USH'S MATRIX GAME- Whole game discussion and post-scripts... please read!
Due to a busy schedule, this is very late in the day. But here are the notes and summary of the Matrix game that was played in the second half of ’04!
From the moment the original Matrix game came out, my brother was interested in the role-playing potential of the system. Several of us had played role-plays before set in cyberised worlds in plots (like Shadowrun or Cyberpunk) that the Matrix took clear inspiration from- as all Matrix aficionados know, the essence of the Matrix was not its originality, but its fantastic blend of earlier ideas, much like the original Star Wars film (though admittedly Star Wars transposed the setting to sci-fi; Matrix stole its settings from… I dunno, countless things!).
Of course, not long after the Matrix came out, The Phantom Menace did, and regardless of competitors Star Wars is still the big one in our lives. Rules development for Star Wars based on the Feng Shui system (whose system of mooks was perfect for putting super-beings like Jedi against endless amounts of battle droids) started immediately, and the first Episode (the Avalar story line) started to be played three months after TPM came out, hence the original setting being three months after the battle of Naboo.
But even in the midst of all this, The Matrix was hanging around my brother’s mind. Feng Shui the game is a simulation of action martial arts movies, with its own tongue-in-cheek plot blending action from ancient samurai films to futuristic technology fighting, was actually far closer to Matrix than Star Wars.. The Modern Feng Shui setting (the whole thing is linked by time travel but most people start modern) is full of Kung Fu cops and gun nutters and was so close to the exact style of the Matrix- little wonder, as Feng Shui is based on the same action film inspirations as the Matrix is- that it was practically screaming for adaptation.
In Star Wars, Fu had become Force, and the Force trees had to be constructed from scratch. But in the Matrix, Fu… well, it was FU! It could stay as it was. Many of the trees you guys use are barely adapted versions of the very original- Sharpened Claws, Hands of Light, Storm Turtle, Leaping Storm, and several others are all from the original game, though they have been tweaked. All the more advanced Paths- weapons, blocking, and oddly enough, Venerable Grasshopper- were created by my brother and myself.
After the original SW game finished, my brother put some thought into a possible Matrix plot. Remember at this time, huge swathes of it were far more mysterious and unknown than they are now. The original plot was set in Hong Kong, with Asian Agents (led by Agent Chang), and the storyline was the players with a Morpheus-sympathetic brief, set at the same time as the original Matrix film, deliberately causing as much devastation in Hong Kong as possible, to distract the System’s attention away from Morpheus, who believed he had found the One and needed breathing space to pick him up. System-wise, my brother put early work into the ‘grid’ system, which allowed people to create their own programme set-up by inserting tetris-style blocks into the grid, with better programmes being larger and more awkwardly shaped.
All this was done, and then promptly forgotten about. Even Star Wars was not played again for a while, though other games were for extended periods. Matrix as a concept lay dormant.
So, time passes, other games get played, fun is had, I join the boards in 2001, Star Wars gets played here again, and then I ask Rich if I can adapt his Star Wars game for on-line play, which slowly grew, as we all know. But Matrix did not come back into the frame until the PR machine for Reloaded got under way.
Obviously, this was big business. My brother had quietly resurrected his old Matrix idea already when the build-up started, and then when demand started coming his way come the release of the Reloaded trailer, he already had his plot ideas in place.
Much had changed. His original plot was untenable- for a start, fighting Agents was just too awkward for continual play. Secondly, it was becoming increasingly clear that whatever the ACTUAL logic of it (like Morpheus being spotted at Heathrow in London), thematically and stylistically speaking- VERY important to catch the atmosphere of these adaptations- all plot action took place in ‘The’ City. Thirdly, he wanted the plot to move on from just being spun off from the original film.
The grid system, and an early template creation, remained intact. Unlike Star Wars, there were to be very few templates, as the grid system would provide variety. The basics of guns being the best mook killers, but all important duels being resolved up close, were laid down.
So, a new plot was needed. My brother’s first problem was- what credible enemies can he give to the players to meet? Now, remember, all this was being done long in advance of plot spoilers for Reloaded, which my brother never goes out of his way to get anyway. He had no idea Renegade programmes existed. Agents were too powerful, Mooks too crap. Lesser Agents? But why would the System use anything worse?
The answer was logically simple, plot-wise more tricky, but led to the story starting to write itself. The best enemies for players, balanced by default, were other humans! The Dojo fight scene was amazing; credible enemies in that form could come very quickly.
But then why the hell would you be fighting other humans in the Matrix? A simple traitor plot was a. very hard to justify in the Matrix world and b. had already been explored by Cipher.
And so Jericho was born. His character was based upon that of Captain Remius from ‘The Hunt for Red October’, played in the film by Sean Connery. Remius is the Russian strategic genius Submarine Captain who suddenly on day spontaneously makes a highly risky defection, along with his entire crew, faking an accident to make it look like his submarine, Red October, has been destroyed. Obviously it doesn’t go that smoothly or there would be no plot, but those are the basics.
But why would Jericho defect? In Red October, Remius has ideological grounds; Red October had been built as a surprise weapon to use on the West, and Remius thought the conservative Russian faction that built it would doom the world, and so he had only one choice. Jericho was in a war of annihilation and survival; you cannot ideologically differ from that. Even worse, who could he defect TO? Not the Machines, that would make no sense, and would again be too Ciphery. The only possibly of a third faction at the time was the Oracle. Most fans were pretty sure she was a Machine helping the Rebels, before this was actually revealed in-film. But whatever she was or was not, it was clear that the cause and means she supported was Zion’s war, so he couldn’t defect to anything she represented.
So, two concepts came forwards, and in one of those neat little developments that keep hitting the Star Wars games, future Matrix developments made this ideas look VERY smooth, even though when they were designed, my brother had no idea of these developments at all. First of all, Jericho’s given motivation was that, as the strategic genius, he knew Zion would lose the war, and he needed another option. As originally written, this was just meant to tragically illustrate how he staged his deception just before the One was found, Of course, come the end of Reloaded and all of Revolutions, he is absolutely right! As the game was not eventually played until after Reloaded, and here after Revolutions as well, it looks like that part was written in retrospect- but no, it was written in advance!
Secondly, Melitus was created- a powerful programme of the System, who was running certain ‘Operations’ that Jericho could hook into. Creating a personality like this was a terrible risk- at the time, it looked like the System was just faceless Agents and that was it. But Smith had a personality, so other programmes could, and so Melitus was given one. Over time, his immovable but very powerful form was developed.
Of course, the fact that the Merovingian performs almost the exact same role in Reloaded, AND the Brothers often made note of the ‘two Ms’ of the film, good M and bad M, and Melitus just happened to start with an M as well, and that Melitus was given a hatred of the Oracle, which the Merovingian ALSO apparently has… is HONESTLY all complete coincidence! When Melitus was created, no-one had even heard the name Merovingian linked with the Matrix.