Hijacking the jumpstart attempt at running a new game

One thing GM-ing has taught me is the value of player buy in. The fact that your players have this starry-eyed look of expectation whe you tell them what you plan next means they are hooked.

I've been mulling a more Hawkmoon-esque Mutant Future game in the coming weeks and started the actual task of jotting down my ideas just to make them simmer and stew. In the process of doing this, I seem to have been hijacked again along my original path. This has happened before so I am not really bothered. My ultimate end in the proposed upcoming game is a gradual decline of technological civilization on Earth during the course of a drawn out struggle which savants of a later more civilized age will refer to as the Tragic Millenium.

The thing is, I seemed more drawn for now to run a game at a point in the TM when technology and civilization is still somewhat formidable but falling catastrophically fast.Having to explain how I envision this to some of my more new school players I described the feel of this attempt at a Mutant Future to be Fallout Tactics meets Planet of the Apes and a dash of the X Men. Well, this got their attention.

Next, I decided to try a different tack. I decided to set the game in the place I call home. This means hot, tropical beaches, a lot of native slang, crumbling ruins near fortress gothic churches all set in a place once referred to as the Pearl of the Orient Seas. Other things of interest include local warlords (we never seem to lack those even today), mutant water buffalo, overgrown rice paddies with mutated carnivorous flora, mangrove swamps aplenty, a resurgent ultra-fanatical religious order which would put the Knights of Genetic Purity to shame, fortified towns cobbled together from the floating hulks of ancient tramp vessels (clustered around a beached inert SSN Boomer as the town hall), and rain - lots and lots of it as climate change is slowly but surely sinking our land beneath the waves.

I'm presently tweaking the MF rules to allow more and deadlier slug throwers in keeping with the tradition of Fallout Tactics. Knowing my players they'll be demanding this. Maybe it's the legacy of playing too much Twilight 2000 in the past. So yes, guns, guns and more guns. At least until they come upon some serious energy weapons (I do believe that's what happened in Fallout Tactics too).

Another thing that provided me with unexpected fun is how I get to use the current slang and subculture here and turn it on it's head when crafting the background. I know my old language teacher will probably maul me what with my bastardizing a lot of Tagalog for this game, but heck, this can be fun!

I do recall that the original Gamma World had a lot to do with satirizing Western culture. So maybe I'll do a little of that as regards the culture over here with Mutant Future and see how it pans out.

By the emails I've been getting from my prospective players, I do believe I've latched on to something promising here.

What's it like?

I’d said earlier that Under A Blood Red Sky is more of a rubber-science game with more of a science fantasy feel than a true science fiction post-apocalyptic one. This game then departs from my usual gritty style which was, for the longest time, my default setting in earlier games I ran in Twilight 2000 and Gurps: Fallout.

No, this time, I’m running something different. Under A Blood Red Sky goes all out with such staples including aliens and rayguns as well as giant insects and talking mutant animals. Just to give you all an idea as to where I am coming from this time, here are a few of the influences which served to shape my particular vision of the Mutant Future:


Jack Kirby’s Kamandi. I grew up reading this comic from the 70s and largely went out of my way to track down many of its issues. I recall combing the thrift shops outside Clark AFB in Angeles City just to find the next installment in the thrilling adventures of The Last Boy on Earth. The mutant animals of my Mutant Future have a lot in common with Jack Kirby’s Doctor Canus, Great Ceasar, Mylock Bloodstalker, and of course, the serpentine Mr. Sacker.



Thundarr the Barbarian. To be honest, I used to see this being flashed on TV when I was in high school but never paid it much attention. Now, I’m catching up through You-Tube and the very excellent posts from The Savage Afterworld which I follow with great interest. The image of an intrepid and eclectic band of adventurers led by a sword-swinging fighting man making their way through the ruins of our fallen civilization is just pure grist of the mill in my Mutant Future.

Gamma World. Arguably the mother of all post-apocalyptic role playing games and the linear progenitor of Mutant Future. Amongst all its incarnations, I still prefer the old first edition with all its clunkiness and rough edges.



My Mutant Future may be more ‘wonky’ than ‘gritty’, as opposed to say a campaign set in the Darwin’s World setting – a setting which I personally think looks awesome. Nonetheless, while our adventures in Cygnet Delta are described as science fantasy, I’d like to think that they are, as my games always have been, very deadly. A well-aimed shot from a Mark XX Hand Blaster will kill you just as efficiently as a well-placed sword thrust or rending strike from a mutant critter.