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Posted by: Malbur Apr 2 2011, 11:20 PM

So I picked up Corporate Guide a couple days ago and have been reading through the various information it provides. So far I've read on Ares and Aztechnology and am 90% of the way through the chapter on Evo. As the responses in the chapter state, it's written by a fan-boy for the company and as a result, it is all very clean. Being new to the Shadowrun world, I can't see this as a possibility (you don't get to AAA without doing some underhanded things...) so I'm asking, where's the dirt on Evo?

Posted by: CanRay Apr 2 2011, 11:25 PM

Well, for one thing, CrashCart, their medical service that runs as competition to DocWagon in the UCAS (And elsewhere) was founded by Insect Spirits. Will that be a good start?

Posted by: Malbur Apr 2 2011, 11:34 PM

Wait, what? Where'd that tidbit of info come from? And whats the full story?

Posted by: CanRay Apr 2 2011, 11:44 PM

Oh man, back in the day...

Nigel Findley's novel, 2XS has the full details. http://www.battlecorps.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=2476, so you don't even need to hunt through the used book stores to find it.

Second book I read about Shadowrun, and what sold me on the universe.

Posted by: Abstruse Apr 3 2011, 12:31 AM

Coincidence, I came here immediately after posting that entire thing on the "official" forums.

Yeah, there's some dirt on Evo, but it's back when they were Yamatetsu. They have a free spirit on the board that no one knows a whole lot about, they jumped from Japan to Russia, and there's the whole CrashCart thing which is just a really great story you should REALLY get from the novel 2XS. One of my favorite books of all time.

Posted by: Ascalaphus Apr 3 2011, 07:54 AM

They're really into transhumanism. Which some people find appealing, others find scary.

They'll be doing a lot of scary bio-research. And are you sure all test subjects are willing?

Posted by: TheOOB Apr 3 2011, 08:05 AM

There are pretty high on the list of corps I'd suspect for human bio-drone research.

Posted by: Minchandre Apr 3 2011, 08:24 AM

Evo and Horizon are actually notorious in-universe for having squeaky clean images, leading people to suspect they must be up to something really bad.

Posted by: ggodo Apr 3 2011, 08:42 AM

My campaign has Horizon as Google reborn, because you know those guys are up to something.

Posted by: Ascalaphus Apr 3 2011, 11:07 AM

Something like http://www.xkcd.com/792/?

Posted by: Sengir Apr 3 2011, 11:16 AM

Their Mars terraforming project (mentioned in Agumentation IIRC) could be the start of something sinister. Creating a biosphere will also establish a manasphere, which could cause those mysterious pyramids and dragon skeleton on Mars to "awaken" in some way...

Posted by: Nath Apr 3 2011, 11:35 AM

Yamatetsu/Evo hasn't been always playing nice, but most of it happened before 2049, or in the gap between 2064 and 2070.

Yamatetsu originally was the merger of Japanese and Filipino companies in 2032. During the 2040ies, the Japanese conspired against their Filipino partners to take full control of the company. That was probably not nice.

The free spirit Buttercup, a shareholder of Yamatetsu, had Yamatetsu endorcing a policy toward metahumans slightly nicer than other Japanese corporations. In 2059, Buttercup and Yuri Shibanojuki seized control of the company from the Japanese traditionalists. It is more or less suggested Buttercup may have hasted the death of Yuri's father, chairman of the board Tadamako Shibanojuki, after he suffered a stroke.

After the second crash, between 2064 and 2066, a number of Japanese executives acted on their own behalf. In Turkestan, they tried to overthrow the government (Corporate Guide talks about an "open war", ignoring the three golden rules of the Corporate Court as defined in Corporate Download). In Poland, they helped members of the Rybinski regime to loot the country before leaving power. But Yuri Shibanojuki quickly cleaned up the house. However, it seems Yamatetsu/Evo Naval Technologies, which was created by Yuri with Yamatetsu naval forces and Russian former military, is under control from the Japanese traditionalist faction.

Posted by: Malbur Apr 3 2011, 03:46 PM

That's bizarre. I'd figure that CGL would give some tidbits or something to just keep people guessing, but by saying "nope, they're cool. completely cool. don't worry about it!" without any reason *to* worry about it seems strange to me.

Posted by: CanRay Apr 3 2011, 03:53 PM

It makes us jump to our own conclusions...

Posted by: Sixgun_Sage Apr 3 2011, 05:30 PM

Exactly, they know their public and know that fans of shadowrun will just assume some big nasty on the event horizon. Then they get to plunder our ideas for metaplot hooks.

Posted by: ggodo Apr 3 2011, 05:48 PM

Yeah, but with more mind control. I'm scared shitless of The Consensus. I betcha t's brains in jars or something akin to The Attic from Dollhouse.

Posted by: CanRay Apr 3 2011, 07:56 PM

It's what I'd do. You get the best of options from a variety of sources from some rather imaginative people, and get to smile when someone gets to crow, "I WAS RIGHT!"

Or, if you don't like any of the other ideas, you just go with your own, and make like Jim Butcher.

Posted by: Tyro Apr 4 2011, 12:07 AM

Jim Butcher is AWESOME

Posted by: CanRay Apr 4 2011, 01:15 AM

He's also a complete and total bastard.

I made the mistake of reading the first chapter of "Ghost Story" online yesterday...

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Apr 4 2011, 02:36 AM

What is wrong with that one? Book 3 of the Dresden Files, right? Just finished it, and I actually liked it.

Posted by: CanRay Apr 4 2011, 02:46 AM

Book 13 of The Dresden Files. The one that's coming out later this year.

Changes left it at a cliffhanger, and I really, really, REALLY wanted to know what the light at the end of the tunnel really was.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Apr 4 2011, 02:50 AM

Sorry... Saw "Ghost" and thought Grave Peril. My apologies.

Posted by: Abstruse Apr 4 2011, 03:14 AM

First chapter of Ghost Story is online on his website. Tells you precisely what that the light is right off the bat.

Posted by: Sixgun_Sage Apr 4 2011, 02:13 PM

Honestly... gonna read it, but that first chapter teaser has me worried.

Posted by: Doc Chase Apr 4 2011, 09:00 PM

Just a freight train comin' your way?

Hey hey, yeah?

...

I'll have to go read that tonight. Side Jobs was decent,but I'm finding it to really only be worthy of a single read. Changes is worth multiple.

Posted by: Tyro Apr 5 2011, 02:57 AM

Seconded. Ghost Story can't come out soon enough.

I loved the Side Jobs story with Murphy leading ^_^

Posted by: CanRay Apr 5 2011, 05:34 AM

I thought Jim Butcher was doing a bad job writing as a female until I realized... "Murphy is a woman thinking as a man due to her job.". I had new admiration for him after that.

Posted by: Tyro Apr 5 2011, 06:15 AM

Murphy is a very believable character once you realize that.

Posted by: Abstruse Apr 5 2011, 06:21 AM

He also had his wife (a romance/paranormal romance writer herself) help him find the voice according to interviews.

Posted by: Pepsi Jedi Apr 5 2011, 06:45 AM

He writing for Evo now?

Posted by: Lansdren Apr 5 2011, 09:20 AM

Now that I would pay good money to see



Hell can I vote for a cross over Dresden, Nightside and Shadorrun book?

Posted by: Sixgun_Sage Apr 5 2011, 02:12 PM

That would either be so awesome it would make your head explode or so bad it would be banned under the geneva convention.

Posted by: KarmaInferno Apr 5 2011, 04:52 PM

I dunno if he still plays, but if I http://img403.imageshack.us/img403/6260/screenshot2009050214250.jpg I'll ask if he'd consider writing for Shadowrun.*








-k

*- Yes, that's really his character. He has specific permission from NCSoft to play that character in the game.

Posted by: Abstruse Apr 5 2011, 08:59 PM

He's on Twitter. I'll ask him next time he's doing an impromptu Q&A on there (might be a bit since he's probably taking a break having just finished Ghost Story). Plus his schedule's kinda full right now according to him. I'm sure he has an opinion on Shadowrun seeing as the Dresden books feel a lot like Shadowrun without the tech and he's a gamer himself. Getting Butcher to write for Shadowrun would probably bring the game back to the Findley/Hume/Dowd glory days of the metaplot...

Back on topic, Evo is only bright and shiny for the last 10 years or so in-game. Before that, they were second only to Universal Omnitech in terms of icky inhuman medical experiments. Plus the bug thing didn't help.

Posted by: Tyro Apr 6 2011, 03:02 AM

That is SO AWESOME!

Posted by: Xahn Borealis Apr 6 2011, 04:14 AM

And here's something else that goes over my head. My library sucks. Who's Jim Butcher?

(Cue jaws hitting ground, undoubtedly.)

Posted by: Tyro Apr 6 2011, 04:20 AM

Author of the Dresden files. If you haven't read them, do so. Now.

Posted by: CanRay Apr 6 2011, 04:51 AM

Jim Butcher also took two really bad ideas, and turned them into a killer series.

The Lost Roman Legion, and Pokemon. Combined.

Posted by: Tyro Apr 6 2011, 04:52 AM

I don't follow, and I've read the books.

Posted by: CanRay Apr 6 2011, 04:53 AM

The Codex Alera series is a combination of The Lost Roman Legion and Pokemon. He wrote it on a dare. (Or a bet. I can't remember which.)

He won.

Posted by: Tyro Apr 6 2011, 04:54 AM

Heh. Haven't read those ones. Any good?

Posted by: CanRay Apr 6 2011, 04:56 AM

I bought them one after another. In less than a month. During a time when I had a hard time reading due to various... Issues.

You tell me.

Posted by: Tyro Apr 6 2011, 05:05 AM

I see *visits the library web site*

I love living in the second-busiest library system in the US ^_^

Posted by: Bira Apr 6 2011, 06:21 AM

No megacorp is nice. Even if they aren't doing something monumentally evil like consorting with insect spirits (Ares) or running technomancer server farms/concentration camps (MCT), they still engage in wide-scale criminal activity with lots of black ops thrown in, for the silliest of reasons. Corporations in general are amoral and profit-obsessed by nature, and only play nice when compelled to do so by the law. And the only laws binding Shadowrun megacorps are those they make themselves.

You know how everyone says Horizon is "too nice to be true"? On the Run, the very first SR4 adventure, published right after the corebook, had a Horizon executive send at least one well-armed hit team after a music album, very likely because it was cheaper than just buying it.

As for dirt on EVO, they have a big military/research arcology in Hong Kong, from which they run the city's coast guard, which is practically a Vory subsidiary.

Posted by: ggodo Apr 6 2011, 07:40 AM

This makes that series so much more appealing to me. I'm kinda allergic to high fantasy. As much as I love Dresden, I really don't like high fantasy.

Posted by: Abstruse Apr 6 2011, 09:20 AM

Better. An internet bulletin board argument

Posted by: Tyro Apr 6 2011, 10:03 AM

Seriously?

Posted by: CanRay Apr 6 2011, 03:37 PM

Wait... You're saying Jim Butcher did the absolute impossible... He won the INTERNET?

Posted by: sabs Apr 6 2011, 05:08 PM

he was having an internet bboard argument with someone who told him that if your premise was trite and crap there was no way to make a good story out of it. And that with a good premise, even an idiot could write a good book.

Jim said he could take any bad premise, and turn it into something good, hell.. give him 2 bad ideas, and he could turn them into smoething good.


So the guys said.. Oh yeah..
I bet you can't write a decent story involving the Lost Roman Legion, it's been done to death and it sucks. I hate all stories involving the Lost Roman Legion.

So butcher says:

Okay.. what's the second bad premise.

The guy answers:

Pokemon.


And thus a New York Times best selling series was born.

Posted by: Malbur Apr 6 2011, 09:24 PM

So thats pretty much it? Crashcart was started by an Insect Spirit group...? Well I'm disappointed with the writers now ... And now it looks like I have some reading to do

Posted by: CanRay Apr 6 2011, 10:02 PM

Evo was the "Quiet Corporation" until the CrashCart thing started the ball rolling to make them a household name. The character in 2XS finds out about the AAA-Corporation, and is amazed that he's never heard of it before.

And we're not talking some Barrens rat, here, either. Dirk was an educated person who had a pretty good view of the world that is from a number of different aspects.

Posted by: Abstruse Apr 6 2011, 11:13 PM

College-educated former Lone Star officer who worked the shadows as a mundane human with no cyber and was successful at it. That should be enough to cement his badass status.

And the Alera thing came about because Jim Butcher was on a writer's workshop board (I think Random House, but I'm not sure). A polite discussion and thought exercise started about whether craft or an idea is more important. One side was no matter how good of a writer you are, you can't polish a turd. The other side had seen the Mythbusters episode about that and said you could make a bad idea into a good book if you were a good enough writer. It devolved into a flamewar with all that entails. Butcher and several others were on the craft side, while other people were on the idea side. Eventually, one guy on the idea side said "Prove it then. Take a horrible idea and write a good story with it!" Butcher, being in his 20s and fueled by internet rage, said "Screw that, give me TWO bad ideas!" The guy responded with lost Roman legions and pokemon. Butcher then started brainstorming and realized that pokemon were basically manifestations of the Shinto kami of the elements and went from there.

He also challenges anyone to read the Alera books now and imagine the first big battle in the woods with "Rill, I choose you!" and take the books seriously.

Posted by: CanRay Apr 6 2011, 11:14 PM

My brain just broke.

And that's like crack for writers, from what I've heard of his interviews!

Posted by: Fatum Apr 10 2011, 11:02 PM

Former Russian military? As in, ships? Tech? Or what? Where is that piece coming from?

Posted by: Nath Apr 11 2011, 09:13 PM

Yamatetsu Naval Technologies is described in Corporate Download, page 117, and Corporate Guide, pages 88-89.

Shipping was originally one of Yamatetsu core business (though Corporate Guide has it as a construction company, Tsuruga International, Tadamako Shibanojuki's own company, was a shipping company according to Blood in the Boardroom). Before 2059-2060, Yamatetsu did not officially have a military force, but maintained a fleet of about 40 patrol ships (probably corvettes or frigates-sized ships) to secure shipping routes. When a land force was needed, they were contracting operations to Ares Arms or similar corporations.
After Buttercup and Yuri Shibanojuki seized control of the corporation and moved the headquarters to Vladivostok, they strengthened ties with the Russian authorities. However, at that time, Russia was a game of thrones between Saeder-Krupp, Zeta-Impchem, Yamatetsu and Cross-backed factions. Most of Yamatetsu allies were related to parts of the Russian space complex, the eastern local governments and the Pacific fleet. The Russian government considered allowing Russian troops to be sent abroad if needed to defend the interests of the now-Russian only AAA megacorporation.
Buttercup and Shibanojuki then establish Yamatetsu Naval Technologies. YNT was to act as an umbrella for all Yamatetsu defense-related activities : the military shipbuilding business, the patrol fleet, and the use of Russian or contracted military forces. The first President/CEO of YNT was Fyodor Uvarovka [sic], a Russian military advisor, tasked with the creation of a combat swimmer unit. By 2072, YNT is nonetheless described as "one of the last holdouts of the hardliner Japanese".

Posted by: Doc Chase Apr 11 2011, 09:31 PM

And that's why I can't read the Alera series.

Posted by: Fatum Apr 12 2011, 10:28 PM

>Fyodor Uvarovka
>hardliner Japanese

Yeah, SR3 is still as good as I remember with Russian surnames, and Corporate Guide is just as good with everything at all. :3
Anyway, thank you for the info.

Posted by: Malbur Apr 13 2011, 05:20 PM

The real problem I see is while Evo and Horizon both seem to have sparkle-y clean records, I only really have sympathy for Horizon. Evo just seems to rub me the wrong way. With Horizon, at least how it's portrayed in Corporate Guide, seems to actually be a half decent corp. Hell, there's suggestion that they caused Crash 2.0 in their section, but even with that, I still like them.

Posted by: ggodo Apr 13 2011, 06:42 PM

This is the mind control kicking in.

Posted by: Malbur Apr 13 2011, 08:19 PM

well i should specify... I can't see much harm coming out of Horizon, but i can see doing runs against them as much more dangerous than against other corps... so I am less inclined to go against them, so I like them more I guess? After hearing that Horizon won't nec. destroy you, but will instead destroy your cred... yeah, thats a pretty powerful incentive not to f*ck with them.

Posted by: Fatum Apr 14 2011, 09:16 PM

Evo is a major driving force beyond the pro-meta action; that alone makes it better than the great spin-corp.

Posted by: Tyro Apr 14 2011, 09:17 PM

I will give them that; not only are they involved in pro-meta politics, but they also are responsible for much of the meta-friendly equipment on the market. Whatever their motives, they do good works.

Posted by: KarmaInferno Apr 15 2011, 04:07 AM

The question is how they research that meta-friendly stuff.

There is a reason my pixie is listed as "Experiment 235-D" in Evo's records.






-k

Posted by: ggodo Apr 15 2011, 06:14 AM

Very much the above, they're too back alley and underhanded with their sneaky. At least Lofwyr's fairly honest about his intent to rule the world.

Posted by: Sixgun_Sage Apr 15 2011, 03:15 PM

Would you believe the frakking huge golden dragon trillionaire if he told you he didn't want to rule the world?

Posted by: CanRay Apr 15 2011, 04:48 PM

Depends on how big the numbers on the stick he was handing me were.

"That's enough for me to agree that the moon is cheese and the sky is mauve."

Posted by: Sixgun_Sage Apr 16 2011, 03:05 PM

Agreeing and believing are two differant things, if Mr J. hands me enough money I'll agree that Mr Knight is a dumb punter, doesn't mean I believe it. Dragons have more.... immediate methods of securing agreement.

Posted by: CanRay Apr 16 2011, 03:14 PM

If nothing else, because they're rich enough to own a ketchup factory.