So, I'm progressing on my self-set target of getting a playtest document for Anarcgy written up by the end of February. I've now managed to get the introduction sorted out and have been working on the system, which I think is looking much better than it was before I lost my notebook! The draft intro is shown behind the below cut, to avoid cluttering up your Friends Page:

Introduction

What is Anarchy?

Anarchy is a roleplaying game of conflicting dichotomies, struggle and inevitable decline and failure set in a dystopian, near-future Britain where the government holds all of the power and most of the population in its thrall. In the game you and your friends play a resistance cell and the government and wider population know you as Anarchists, part of the Anarchist Movement. Anarchists are the only free voice to be found in this time of oppression and brutality. You and your fellows are pushing for change and an end to the dark regime that controls the country, although whether you bring about that change by political means, with devastating terror tactics or powerful rhetoric is up to you. Whatever the case you know that the status quo cannot be allowed to remain; sweeping change is necessary and you and your cell are the ones with the vision, the drive and the determination to bring it about, no matter the cost.

However, questions remain. What are the motivations of your fellow Anarchists? How have they broken free from the mindless acceptance that has swept the rest of Britain? What secrets do they hide? What agendas do they pursue? You are collaborating with terrorists and hooligans, political ideologues, power hungry men and women who are as likely to be corrupt or in the pay of the government as they are to be allies and saviours. Who can you really trust except for yourself? Does it matter? In the end the police or MI5 will get you anyway; either through carelessness or betrayal your time will come. All that you can really hope for is to make a difference in the short time that you have before your freedom is ended.

The World of Anarchy

Anarchy is set in a near-future, dystopian Britain of 2027. In the year 2006 a cabal of powerful, shadowy individuals staged a successful coup via the use of sponsored terror attacks and deft political manoeuvring. It was done in such a subtle, behind-the-scenes manner that the general population was barely aware of the transfer of power.

True, there was a fair amount of popular uprising at the time in the form of protests and demonstrations, some of them even quite sizeable, but that was directed at the government when they revealed certain planned laws and reforms. There was even violence between the protestors and the police on a number of occasions. In one case large parts of central London were engulfed in a huge riot with people protesting the death of civil liberties. However the rumblings of discontent from the people of Britain slowly subsided as they got on with their lives, safe in the knowledge that nothing would ever really change, no matter what laws were passed.

None of them knew the real truth.

The laws that came into force allowed the unelected party of conspirators to wrest control of the country from the elected parliament, putting into place a puppet government to maintain a façade of democracy and placate the liberal activists and campaigners.

As the years passed the veil shrouding the cabal’s activities slipped further and further until their actions, motivations and utter control of all aspects of life within Britain were overt and unavoidable. And yet, like the frog that sits quietly whilst boiled alive, the British people did nothing. Indeed, protests and acts of defiance became increasing rare as time went on and those that engaged in such activities had a distressing tendency to disappear. After 10 years of increasing overt dictatorship fronted by a puppet Prime Minister and Cabinet the British people seemed to have utterly accepted their fate. They had become as sheep to the wolves that led their flock.

The near total level of disinterest and acceptance of their fate across a nation renowned for their opposition to such regimes in the past seemed inexplicable to the outside world; a world that found itself increasingly cut-off from the affairs of an isolationist, paranoid Britain. The truth was far more sinister than anyone had guessed.

The cabal had been experimenting with subliminal control techniques and various drugs for years prior to the success of the coup. Once they had seized power they began to put knowledge, and the considerable resources now afforded them due to control of the British government, to use.

Modern Britain is a world where the televisions and radios (where one can receive only the BBC and other state approved programming) broadcast constant subliminal messages and cannot ever be switched off, where the national water supply is deliberately contaminated with drugs to make the population docile and suggestible, where the internet does not exist. It is a world where neighbours are encouraged to sell out their friends, loved ones urged to betray their families, all for the slightest hint of seditious thoughts or revolutionary leanings. It is a world papered over with lies and held together by pernicious technologies and the velvet-cloaked brutality of MI5 and the police. It is a world where progress, living conditions and quality of life have fallen dramatically for the average citizen, where cars spew fumes into the smoggy sky and people work from dawn to dusk in their assign careers, never to retire before they die.

It is in this world that you have woken. You are different, unique. You are somehow immune to the subliminal messages, resistant to the drugs. You know that something is deeply wrong at the core of Britain and, unlike the rest, you care. You know that something must be done; you know that the system is corrupt and that those in power must be brought down. You are an Anarchist. And you are not alone...

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