Blue Planet

In May 2016 we presented the Blue Planet Bundle featuring Blue Planet, the 1997 science-fiction RPG from Biohazard Games about colonizing the ocean world of Poseidon, year 2199. With its accurate depictions of an alien planet’s geography, climate, and ecosystem, Blue Planet sets the standard for “hard” (scientifically accurate) sf roleplaying. This offer presented both editions of the Blue Planet rules (Biohazard, 1997, and Fantasy Flight Games, 2000) and all the major supplements.

AD 2078: Investigating an anomaly at the edge of the Solar System, the Prometheus II probe discovers a traversable ‘wormhole’ (space warp) that leads to the Lambda Serpentis system, 35 light-years from Earth. Ten years later, the United Nations establishes a small frontier colony of genetically engineered humans and ‘genlifted’ cetaceans on the system’s habitable ocean world, Poseidon. Earth’s civilization promptly collapses for over a century, but the abandoned colony thrives. Now it’s 2199, and Earth’s resurgent government(s) and Incorporate States have returned to Poseidon in a gold rush for the life-prolonging xenosilicate Long John. There’s a world to explore, an amazing ecology to study or plunder, criminals to catch — and the original pioneers are rebelling. Meanwhile, deep in Poseidon’s endless ocean, mysterious “aborigines” pursue unknowable goals of their own.

It’s an amazing setting, a waterworld “sandbox” where you can try just about anything, take on just about any profession, and be any kind of person — or uplifted dolphin, orca, or whale. It’s a place where life is hard and dying is easy — where GEO Marshals enforce the peace and wired mercs patrol deep waters in deadly fighter subs — where corporate greed and human desperation ravage an alien ecology, threatening to plunge humanity into a war of survival with an ancient legacy. The 23rd Century will be a time of unprecedented possibilities, not just for institutions and governments, but for real men and women (and cetaceans) who have the will and courage to build a future for themselves.

Our Player’s Collection included four titles (retail value $52.50) as DRM-free .PDF ebooks:

• Blue Planet First Edition rulebook (retail price $14): The complete 353-page 1997 rulebook from Biohazard Games.
• Blue Planet v2 Player’s Guide (retail retail $14): The new rules introduced in the Second Edition (Fantasy Flight Games, 2000). Play a dolphin or orca!
• Fluid Mechanics (retail $12): An equipment book showcasing the impressive yet plausible high technology of 2199.
• Ancient Echoes (retail $12.50): The cetacean sourcebook. Play a beluga whale! With a rocket launcher!

Those who paid more than the threshold (average) price also got our entire Moderator’s Collection with seven more titles (retail value $67.50):

• Blue Planet v2 Moderator’s Guide (retail $14): The gamemastering rules, sourcebook, and campaign advice for the Second Edition.
• First Colony (retail $12): A location sourcebook for Poseidon’s largest settlement, Haven.
• Frontier Justice (retail $12): Crime and law enforcement on Poseidon, and how to run campaigns with either crooks or GEO Marshals.
• Natural Selection (retail $12): The marvelous (and plausible) ecology of the alien oceans, and many newly discovered residents.
• Archipelago (retail $9.50): The first supplement for First Edition, this guide to the Pacifica Archipelago opens new frontiers on Poseidon.
• NEW! Access Denied (retail $8): The First Edition GM screen booklet with maps, charts, and adventure seeds.
• NEWER! Undercurrents (free): An archive of all eight issues of the Biohazard Games promotional newsletter, 1997-2007.

In a Free Zone of blighted 22nd-Century Earth, all these titles together would cost you US$120, before adjustment for two centuries of inflation. Ten percent of each payment (after gateway fees) went to the charity chosen by Blue Planet designer Jeffrey Barber, Ocean Conservancy.