Tenchi Masaki is an ordinary Japanese high school student (again). Coming home from school one day, he suddenly sees two strange objects fall from the sky and crash in the mountains not far from his home. Running to investigate, he finds an unconscious, beautiful, blue-haired girl amid the wreckage of...something! When he revives her, she begs him to protect her from a vicious space pirate who attacked her starship. A bulky power armor suddenly appears, the girl shouts that it's the space pirate, and a chase ensues. When Tenchi and his newfound friend are finally cornered on a high cliff, the power armor suddenly trips on a discarded soda can and is unable to rise. The girl casually punts it over the cliff.
Tenchi's new companion, as she's decided she will be, accompanies him home, where she quickly wins over his widowed father, though his grandfather, an elderly Shinto priest, is a bit skeptical. That evening, the house recieves a visitor: the same powered suit from before. The bizarre metal monster chases Tenchi and the young crash survivor up the hill to Tenchi's grandfather's shrine, where the old man handily defeats it with his wooden bokken. Out of the wreckage pops a beautiful, blond, bubbleheaded Galaxy Police detective pursuing a dangerous space pirate...who just happens to be the damsel in distress Tenchi rescued earlier!
And things only get more complicated from there. Tenchi's family and the two alien hangers-on are quickly joined by a beautiful space princess whose demure exterior hides a horrible temper, her cute, oddly mature little sister, the space pirate's adorable, carrot-munching pet starship, a diminutive, red-haired mad scientist and her coffee-mug-sized robot cheerleaders, and the detective's serious-minded, long-suffering partner. And the misadventures and mayhem don't even come close to stopping there!
Such are the events chronicled in Tenchi Universe, an RPG supplement based on the popular 26-episode anime of the same name. Of course, the original Tenchi Muyo! RPG and Resource Book is required to play.
The book itself is a 109-page softcover, lavishly illustrated with pics from the anime and a few other sources. It's put together with the same graphical layout as its predecessor, with the same emphasis on readability and organization. Everything is well-organized and easy to find via the table of contents and the index (though such things are often considered unnecessary in a book this size, it's still nice to have it there). It manages to describe almost everything that played an important part in the anime, from new characters (like Detective First-Class Kiyone) to new settings (the Time and Space perfect worlds) and new machines (Detective First-Class Mihoshi's powered suit), all set up in GOO's Tri-Stat System. Everything is ready to be put into a game, minus a GM and players, of course.
The book's first chapter includes descriptions of the 26 episodes of the Tenchi Universe anime. Chapter 2 focuses on the characters, ships, and gadgets of the series, including game statistics, well-worded descriptions, and illustrations (though some of the ships, gadgets, and characters aren't illustrated, a common flaw in some GOO products). Chapter 3 deals with the world of Tenchi Universe, with detailed descriptions of the locations, notable devices, institutions, and even the ideal worlds created by the girls when they fooled around with Washu's Dimensional Cause and Effect Controller. Chapter 4 gives the gamemaster some advice on running a campaign in the Tenchi Universe setting, including overall themes and advice on giving such games the proper "feel." Chapter 5 contains two sample adventures, both fairly simple, but closely connected to the game's setting and characters. While these adventures require the use of the anime's star characters, one of them could easily be adapted for any group of PCs. Within the same chapter is information on the voice cast from the anime, publication info on the songs, and other information for the anime fans who might buy this book. All in all, the book's information is complete, well-organized, and easy to use.
Now if this review only stopped here, this would almost be the perfect sourcebook. Unfortunately, it doesn't, because this sourcebook, good as it is, has some glaring flaws.
The first flaw is right in the foreword, a typo near the bottom of the page. This almost starts a tradition of a typo on every page. I say almost because every page doesn't have a typo. Unfortunately, several of the pages have enough of them to make up for this. This book has more typos than a Palladium Book of twice its length. This may sound like nitpicking in an industry where typos are a lot more common than they used to be (for whatever reason, but it doesn't have to be that way), but the sheer number of typos and editing mistakes in this book smacks of pure carelessness. GOO's editing department has apparently suffered since the days of the original Tenchi Muyo! RPG.
The second flaw is obvious the second you open the book. What?!! Black and white?!!
In any other book, this wouldn't even be a concern. The vast majority of RPG books these days are still printed on good ol' fashioned white pages in black ink, with an illo thrown in here and there. But these books aren't designed with color in mind. The layout of this book /is/, and suffers considerably for its absence. After the stunning, full-color layout of the original Tenchi Muyo! RPG, this is a visual poke in the eye. This carries over into the illustrations as well. Most of these are screen shots from the anime, with a few color drawings from somewhere else (like the great parody of the Return Of The Jedi movie poster at the beginning of Chapter 5). Many of them, sadly, have been turned into textbook demonstrations of the problems of turning color artwork into black and white artwork, namely the problems of contrast and shading. Please pardon my barbaric dialect, but some of those pics are so damned dark that it's hard to tell there's anything in the picture at all! At best, it all runs together (there /is/ a Galaxy Police cruiser in this illo of one, right?). This is a travesty in a series like Tenchi Universe, which depends so heavily on bright, eye-catching color. Sure, it keeps the price down, but a couple extra dollars wouldn't be too much to ask for a color version of this book (hint hint, GOO. You've Tenchi In Tokyo yet to do, at least!).
Tenchi Universe is a fine sourcebook, if you're only buying it for the information. If that's not the only reason you're buying it, it's still a pretty good book. Just don't expect to be blown away by it.
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