Gamemaster Culture (IF)

Hard Science-Fiction Setting

The solar system is both very divided and culturally cohesive. History has shuffled people around, mixing genes and cultures and creating new hybrids, while old minority have clung to or even recovered their past. With universal translation, the pressure to learn a major language disappeared, and when the large political blocks fractured, the pressure to conform disappeared. At the same time, living conditions have become more similar across humanity, creating similar solutions to the problems we all face.

Abundance Society

Humanity has never been richer. Industrial automation and hydroponic farming makes everyday resources abundant. After the struggles of the 21st century, basic income was recognized as a human right; no-one outside degenerate polities lacks food, basic necessities, care, or access to education and information. With genetic engineering, many of the causes of need and impulses to crime were eliminated and most people live to 200 years of age. You no longer have to work to survive, you work to achieve self-realization and social standing.

Money still exists even when basic goods are free; personal services, handicrafts, pastorally produced food, and luxury housing still have a cost. People work to afford such perks, but most are able to find a job that aligns with their own interests. The average work week is 20 to 30 hours; some work 4 to 6 hours a day, others prefer fewer, longer days. Caretaking employs many, taking care of children, even your own, is considered a profession. Dangerous, uncomfortable, or simply unpopular work nets higher pay, rising until the needed workforce is available.

This all took a hit during the Fall; people were ordered to work, with those lacking appropriate skills often ending up in involuntary work parties. When the crisis abated, this was quickly abolished, but resentment and distrust lingers, mostly directed at Earthforce that stepped in to handle the crisis.

Personhood

With genetic engineering, many things once decided by birth can now be altered. Common genetic programs brought most of humanity to the point where no-one performs much below what was once average. Poor health, eyesight, birth defects, and vulnerability to mental ill-health can all be pre-empted. Ageing is routinely postponed; most people live 200 years or more, maintaining the health and flexible intellect of youth.

Gender and sexual expression have become matters of choice, while the differences between the sexes have narrowed. On average, women are physically stronger and more resilient under stress than they used to be; men have become more cooperative and socially agile. Fertility is fully under conscious control — conception must be willed, and no longer declines with age. Painful menstruation and involuntary menopause are conditions of the past. Ancestral features can be altered or erased, though this is uncommon today. All of this is voluntary, and many choose to retain older ideals. Virtual reality experiences allow people to try new roles before undertaking therapies that would alter their bodies more permanently.

Greater changes are achievable, if somewhat dangerous and controversial. Cosmetic changes, such as altered skin color or adding fur, tails, or animal ears, have long been popular in various subcultures. Adaptations to different environments are possible, facilitating life in microgravity, low gravity, and even underwater.

Posthuman Genetic Modifications

Not everyone thinks this should be done. The Earthforce Medical Service continually reviews medical standards, caught between conservatives and radical post-humanists who want more change. Rules used to be stricter before the Fall; adaptations to the harsher post-Fall environment are now widely accepted.

Gerontocracy

With people routinely living to the age of 200 and luck and wealth can allow you to live up to twice as long, power is gathered in the hands of the elderly. Therapy maintains fluid intelligence over time while crystalized intelligence still accumulates over time; older people simply have more skills to use. A stable economy also benefits the old; long time savings and interest means many old people are rich. Well-sestablished politicians have the support of stable constituencies. The backside of this is that old skills do lose in value as new technologies and social issues develop, but not enough to overcome the advantages of age. It is not that young people lack opportunities; education is free and run by enthusiastic teachers with long experience. Entry level jobs are available in most sectors. But advancement is slow; few elderly retire to make room for the new. Two trends have grown out of this; older people do retire to focus entirely on their personal interests, and young people become colonists to find opportunities in faraway places where few are senior to them.

Storm Time

All across Sol space, post-Fall communities have adapted to recurring solar storms. Magnetic shields and heavy water tanks blunt the danger, but intense events still drive whole populations into mass shelters. This shared ordeal has produced a distinctive cultural event known simply as Storm Time.

Storm Time carries taboos and rituals that vary by station yet share common elements. At the signal — usually blue beacons or a two-tone siren — work, recreation, even sleep stop, and life shifts into Storm Shift. Families, strangers, and rivals crowd into shelter halls where normal distinctions blur. Class barriers soften, rules are set aside, and local law often grants a storm-time amnesty for minor offenses. The unspoken rule is absolute discretion: what happens in storm-time stays in storm-time.

Customs have flourished in this suspended space. Communal playlists and low amber lights create calm; storm kitchens distribute simple meals; children’s story circles carry traditions forward. In some places, shelters become clandestine meeting halls or spontaneous festivals, with music, drinking, and matchmaking — a brief ritual outside of ordinary time that lets off steam and keeps communities intact. The Quiet After — the silence that follows an all-clear — is observed everywhere as people return to their usual lives, without speaking of what happened in storm-time.