One of my PCs was trying to buy the pit-fighting Martial Art from Arsenal, and we spent some time coming up with in-game ways for him to learn it. It's not the sort of dojo-friendly Tai Chi kind of martial art you might learn at the mall; this is bloodsport! After shuffling around underground boxing leagues and Barrens pick-up matches, I had a revelation: It's legal in Seattle. Specifically, there's no reason why Aztechnology couldn't run pit fights from the Pyramid, using the law of extraterritoriality. It's got to be awesome pay-per-view, and compared to some of the other things they get accused of it's practically ethical. It also makes a lot of sense for them to run a 'Farm League' for the Tenochititlan pits in Seattle - with all the wanna-be razorboys trying to stay SOTA, there have to be lots of willing fighters who will do it for money and fame.

My player was pretty pleased - he got to earn a few Karma points and a couple thousand Nuyen, and we got to try out the melee rules. We also learned valuable lessons about dodging and shock gloves, but that's a whole story by itself.


Anyway, wanted to share - any thoughts on how we can develop this idea?

Inter company championships. The top 5 from each company get pitted against each other in a no holds barred competition for the title "Most ruthless company: Pit fighting branch"

We have something like this in our game, but it's more focused on large-scale group battles or deathmatches, with lots of high-tech equipment and magic, like a scaled-down Desert Wars. A more fighter-driven sport, in scale from 1-on-1 ring to massive gladiatorial arena, and all run by the only company who could happily create such a thing without anything but pride in their hearts, is a very compelling idea. Nice one!

Who cares if its illegal? Most of the contestants would be SINless anyhow. In a world where people are kidnapped for their organs by Tamanous, or turned into bunraku meat puppets by the Mafia / Yakuza, or have thier brains ripped out by megacorps to use in cyborgs, a pit fighting operation is hardly a blip on law enforcements radar. They'd probably worry more about (not getting a cut of) the gambling that goes on than the fights themselves.

Professional fighting of all types is big business. UFC, Professional Wrestling, and even Boxing made a comeback with Cotto vs. Pacquiao two weeks ago.

Make the event a game show or broadcasted on live television. With the victories comes the fame, fortune, drugs, BTL chips, and the storylines surrounding fighters.

What I mean is, there's no reason that it can't be officially sponsored by Aztechnology - they can be entirely public about it and Law Enforcement doesn't have the option to take interest. They can sell pay-per-view and box seats, and KE/LS is going to have to live with it, because it's legal for them to do so. Most of the other shadow activities you mentioned are at least done under the table, or with some discression - this they can brag about.

Ah, yes, Pit-Fighting.
Good way to have your Melee-Specialist let out some steam and have some fun on his own, if the run did not provide any opporunity to do his or her shtick.
Better than walking around waiting for some Gangers to try something stupid, because that could get messy soon, if they just pile it on.
Furthermore, as you mentioned, it's a way to meat(that was intentional) people and learn new stuff. or to try out new toys and skills.
Last but not least, you can use this to solve inter party conflict also. throw them in the pit, throw down the rules, throw down who opposes, have them throw down each other.
It's good to solve things like "honor" even if one does not have to fight with honor in there ^^
We used to throw one of our characters(no matter if it was the right character for this or not) into such things if we needed info or something else . .

My GM ran a few of these as basically pit fights at fight clubs run in the barrens. The prizes are a few thousand nuyen - if you survive - and some limited medical care regardless. But the cost you pay to the doctor in the end (if you lose) rarely is enough that the prize money makes up for it.