In this satire of American political strife, the player is cast as a revolutionary liberal operating out of one city, seeking to reform a conservative United States through violence, abduction, brainwashing, sex, firepower and crime, with a few less effective options for peaceful political advocacy thrown in the mix.
The heart of the game is traveling to sites, recruiting/seducing followers, committing crimes and general mayhem, planting sleepers in the conservative machine, and surviving deadly sieges from reactionary police, CIA agents, corporate mercenaries, the military, and the Conservative Crime Squad which forms to stop you. Your characters gain skills with use, capped by their original stats. Increasing one’s original stats can only be accomplished by getting more “juice” points, the LCS version of experience, which is mostly acquired by violence and criminal behavior.
All of this is decidedly tongue-in-cheek, and neither of the warring ideologies receives any quarter from the game’s biting satire. Thus both liberals and conservatives can enjoy the game, despite the former being the protagonists, as no position on the political compass is safe from the radicalizing bludgeon-like absurdity that prevails throughout.
The player’s over-the-top actions can influence public opinion and elections, cause violent police/military crackdowns, result in dramatic trials, prison escapes, etc., generating an almost limitless cavalcade of dramatic events. Policy changes regularly via Congressional votes, public referenda and Supreme Court decisions, and these changes influence the game world directly in terms of what is legal and what is popular.
The ultimate goal is to turn the country “Elite Liberal,” which requires policy shift on an extremely broad range of issues and extensive liberal domination of government. This naturally requires the Supreme Court, a body which can take many in-game years to turn fully liberal due to its potentially life-long terms of service.
The core game was brought to its final state via Bay 12 Games’ development, but it has been altered well past this version through the release of its source to fans. The fan additions are officially sanctioned and can be found on the Bay 12 Games Forums, Jonathan S. Fox being the current guiding force behind them.
