I personally have never played a Tabletop Role-Playing-Game (RPG), but I’ve always been fascinated by them and wanted to play them… I’ve just never had friends that wanted the same I guess.
I base a lot of my own Story Universe, The Akasha Records, on the original RPG Dungeons & Dragons, but I also really love and am inspired by Pathfinder, Starfinder, Dragonstar, and of course Shadowrun!
Shadowrun is a Science Fantasy Tabletop RPG set in an alternate Earth timeline of Seattle in the year 2080 (first edition of the game was set in 2050). It is a mix of Cyberpunk, Urban Fantasy, and Crime drama created back in 1989. The game’s premise is that in the near-future, industrial espionage has run amok and physical or data theft at rival corporations is the name of the game. In the game’s setting, in 2011/2012 the Earth entered into a “Sixth World” stage of existence where once-fantastical races and beings (elves and dragons and more) came back into being, magic started working again and technological and social developments still continued to advance rapidly as well.
When conflicts arise, corporations, governments, organized crime syndicates, and even wealthy individuals subcontract their dirty work to specialists, who then perform “shadowruns” or missions undertaken by deniable assets without identities or those that wish to remain unknown. The most skilled of these specialists, called shadowrunners, have earned a reputation for getting the job done. They have developed a knack for staying alive, and prospering, in the world of Shadowrun. -Shadowrun on Wikipedia
To be honest, Shadowrun has had more of an impact on my storytelling than even Dungeons & Dragons… it just so closely encapsulates the definition of “Science Fantasy” that exists inside my head for The Akasha Records story universe.
I find a LOT of images that I associate with Science Fantasy have already been created for the game of Shadowrun and its spinoffs so I use those images for now until I can pay to have some of my own created unique to my story universe.
Do you have a strong inspiration source(s) which heavily influences your own creations and worldbuilding?