Review of Survivors' Guide to the United Kingdom

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"Survivors' Guide To The United Kingdom", by Peter Phillipps, was the last item published for the First Edition of "Twilight 2000", prior to the release of the Second Edition. It is one of several regional sourcebooks published for the first edition of GDW's "Twilight 2000", a post-WW3 role playing game.

Like, "RDF Sourcebook", "Howling Wilderness", the Norwegian history section of "Boomer" and the Finnish produced, "Nordic Countries: Sourcebook", "Survivors' Guide To The United Kingdom" is designed to provide the GM and players with information on the history, conditions and organisations/characters that exist within a particular region of the "Twilight 2000" game world.

This book outlines the situation in the United Kingdom (UK) as of the 1st of January 2001. Scotland & Wales are effectivly independant and with the exception of the south-east corner (Kent, East/West Sussex & Hampshire), which is Government control, England is in anarchy with various warlords, marauders and free towns fighting for control.

Beginning with advice on how to get the characters to the UK, the book then covers history, basic geography, living conditions, current events in various parts of the UK, important personalities/organisations and encounters within the UK.

The final portion of the book consists of how to generate British Military characters, additional weapons/vehicles and an order of battle/unit history of the British Army as of 01/01/01.

"SURVIVORS' GUIDE TO THE UNITED KINGDOM", VERDICT.

The "Survivors' Guide To The United Kingdom", will provide the GM with a good overview of the situation in the UK and careful reading will provide him with plenty of ideas for adventures/campaigns.

However, the book should have been backed up with a series of adventures to provide more detailed information on individual areas, as there are a number of organisations/individuals who exist only as names. For whatever reason only one such adventure was provided, "Sheltie Holiday" (Challenge 43), which dealt with an attempt by the British government to recover spare parts needed to repair the surviving North Sea oil rigs under British control.

Therefore while I do recommend this book for any "Twilight 2000" GM planning to run a British based campaign, I do so with the following warning, be prepared to spend time expanding on the material provided.

Overall, three out of five for style, three out of five for content.