'On.' The system starts pulsing megabauds of data, the deck spurning to life and running through the diagnostic protocols for its persona. Light outside. The sort of clammy filtered lens that artists put on for rustic impressionism, fading through clouds like the electric current sipping on neural impulses through the serpent plugged into my skull. And we dive, and dive, and dive... Slipping through shears of geometric prisons for data, crystalline imperfection in every vertex.

Outside the crumbling room, the Barrens were as lively as ever. Cheeky gangers plugged up to simdecks like sex slaves chained to Jabba the Hutt live out their deepest fantasies of murder and bacchanal glory. Fixers ogling joygirls, and the general slum of human populace dredging through the gutters, human drek and wasted potential alike.

Fires burned in a drizzling sprinkle, spitting sparks of protest and garbage-scented incense. Only plastic ganger rides and cheap jackrabbits clutter roads riveted with potholes, no patrol cars would dare come this route - there was more filth than any one lifetime could clean up. Like roaches, every one disaster averted meant there were droves in the corners and recesses where the light couldn't entirely touch.

Just another day in the Sprawl. ---- I've played here two years. Played MUDs ever since the BBS games were no longer readily available. There are other ShadowRun games out there of course, but this is the only one with grit in my eyes. This isn't a high striker bell for DPS, and has a very concise consistency to the world and its roleplay. You might be blackballed by a fixer one day and in their graces the next, but you're earning it no matter what. Consequences are emphasized, and the characters are intensely human - even if they're metahumans. The game still has room to grow and improve like every good game does, but remains the most faithful recreation of the tabletop that I've ever played.