So what brings you to San Aligheri, stranger? Looking to buy the latest smartwear or robot assistants? A new full-sim VR rig or the hottest cybernetic enhancements? Maybe your very own flying car? You can find nearly anything you want here for the right price, legal or otherwise if you’re willing to brave Ground Level…
Oh it’s work your after? Well there are plenty of opportunities for that, too. Ground level’s mostly gang territory, so unless you want to be a factory drone, trafficker, or professional robbery victim, I’d suggest you stick to the Upper Crust where all the good retail and office jobs are. Keep your head low and play your cards right and you might even get promoted to a cushy managerial position complete with a swanky penthouse suite in the Apex with all the other Corporate bigwigs.
…oh you mean that kind of work work. Now that’s different.
So here’s the way things work here in San Aligheri:
Ground level everyone just calls “Inferno” now, and it’s not hard to see why: ever since the Gangs took over after the Corps and all the rich folk fucked off to the Upper Crust in their flying cars, it’s pretty much hell on earth down here. The only legal work left here is somewhere on the spectrum of “exploited Corporate factory drone”, “Professional robbery victim”, and “Hobo”; fortunately or unfortunately, legality doesn’t carry much weight in these Infernal slums literally beneath notice of the law. Inferno is the place people go when they want something the Law doesn’t want them to have- warm bodies, illegal substances, jailbroken hardware, cheap secondhand cybernetics, unregistered weapons, or more than likely hired muscle. Mercenaries are a pretty prolific market down here in Inferno; the warring gangs want to expand their numbers with competent enforcers, anyone with an honest buck wants to protect their investment from said gangs, and even the Corps, some whisper, occasionally send representatives down here when they want someone dealt with while keeping their own hands clean to the public. Some even say the heads of the Malebranche cartel, the most feared and notorious gangers beneath the Upper Crust, answer directly to the Corps in exchange for better funding and supplies than what normally trickles down to Inferno.
And speaking of the Upper Crust, you’d think life above this invisible barrier of air traffic, elevated roads and walkways, and elitism would be pretty easy with all the funding it gets and with the Corp actually keeping the peace up there, right? Well, let me tell you about Purgatorio. On the surface it’s a futurist’s paradise; clean walkways overlooking coastal vistas, skyscrapers of shining glass and steel, holobanners advertising all the best consumer markets by day and neon trails leading to the liveliest clubs and venues by night. You can find nearly anything you want in Purgatorio, and unlike Inferno there are actual corp-sponsored police and security forces keeping the peace with state-of-the art surveillance systems monitoring every shop, street corner, and IP address in the city. If that last part sounds disturbing to you, good, you’re paying attention. Purgatorio is practically a police state with how heavily the Corps monitors things, and they’re not exactly above abusing that level of privilege. Sure it doesn’t have a violent crime problem like Inferno does, but there’s still plenty of white-collar crime to go around, to say nothing of the occasional hackers or Deviant AI making good machines go bad. Private investigators and security firms are a pretty popular investment here in Purgatorio, especially among those who know how shady the Corp-sponsored ones can get.
Residents of Purgatorio may have it better off than those in Inferno, but they’re still on the bottom rung of San Aligheri’s corporate power structure, for the most part. At the top is the Apex, a.k.a. Paradisio, a sort of nebulous zone of private airspace connecting the tops of the skyscrapers towering above Purgatorio, owned by all the politicians and CEOs and corporate bigwigs of San Aligheri. If you can make it up here, you have it made, friend. Luxury accommodations, high-class venues, the finest foods, fashions, and wares on the planet, and the best in medical and cosmetic modifications in the world. Most are lucky to visit Paradisio for a bit of luxury night out after years of savings or on invite from someone on a higher rung of the corporate ladder; anyone who can afford to live there is either a corporate genius or, most likely, has a natural history museum’s worth of skeletons in their closet. And those who fit the latter category seem keenly aware that they are surrounded by more of their kind. It’s a bit of an open secret that the Corp board members up in Paradisio consider themselves above the law. After all, they own the police, they own the politicians, they own the city infrastructure, as far as they care they own you too. The only thing the residents of Paradisio fear is others of their status, which is why their private security forces are top-notch. They say ‘Jump’, their bodyguards don’t ask “how high”, they ask what the hell “jump” means and do whatever their boss says it means no matter how ridiculous or unethical it sounds. In exchange they pretty much get paid in blank checks, provided they shut up, stay in line, do their jobs right, and do exactly nothing their bosses don’t approve of. For all the glitz and glamour, depending who you ask Paradisio’s basically a gilded cage built just as much to keep other people out as much as it is to keep its inhabitants in.
But enough about the city, friend. What about you? What are you looking to find in San Aligheri?
(TL;DR: Cyberpunk setting a la Cyberpunk 2077, Shadowrun, or Logan’s Run, in a tiered city where the ground-based slums are overrun by gangs and black marketeers, the city elite are corrupt billionaires and politicians, and tech tycoons who hold themselves above the law, and the average citizen in between is just trying to get by without either of the above screwing them over. Mostly non-fantasy species are allowed but you may find loopholes via gene mods or cybernetic augmentations. Robots may require cooperation with another player as they don’t exactly have independent rights in this setting.)
Name: Self Explanatory
Race: (Most animal species allowed, fantasy species may require handwaving via gene mods or cybernetic enhancments. Robots may require cooperation with another player as most AI’s come shackled to a job or owner and don’t have rights or citizenships in this city)
Age: Self Explanatory
Description: If you want just to help others understand.
Profession: (Freelancer, Ganger, Private Eye, Cop, Corp employee, or possibly Civilian. Paradisio agents are NPC only for the time being)
Weapons and Equipment: (What’s a Cyberpunk setting without smart guns, robot drones, cool gadgets, and hacking rigs? Certain technologies like hard light and teleportation aren’t a thing yet, but feel free to go crazy otherwise)
Augmentations: (If any, can be biological or cybernetic, the latter being more common while the former are usually either less obtrusive or more expensive)
Skills: (Self-explanatory; things your character can do that aren’t tied strictly to equipment from the above section)
Personality/Goals: (Self-explanatory)
Flaws/Weaknesses: (Ditto)
