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Snake Pipe Hollow was one of the earliest adventures of RuneQuest which is both extremely dangerous and evocative. Four printings were made; the first has a "just awful" piece of cover art featuring a giant snake, the second an excellent two-tone walktapus, the third a gloomy cartoon broo, and in the final incarnation, published by Avalon Hill, a more realist broo. The text in the four printings does not change substantially. The most significant difference is in the final edition where the stats are updated to RQ 3rd edition, a digest and full-map of the caverns is included. The AH version also includes more (and better) interior art, a more readable serif font, better layout and, several pages of notes for owners of the "Standard" RuneQuest rules, rather than the Deluxe rules.

The setting is Glorantha, and the background to the formation of the Hollow is inspiring; in a great battle against a chaotic army, mortal mages caused a plain to collapse upon itself, sinking into the ground and trapping much of the horde. Somewhere within the hollow is the "Snake Pipe", a magical artifact from an earth temple that was on the location before the sinking. Within the area are Dragonnewt plinths, an ogre temple, a giant's table, and a waterfall where elves, trolls and ogres often fight each other.

Multiple reasons for entering the Hollow are provided; a smithy needs some magical sea metal, some young healers need their priestess rescued, a knowledge cult wasnt fossils, an alchemist is wants the eggs of a scorpian man. Others simply venture to destory chaotic monsters and steal their stuff. These adventures are all based around entering caverns which pock the cliffs of the Hollow; only one of many is described in detail, but that alone takes up the bulk of the book.

Each location in the cavern is described in a common format; initial die rolls (for random events, or the location of particular denizens), first glance (including rock strata type, which adds to "this place is a sunk plain" feel), closer looks, exits, search (random chance of "found objects"), traps, denizens, treasure and miscellaneous notes. It's not a bad way of doing things, although sometimes the die rolls give the impression of being on a randomly generated dungeon crawl. There are fifty-four cavern locations so described.

The caverns themsleves are an appropriate chaotic melange; irregular shapes, pools and underground streams, the sunken and broken remains of the temple, and a very unnatural winding snake-like passage. Sentient denizens include a potentially helpful giant turtle, a narcisstic giant, broos, ogres and scorpian men. On the less-than-sentient column are a variety of dragonsnails, worms, gorps, and other lumps of dangerous goo. In a parallel reality are a number of spirits from the old temple, their blind and deaf veralzi assistants, and two very malignant and very dangerous giant disembodied hands.

One of the great strengths of the module is that it manages to include these denizens within proximity to each other in a manner that makes some sense and is written as such into the scenario. If a party is so inclined they can even start playing one chaotic faction off against another in their attempts to completing one or more of the several scenario leads. There are multiple potential stories here, and the situation as presented is quite dynamic.

This said, Snake Pipe Hollow is very dangerous. Many of the denizens and even some of the traps are quite capable of slaying a character without even thinking of breaking a sweat, such is their strength, magic, or both. Indeed, there are a couple of opponents which are, quite deliberately, impossible to defeat. Great caution, a small mountain of protective magics, and enormous levels of diplomacy when confronted by anything that might even tend towards a neutral reaction is highly recommended. It does however suffer a common problem in RQ; for some parties this will prove to be impossibly difficult - for a few very powerful others, they'll clear the place without trouble. Sample characters would have been very helpful to guide a GM in making the choice on when to apply this setting.

Snake Pipe Hollow is more than a very tough dungeon-crawl, as it comes with the added bonus of multiple scenario objectives, a dynamic setting and many delightfully weird characters and locations. When it was first published, in 1979, it could have been considered quite possibly the best adventure available on the market. However, over the multiplicity of printings very little was done to improve or expand the scenario and setting; the RQ3 edition is virtually identitical to the three RQ2 printings. It would have been very nice to see expansion to the wilderness setting and perhaps even some of the minor caverns. Overall however, this is an above average product, both in terms of the writing, the setting, the story and presentation.