Rifts Atlantis, the second World Book for the Rifts RPG covers the legendary lost continent. Slightly shorter than its predecessor, it still packs a wealth of content into its 161 pages. Beginning with a brief history of the lost continent by Rifts character Erin Tarn, the reader is exposed to the backstory of the continent. This section is well-written and insightful, providing a superb jumping point for using this setting in one’s own Rifts campaign.
The reader is then introduced to some rather fun random encounter tables and the unique concept of let line storms. Thankfully, the text doesn’t linger on the details here and soon we learn about Atlantis and the True Atlanteans.
I like the idea of Atlantis as a center of ley line magic and technology. In Rifts, the continent ended up being swallowed by a dimensional rift, while the city itself sunk into the sea. As the continent drifted through the dimensions, an evil race of slave-mongers—the Splugorth set up the land as their base of operations. The Splugorth creep me out. The very idea of an enslaving race, ruling from afar and making allies with monsters and malevolent interdimensional brings is downright terrifying—and that makes them the perfect villain. By the time we get to their appearance, things become downright chilling. Try to imagine a gigantic slime-covered mound with a mass of writhing tentacles—a kind of behemoth beholder with tentacles instead of eye stalks.
The section on the Sunaj—for the GM's eyes only, of course—provides a neat basis for some in-game intrigue. There’s another massive section detailing the slave stock of the Splugorth, which can seem a bit tedious and another long and not particularly interesting section on magic tattoos. Then, of course, there are the available character classes based on the tattooed men. The more interesting characters are the True Atlanteans and stone magic users.
True Atlanteans—displaced transdimensional nomads—are the human descendants of the original denizens of Atlantis and offer an excellent opportunity to play a character with increased psychic power energy and psychic recovery abilities. That’s even an option for an undead slayer, perfect for those excursions down to Vampire Country. True Atlanteans also have magic tattoos, a unique detail of the race, but they’re slightly different than the tattooed men. The book is a bit confusing on this point, but either way, it seems to work.
The high tech City of Ki-Talan most resembles the traditional image of Atlantis—a place of high technology and creature comforts. It’s nice to see the game paying tribute to the actual mythological city with this section. The new capital city of Atlantis, Splynn is an abjectly horrendous place full of danger and intrigue. It's impossible to overstate how tremendously cool this place is.
The tome wraps up with a section on bio-wizardry and various Atlantean weaponry. The symbiotic creatures described here are certainly the stuff of nightmares and would be right at home in an Alien or Nightmare on Elm Street film. The advanced weaponry is reminiscent of comic and anime sensibilities of the time—loud, lavish and incredibly destructive. These are the types of weapons those alien hunters in Men in Black possess.
The writing in the books is mildly disjointed. It’s almost as if they took several ideas and mashed them together. Granted, there’s a certain charm in the style and prose—and the entire book isn't like that—but it can be jarring to the reader, likely immersed in the material to come across some of these passages. I liked the images and ideas the book had to offer and immensely enjoyed the illustrations.
Contributed by David J Buck
The reader is then introduced to some rather fun random encounter tables and the unique concept of let line storms. Thankfully, the text doesn’t linger on the details here and soon we learn about Atlantis and the True Atlanteans.
I like the idea of Atlantis as a center of ley line magic and technology. In Rifts, the continent ended up being swallowed by a dimensional rift, while the city itself sunk into the sea. As the continent drifted through the dimensions, an evil race of slave-mongers—the Splugorth set up the land as their base of operations. The Splugorth creep me out. The very idea of an enslaving race, ruling from afar and making allies with monsters and malevolent interdimensional brings is downright terrifying—and that makes them the perfect villain. By the time we get to their appearance, things become downright chilling. Try to imagine a gigantic slime-covered mound with a mass of writhing tentacles—a kind of behemoth beholder with tentacles instead of eye stalks.
The section on the Sunaj—for the GM's eyes only, of course—provides a neat basis for some in-game intrigue. There’s another massive section detailing the slave stock of the Splugorth, which can seem a bit tedious and another long and not particularly interesting section on magic tattoos. Then, of course, there are the available character classes based on the tattooed men. The more interesting characters are the True Atlanteans and stone magic users.
True Atlanteans—displaced transdimensional nomads—are the human descendants of the original denizens of Atlantis and offer an excellent opportunity to play a character with increased psychic power energy and psychic recovery abilities. That’s even an option for an undead slayer, perfect for those excursions down to Vampire Country. True Atlanteans also have magic tattoos, a unique detail of the race, but they’re slightly different than the tattooed men. The book is a bit confusing on this point, but either way, it seems to work.
The high tech City of Ki-Talan most resembles the traditional image of Atlantis—a place of high technology and creature comforts. It’s nice to see the game paying tribute to the actual mythological city with this section. The new capital city of Atlantis, Splynn is an abjectly horrendous place full of danger and intrigue. It's impossible to overstate how tremendously cool this place is.
The tome wraps up with a section on bio-wizardry and various Atlantean weaponry. The symbiotic creatures described here are certainly the stuff of nightmares and would be right at home in an Alien or Nightmare on Elm Street film. The advanced weaponry is reminiscent of comic and anime sensibilities of the time—loud, lavish and incredibly destructive. These are the types of weapons those alien hunters in Men in Black possess.
The writing in the books is mildly disjointed. It’s almost as if they took several ideas and mashed them together. Granted, there’s a certain charm in the style and prose—and the entire book isn't like that—but it can be jarring to the reader, likely immersed in the material to come across some of these passages. I liked the images and ideas the book had to offer and immensely enjoyed the illustrations.
Contributed by David J Buck
