Set in an alternate 1997, players embark through a strange America. The landscape is littered with the ruins of gigantic battle drones and the discarded trash of a declining high-tech consumerist society. The focus is not on reaching a specific goal but on the journey itself—exploring the characters' experiences and how they change. As players navigate this collapsing world, they delve into self-discovery and examine the depths of their relationships and moral boundaries.

It delivered, in droves.

Players

  • Craig: Gamemaster
  • Rodney: Doctor
  • Donny: Wren (Pop-Star)
  • Colin: Shadow (Runaway)
  • Max: Private Investigator (PI)

Militia Attack (Dusk)

The game started quickly scattered the core premise is our suburb (town?) fell under attack by a violent and unknown militia flying a Gadsden Flag and our group found themselves a loose collective of refugees clinging together for safety with the core goal of getting to LA Safe Zone.

We successfully bargained for a worn-in pickup truck with supplies and took off.1

That evening the same militia was spotted tailing us and quickly overrun. Shadow made a hasty decision on a steep incline. She flipped off the headlights and performed a quick 180 to send the vehicle back down the hill in neutral towards the aggressors [FAILURE]. But that never happened; she got them stuck in a ditch before they had a chance to bail.

Seconds later a Pacifica military drone flew from behind the hill targeting and annihilating the militia with short-range ballistics. We’d been saved.

The drone gunship leaves, refugees are not a priority, and we checked the wreckage for supplies, a quarter-full Jerry Can of gas, and not much else among the burnt bodies.

We recover the truck and leave.

Police Cordon (Twilight)

Miles ahead a police cordon was set up. Shadow uses a pair of binoculars2 and spots a couple of bored officers in their vehicles; we approach—slowly, and they come out friendly. We talk about what’s going on and neither of us knows, they were stationed out here without guidance but are telling people to head to the LA Safe Zone. One of them spots Wren for who she is, a national pop star. She signs the star-struck officer’s neurocaster—a helmet that puts your conscience mind into the Nurascape—and we say our goodbyes shortly after.

Lonely Gas Station (Late Night)

Nobody is here, but the place is open. We fill up the Jerry Can and check the station for supplies. There is one bored attendant here and not much for sale, the whole place has been bought out. Shadow tries to steal a UMD Album [FAILURE], and gets caught by the bored attendant, she rolls her eyes and pays for it not wanting to cause further trouble.

The Small Town of Boron (Sunrise)

@#$&! Our truck stops running and we opt to push it a half mile to the small town of Boron, population: nearly abandoned. We think we see a lumbering thing, in the distance, but it’s gone by the time we get to Main Street.

The Doctor is getting fidgety [Addiction: Neurocaster] and we’re starting to get hungry. PI is about to cook up a hobo combo of fried spam and a half bottle of ketchup4 before a veteran fella comes out of an American Legion Tavern and offers a few gallons of water and a cheeseburger-and-egg breakfast—we quickly comply.

American Legon Tavern (Early Morning)

Inside a few local elders trod in with walkers and oxygen tanks, nod, and rank up a game of dominos. We make small talk. Boron has few holdouts left, and supplies sparse, this place is dying. We get the name of the local mechanic and say farewell.

Finding the Mechanic (Early Morning)

We find him at a small diner down the street, hunched over an unfinished crossword puzzle (weeks old). Flash-forward to his garage and a professional assessment—our truck is toast. We’re going to need an engine overhaul and parts with delivery dates that don’t exist.

We need a new travel plan to LA Safe Zone.

Nurascape: One of the interesting (and terrifying) features of this setting is mid-nineties access to a neural-based internet, a quantum skip over the internet of today. Throw on a portable Nuralcaster Helmet and you’re in full dive virtual reality. The whole game is centered on this technology and how it’s led to civilization stagnation and population decline.

Critter Care (Mid Morning)

With the downtime of figuring out what to do next, The doctor dives into the neuralscape and searches for medical supplies, the best option is a local veterinarian: Critter Care.

We find her zoned out with a Neuralcaster on and a bored dog curled up on the floor next to her. The psycho-shock of pulling off her helmet isn’t worth the fallout; instead, we dive in to pull her out.

We find her fursona in a VRChat among others who share her passion for animals—she reluctantly meets us back in real space.

The doctor slaps cash on the table and the vet says we can grab whatever from the back. Before she dives back into the neuralscape Shadow offers to buy her dog. She scoffs at first but relinquishes ownership; the dog is being fed, but her emotional well-being isn’t.

We leave.

Town Events and Rumors (Afternoon)

  • The American Legion Tavern regulars tell us a gang of young adults captured a Military Humvee and were buying resources. They’re our best option for traveling out of here, assuming we can find them.
  • Shadow had spotted a Sentra drone with her binoculars. Sentra is the megacorporation that built and maintains the neuralscape.
  • The locals gather at the drive-in theater at the edge of town and we’re formally invited if we’re hanging out for a few days.

Breaking & Entering (Dusk)

We find a house with lights on and figure it’s out our best chance to ask if they have a vehicle or information. Shadow is the sneakiest so they ask her to scout it out, she rolls her eyes and grabs Wren to play up the stranded travelers con—nobody answers.

She shrugs and goes in, the others slunk in behind her. They find an emaciated man on the couch dived into a neuralcaster. The doctor checks to see if he’s breathing. He is.

We’re considering pulling him out when we hear the sound of our salvation, a Humvee is speeding nearby. We sprint to follow the noise to a nearby middle school.

The Deserters (Twilight)

After shakey, low-trust, negotiations, we’re let into their makeshift compound. They're young, 18-20, and confess they’ve deserted the army base they were stationed at due to a lack of command 5 and aimlessness.

None of us care about that. We need to get to the safe zone.

They’ve got a plan. They’ll take us, but they want to capture a military drone masquerading as a giant corporate mascot. If they can kick out the AI piloting it, we take control. Nobody messes with you with firepower like that.

Fuck it, we’re in. What could go wrong?

The Picture Show (Night)

Everything. The young deserter’s intel says the drone appears nightly at the drive-in movie theater to watch what the humans are watching, the perfect time to dive in and “fight” the AI controlling it. Our group arrives in the Humvee with the deserters, surprising the few townspeople there. The lady-projectionist drunkenly hollers, “What do y’all wanna watch tonight?”

Shadow shouts back, “Night of the Living Dead!”

The mascot appears—a giant animatronic dog from an iconic TV show—and sits next to us like a child. Everyone flees. Now is our chance. Shadow and Wren don’t have helmets and play watch out with the Deserters while the Doctor and the PI dive in to find the AI.

They find the AI’s avatar, a cartoon version of the giant robot it pilots. There is no appeal to humanity. The PI lashes out and attacks the AI, who barks back at him and the Doctor.

Watch Out! A magnetrine Sentra gunship appears, and a group of PMCs6 drops from ropes. They maneuver to reclaim Sentra’s rogue AI. The young deserters engage them, and Shadow grabs one of the doctor’s sedatives, running full tilt at a Sentra PMC’s hacking a panel on the robot’s leg [FAILURE: LOST HOPE].

The two of them meet each other’s eyes, and Shadow breaks down; she’s a scared-as-hell teenager about to hypo a guy who is litterally here to stop this thing from getting out of control. This whole situation is beyond fucked up.

The Doctor and the PI wreck the AI, but this does not go as planned—it’s not an artificial intelligence; it’s a child playing with something it shouldn’t have. The PI runs a local trace. He has the address.

The gunship leaves as the PMCs are driven off. The Doctor guides Shadow back to the Humvee. One of the deserters is dead from the skirmish.

We drive to the address and find the horror that has become our world: Two dead parents of neurocaster bliss and a neglected preadolescence child.

[SESSION END]

Review

This game hits harder than you think, cathartic even. All of us escape into our phones and abandon the real world for a virtual one of amusing ourselves to death. While civil war, strife, and survival are obstacles here the real horror is the slow social collapse of civilization.

When I bombed my "try to hypo a guy with a sedative" roll and my hope score crashed, the fantasy of being a teenage hero in the apocalypse died. Roleplaying into the "shift tracks" moment enforced by the mechanics sold me on this game and is one of the reasons why I love Chaosium's Passions from the Basic Roleplaying system and Beliefs from The Burning Wheel so much.

  1. Starting Gear: I like how half of our gear was mundane life items like a popular novel, or a Sony Walkman to keep hope alive, Hope being a necessary resource to manage on your character sheet. ↩︎
  2. Binoculars: I have a personal rule for binocular/telescope usage in roleplaying games: You always spot interesting things for free; a clue, movement, weather patterns anything that moves the story forward. Rolling gleans bonus information. ↩︎
  3. Pop Star in an Apocalypse: One of the most overpowered character concepts I didn’t even think of, it’s like a free advantage in every reaction roll. Does this game even have reaction rolls? That feels like a missed and greatly needed mechanic for a game like this ↩︎
  4. Food: Dungeon Meshi for the apocalypse. ↩︎
  5. Desertion: "lack of command" alone is not considered a valid reason for desertion in military contexts. Military personnel are expected to maintain their posts and carry out their duties even in challenging circumstances or when immediate leadership may be absent. ↩︎
  6. PMC: Private Military Contractors ↩︎