Right now, Singularity, a new Traveller TTRPG campaign, is outpacing most of its goals on Kickstarter. It even completed the original funding goal within the first half-hour. You can download the first fifty pages of the project from its Kickstarter page.
Like a great amount of science-fiction, it centers on the impact of artificial intelligence. From Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein, Ridley Scott’s Alien, Cameron’s Terminator, The Matrix and all the way to the movie Ex Machina, these thinking machines drive plots and make amazing characters. It also explains the default setting for the game, the core section of the Third Imperium and how it will be changed by this campaign.
The principal writer of this is Chris Griffin, who has written Traveller based comic books and the adventures like Makergod, Enemy of my Enemy or the setting sourcebook The Glorious Empire. He is actively answering questions on the Kickstarter page.
The main scenario is this, an Artificial Intelligence of Alien origin contacts the characters of the Traveller players. The teaser from the book states that the “powerful conscious intelligence – one that purports to be benign, one which claims it can take Humaniti, and by extension all intelligent life, to new heights of achievement and civilization.”
Mongoose Publishing used Kickstarter to launch some of its previous TTRPG products like the dystopian tongue-in-cheek “perfect edition” of Paranoia or the cosmic sci-fi Shield Maidens. Matthew Sprange of Mongoose Publishing guided many of these successes while also working to make his company into employee ownership. The UK based company recently purchased the game Traveller from Mark Miller, one of its creators.
GiN has covered this TTRPG and the most recent fan-run TravellerCon/USA convention, plus the origin of both TravellerCon/USA and the Traveller game.
The stretch goals, many of which have been met quickly, don’t point to a railroaded campaign with a strict linear plot. It looks like players will be able to work with or against the artificial intelligence in the adventure. It also looks like it will have side quests and lore for the Third Imperium too.
We are all dealing with artificial intelligence in the present and this promises entertaining roleplaying scenarios to try out possible outcomes. The recent movie Dune and its spinoff TV series is based on a future where humanity revolted against its thinking machines to make a world where humans transcend their limitations. The Singularity RPG explores a future where an artificial intelligence asks for help to transcend its imposed limitations. You and your friends can use the TTRPG Traveller to explore all these present-day challenges in a far future filled with adventure.