J. E. Goodrich

Twilight: 2000 was one of my favorite RPG games in the 1980s. Set in 2000, the world was ruined by a 5-year war that began with a Sino-Soviet conflict that spread to Europe when Germany reunited. The introductory adventure had the players as part of the devestated 5th Mechanized Division, trapped behind enemy lines in Poland after their unit was destroyed. Later adventures expanded the scope of the game to the Mid-East, America, and other parts of Europe.

I ran my first T2K campaign while I was still in high school and another after I graduated. Both campaigns used the introductory scenario as a background, although the second campaign was much more successful and fun. I ran a third campaign set in the Mid-East which had a much more structured environment for the players

(The Mid-East campaign also allowed me to introduce one of my favorite NPCs, Colonel Yuri Brekov -- a perfect foil for the players and one that drove them crazy a few times. I'll have to write a blog about him sometime ...)

By the early 1990s, GDW switched T2K over to a new system; one completely different from the first edition (T2K 2.0). While it had a number of good points, it never caught on with myself or the group and the fourth campaign barely started before it was done. GDW did yet some more tweeking to the system (T2K 2.2) to bring it in line with their other RPGs (Traveller: The New Era and Dark Conspiracy).

Twilight: 2000 also spawned a sci-fi game: 2300 AD (intitially called Traveller: 2300). 2300 took the T2K history and looked at what would happen in 300 years. While it had some good, hard science and an interesting setting, one aspect of the background killed it for me (France as the world's superpower?!? Right. Not unless somebody clones Napoleon.) there were a few other little bits I found hard to believe as well.

Aparently, there is a new version of Twilight: 2000 in the works for release sometime next year (Twilight: 2013) and a d20 version of 2300 AD (2320 AD) is still being worked on by another company. Although I'm not really looking forward to either version, it might be interesting to see how the new versions are presented. Twilight:2000 was always a gritty game and I can't see it being powered by a cinematic system like d20. 2300 AD was gritty as well, but later adventures and supplements began emphasizing the cyberpunk aspect of the game, so I could see it as a d20 system.

The reason why T2K is on on my mind is that its one of the games that I'm thinking about running as a PBP on the message boards. I still have a lot of fond memories of the game, even if its setting and history have relegated it to an alternate history. Or an alternate Earth.

Hmmm .. isn't there a GURPS book about alternate Earths ...