The next 40 pages are spent describing the world of Apocalypse and daily life for some of its denizens. While every continent is touched on to some extent, most of the attention is lavished on life in the Kaiser Reich, the domain of the Silver Alferi. They appeared in Europe during the Juxtaposition, and took on the characteristics of Hitler's Germany, with all the attendant nastiness. Humans are enslaved within the actual confines of Europe. The northern coast of Africa is a Kaiser Reich territory, referred to as the P.I.T. (Polizei Imperius Territorium), where humans and half-alferi have more freedom. The city of Casablanca is the ultimate free territory, being ruled by an enigmatic Eternal who mandates that no country's laws may apply within the city. As it turns out, the Silver Alferi are the only Alferi which choose to use technology, and they are incapable of advancing beyond the level established in 1945. The entire world, since then, has been frozen at a WWII technological level. Humans are capable of advancing beyond this limit, but are brutally repressed by the Silver Alferi. The next 15 pages describe 12 NPCs and 11 monsters that are common to the Kaiser Reich territories. These are reasonably well done, with an average of half a page spent on describing the character's background and how they would impact a campaign. Each entry is accompanied by some illustrative artwork. The artwork is reasonably good quality, and most of the illustrations seem to fit the text descriptions. As far as the monsters go, there really isn't anything unique enough to be worth stealing for another game, except maybe their take on mutant hyenas. 17 pages are used to detail two adventures. The first is an adventure for one character (included), introducing the setting of Casablanca and allowing the PC to interact with some of the NPC's described in the preceding chapter. As written, it's pretty much a railroad with only one track. The second adventure is more of a creature-feature, introducing some potential long-term opponents. Collectively, they add 2 more (potential) NPCs and 3 more monsters to what was already described in the book. Apocalypse ends with four pages detailing common weapons and vehicles, and a one page, photocopyable hexagonal map sheet. Good Stuff: I really like the setting of this game. It reminds of RIFTS (in a good way). Like RIFTS, the background allows you to bring characters into the setting from other campaigns. This makes it easy to run cross-over adventures, or take tired old characters into uncharted realms. It also allows the GM a free hand in designing all kinds of monsters to torment the players. Beyond these elements, however, an Apocalypse campaign can involve intrigue between the various powers, exploration of a devastated and changed alternate Earth, murder mysteries, military campaigns, you name it. Unlike RIFTS, Apocalypse offers a much more restrained and balanced power level. That is not to say that characters are created equal... the Alferi are innately superior to humans, but they are still mortal beings, and can be killed just as dead with a sharp stick as with a bazooka. Bad Stuff: Unfortunately, Apocalypse is not without some flaws. Nothing major, but enough irritating deficiencies to make me somewhat unhappy. Starting from the top, my first complaint is that while Apocalypse is a supplement for CORPS, not a complete game in itself, it is not clearly labeled as such. I mentioned that I had learned about Apocalypse from the BTRC web site months before seeing it in a store. One could make the argument that I should have been a more informed consumer, therefore. Regardless, I did not remember that it was only a supplement, and the store which I purchased the book from wraps all its gaming materials in plastic (to keep the grubby little paws of children off them, I suspect). Going only from the information presented on the front and back covers, I did not know that it was a supplement. I was hoping that it would have the CORPS game rules included. I don't consider this a major flaw, as most stores don't follow the practice of wrapping their books in the same way, and it would only take a few minutes perusal to determine that it was a supplement. And frankly, I'm adapting the setting to the HERO rules anyway. My other complaint is about the organization of the material. In general, the book progresses logically. However, it lacks an index, and it could also have used a glossary of common terms. While I was reading over the details on the Silver Alferi, I would run into acronyms and have a hard time figuring out what they stood for. For example, the acronym IAA stands for Imperial Affairs Agency. There is no heading in the text for Imperial Affairs Agency. Instead, this worthy group is described under Religion (which does make sense, the IAA is run by the Kaiser Reich church). There are a number of instances of this sort of thing. Example 2: Silver Alferi scientists suffer from a condition called the Syndrome. They go mad when trying to breach the 1945 technological barrier. Is this condition described under the heading Scientists? Nope... it's also under, you guessed it, Religion. These problems could be addressed, even without an index, by changing the way the text is arranged and using more descriptive subject headings, or even by accenting key words in the text in bold or italic. I suspect that the author and editor were simply too familiar with the material to pick up on problems that a newcomer would have reading through it. It should be noted that there is a very strong attempt to remain PC with this material. Even though the Silver Alferi have turned humans into an oppressed sub-race, they believe very strongly in the equality of the sexes, as apparently all the Alferi do. While this isn't a flaw in and of itself, it does lead to some strange cultural paradoxes. For example, the Wild Alferi in America base their culture on that of the Native Americans. In Native American culture, there were great differences between the roles filled by men, and the roles filled by women. Now that the Alferi have come and everybody gets to be a warrior, who does the drudge-work? It just seems strange for an intentionally dark game to willfully ignore the misogynistic baggage of cultures both ancient and modern when it is willing to deal with prejudice in other ways. Oh well. Finally, there are some gaps in the information. For example, it would have been helpful if typical ranks in the Kaiser Reich military and theocracy were described. It's easy enough for me to do an internet search on the WWII German Military for that information, but it would have been even easier for the author to do it and include that information in the text. In the equipment list, they decribe a number of common firearms in the setting. In the rifles, they list the Karabiner 98K and the Sturmgewehr 74. If, as a GM, I were to have a small platoon of Kaiser Reich soldiers as opponents for the PC's, which rifle would they most likely be armed with? I dunno. Does it make a difference? Maybe... the Karabiner does more damage per shot, but the Sturmgewehr is an automatic weapon with a large clip. It would have been nice to see some more typical 'grunt' NPCs with typical equipment. I suspect the problem here is that the book already contains a lot of information shoe-horned into 128 pages. I really wish they had decided to go with a larger size, so they could expand on the detail and provide more immediately useful information. Final Thoughts: Although I think it has some flaws, I liked this product well enough to decide to go ahead and adapt some material for it so that I can run a campaign. If you think you would enjoy running a more toned-down, RIFTS-like campaign with an even darker setting, then I recommend Apocalypse to you. Keep in mind, as it stands, there's a lot of work for the GM to do. For some people (including myself), that's actually a plus. There are still some annoying gaps, though. Perhaps if it sells well enough, BTRC will put out a sourcebook to fill in some of those gaps. As an adjunct to a campaign you are already running, or a sourcebook of ideas, I can't recommend it as strongly. I think there are some elements of interest, but the book doesn't provide enough really unique characters, monsters, or circumstances to justify its cost for that purpose. Still, you may want to buy it as a financial sacrifice to the Gaming Gods, in order to help keep the industry afloat in these trying times. Style: 3 (Average) Substance: 3 (Average)