|
It is the future. The world has changed. Crime has not.
Five years have passed in New Angeles. The megapolis remains a priceless economic jewel for the corps and government that lay claim to it, but the reversion to Ecuador is five years closer, and nobody is prepared. The NAPD's android detectives - Caprice Nisei, Floyd 2X3A7C, and Drake 3GI2RC - struggle to solve crimes while navigating their own complicated identities. At the same time, Haas-Bioroid attempts to quash rumors of bioroid uprisings on Mars and rogue bioroids on the streets of New Angeles, while Jinteki tries to protect the secrets surrounding its clone manufacturing processes and contracts on specific clone lines. Runners crack into datafortresses to try and discern the truth or sell what they can to the highest bidder.
Beneath the sky-high arcologies of the corporate sarariman, orgcrime syndicates wage bloody wars and protect their own against corporate and political meddling. Drones sweep the streets in search of criminals and stolen tech, while even more insidious spies can be found inside children's playthings in every home. NBN can turn any camera into a surveillance tool, despite the activism of groups like the Opticon Foundation and independent investigative journalists. And yet, despite the incredible advances in technology, even the titans of the financial industry can fall with a little push. What came to be known as the Flashpoint and the 23 Seconds that almost led to outright war between the corps shook New Angeles far more than the tsunami that may have been triggered by Project Vulcan and the GRNDL facility. Even after the rapid deployment of all-new security features, something new seems to be menacing the Network, reminding some data-analysts of the Blackout Virus that crippled the world in the late twenty-first century.
In meatspace, more mundane threats are simmering. The Indian Union is still recovering after the highly anticipated election and tragic assassination of Akshara Sareen, whose push for clone rights earned her enemies, both without and within her own Ēkatā Party. Up the Beanstalk, on Luna, Melange Mining does whatever it takes to keep Helium-3 flowing Downstalk, and the steady stream of profits climbing back up. But the creation of a second space elevator in Kampala threatens Melange’s and Weyland's chokehold on the energy industry. Such squabbles are meaningless to the colonists on Mars trying to start a new life unhampered by Earth authority, yet the Weyland Consortium, Globalsec, and other private security outfits appear to be stocking up for what they hope will be a new conflagration of Martian Colony Wars.
It is in this new era that the cyberstruggles of the near future take place, with even more threats threatening to boil over into the next big confrontation. Whoever holds the keys to the Network will help decide who wins, who loses, and who gets to survive.
The classic Living Card Game of asymmetrical bluffs, counterbluffs, and economic struggles, Android: Netrunner pits two players against each other in a tense, cat-and-mouse duel for the control of valuable data. With more than 240 cards, the Android: Netrunner Revised Core Set immerses you in this age of sprawling megacities and high-stakes cybercrime. Here, artificially intelligent bioroids and genetically modified clones work alongside cyborgs, g-modded humans, and naturals. Hoppers pass overhead in their skylanes, and in New Angeles, a Space Elevator most commonly known as the 'Beanstalk' dwarfs neighboring arcologies and skyscrapers as it reaches beyond the Earth's atmosphere and gravity to serve as a low-cost launch for near-space travel.
|
