Scifi rpgs

[tecnowraith]

Ok I have a general question and/or gripe. When ever someone wants a scifi game it has to be a space opera. Now a days rpg publishers and designers are making space opera games, which we have good number. But what I do not see is games set on earth or another world in the future. A rpg game can be good with out having to resolve in space ships and dozen of planets thrown into the fray. Where are these rpgs that is missing out? Do not give me "you can add this book for what you want or that lose this part of the book". Show me a complete futuristic world that has the same impact like Forgotten Realms or Earthdawn.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

Hmmm, take a look at the Mongoose website.

Armageddon 2089 (pretty much what you described.)
Babylon 5 (sort of, I personally would love to run/play in a B5 game set on earth rather than the station)
OGL Cybernet
Judge Dredd (hokey, and not my cuppa, but a lot of other people seem to like it.)

And that's just one company. Maybe you didn't look hard enough?

The Auld Grump

 

[Corinthi]

Blue Planet by Fantasy Flight Games- Hard science fiction, detailed alient world, non D20, easy to learn, but lethal mechanics. It's not the least bit space opera.

Lost Colony and Hell on Earth - Futuristic Deadlands. Campy scifi with a healthy dose of horror mixed in.

Any one of many Gurps sourcebooks about a variety of topics/settings.

Traveller without the travelling part. Run a campaign where a group of explorers are dropped off on a recon mission on an alien planet or a group of colonists crash land on an alien planet.

Just because a game system includes rules for space travel doesn't mean a given campaign has to use those rules.

Jesse

 

[afreed]

More SF

Most outside of d20, all currently supported by their publishers:
Heavy Gear (Dream Pod 9): Far future mecha game, based mainly on Terra Nova.
Jovian Chronicles (Dream Pod 9): Nearer future, some mecha, some space opera, but all within our solar system.
Transhuman Space (Steve Jackson Games): Near future, almost all on Earth (some solar system exploration). Nanotech and biotech have reshaped the world.
Trinity (White Wolf / Sword & Sorcery, out of print, but back soon as d20): A bit of a stretch, but while Trinity has aliens and space exploration, most of its setting is Earth-based.
Gamma World d20 (Sword & Sorcery): Post-apocalyptic, so maybe not what the poster wanted, but definitely Earth-based science-fiction. Also see Darwin's World.
There's five for ya. RPG.net has reviews of them all, if you want more information.
One general note, as well. I think many publishers go with space opera because it can encompass other styles easily due to its scope; nothing stops you from focusing on a single aspect of a single world (just like nothing stops you from having a fun campaign based in one city in the Forgotten Realms). But in a more specific game design, you trade versatility for focus.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

I second Transhuman Space. It takes all the technological advances we could realistically expect in the next 100 years - artificial intelligence, radical genetic engineering, biotech, believable nanotechnology, space colonization and terraforming - and shows how these can transform human society and humanity itself.

There are no aliens - but the setting has one of the highest number of player character "species" (a couple of dozens in all the sourcebook) of any setting I know, and making up new ones is easy and only to be expected.

This setting will make your head spin with the possibilities. While the future probably won't play out exactly as this, I gurantee that you will think about the future differently after this...

 

[tecnowraith]

Some of the games that have been mentioned that area space opera still consider space opera to me which means a poteintal to use space ships. I do not want that. I personally have a reason to my eyes I still see space opera in some of these games like Transhuman or Traveller. Now some of the others I can see.
I always thought that Blue Planet was on Earth.
I am looking for non-earth, different world type games.

 

[Corinthi]

I always thought that Blue Planet was on Earth.
I am looking for non-earth, different world type games.

Blue Planet is set on Poseidon, a planet in a galaxy far, far away.

Essentially, scientists discovered a stable wormhole out past Pluto. On the other side of the Wormhole is Poseidon, a planet many times the size of Earth. Poseidon has about the same amount of Landmass as Earth, but since the planet is so much larger, the oceans are /much/ more expansive.

Earth began to colonize and explore this planet when the Blight struck, a disease that wiped out most of the food on Earth. It took 75 years for Earth to
recover enough to remember it had a colony. The colonialization resumes, much to the dismay of the 'natives' descendants of the original colonists who'd been abandoned for nearly a century.

Now, space travel is a possibility in Blue Planet, but not an exciting one. You can board a spaceship, enter cold sleep for a year, and wake up back on Earth. Assuming the ship doesn't have some accident in transit. You're more cargo than a passenger.

Jesse

 

[Impeesa]

The vast majority of the Robotech timeline can be played out on Earth. Sadly, the books are out of print now and getting a bit harder to find...

 

[Nikosandros]

I am looking for non-earth, different world type games.

You could check GURPS Planet of Adventure.

The setting features an alien world with four different civilizations and submissive or enslaved humans.

I have not yet read it, but the original books by Jack Vance were (IMO) great.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

Some of the games that have been mentioned that area space opera still consider space opera to me which means a poteintal to use space ships. I do not want that. I personally have a reason to my eyes I still see space opera in some of these games like Transhuman or Traveller.

Transhuman Space isn't "space opera" in any meaning of the word I am familiar with. Space travel is realistic, which means long travel times interrupted by short periods of acceleration - and most of the piloting is done by AIs, and most of the heavy-duty fighting by AIs and ghosts (people who have turned themselves into computer programs) in robotic bodies. Doesn't sound too space operatic to me...