What will the world do when life expectancies reach 150…or 250? CRISPR and synthetic intelligence threatens to create havoc with our legal, governmental, and social systems. How will people find purpose when genetically modified humans and humoids can do their work faster and better? Will engineered humans displace the unmodified, or will they live at the fringes of society without the legal protections of traditional organics?
Megacorps
Megacorps? Yeah. Zone 17 is replete with megacorps. And as you expect, they run the walled cities throughout the Zone. Some critics hold the opinion that corporations make terrible governments. Of course they do. That said, every government has always been a corporation. Heh. As a great power collapsed, modern princes leveraged unconscionable wealth to fill the power vacuum and build a new society. Scary stuff? Our future?
Of course, international corporations devoted to making numbers go up don’t make for a very stable basis for society. Your average megacity consists of a few islands of clean, orderly corporate enclaves surrounded by urban decay and threatened by plots by rival corporations, interference from nation-states, criminal gangs, revolutionary cells, and terrorist organizations. All of which are fighting between each other for influence and control. Which makes the Zone a terrible place to live, but a great place to find work as a mercenary.
A Dark Future
The world currently faces a clutch of serious challenges. Megacorporations. Climate change. The Singularity. Demographic collapse. Half of Zone 17’s background is extrapolated from current events. The remaining half comprises nudges made to bring everything into a cohesive narrative. Zone 17 is a TTRPG that has all the action and adventure of your favorite RPGs but also includes the tools to explore some of these aforementioned challenges. Some of this exploration can take players to places some might find a bit dark. You don’t have to play using any scary stuff if you don’t want to. But let’s be real. You wantz it. You NEEDZ it
Cyberpunk...but not Cyberpunk
What does Cyberpunk but not Cyberpunk mean? Cyberpunk has several foundations: Dystopia. Cybernetics. High tech. Societal collapse. Zone 17 dabbles in some of these themes. But cybernetics? No. Not really. In the game, technical body mods are possible…but not recommended. Mods are a fetish, perhaps even a lifestyle. But modding carries extraordinary costs and risks (e.g., surgery, hacking). As such, only a small fraction of people mod without extraordinary medical reasons.
So, what is Zone 17?
So…this Zone 17 game? It’s kind of everything. It’s mostly its own thing. Cyberpunk…but not Cyberpunk. Mecha. Bands of bandits fighting over wasteland ruins. Mutated horrors. Genetically engineered meta humans. Synthetic intelligence-driven androids. Dogs and cats living together. Probably some mass hysteria. We cram all sorts of cool ingredients into the soup. Mmm. Tasty.
Sketch Art Styles
Now we’re trying pen sketches. They have a bit more of a third dimension than silhouettes and Rage Mode, and they bring art from different sources into a domain in which they appear somewhat homogeneous.
Art Styles Continued
While most of the original artists and art pieces were very good, we were never satisfied with the results. Oh, the quality was usually fine, but there were challenges making all the pieces look as if they came from the same hand. The homogeneity of design was very important to us, and we just couldn’t reach it. One of the styles we tried was silhouettes. Love ‘em, but they were tough to replicate with vehicles and gear.
Art Styles
We’ve tried out a variety of art styles for interior art. Over time, we hired six different artists. We tried out many different art styles. One of the styles I really liked was Rage Mode from the computer game Wet. It’s hyper simple combination of black, white, and red.
Thing is, while it’s simple and cool, our book interiors are strictly black and white. When we tried swapping the red tones with grey tones. The images became muddled. Scowl Owl judged the results…disappointing. That said, buy the Wet game. It’s discounted these days and its fun.
New Old School
The original Traveller form factor was amazing, but the typesetting and layout were, well, products of their time. Forty-five years have passed. We sorted that out too, to ensure we’re providing a modern, perhaps a bit futuristic, product. We’re bringing the interior page count to a total of 80, almost doubling the original page count. We cleaned up the typesetting and layout. We’re adding interior art and amazing color covers. Our target for the individual printed booklet price is $14.95.
Blasts from the Past
Back in the late 1970s and early 1980s, this booklet size was common. From Nova Games’ Lost Worlds to Task Force Games’ StarFire, publishers and customers enjoyed the high-value and low-cost this design provided.
Format Inspirations
One of the many inspirations for Zone 17 is the original Traveller RPG. Three black and white 48-page booklets. Saddle-stitched. Limited art. I loved the size and Bauhaus-nature of the booklets. They were simple, organized, and inexpensive. Booklets fit into a large pocket. Amazing.
Character Sheet Changes
We are editing the Zone 17 Character Sheet…again. See? This is why military programs cost a bazillion dollars each. Every couple of months, some ridiculous playtester makes some preposterous suggestions about how to improve organization or ergonomics. Ergonomics? Is that even a word? The current Character Sheet is available on our website (Resources — OSS) for you to download. We’ll get the new one posted when I’m finished with it. What? When will that be? WHEN I’M FINISHED WITH IT.
What’s next for Zone 17
Over the next few months we’ll share with you design concepts, play examples, and way-cool game elements. We think we have a great product and want to share with you what we’re doing so that you and your group can make the best purchasing decision.
So far in Zone 17
We ran a Zone 17 crowdfunding campaign a year ago. We pulled the plug on it a few days in when appeared that we were going to fall a bit short of our goal. We’re reworking the funding campaign to create one that is better, stronger, and faster. We also took the time to update the books, improve the art, and integrate some of the amazing ideas that we left on the cutting room floor. Our next campaign will attach “Version 1.1” to the material. We think you’re worth it.
Scales in Zone 17
Zone 17 play has two scales — Agent Scale, to manage personal role-playing and gun-fu combat and Battle Scale, to manage combat between vehicles, such as tanks and mecha. Mmmm. Mecha. Players can design their own vehicles, to specialize in cargo hauling, racing, or combat as desired.
Game Mechanics in Zone 17
Zone 17 uses puzzles to resolve role-playing efforts and other challenging tasks. Combat resolution uses Evade, Dodge, and Juke values to avoid hostile fire and Resilience values to mitigate effects. Armor works like real armor. Trauma and Havoc are products of hit severity and weapon class. Real physics. Who’d have thought?
Game Systems in Zone 17
Zone 17’s game system is novel. No hit points. No armor classes. It’s a whole new game system. If you’re up to learning it, great! On the other hand, some people don’t like to learn new things. That’s cool. There are plenty of other games whose settings and game engines haven’t changed much since the 1970s. Your fun is valid. You play any way you want.
Characters in Zone 17
Characters have roles. Scavengers battle with other scavengers and mutants over wasteland resources. Suits navigate the labyrinthian mega-corp political maneuvers. Soldiers drive high-tech armored vehicles across contested landscapes. Solos traverse back alleys to complete underworld gigs for which others haven’t the stomach.
Zone 17 One Small Step Game’s New Role-Playing Game
Zone 17 is One Small Step Game’s new role-playing game. The game takes place 60 years in the future amidst the ruins of a failed superpower. Some of the places that characters find themselves are dystopian. Other places are horrifying wastelands. The game even has some cyberpunk game elements. You can drive technicals (DIY combat vehicles) and do battle with scavengers amidst city ruins. You can hunt genetically engineered super humans or humanoid robots inside of high-tech cities of steel and glass. You can design and field a combat mecha to escort goods across hostile territory.
