Stefano Buonocore
Today we are pleased to offer you the review of The Walking Dead Universe – Roleplaying Core Rules. First of all, we want to thank Nils Hintze, the lead designer of the game, and Free League for sending us a digital version of this manual so that we can study it carefully. This is the basic manual of the Swedish company’s latest work, a role-playing game set, as the title suggests, in the world of The Walking Dead, the popular television series from AMC Networks.
You can find the volume, with 180 pages, on Free League e-shop. For 568 crowns (just over 50 euros) you can have the physical copy, while the digital one costs 278 (just under half). Other products are also available, such as a useful Starter Set.
Before starting to describe the manual, an important clarification. The game resumes in the title the The Walking Dead Universe, which specifically refers to the shared universe born with the first TV series, in 2010. Even if the setting is the same as Robert Kirkman’s comic series of the same name from which the franchise was born, first took on a connotation and then a completely autonomous editorial life. For this reason, the manual, and the game in general, will always refer exclusively to the TV series.
Volume Review of The Walking Dead Universe
There will come a day when we get tired of singing the praises of Free League products. But it is not this day. Once again we must note how the quality of this volume is very high. Readability and atmosphere do not need to be compromised because they go together perfectly. Reading is practical and easy, with a double-column layout with text boxes and tables where necessary.
The volume is full of examples and small narrative inserts which, in a nutshell, not only help to better weave the lore of the game but also help to translate the rules into a taste of the gaming experience. The valuable illustrations by Gustaf Ekelund and Martin Grip, two leading Free League artists, further strengthen this concept; without pretensions to hyperrealism or protagonism, they accompany the reading by always placing the right emphasis on the page, or the right gap between two chapters.
Man Versus Zombie
In general, more and more attention is being paid to how a manual proposes the gaming experience, before anything else. Free League has always been particularly attentive to this aspect and its games have an excellent degree of depth. For The Walking Dead Universe, this is even more true, considering its specific characteristics.
This role-playing game is not based on a particularly structured setting. Not that it doesn’t have it, but it has a light, flexible setting. It relies on the events that form the backdrop to The Walking Dead Universe: the epidemic spread of a virus that transforms people into Walkers. Basically zombies. We don’t know its origin or epicentre, we don’t even know if a cure is possible. What was discovered is only that all the characters, players and non-players, are healthy carriers of it, and that upon their death the virus will transform them. Provided that they are not bitten by a Walker: in that case, the infection will take over in a variable time, but never particularly long.
Review of The Walking Dead Universe: Anthropocentrism
This “loose-mesh” setting is intended precisely for the gaming experience that The Walking Dead Universe proposes. The intent of the game is not to tell the story of the fight with the Walkers or the search for a cure that will put an end to the epidemic. On the contrary, the real focus of the narrative is human relationships. Both those within the group to which the characters belong and those facing outwards, towards the other groups of survivors.
In some ways, it can be said that the true enemy of man, in The Walking Dead Universe, is the man himself. Yet it is at the same time his only hope for survival. A subtle game, in which however the threat of the Walkers must never be forgotten; indeed, the game master is encouraged to always keep it under control. However, it is not an element of tension on which to base the game, but rather an element of pressure to always be used so that the narrative remains alive.
More Lore than Setting
Precisely by virtue of this, the manual does not go into too much detail in describing the setting. It disseminates within its pages many useful elements to reconstruct a global picture and describes in particular the Atlanta area, the city from which the events of the original TV series start. But this is because it is proposed as a setting for a scenario, an example of a possible game.
For the rest, the setting is, as mentioned, deliberately light, because, on the contrary, it has an extremely strong underlying lore. A lore that imposes very distinctive notes on the game regardless of the context in which they are played. Not for nothing the suggestion for those who want to start playing The Walking Dead Universe it’s as simple as it is clear and explicit: take a map, divide it into zones and let the game guide you.
Mechanics Review: The Walking Dead Universe
So we have a game based on human relationships and survival; about a pressing danger and resource management. A Free League game that always puts the characters in situations of risk or tension, leading them to challenge their limits, close to the breaking point. Mixing all these elements, the answer for the ideal gaming system is almost obvious: the Year Zero Engine. A versatile gaming system that we have already explored in various reviews: from Forbidden Lands a Twilight 2000, passing through Alien RPG. Mechanics, therefore, are adaptable to completely different genres.
The Swedish house rules system is extremely simple, to the point of often being confused with games OSR. The Old School Reinassance indeed shares several principles: extremely simple rules and board management, a rather high character mortality rate, and great use of the tables. But it certainly goes much further.
The Year Zero Engine also manages the emotions and psychic balance of the characters. It takes them to the breaking point, managing the various physical and psychological traumas they may experience. It has very “intrusive” mechanics in character management, which is undeniable, but it does so by bringing enormous depth. Managing emotional trauma through mutual empathy is not a typical OSR thing, but on the contrary, an extremely modern brushstroke that extraordinarily enriches the game.
Character Creation
However, character creation remains extremely simple. The player distributes thirteen points between the four characteristics: Strength, Agility, Wits and Empathy; he then distributes twelve points among as many skills and chooses one from a list of three talents linked to the Archetype. The mechanical part of the board is practically finished; for each action, the player composes a pool of six-sided dice with the most suitable characteristic and ability. A 6 allows you to have success. Each 6 beyond the first one allows you to improve the quality or obtain additional effects.
In case of failure, it is possible to “push the roll”. If that action has a crucial impact on the character, the group or the session, the player can choose to re-roll the dice. However, doing so increases one’s Stress: each Stress point adds a specific die (of another colour to be able to distinguish it) to the pool, the result of which can generate catastrophic outcomes, even in the event of success; mainly it will be to increase the Threat Level.
The Threat Level is a key element of the game. It indicates the quantity and reactivity of Walkers in the area and has a score ranging from 0 to a maximum of 6. There are various ways to increase it, but Stress is the most frequent. It represents a bit of the classic tense situation in which a character, to move in a state of alert, commits a misstep, alerting the Walkers. This is a pretty major rework of the standard mechanics of the Year Zero Engine, which once again demonstrates how flexible this system is.
Review of Additional Customization Options in The Walking Dead Universe
Of course, character creation isn’t over. You must first choose the Archetype into which it fits. This is a classic topos of the survivors of zombie movies and in particular of the series The Walking Dead. We have the Criminal, the Doctor, the Farmer, the Homemaker, the Boy, the Law Enforcer, the Nobody, the Outcast, the Politician, the Preacher, the Scientist and finally the Soldier.
They are all very intuitive macro-categories, which determine some minor changes in the Character’s Characteristics and Abilities, in addition to the different list of talents that can be drawn upon during creation. But above all they characterize it: just choosing one helps to have a clear idea of what you are playing at.
Another fundamental step is the choice of Anchors, characters (one player and one non-player) who represent something important for our protagonist. Anchors are what allow the character to maintain, or recover, his mental balance. A fundamental element of the game, which brings the true protagonist to the foreground: is the humanity of the character.
Complications & Objectives
The further elements that characterize the character are his Issues and his Drives. If the latter are rather intuitive, the Issues are a more original element. It’s about the character’s weaknesses, potential risks, and what could bring him close to a breaking point.
Issues are a tool available to the player to characterize and interpret the character, but the game master will also use it as an active narrative element. Non-player characters also have their critical issues, and so does the group’s Haven.
This is a very important element of the game. The Year Zero Engine poses since its first release (for the game Mutant: Year Zero, from which the system takes its name) much emphasis on the exploration and management phase of the refuge. Even if in The Walking Dead Universe these rules are very simplified, however, they contribute to giving further depth to the human drama that the protagonists of the game experience. A shelter is actively managed, with its resource and defensibility scores – both crucial criteria for the group’s long-term survival.
Putting the pieces together
This is the core of the game, and it all comes together perfectly. The manual offers a whole series of additional tools: from weapons to vehicles, much more important than the simple accessories available in other games. From lists of NPCs to factions to take as examples to create other original ones for your sessions. Rich in examples, threats and possible dangers, it also offers a detailed section for the management of Walker swarms and rich appendices for the management of the exploration and collection phases.
But what gives a unique value to The Walking Dead Universe is its section dedicated to the game master. In addition to the security and table management tools, which are fundamental, to say the least, in a game that brings such issues to the surface, there is everything you might need during a one-shot adventure, a short chronicle or a long campaign.
It’s not a figure of speech. Lists, tips, tables. The Walking Dead Universe requires some preparation, they are not tools designed for improvisation. But at the same time, it is a light preparation: just use the random choice systems, or select from the lists the one that comes closest to the type of experience you want to experience at the table and put everything together. The process is extraordinarily simple: once the game master has assembled what is requested with the characters, the game will continue naturally without the need for forcing.
Final Considerations of the Review of The Walking Dead Universe
We started by saying that to date, of the many Free League products reviewed, none have disappointed us, and we can only reiterate this. The Walking Dead Universe is a truly precious game; a simple and pop idea, which at the same time offers enormous depth to players. In a zombie-based setting, the real enemy is other human beings, but the real challenge is within the PCs themselves. All in three different game modes: Campaign, for classic long-term development; Survival, for shorter and “guided” adventures (the most suitable for intertwining with the events of the TV series); and also for solo role-playing, with a series of dedicated tools.
Surely these are themes and styles of play that must be liked, and which do not suit all tastes: this is a necessary premise. But apart from this, we are talking about an RPG that in terms of conception, development and implementation is simply perfect. It rarely happens that you can get your hands on a volume that, although so compact, is so complete. For this reason alone it deserves a place in any library; but if you are passionate about games that delve into the social and psychological dynamics of the characters (while maintaining a more classic approach), The Walking Dead Universe is a simply essential volume.
