WALL-E: Postapocalyptic RPG setting?
This post contains spoilers for WALL-E, Pixar’s new movie-thing… and won’t make a whole lot of sense unless you’ve seen it.
Angela and I saw WALL-E on Friday. As we walked out of the theater, she leaned over and said something to the effect of, “…and they all died within the first year back on Earth.”
I pointed out that the AXIOM, while no longer in space, may well still be fully-functional and capable of providing food and such.
Today, someone else pointed out the possibilities for the children to survive in a Lord of the Flies style society.
You see where this is going?
I’m pretty sure you could create a compelling postapocalyptic setting in the aftermath of the movie. You could easily combine the wastelands of earth with still-semi-functioning technology, rogue robots, BNL-worshipping cannibals descended from AXIOM passengers, BNL executives revived out of coldsleep seeking to re-assume control from their underground HQ, and towering pillars of compressed trash.
off topic:
Howdy, just found your blog the other day while looking for info on Star Wars Saga Edition. I don’t blog, so not sure if it tells you when you get a comment on an old post. I read through your post on Saga, just wondering if you ever actually played, and if so what you thought? Thanks!
Hey there.
I played SWSE a little bit. Overall, I had a pretty good time.
I wanted to play a sneaky Jedi, which isn’t really a character type allowed by any of the base classes. I ended up creating a Scoundrel with Force Sensitivity who multiclassed to Jedi at second level. Why? So that I could be trained in stealth and deception. This seemed a bit kludgy… and my PC didn’t feel like my concept at 1st level. I think that was my primary gripe with the game – that it tries to shoehorn you into certain character archetypes.
Hmmm, do you have any experience with the West End star wars games that you could compare the two?
I played the WE version back in the early 90s… so my memory of it is spotty. One thing that I definitely liked about SWSE over WEG-SW is that it is a lot simpler to be a technician in SE. In the movies, it seemed like if someone had one tech skill, she had them all. In WEG-SW, I remember there being a ton of different tech skills and piloting skills and weapon skills… which wasn’t really reflective of the general competence of people in the films. SWSE does better with that.
I had the same thought about a potential post-apocalyptic WALL-E RPG. It wasn’t as developed to include frozen BnL execs or cannibals, but watching the robots and humans cooperate to rebuild their society during the credits sequence really struck a “Ooo, new sandbox!” chord within me. I think it also reminded me a little of Phantasy Star by Sega. Anyway, I was sure I couldn’t be the ONLY one who had that notion, and I’m glad to find someone else out there thought the same thing. Nice!