Dark Future Ahead 30 – News from the ‘Net of a Cyberpunk bent

How dark is the Future?  As dark as you need it to be for an interesting game.  (Personally, I am pretty hopeful but happy, shiny futures are not as interesting to play in.)  Let us see what interesting things await us in the near future:

Food thefts become more common?  Look at the case of the purloined pistachios.  At the very least it would make for a different sort of adventure.

Looking at alternate forms of powers, what about harnessing the power of the wind through kites!  Kites can be used to generate power in several different ways and take up let space than a windmill and can even be mobile.  Or perhaps you would rather convert obsolete oil tankers into floating energy generators and maybe even factories as they travel the world, fishing for power.  Seems like a great place for a job.  Other companies are working on modular turbines that can be used in rivers and tidal basins and easily connected into existing grids (or create new ones in isolated areas).  This sort of turbine powering a small, out-of-the-way community could be a good centerpiece for a magnificent seven sort of scenario.  Interesting ideas all.

Speaking of interesting ideas, what about underwater greenhouses?  Using the water outside for temperature regulation, maybe hook them up to some of the generators above for a complete closed system.  A fascinating idea but harvesting and retrieving the plants grown seems a bit tricky.

Water systems seem to be a theme, Bechtel is working on ways to use water to improve the efficiency of cooling data centers, which is a huge energy sink apparently, so reducing energy costs for cooling such is important for a variety of reasons.  Again, another interesting place to set a mission.

So, who is watching you?  The Electronic Frontier Foundation has advice on how to know who is watching you and how at street-level surveillance.  Good things to keep aware of.

And more ways to use technology to learn things, there is a way to use a single laser to “see” what is in a room, useful if you need to break into that room, troubling if someone is planning on breaking in on you.

Need a campaign idea?  How about rescuing stranded and damaged container ships?  It is likely to be a growth industry, requiring specialized skills and nerves of steel, sound like player characters to me.

Now, to wrap up on a lighter note.  Need some ideas for new and almost real media for your game world, try NestFlix!

Photo underwater greenhouses from Nemo’s Garden and used without permission.

 

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