The Cyberpapacy: The Sourcebook of Virtual Reality

'The Cyberpapacy: The Sourcebook of Virtual Reality''. Jim Bambra, Design.''' Honesdale, PA: West End Games, 1991. In the Torg series, "Roleplaying the Possibility Wars." Illus.

A roleplaying game highly sophisticated in its use of geography, history, cybernetics, politics, propaganda, and cyberpunk and its precursors (e.g., P. K. Dick and S. R. Delany). The alternative reality here is a "theocratic technocracy" (65) combining medieval social structures with advanced technology in a world where miracles happen and some magic can work, and where a large hunk of Europe is ruled by the Cyberpope in Avignon. See esp. for the GodNet (34 and passim), the miracle of "Machine Empathy" (78), surveillance by the Inquisition et al. (e.g., 24-30), and the idea of possession (106) or dehumanization (92) if one fails to be careful implanting cybernetic devices into one's body. Caution: The Sourcebook is impeccably antiFascist; we're less sure of the game as played.

RDE, Title, 12Aug19