Mage: Drifting Tokyo

Targeting the new year.

Setting Elements

Drifting Tokyo Cosmology Sketch

Natural Society

Tokyo 2020

It's not long now before Tokyo will be swallowed by this festival of athleticism and its sordid underbelly. Those who want to make a point to the whole world will converge to proclaim their messages.

Climate Change

Freak weather events are increasing, and the summers are becoming hotter. The four seasons of Japan teeter on the edge of chaos.

Supernatural Society

Techno Quiescence

Tokyo is techno turf, but recently their activity has declined for unknown reasons.

Tokyo Metropolitan Special Police

This little-advertised special force deals with 'unusual' situations.

Undead War

The kei-jin courts of Japan are long-established, but successive waves of Cainite (kein-jin [polite], hirubito [derog.]) immigration have carved out niches. Recent events have spurred a new hot phase of this cold war.

Onmyouji

The practitioners of onmyoudou are not tradition mages, but their organisations and families have many political links with the Order of Hermes, and Hermetics visiting or living in Japan will often rely on them as a local network. Of course, any Hermetic knows not to rely too much on the good will and good faith of a host.

Urban Legends

On street corners, in hallways, in locker rooms, in comment threads; Tokyo is an endless marketplace of fanciful rumours.

Drift

The appearance of objects and phenomena from alternate histories. Banknotes from the Heisei era of Imperial Japan, refugees from brutal civil war, and newspaper articles announcing the death of Nelson Mandela in prison have all had their moments of unverifiable online fame.

Tokyo Labyrinth

Tokyo's transport network is larger than any human mind can grasp, but some say it is larger than even its creators and operators know. Crannies in time and space hide secret lines and districts, which few find and fewer return from.

Heaven or Hell

It's hard to get ahead in the Japan of the lost decades, but some down on their luck are given a chance at a new life. Participate in one of the bizarre secret games run for the amusement of certain wealthy spectators, and you can achieve your dream - or suffer a fate worse than debt.

Vermilion Air

Children have always pretended to have special powers, but more and more unsourced testimonials insisting that these ones are real have begun to appear. Enthusiasts declare that the spiritual alignment of modernity has created a 'vermilion air' that awakens latent powers... or something.

High Schools

Fujisaka Jogakuin (藤坂女学院)

Posh girls private HS. Has a ghost problem.

Shingata Rengou Koutou Gakkou (新型連合高等学校)

'Scientific' high school using new educational techniques. Backed by a combination of business concerns and foreign investors, with a generous scholarship policy. Its university enrolment rate is top-class.

Sotei Gakuen (素亭学園)

Ultra-high-class private school for children of the nationalist elite. Sinister.

Establishments

Hooded Lantern (フード付き ランタン)

An occult and antiques shop in Jimbocho, run by the stiff old Mr. Kurohara. Has a particular interest in rarities and old asian wares.

Sushi-ya Ooshiro (すしや おおしろ)

A hidden gem sushi restaurant near the Tsukiji market. The proprietress, snaggle-toothed young Ooshiro Hireko (大白 鰭子), knows a great deal about goings-on around Tokyo Bay.

Museum of International Art and Culture

Opened in the 60s as the inheritor of a similar institution destroyed in the war. This museum celebrates the history of cultural and artistic exchange between Japan and the West; its exhibits on Japanese Christianity and the adoption of firearms are exceptional. It is noted for its unusual 24-hour opening times policy, buttressed by a strict policy against violence and rowdiness.

Areas

Top levels are the 23 special wards. Special wards are quite large, 10+ sq.km.

Chiyoda

A special ward. The heart of political power in Japan. Chiyoda-ku houses the Imperial Palace, the National Diet, the Supreme Court, and the residence of the Prime Minister, as well as important mystic sites like Akiba and the Yasukuni Shrine. Low population density, high xp density.

Akihabara

'Electric Town', 'Akiba'. You know what this is.

Jimbocho (神保町)

'Booktown'. A district thick with used bookshops, publishers, and purveyors of curios. Many occultists and occult beings make their homes or ply their trades here, among musty stacks deep with secrets.

Chuo

'Central'. A special ward and the historical commercial centre of Tokyo. The Bank of Japan is headquartered here.

Ginza

Upscale shopping district.

Nihonbashi

Business district. Home of 'Kilometre Zero' for Tokyo and Japan.

Tsukiji

Home of the Tsukiji Fish Market (fishket).

Ikebukuro

A special ward, known as a shopping and entertainment district.

Otome Road

An otaku shopping area aimed at women.

Nishi-Ikebukuro

A red-light district.

Chinatown

A relatively new and wealthy chinatown.

Suginami

A special ward. Many animation studios including Sunrise and Bones keep their headquarters here.

Koenji

An aging retail & commercial district, filled with many second-hand shops, particularly for clothing and electronics. Its 'retro' culture conceals a community of technologically-oriented supernaturals.

Minato

A coastal special ward, name meaning 'Harbor'. Home to many corporate and industrial HQs, foreign company local HQs, and foreign embassies.

Shibuya

A special ward. A centre of the Japanese IT industry and the home of NHK headquarters.

Harajuku

A centre of fashion and youth culture. Contains the shrine of the emperor Meiji and Yoyogi park.

Shibuya Station

The station is surrounded by a famous shopping district.

Shinjuku

A special ward and major commercial centre. Shinjuku Station is the busiest railway station in the world.

Kabukicho

An entertainment and red-light district. The Hidden Theatre has been a significant supernatural meeting site since the late 40s. Kabukicho is traditionally a hideout of organised mundane crime and reality crime, though recent crackdowns have reduced this along with the prominence of the Theatre.