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Underground (role-playing game)
Encyclopedia
Underground is a satirical
"grim and gritty"-style
superhero
role playing game set in the near future. It was released by Mayfair Games
in 1993 as a commentary on the politics and society of the early 1990s as expressed through the year 2021.
The backstory for Underground borrowed heavily from Pat Mills
' Marshal Law and Alan Moore
's version of Marvelman. The former had concentrated on genetically-engineered super soldiers recently come back from an unsuccessful war in South America
. In the latter, technology gathered from a crashed alien spacecraft and psychological conditioning in a virtual reality
environment. These were two of the earliest of the deconstructionist superhero comics of the 1980s.
is Dead
The future timeline of Underground begins with a UFO crash in 1996 in the Florida
Everglades
. The UFO was a small escape pod from a larger interstellar starship and contained a pair of lobster-like aliens. While officially a secret, the entire world witnessed the crash and the secrets of the UFO leaked to the entire world within a year. Apparently, the alien technology was based entirely on manipulation of amino acid
chains and advanced biotechnology
, which started a revolution in genetic engineering
. This resulted in major corporations and the wealthy gaining even more power and becoming far more decadent, while the poor remained oppressed even more so.
Rapper-activists Flavor Flav
and Chuck D
are assassinated on August 11, 1998 in Columbus, Georgia
by a psychotic off-duty policeman. Their untimely deaths are commemorated in a national holiday called "Chuck D Day", celebrated on the first Monday in August.
World politics are dominated by the Second Cold War, which is a three-way deadlock between the United States, China, and the European Community.
In 2003 the United States has annexed most of Canada as the 51st through 58th
states. Quebec separatists managed to form an independent Quebec right before the American annexation, creating the People's Republic of Quebec, a communist state allied with Neo-Deutchland.
Apartheid in South Africa
didn't end until 2010, when the entire nation went into bankruptcy from worldwide boycotts. South Africa has been replaced by "New Providence", a gigantic nationwide vacation resort staffed by the South African population.
On August 1, 2011, popular Liberal Independent president Raymond Feist is assassinated at a "Chuck D Day" rally in Los Angeles. His vice president loses to
The European Community is dominated by Neo-Deutchland
. It controls all of unified Europe under a tyrannical fascist theocracy
where Scientology
has become the dominant religion. Neo-Deutchland is administered by the ARC Party and is run by a Chancellor assisted by the Ministers of Having, Wanting, and Being. The Holy See
is sent into exile in Nicaragua
(which it takes over as a theocracy of its own).
An entire sub-race of human beings has been created through cloning
, the "pre-frontals
" who only have 45 chromosomes. This causes them to have an underdeveloped pre-frontal cortex
, so they have an extremely low intelligence and have trouble separating fantasy from reality. They were originally created by the MacRaney's fast-food chain to staff their restaurants and consume their product, as they have tailored metabolisms that can only digest MacRaney's foods. They are relegated to unskilled blue-collar jobs and live in the ghettos of major cities. They exist as a servant class that is deprived of all civil rights
due to society legally and constitutionally redefining
what it means to be "human"
.
Dressing up in costumes on Halloween is now banned nationwide after an incident in which a couple dressed as Leopold and Loeb
went on a killing spree, shooting anyone with a "stupid" costume. People violating the ban can be shot on sight due to a fear of copycats.
Los Angeles street gangs are polarized into two large factions: the People (who wear checkered clothing
) and the Folks (who wear plaid
).
The Democrat
and Republican
parties have fused into the ineffectual Republicrat
Party which exists mainly to provide token opposition to whatever is said by the dominant Plutocrat Party founded by Ross Perot
. The basic doctrine of the Plutocrats is whatever is good for Big Business and the obscenely wealthy is good for the nation. The rising National Anti-Socialist Party, a conservative populist movement, is slowly gaining influence as a party of the people.
In a twist common to cyberpunk
literature, mega-corporations have gained legal sovereignty. Large multi-national corporations can legally enter into treaties, grant diplomatic immunity
, and field private armies (which they typically rent out to other entities). Their property is considered sovereign territory, like that of a nation.
Cannibalism
is extremely popular, first gaining prominence at secret underground restaurants in the late 1990s. Instead of signing an organ donor card, people sign a card which gives their next of kin a token fee and consents to having the deceased's body processed into food when they die. The most popular fast-food
chain in the world is Tastee Ghoul, which exclusively serves human flesh and gives away disposable polymer handguns in its Happy Meals. The book contains grisly art of what the meat lockers in the back of a Tastee Ghoul franchise look like, and the unfortunate teenagers who work there as a first job. Sweeney's
is an upscale cannibalism theme restaurant
chain (like Bennigan's
, TGI Fridays, or Chili's
). Boosted mercenaries who die in their employ are featured as a "Daily Special".
The Constitution of the United States has been heavily modified. Its many new amendment
s are responsible for (among other things) sharply limiting free speech as potential slander, granting some corporate bodies legal sovereignty, and defining "humans"
as "beings which have or once had 46 chromosomes". Constitutional amendments now have corporate sponsors, with the amendments themselves having corporate naming rights
and its slogan
s inserted in the amendment's text as product placement
.
The president in 2021 is Plutocrat Charles Foster
, who mentioned in his inaugural address "As a good friend
of mine once asked, 'can't we all just get along?'
"
A lunar penal colony has staged a revolt and become an independent state
. A sourcebook that detailed this part of the setting, "Steel Deep," was one of the last Underground products produced.
who were given superpowers by reverse engineered genetic technology recovered from the UFO crash. They are given extensive genetic modifications (called "boosting"). Then after being decanted they work as augmented mercenaries (called "Boosts") for any one of several private armies operated by giant corporations, fighting in small wars around the world.
This is paired with psychological conditioning (the Bushmiller
Process) in the form of a Virtual Reality
simulation (called "Dreamland
") that teaches them how to handle and use their new powers. The virtual world looks just like a "four-color" Silver Age
superhero
comic book
, except it's ultra-violent and merciless to simulate combat conditions and desensitize the recruits to violence. Subjects are made to believe that their fictional life in the virtual world was real, then are later deprogrammed
and normalized
into accepting mundane reality after their discharge.
A Player Character begins as he's discharged from service as a genetically-enhanced warrior who had been conditioned to think of himself as an ultraviolent superhero with a bizarre origin story and a dramatic past. They tend to see the world in the uncompromising black-and-white ethos of superhero comics filtered through the mental illnesses and phobias triggered by the process that grants them their powers. They are dumped in the decaying ruins of an American culture with civilians who fear and hate them and a corrupt and totalitarian government that ignores them (an intentional reference to the state of Vietnam veteran
s coming home after the Vietnam War
). It is presumed that the player characters join and form various "Underground" movements to oppose the government, giant corporations, or other tyrannical forces in the world. The fact that they were brainwashed by the corporations that employed them and were betrayed by the governments that hired them often makes them distrustful of authority.
, originally developed at Mayfair Games for the earlier DC Heroes
roleplaying game depicting the DC Universe
, however the rules were modified to depict lower-powered characters and a more deadly setting.
The Underground game books had color-coded text. Each line of text in the books was colored differently if it was part of the rules, an example of game play, optional rules, or fiction and exposition for the setting. The art used in Underground was intentionally inspired by the Aeon Flux animated shorts, as well as the comic books Marshal Law
, Watchmen
and Elektra Assassin!
.
As part of the political and social nature of the game, and to encourage games to be about righting the many wrongs in the setting, the designer
included Parameter Rules, a mechanism wherein the players could change the entire setting. The rules allowed, over time, for players to change the political affiliation, morals, or even the entire culture of an area, or even the world with enough time and effort.
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
"grim and gritty"-style
Modern Age of Comic Books
The Modern Age of Comic Books is an informal name for the period in the history of mainstream American comic books generally considered to last from the mid-1980s until present day...
superhero
Superhero
A superhero is a type of stock character, possessing "extraordinary or superhuman powers", dedicated to protecting the public. Since the debut of the prototypical superhero Superman in 1938, stories of superheroes — ranging from brief episodic adventures to continuing years-long sagas —...
role playing game set in the near future. It was released by Mayfair Games
Mayfair Games
Mayfair Games is a publisher of board, card, and roleplaying games. They also license German-style board games and publish them in English throughout the world...
in 1993 as a commentary on the politics and society of the early 1990s as expressed through the year 2021.
Overview
Inspired by the Dark Age of Comic Books, Aeon Flux, and the political and social upheavals of the early 1990s, the game attempts to inspire social and political debate among its players as well as provide entertainment through playing renegade superheroes. In it, players typically play unemployed, genetically enhanced veterans of corporate wars.The backstory for Underground borrowed heavily from Pat Mills
Pat Mills
Pat Mills, nicknamed 'the godfather of British comics', is a comics writer and editor who, along with John Wagner, revitalised British boys comics in the 1970s, and has remained a leading light in British comics ever since....
' Marshal Law and Alan Moore
Alan Moore
Alan Oswald Moore is an English writer primarily known for his work in comic books, a medium where he has produced a number of critically acclaimed and popular series, including Watchmen, V for Vendetta, and From Hell...
's version of Marvelman. The former had concentrated on genetically-engineered super soldiers recently come back from an unsuccessful war in South America
South America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...
. In the latter, technology gathered from a crashed alien spacecraft and psychological conditioning in a virtual reality
Virtual reality
Virtual reality , also known as virtuality, is a term that applies to computer-simulated environments that can simulate physical presence in places in the real world, as well as in imaginary worlds...
environment. These were two of the earliest of the deconstructionist superhero comics of the 1980s.
Setting
It's 2021, and the DreamAmerican Dream
The American Dream is a national ethos of the United States in which freedom includes a promise of the possibility of prosperity and success. In the definition of the American Dream by James Truslow Adams in 1931, "life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each...
is Dead
The future timeline of Underground begins with a UFO crash in 1996 in the Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
Everglades
Everglades
The Everglades are subtropical wetlands in the southern portion of the U.S. state of Florida, comprising the southern half of a large watershed. The system begins near Orlando with the Kissimmee River, which discharges into the vast but shallow Lake Okeechobee...
. The UFO was a small escape pod from a larger interstellar starship and contained a pair of lobster-like aliens. While officially a secret, the entire world witnessed the crash and the secrets of the UFO leaked to the entire world within a year. Apparently, the alien technology was based entirely on manipulation of amino acid
Amino acid
Amino acids are molecules containing an amine group, a carboxylic acid group and a side-chain that varies between different amino acids. The key elements of an amino acid are carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen...
chains and advanced biotechnology
Biotechnology
Biotechnology is a field of applied biology that involves the use of living organisms and bioprocesses in engineering, technology, medicine and other fields requiring bioproducts. Biotechnology also utilizes these products for manufacturing purpose...
, which started a revolution in genetic engineering
Genetic engineering
Genetic engineering, also called genetic modification, is the direct human manipulation of an organism's genome using modern DNA technology. It involves the introduction of foreign DNA or synthetic genes into the organism of interest...
. This resulted in major corporations and the wealthy gaining even more power and becoming far more decadent, while the poor remained oppressed even more so.
Rapper-activists Flavor Flav
Flavor Flav
William Jonathan Drayton, Jr. , better known by his stage name Flavor Flav, is an American rapper and television personality who rose to prominence as a member of the rap group Public Enemy...
and Chuck D
Chuck D
Carlton Douglas Ridenhour , better known by his stage name, Chuck D, is an American rapper, author, and producer. He helped create politically and socially conscious rap music in the mid-1980s as the leader of the rap group Public Enemy.- Early life :Ridenhour was born in Queens, New York...
are assassinated on August 11, 1998 in Columbus, Georgia
Columbus, Georgia
Columbus is a city in and the county seat of Muscogee County, Georgia, United States, with which it is consolidated. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 189,885. It is the principal city of the Columbus, Georgia metropolitan area, which, in 2009, had an estimated population of 292,795...
by a psychotic off-duty policeman. Their untimely deaths are commemorated in a national holiday called "Chuck D Day", celebrated on the first Monday in August.
World politics are dominated by the Second Cold War, which is a three-way deadlock between the United States, China, and the European Community.
In 2003 the United States has annexed most of Canada as the 51st through 58th
51st state
The 51st state, in United States political discourse, is a phrase that refers to areas either seriously or derisively considered candidates for addition to the 50 states already part of the United States. Before 1959, when Alaska and Hawaii joined the U.S., the term "the 49th state" was used...
states. Quebec separatists managed to form an independent Quebec right before the American annexation, creating the People's Republic of Quebec, a communist state allied with Neo-Deutchland.
Apartheid in South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
didn't end until 2010, when the entire nation went into bankruptcy from worldwide boycotts. South Africa has been replaced by "New Providence", a gigantic nationwide vacation resort staffed by the South African population.
On August 1, 2011, popular Liberal Independent president Raymond Feist is assassinated at a "Chuck D Day" rally in Los Angeles. His vice president loses to
The European Community is dominated by Neo-Deutchland
German question
The German question was a debate in the 19th century, especially during the Revolutions of 1848, over the best way to achieve the Unification of Germany. From 1815–1871, a number of 37 independent German-speaking states existed within the German Confederation...
. It controls all of unified Europe under a tyrannical fascist theocracy
Theocracy
Theocracy is a form of organization in which the official policy is to be governed by immediate divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided, or simply pursuant to the doctrine of a particular religious sect or religion....
where Scientology
Scientology
Scientology is a body of beliefs and related practices created by science fiction and fantasy author L. Ron Hubbard , starting in 1952, as a successor to his earlier self-help system, Dianetics...
has become the dominant religion. Neo-Deutchland is administered by the ARC Party and is run by a Chancellor assisted by the Ministers of Having, Wanting, and Being. The Holy See
Holy See
The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...
is sent into exile in Nicaragua
Nicaragua
Nicaragua is the largest country in the Central American American isthmus, bordered by Honduras to the north and Costa Rica to the south. The country is situated between 11 and 14 degrees north of the Equator in the Northern Hemisphere, which places it entirely within the tropics. The Pacific Ocean...
(which it takes over as a theocracy of its own).
An entire sub-race of human beings has been created through cloning
Cloning
Cloning in biology is the process of producing similar populations of genetically identical individuals that occurs in nature when organisms such as bacteria, insects or plants reproduce asexually. Cloning in biotechnology refers to processes used to create copies of DNA fragments , cells , or...
, the "pre-frontals
Lobotomy
Lobotomy "; τομή – tomē: "cut/slice") is a neurosurgical procedure, a form of psychosurgery, also known as a leukotomy or leucotomy . It consists of cutting the connections to and from the prefrontal cortex, the anterior part of the frontal lobes of the brain...
" who only have 45 chromosomes. This causes them to have an underdeveloped pre-frontal cortex
Prefrontal cortex
The prefrontal cortex is the anterior part of the frontal lobes of the brain, lying in front of the motor and premotor areas.This brain region has been implicated in planning complex cognitive behaviors, personality expression, decision making and moderating correct social behavior...
, so they have an extremely low intelligence and have trouble separating fantasy from reality. They were originally created by the MacRaney's fast-food chain to staff their restaurants and consume their product, as they have tailored metabolisms that can only digest MacRaney's foods. They are relegated to unskilled blue-collar jobs and live in the ghettos of major cities. They exist as a servant class that is deprived of all civil rights
Civil rights
Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from unwarranted infringement by governments and private organizations, and ensure one's ability to participate in the civil and political life of the state without discrimination or repression.Civil rights include...
due to society legally and constitutionally redefining
Constitutional amendment
A constitutional amendment is a formal change to the text of the written constitution of a nation or state.Most constitutions require that amendments cannot be enacted unless they have passed a special procedure that is more stringent than that required of ordinary legislation...
what it means to be "human"
Human
Humans are the only living species in the Homo genus...
.
Dressing up in costumes on Halloween is now banned nationwide after an incident in which a couple dressed as Leopold and Loeb
Leopold and Loeb
Nathan Freudenthal Leopold, Jr. and Richard Albert Loeb , more commonly known as "Leopold and Loeb", were two wealthy University of Michigan alumni and University of Chicago students who murdered 14-year-old Robert "Bobby" Franks in 1924 and were sentenced to life imprisonment.The duo were...
went on a killing spree, shooting anyone with a "stupid" costume. People violating the ban can be shot on sight due to a fear of copycats.
Los Angeles street gangs are polarized into two large factions: the People (who wear checkered clothing
Check (fabric)
A check is a pattern consisting of crossed horizontal and vertical lines forming squares.-Etymology:...
) and the Folks (who wear plaid
Plaid
Plaid may refer to:Material* A plaid or full plaid is a pleated cloth worn with the modern kilt, made from the same tartan and worn cast over the shoulder and fastened at the front* The belted plaid or "great kilt", earlier form of the kilt...
).
The Democrat
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...
and Republican
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
parties have fused into the ineffectual Republicrat
Republicrat
Republicrat or Demopublican are portmanteaux names for both of the two major political parties in the United States, the Republican Party and the Democratic Party, collectively...
Party which exists mainly to provide token opposition to whatever is said by the dominant Plutocrat Party founded by Ross Perot
Ross Perot
Henry Ross Perot is a U.S. businessman best known for running for President of the United States in 1992 and 1996. Perot founded Electronic Data Systems in 1962, sold the company to General Motors in 1984, and founded Perot Systems in 1988...
. The basic doctrine of the Plutocrats is whatever is good for Big Business and the obscenely wealthy is good for the nation. The rising National Anti-Socialist Party, a conservative populist movement, is slowly gaining influence as a party of the people.
In a twist common to cyberpunk
Cyberpunk
Cyberpunk is a postmodern and science fiction genre noted for its focus on "high tech and low life." The name is a portmanteau of cybernetics and punk, and was originally coined by Bruce Bethke as the title of his short story "Cyberpunk," published in 1983...
literature, mega-corporations have gained legal sovereignty. Large multi-national corporations can legally enter into treaties, grant diplomatic immunity
Diplomatic immunity
Diplomatic immunity is a form of legal immunity and a policy held between governments that ensures that diplomats are given safe passage and are considered not susceptible to lawsuit or prosecution under the host country's laws...
, and field private armies (which they typically rent out to other entities). Their property is considered sovereign territory, like that of a nation.
Cannibalism
Cannibalism
Cannibalism is the act or practice of humans eating the flesh of other human beings. It is also called anthropophagy...
is extremely popular, first gaining prominence at secret underground restaurants in the late 1990s. Instead of signing an organ donor card, people sign a card which gives their next of kin a token fee and consents to having the deceased's body processed into food when they die. The most popular fast-food
Fast food
Fast food is the term given to food that can be prepared and served very quickly. While any meal with low preparation time can be considered to be fast food, typically the term refers to food sold in a restaurant or store with preheated or precooked ingredients, and served to the customer in a...
chain in the world is Tastee Ghoul, which exclusively serves human flesh and gives away disposable polymer handguns in its Happy Meals. The book contains grisly art of what the meat lockers in the back of a Tastee Ghoul franchise look like, and the unfortunate teenagers who work there as a first job. Sweeney's
Sweeney Todd
Sweeney Todd is a fictional character who first appeared as then antagonist of the Victorian penny dreadful The String of Pearls and he was later introduced as an antihero in the broadway musical Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street and its film adaptation...
is an upscale cannibalism theme restaurant
Theme restaurant
Theme restaurants are restaurants in which the concept of the restaurant takes priority over everything else, influencing the architecture, food, music, and overall 'feel' of the restaurant...
chain (like Bennigan's
Bennigan's
Bennigan's is an Irish pub-themed casual dining restaurant chain with locations throughout the United States, and in 14 countries and 15 territories outside the continental U.S...
, TGI Fridays, or Chili's
Chili's
Chili's Grill & Bar is a restaurant chain founded by Larry Lavine. The chain has more than 1400 casual dining restaurants, mostly located in the United States and Canada...
). Boosted mercenaries who die in their employ are featured as a "Daily Special".
The Constitution of the United States has been heavily modified. Its many new amendment
Constitutional amendment
A constitutional amendment is a formal change to the text of the written constitution of a nation or state.Most constitutions require that amendments cannot be enacted unless they have passed a special procedure that is more stringent than that required of ordinary legislation...
s are responsible for (among other things) sharply limiting free speech as potential slander, granting some corporate bodies legal sovereignty, and defining "humans"
Human rights
Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...
as "beings which have or once had 46 chromosomes". Constitutional amendments now have corporate sponsors, with the amendments themselves having corporate naming rights
Naming rights
In the private sector, naming rights are a financial transaction whereby a corporation or other entity purchases the right to name a facility, typically for a defined period of time. For properties like a multi-purpose arena, performing arts venue or an athletic field, the term ranges from three...
and its slogan
Slogan
A slogan is a memorable motto or phrase used in a political, commercial, religious and other context as a repetitive expression of an idea or purpose. The word slogan is derived from slogorn which was an Anglicisation of the Scottish Gaelic sluagh-ghairm . Slogans vary from the written and the...
s inserted in the amendment's text as product placement
Product placement
Product placement, or embedded marketing, is a form of advertisement, where branded goods or services are placed in a context usually devoid of ads, such as movies, music videos, the story line of television shows, or news programs. The product placement is often not disclosed at the time that the...
.
The president in 2021 is Plutocrat Charles Foster
Charles Foster Kane
Charles Foster Kane is a fictional character and the subject of Orson Welles' 1941 film Citizen Kane. Welles played Kane , with Buddy Swan playing Kane as a child...
, who mentioned in his inaugural address "As a good friend
Rodney King
Rodney Glen King is an American best known for his involvement in a police brutality case involving the Los Angeles Police Department on March 3, 1991...
of mine once asked, 'can't we all just get along?'
1992 Los Angeles riots
The 1992 Los Angeles Riots or South Central Riots, also known as the 1992 Los Angeles Civil Unrest were sparked on April 29, 1992, when a jury acquitted three white and one hispanic Los Angeles Police Department officers accused in the videotaped beating of black motorist Rodney King following a...
"
A lunar penal colony has staged a revolt and become an independent state
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress is a 1966 science fiction novel by American writer Robert A. Heinlein, about a lunar colony's revolt against rule from Earth....
. A sourcebook that detailed this part of the setting, "Steel Deep," was one of the last Underground products produced.
Plot
Player characters in the game are genetically enhanced ex-mercenariesMercenary
A mercenary, is a person who takes part in an armed conflict based on the promise of material compensation rather than having a direct interest in, or a legal obligation to, the conflict itself. A non-conscript professional member of a regular army is not considered to be a mercenary although he...
who were given superpowers by reverse engineered genetic technology recovered from the UFO crash. They are given extensive genetic modifications (called "boosting"). Then after being decanted they work as augmented mercenaries (called "Boosts") for any one of several private armies operated by giant corporations, fighting in small wars around the world.
This is paired with psychological conditioning (the Bushmiller
Ernie Bushmiller
Ernest Paul Bushmiller, Jr. was an American cartoonist, best known for creating the long-running daily comic strip Nancy....
Process) in the form of a Virtual Reality
Virtual reality
Virtual reality , also known as virtuality, is a term that applies to computer-simulated environments that can simulate physical presence in places in the real world, as well as in imaginary worlds...
simulation (called "Dreamland
Little Nemo
Little Nemo is the main fictional character in a series of weekly comic strips by Winsor McCay that appeared in the New York Herald and William Randolph Hearst's New York American newspapers from October 15, 1905 – April 23, 1911 and April 30, 1911 – July 26, 1914; respectively.The...
") that teaches them how to handle and use their new powers. The virtual world looks just like a "four-color" Silver Age
Silver Age of Comic Books
The Silver Age of Comic Books was a period of artistic advancement and commercial success in mainstream American comic books, predominantly those in the superhero genre. Following the Golden Age of Comic Books and an interregnum in the early to mid-1950s, the Silver Age is considered to cover the...
superhero
Superhero
A superhero is a type of stock character, possessing "extraordinary or superhuman powers", dedicated to protecting the public. Since the debut of the prototypical superhero Superman in 1938, stories of superheroes — ranging from brief episodic adventures to continuing years-long sagas —...
comic book
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
, except it's ultra-violent and merciless to simulate combat conditions and desensitize the recruits to violence. Subjects are made to believe that their fictional life in the virtual world was real, then are later deprogrammed
Deprogramming
Deprogramming refers to actions that attempt to force a person to abandon allegiance to a religious, political, economic, or social group. Methods and practices may involve kidnapping and coercion...
and normalized
Torture
Torture is the act of inflicting severe pain as a means of punishment, revenge, forcing information or a confession, or simply as an act of cruelty. Throughout history, torture has often been used as a method of political re-education, interrogation, punishment, and coercion...
into accepting mundane reality after their discharge.
A Player Character begins as he's discharged from service as a genetically-enhanced warrior who had been conditioned to think of himself as an ultraviolent superhero with a bizarre origin story and a dramatic past. They tend to see the world in the uncompromising black-and-white ethos of superhero comics filtered through the mental illnesses and phobias triggered by the process that grants them their powers. They are dumped in the decaying ruins of an American culture with civilians who fear and hate them and a corrupt and totalitarian government that ignores them (an intentional reference to the state of Vietnam veteran
Vietnam veteran
Vietnam veteran is a phrase used to describe someone who served in the armed forces of participating countries during the Vietnam War.The term has been used to describe veterans who were in the armed forces of South Vietnam, the United States armed forces, and countries allied to them, whether or...
s coming home after the Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
). It is presumed that the player characters join and form various "Underground" movements to oppose the government, giant corporations, or other tyrannical forces in the world. The fact that they were brainwashed by the corporations that employed them and were betrayed by the governments that hired them often makes them distrustful of authority.
System
The game rules for Underground is an adaptation of the Mayfair Exponential Game SystemMayfair Exponential Game System
The Mayfair Exponential Game System or MEGS is a rules system developed for role-playing games. It is noteworthy for its use of an exponential system for measuring nearly everything in the game. This system makes it possible to have both cosmically-powered characters and ordinary human characters...
, originally developed at Mayfair Games for the earlier DC Heroes
DC Heroes
DC Heroes is an out-of-print superhero role-playing game set in the DC Universe, published by Mayfair Games. Other than sharing the same licensed setting, DC Heroes is unrelated to the West End Games DC Universe....
roleplaying game depicting the DC Universe
DC Universe
The DC Universe is the shared universe where most of the comic stories published by DC Comics take place. The fictional characters Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman are well-known superheroes from this universe. Note that in context, "DC Universe" is usually used to refer to the main DC continuity...
, however the rules were modified to depict lower-powered characters and a more deadly setting.
The Underground game books had color-coded text. Each line of text in the books was colored differently if it was part of the rules, an example of game play, optional rules, or fiction and exposition for the setting. The art used in Underground was intentionally inspired by the Aeon Flux animated shorts, as well as the comic books Marshal Law
Marshal Law (comics)
Marshal Law is an English-language superhero comic book series created by Pat Mills and Kevin O'Neill. One of the first major creator-owned characters for a major publisher, it was first published by Epic Comics in 1987...
, Watchmen
Watchmen
Watchmen is a twelve-issue comic book limited series created by writer Alan Moore, artist Dave Gibbons, and colourist John Higgins. The series was published by DC Comics during 1986 and 1987, and has been subsequently reprinted in collected form...
and Elektra Assassin!
Elektra (comics)
Elektra Natchios, usually referred to only by her first name Elektra, is a fictional character in publications from Marvel Comics.Elektra is a kunoichi – female ninja assassin – of Greek descent. She wields a pair of bladed sai as her trademark weapon. She is a love interest of the superhero...
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As part of the political and social nature of the game, and to encourage games to be about righting the many wrongs in the setting, the designer
Ray Winninger
Ray Winninger is a game designer who has worked on a number of roleplaying games, including the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy roleplaying game.-Career:...
included Parameter Rules, a mechanism wherein the players could change the entire setting. The rules allowed, over time, for players to change the political affiliation, morals, or even the entire culture of an area, or even the world with enough time and effort.