Getting Fitted For The Future

The Outfit

The Cyberpunk future is mobile. Like the cowboys of the Old West, most people carry their lives on their backs-miniaturized sleeping, eating and entertainment components crammed into carryalls and the back seats of cars. The stuff you carry around is known in street slang as your outfit. A typical outfit might include:

• Inflatable bed (folds to a 6"x6" package for easy storage).
• Compressible down sleep-bag (wads to the size of a paperback book).
• Micro-stereo compo (a microsized boom box with stereo speakers or headphones,
  possibly CD, chip/tape player, TV and certainly radio).
• Handful of tapes or datachips.
• Laptop or pocket computer (for notes, writing, business, links to computer net-works).
• Cybermodem, cables (for Netrunners).
• Pocket Cellular phone (the phone is bought, the service is rented by the month).
• Handgun, knife or both. Possibly an assault rifle or SMG, and a couple backups as well.
  Always extra ammo.
• Body armor (usually an armor jacket or bullet-proof T-shirt).
• Personal things, like clothes, toothbrushes, etc.

Most of this is crammed into a shoulderbag or duffle sack. Most Cyberpunk characters aren't much for settling down. Rockerboys always have the next gig. Solos have to keep moving -the next job requires it, and you keep moving anyway before your enemies figure out where you're sleeping these days. Cops, Netrunners, Medias and Techies are always on the move -on stakeouts, hard stories, or running from the various people you've brought down on yourself with your netrunning. Nomads - well, they don't have homes to start with, and what good is it if you can't cram it on the back of your bike any-way? Even a Corporate may find himself living out of a "coffin" in the Tokyo airport if times get rough.

The point is, a computer society makes it easy for people to live like campers all the time. Why should you have to go home to listen to your favorite music when you can carry your CD player with you? Missing phone calls and hate answering machines? You carry your phone with you and plug into the cellular network; making your business calls on the run from your favorite restaurant or while driving your car. Why bother with cooking when you can grab something quick from a hundred fast food stores? Why keep clothes when you can use them till they wear out, then buy new ones? You'll rent a sleeping cube for the night, put up your personal stuff, and blow out in the morning. Remember:

THE FUTURE IS DISPOSABLE

The key to any Cyberpunk game is thinking Cyberpunk. Think rootless and mobile. You don't know where you're sleeping tonight, and you don't care. You've got a bed in your bag, some tunes in your pocket, some cash for food. And a gun to make sure no one takes anything away from you.