The original Night City Sourcebook for the Cyberpunk 2020 roleplaying game was critically acclaimed. Released in 1991, Night City set the standard for what was possible with a setting sourcebook, by presenting a detailed overview and background to Night City, the default location for Cyberpunk.
Needless to say, Night City 2045, the revamped and updated city sourcebook for Cyberpunk RED, has a lot to live up to.
The first thing you notice with Night City 2045 is that it is similarly huge, coming in at over 300 pages, which is typically the size of a roleplaying game, rather than just a sourcebook. There is a lot of content here, and it has not been padded out with too many images – in fact, it could be argued, there may be too few.
Night City 2045 opens up with a history and overview of the city. Exhaustive may be an overused term, but the writers of Night City 2045 have included details about the city’s politics, public transport infrastructure, telecommunications and sewerage systems.
Readers are then presented with the core content; backgrounds on each of the regions of Night City (The Island, NorCal, SoCal, Mainland and Outskirts, as well as the Playland amusement park), which are in turn subdivided into a series of unique districts.
Each district is introduced by a different character who provides insight into the area and its background. They also introduce the city manager, who runs that particular district. An image, presented as a photograph, offers a glimpse of what life is like in the district. Each district closes with a variety of distinct non-player characters (NPC) sheets for typical inhabitants of the area.
The overall feel of Night City in 2045 is quite different to how was it originally portrayed. Instead of the decaying metropolis, we are now presented with an anarchic city rebuilding itself after a cataclysmic event – the fourth corporate war. This creates a very different feel, but also presents a series of new opportunities for roleplay that players and referees can explore in their game.
Although each block in every district is not defined, Night City 2045 is still incredibly detailed. Of course, that is no bad thing – it is generally better to have too much rather than too little information, but it can sometimes be overwhelming.
Although the Cyberpunk roleplaying game has a lightweight metaplot, the Night City 2045 sourcebook makes a point of referencing events that take place in other Cyberpunk RED sourcebooks, such as Danger Gal Dossier and Tales of the RED: Hope Reborn.
Although intended as a sourcebook for Cyberpunk RED, the material here would be useful as a city setting for any roleplaying game set in a similarly dystopian near-future. It would also be of interest to fans of the Cyberpunk 2077 video game, as the Night City presented here acts as prelude to what is to come.
Overall, Night City 2045 is an excellent expansion for Cyberpunk RED and will be essential for anyone wanting to run a game set in Night City.
