Re: [GZG] First Sci-Fi Game

I haven't read it but from the blurbs I'm reading it looks alot like a
fancied up Shaper/Mechanist universe (the Schizmatrix Plus collection
has the whole series in one volume). Which would be great for a RPG, a
dream for hard sci fi, but terrible for GZG-style military gaming as
conventional warfare is non-existent.

Ship to ship combat is forbidden by common convention, so it's mostly
intrigue, agitprop, claim-jumping, state-sponsored terrorism,
industrial espianoge and economic sabotage. Earth has been ruined by
economic/political/ecological collapse as is under Interdict.
Virtually the whole setting is in free-fall. FTL only appears late in
the series as (actually several) technologies used by aliens, yet to
be reverse-engineered and forbiddingly expensive. So nearly the whole
series takes place in the solar system, disputed by two alliances of
transhuman (here called "post-human") factions. The mechanists
(hypercorporate proponents of cybernetics, computers and robotics)
dominate the Asteroid Belt, while the shapers (fascist bioengineers)
control the rings of saturn. The rest of the solar system is
"disputed".

I could potentially see a star grunt game in shaper/mechanist, but
full thrust and dirtside would be out of the question. Like I said,
though, an ideal hard sci fi RPG setting. Since Bruce Sterling is from
Austin, I wouldn't be surprised at all if Transhuman space borrows
heavily from Shaper/Mechanist.

Rob

On Fri, Apr 24, 2009 at 7:38 PM, Robert N Bryett <rbryett@gmail.com>
wrote:
> The GURPS Transhuman Space sourcebooks are excellent for anyone
> interested in non-FTL, our-solar-system-only gaming. I've looted them
> for ideas for expanding "Belt Wars" into a wider campaign world.

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