One of my favourite things about SR is that it ties the fantasy world to the one we know. This means that people and their works, fictional and non-, are known in the sixth world. This comes up now and then, like when someone suggested that Tolkien was some sort of prophet, or the character who was a Star Wars fan and wanted to emulate a Jedi knight. There's also the old mention of Battletech arenas, and my favourite: the Queensryche references in a lot of the art.

What's really cool to me is when we don't even change the past, but put it in a new light in the future. For example, Tolkien's no prophet, but a lot of people might think he is.

Has anyone taken this and run with it? Used young celebrities from IRL as NPC's of the 2060's? Had a run that was involved directly with a real event that a player witnessed? I'd like to read some stories....

Our world would be the fifth, not the fourth.

One of our first 4th edition runs in Miami was a wetwork job...against a vampiric Britney Spears.

And then there's the merger of TGI Friday's and Hooters that occured in 2021, bringing about TGI Hooters

My group does this sort of thing all the time. Part of the joy of Shadowrun IMO.

I try to avoid RL stuff that's too blatant in my games. I only factor in RL if it's something being presented as in the past, and that doesn't contradict anything else in my game(s).

In one of my games based out of London and Sydney, one of the biggest thorns in the sides of the characters was the head of an international piracy and smuggling ring, a smart but mean old bitch named Tiger Lily Hutchence-Geldof.

RL stuff I did...

A player of mine had a character who was tv addicted. At the beginning of every game, he would always be sitting (the character) in front of the tv (trideo I mean) watching all bunch of stuff. I would usually do around 2 minutes of flavour stuff to bring the world to life, taking half the stuff from Shadowbeat (the greatest book ever!) and half the rest using RL or RL-inspired stuff. I did a spoof of The Crocrodile Hunter on a regular basis (but with meta creatures instead! Hilarious...) As a sad note, he actually died in my game, getting caught in a manastorm in the Australian outback and turned into stone... and 6 months later, my players actually met his "statue" while they were running the shadows down under...

Matt Damon was also a vampire in one of my game. He was the "mentor" of one of my players...

The Harlem Globe-Trotters were a group of Metas travelling around the Globe promoting metahumans rights...

I'm sure I put Bill Gates somewhere...

I was planning on using Michael Jackson at some point but didn't have time...

I put a friend of mine (who is a medicine student) as the head doctor of an hospital in Seattle...

That's what I can think of so far...

Peace!

Crossfire

We had Britney Spears, pre K-Fed, as the target for extraction. then we found out she was behind the run because she wantedo ut of her contract.

Sharon Stone as an Elizabeth Balthory type interested in acting as a mentor to young starlets but really...well.

Recently on a run we encounter dustin Hilton, a young, vapid, out of control heir to a ofrtune who needed nothing so much as a spanking.

We've had a SIM star from the Tir named Justin Timberlake, the Great Grandson, was a speaker's way adept. Wasn't really good for much because he just lived off his families wealth. Much like Paris Hilton now-a-days, just shows up at all the parties, gets his name out there as much as possible. Working on a run right now where he's hiring some runners for a debt elimination problem concerning the mafia.