HorizonVirtual:Inspiration

This page is the home for any "inspirational" material for your Horizon: Virtual game, from books to music to TV series, movies and games. If you think it'll help you and others get a handle on the "feel" of a Virtual session, post it here.

Movies

TRON

One of the first films to use computer generated imagery, and definitely the first to use it so extensively, TRON is the film that probably inspired a generation of cyberpunk writers to create and explore the realm dubbed "cyberspace" (Virtual also includes a couple of nods to it in the form of the Discus and the Code Bike). Although every program in TRON is technically a waker, and no User can "enter" the Program Space of Virtual, it's highly recommended viewing for GMs who want to show their players what Program Space is like, especially if they're trying to set up a "not-like-our-world computer universe" theme. The MCP also makes for a fairly natty progenitor virus, although he's locked within Encom's mainframe.

TV Shows

ReBoot

An entirely CGI kids' cartoon show produced by Canadian outfit Mainframe Entertainment gives more of a "waker's eye view" of life in Program Space. The city of Mainframe is closer to the general feel of Program Space given by Virtual. ReBoot's viruses behave more like crime bosses and less like the dragons and demons that Virtual's progenitor viruses are (at least, not until ReBoot Series 4). The User's Games are more potentially destructive.

Computer and Video Games

TRON 2.0 / TRON: Killer App

The official sequel to TRON in computer game form, the PC first-person shooter TRON 2.0 and its Xbox port TRON: Killer App take us back inside the Electronic World and shows us what today's mainframes, PDAs and Internet look like from the inside. Although not an outstanding game, TRON fans with decent PCs or an Xbox owe it to themselves to add it to their collection. Virtual GMs and players will find it worthwhile for its good examples of semi-comic waker lingo ("The Kernel will never retreat, and neither will I! Drive C: forever!"), the Coderipper-like weapons the game avatar gets to use various forms of Coderippers and the villain Thorne is an almost-spot-on portrayal of a Virtual progenitor virus (although he's actually an incorrectly-digitised User), right down to his mutated "Z-Lot" razor programs.