In June 2022 we presented two offers featuring the post-apocalyptic SFRPG Mutant: Year Zero – Roleplaying at the End of Days from Free League Publishing. Revived from July 2018, the Mutant Year Zero Bundle once again provided the core rulebook and early supplements. And its all-new companion, creatively titled Mutant Year Zero 2, added recent supplements and adventures.
Mutant: Year Zero extends a long and rich tradition in its Zone of origin, Sweden. The first version of Mutant was released by Target Games in 1984, the Golden Age of RPGs in Sweden. Of several versions since then, one evolved into the hugely popular Mutant Chronicles, which we presented in June 2017. Year Zero was published in 2014 in both Swedish- and English-language versions, and became an instant hit. Year Zero goes back to the origins of the Mutant franchise: roleplaying after the Apocalypse. You’re one of The People — heavily mutated humans living in The Ark, a small and isolated settlement in a sea of chaos. You know little of the wasteland outside — the Zone — and nothing of your own origin.
Mutant: Year Zero has two major game environments, each with its own style of play. The Ark, your home in the dawnworld, is a nest of intrigue and Lord of the Flies-style power struggles. Though not a safe haven, it’s the only home you know, and maybe the cradle of a new civilization. The game rules let you improve and develop the Ark’s defenses, food supply, technology, and culture. You’ll also venture into the Zone in search of food, artifacts, other mutants, and knowledge — not least about The People’s own origin. The Zone’s location is up to you — why not play in a post-apocalyptic version of your home town? Year Zero‘s modular approach lets you place all the campaign material wherever you like. The core rulebook presents two example Zones — London (The Big Smoke) and New York City (The Dead Apple) — and the supplements and expansions in these two bundles introduce many new Zones and ways to play.
MUTANT YEAR ZERO
[from July 2018]
This revived July 2018 Mutant Year Zero Bundle included the corebook and the first expansion, Mutant: Genlab Alpha, a standalone RPG about mutated animals. Genlab Alpha was successfully Kickstarted in January 2016 and released in July 2017.
There were four titles in this revived offer’s Starter Collection (retail value $40.50), including the complete full-color 269-page Mutant: Year Zero core rulebook, two Zone Sector location mini-supplements (The Doom Sphere and Denizens of the Sink Hole), and the full-color MYZ Gamemaster Screen .PDF.
Those who paid more than this offer’s threshold also got this revival’s entire Bonus Collection with four more titles worth an additional $53.50, including Genlab Alpha and three Zone Compendium sourcebooks of locations and scenarios: Lair of the Saurians, Dead Blue Sea, and “Die, Meat Eaters, Die!”.
MUTANT YEAR ZERO 2 [all-new]
Before its run of spectacular Kickstarter mega-campaigns for licensed RPGs like The One Ring, Twilight: 2000, and the recent Blade Runner, Free League got handsome responses to its campaigns for the Mutant Year Zero expansions Mechatron (February 2017) and Elysium (November 2018). Each expands the Mutant environment in new directions, and they’re both in this all-new Mutant Year Zero 2 Bundle.
- Mechatron-7 is a huge undersea robot hive where an army of robots continues to carry out the final orders of humanity. Waiting for the humans to return, they work tirelessly in decaying factories. But now, decades after the humans left, something has changed. Some robots have started to express free will. Will these self-aware robots save the Collective, or lead it to its final downfall?
- Elysium I is an underground enclave of unmutated humans, a gilded prison where fear and suspicion grow unchecked and four powerful Houses fight over dwindling resources. As the last torchbearers of human civilization, a force of judicators preserves law and order in the enclave. As a judicator you investigate all crimes, but never forget your strongest loyalty: to your family. When humanity returns to the surface, your House wil lead the way into the new dawn.
There were five titles in this offer’s Zero-Two Collection (retail value $80) as DRM-free .PDF ebooks, including the complete Mutant: Mechatron, Mutant: Elysium, Zone Compendium 4 – Eternal War, Compendium 5 – Hotel Imperator, and the epic campaign The Gray Death.
Ten percent of each payment (after gateway fees) went to these two Mutant Year Zero offers’ pandemic-related charity, Direct Relief. Direct Relief sends protective gear and critical care medications to health workers, with emergency deliveries to medical facilities across the US and to regional response agencies across the world.
