10 Hooks and Rumours for Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0.’s Night City

This list has ten hooks and rumours that can be heard in or about the Upper East Side district of Night City. Whether or not they are true is up to the GameMaster. They can be used as background colour or as potential adventure hooks.

1. Allworld Insurance in the Upper East Side has an enclosure built of reinforced concrete as part of their building, where physical evidence is stored for examination by the company’s forensic engineers. There’s only one street entrance, without using explosives, and there are two checkpoints to ensure only those allowed to enter can do so. Yet there are rumours that some of what’s been stored in the enclosure has been tampered with to affect Allworld’s investigations and ultimate pay-outs.
2. CiNEmaXUS is a theatre and braindance arcade that has been struggling recently due to corporate clientele being driven elsewhere by the punks on the streets at night. Some say that the place is going to start catering to the punks, but there are other rumours that the owners are making a deal with someone far more dangerous than any street punk in order to keep the area around it safe so that its original clientele feels safe to return.
3. Global Foods prides itself on its ability to create any dish that a diner asks for, no matter how disgusting. It’s rumoured that it’s also possible to order dishes that, whilst not unknown, are illegal, with long pig being the one most touted as being available to those in the know.
4. Kitty Liquor violates most of Night City’s local laws, including selling to minors as well as remaining open at all times of day and night. Though the council would like to shut it down, doing so could well cause a riot amongst the local gangs. Others, however, are less bothered about the potential fallout, or about obeying the law when it comes to closing Kitty Liquor down, and there are rumours of violent actions planned against the business.
5. Long Last Books specialises in rare, out of print, banned and hard to find books as well as those published by independents. The gangs appreciate this, but the corps do not, and it’s rumoured that the corps have tried to put the shop out of business a few times, with the use of force, but that the gangs have stepped up to defend them.
6. StreeTemps is used to hire those in need of some quick cash to carry out various activities that, at best, skirt on being on the wrong side of the law and, more often than not, go fully over that border. It’s rumoured that those who sign up with StreeTemps tend to suffer higher casualty rates than normal, which may be because the hirers are not the best people around to deal with.
7. Systems Original manufactures networking software similar to that used in the Net. There’s a rumour that in some cases, perhaps all cases, that a backdoor is created in the software that allows Systems Original, or someone who pays them for the privilege, to access what are supposed to be secure networks.
8. The Advocet is a luxury hotel that provides services, both legal and not, to its clientele. To date, the police haven’t taken any notice of this, as everything happens in-house, but it’s rumoured that’s changing after one of the more dubious clientele caused the death of one of the people providing them with an intimate service.
9. The autovendor in NNEws is run by a marginally intelligent AI that reputedly has chopped the hands of people who have tried to steal from it. There are rumours that the AI is rather more than marginally intelligent, and takes a disturbing pleasure in inflicting harm on others, which may not bode well for the things it vends in the future.
10. The truck drivers of Barstow Enterprises often get into altercations of the punks who frequent The Slammer just down the street, and some take a kind of pride in the number of punks they’ve mown down with their vehicles. It’s rumoured that matters might be about to get out of hand though; some of the punks are said to be in the market for some anti-vehicular weaponry with the intention of blowing up some of the trucks, and their drivers at the same time.

Add random events to a cyberpunk city with 100 Events for a Cyberpunk City.

D10: Night City Rumours – Upper East Side is unofficial content provided under the Homebrew Content Policy of R. Talsorian Games and is not approved or endorsed by RTG. This content references materials that are the property of R. Talsorian Games and its licensees.