Dark Future

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Dark Future is a 1988 miniature wargame by Games Workshop. It is set in an alternate reality where the United States—and indeed the rest of the world—is falling apart. Society is going to ruins, and the natural laws of physics are breaking down. The megacorps rule, technology runs rampant, and Sanctioned Ops patrol the roads and highways tracking down and destroying the renegade scum who live there, outside of the law and doing what they please.

A game bearing the name Dark Future was originally developed for Games Workshop as a cyberpunk roleplaying game. When that project was cancelled, that game's co-author and GW boardgame developer Marc Gascoigne ported it onto Richard Halliwell's car-racing game system, using a mechanic originally developed for Judge Dredd Roleplaying game adventure Slaughter Margin. The game was seen as a replacement for GW's early boardgame Battlecars, which merged James Bond-like combative car gadgets in a Mad Max-inspired background. The game was originally set in the (then-future year) of 1995.

Novels by Jack Yeovil (a pen name of Kim Newman) created an elaborate alternate history where Elvis Presley is a hard-as-nails bounty hunter and Oliver North is president of the United States. In 2005 the Dark Future setting was brought back as a series of novels published by Games Workshop's fiction imprint Black Flame. They updated the setting to 2021, and released several new titles.

In the boardgame, the player plays the part of a Sanctioned Op—a bounty hunter of the future—or a Renegade, duelling for survival in high-tech vehicles of the present.

1 Original Game
2 White Line Fever expansion
3 Magazines
4 Novels
5 See also
6 External links

[edit] Original Game

Published in 1988 it was a standard Games Workshop boxed game containing rules, cardboard track sections and plastic cars a similar size to standard Matchbox or Hotwheels toy cars (roughly 1/60 or 1/64 - 23 to 25mm scale).

[edit] White Line Fever expansion

This is a volume of advanced rules for Dark Future. Inside this book players will find new rules for manoeuvers, shooting, hazards, and new equipment. Also, new vehicles are presented (trikes), new scenarios, and new characters as well.

[edit] Magazines

White Dwarf 100: Highway Warriors! - A preview of the forthcoming Dark Future game.
White Dwarf 102: Dark Future Release Preview
White Dwarf 103: Illuminations - Review of Carl Critchlow, Thrud the Barbarian and Dark Future Artist.
White Dwarf 103: 'Eavy Metal - Pictures of painted DarkFuture models
White Dwarf 104: Redd Harvest - Dealing with the famed Sanction Op, Redd Harvest herself.
White Dwarf 104: Thrud the Barbarian - "I have seen the Future, and it is Dark (but then I took me shades off)".
White Dwarf 105: Street Fighter - An article dealing with the ins and outs of fighting outside the car.
White Dwarf 106: A Day at the Races - New car types and equipment for racers.
White Dwarf 107: White Line Fever: Advanced Manoeuvres - excerpt from White Line Fever dealing with speed and handling.
White Dwarf 107: Three Wheelers - Rules for Trikes and motorcycle combinations, also from White Line Fever.
White Dwarf 107: 'Eavy Metal Citadel and diecast conversions.
White Dwarf 108: White Line Fever: Advanced Shooting - excerpt from White Line Fever dealing with shooting, fire arcs and more.
White Dwarf 108: Citadel Miniatures - Dark Future Street Warriors
White Dwarf 110: Tournament Rules - Simplified rules for quick play, just a little more advanced than the Starter Rules...
White Dwarf 112: St. Louis Blues - A look at the famed Sanctioned Op group.
White Dwarf 124: Dead Man's Curve, part 1 - Advanced rules for campaigns, weather, darkness, psychosis, salvage, experience.
White Dwarf 125: Dead Man's Curve, part 2 - More advanced rules for success, fame, recruitment, cybernetics, hacking and gamesmasters.
Challenge 52: Sand Cats - A Renegade gang that needs to be hunted down.

[edit] Novels

Route 666 short story anthology, edited by David Pringle, published by Games Workshop (1990)
Demon Download by Jack Yeovil, published by Boxtree Books (1990); republished by Black Flame (2005)
Krokodil Tears by Jack Yeovil, published by Boxtree Books (1991); republished by Black Flame (2006)
Comeback Tour by Jack Yeovil, published by Boxtree Books (1991); republished by Black Flame (2007)
Ghost Dancer(Kid Zero in England) by Brian Craig, published by Boxtree Books (1991)
Route 666 by Jack Yeovil, published by Boxtree Books (1993); republished by Black Flame (2006) (an expansion of the short story Route 666 published in the anthology Route 666)
Golgotha Run by Dave Stone, published by Black Flame (2005)
American Meat by Stuart Moore, published by Black Flame (2005)
Jade Dragon by James Swallow, published by Black Flame (2006)
Reality Bites by Stuart Moore, published by Black Flame (October 2006, ISBN 1-84416-408-X)