I've used Google Earth for quite some time to help map out and visualize where places are and such, and not just for Seattle but for other places as well, and for the longest time I've been wondering something about where some places are located and how districts are outlined. For one example, Underworld 93 is listed as being in Puyallup but the actual address & location on maps puts it well into Tacoma, The Daisy Chain which is also listed as being in Puyallup has an address even deeper into Auburn, and as I was figuring locations just earlier I found the Cougar Mountain Resort that's listed as part of Renton is actually on the Bellevue side of the 900.

This isn't just using Seattle 2072 as a reference, either, but even something as old as the original Seattle Sourcebook (which by the grid coordinate system in that book alone still has Underworld 93 physically located deep in Tacoma). Something I've been wondering is why are the addresses to the districts so badly off?

When I was younger (and before the time of yahoo let alone google) I never noticed these differences. Now after being older and actually noticing the same thing (from both having Google and from driving there multiple times) some time ago I had to realize somethings. It's a game set 60 years in the future where the USA has lost territory, Merged with parts of Canada becoming the UCAS, and Seattle is now a city-state that's part of the UCAS. This has caused some shifts in borders even within cities.
Example: Denver; The mile high city; A.K.A The City of Shadows: It has 4 separate areas with customs and borders for UCAS, CAS, NAN (which I believe cover PCC and Souix), and FRFDZ.. IIRC...

That I understand, but even the in game material is not consistent with itself. From the old Seattle Sourcebook alone some locations are off; page 143, in the Puyallup section, there's Underworld 93 with a grid coordinate of #23 H and a street address. Go to pages 174-175 for the map of Puyallup and the grid starts at #24 at the furthest north. This puts Underworld 93 further north still, and well outside of the district. Same goes for the aforementioned hotel in Renton, the grid coordinate is outside of the district.

Crossing game editions I can understand there will be some mistakes (like the Eirran-Tir Finsceal going from fixed-wing STOL in Rigger 3 to helicopter in This Old Drone, or the Cyberspace Designs Wolfhound mysteriously loosing its VTOL capability), but addresses don't change that easily.

Well, there's only one word I can think of to explain the horror we deal with in publications...
"WAR!" (as in 20A ed sup)

When I helped Fex find discrepancies on his Seattle maps, we identified a lot of places that didn't quite fit.

http://fexes.deviantart.com/art/Shadowrun-...oster-216470395
http://fexes.deviantart.com/art/Shadowrun-...-2050-362433941
http://fexes.deviantart.com/art/Shadowrun-...oster-216358899

I guess back when the Seattle Sourcebook was produced, they probably worked with different foldout maps and maybe that process is the source of some of the inaccuracies. The Seattle stuff has been mostly copied ever since. But for example with Seattle 2072 some of the problems with the map came up as can be seen in this update from the old Shadowrun 4 website: http://web.archive.org/web/20101224214957/...e-futures-past/

Anyway the newest Seattle map could bring us new shiny borders as I explain here: http://forums.shadowruntabletop.com/index....59020#msg359020

I actually already have PDF versions of those maps saved locally (acquired from the Hostile Takeover thread you linked, actually), and have used them as well in trying to coordinate locations for where what is when I work on my own Google Earth maps. It just doesn't help when the first generation source material has some really off points to the borders, and I've been trying to keep as accurate as possible.

But the "Why?" still stands. I would've thought that back then someone would have noticed something like Underworld 93 being quite out of place.

Yea, but looking back they were hand drawn and probably no one knew hardly anything about Seattle.

In the game the Seattle Underground is Huge with it's own port. After actually being there I really have laughed knowing it could never actually happen IRL. But it's a game so I play and don't worry about the inaccuracies.

Keep in mind that most of the original Seattle stuff was done by a bunch of guys from and in Chicago, working without the benefit of things like Google Maps. They probably had a couple atlases and maybe fold out map or two, and everything was based on that. <shurg> I think people forget just how much harder and more involved research on even basic things like geographic locations was back before the Internet.



There are actually reasons for the Underground to be much, much larger. Maybe someday I'll get around to writing that up. But short form: Lots of tunnelling and digging by the early Orks and Dwarves, utilizing a crap ton of sewer lines that were enlarged, using a subway line that mostly didn't exist back then, some magical shenanigans involving the Great Ghost Dance and those Volcanoes around Washington blowing at once, and some creative license, because license.

Yeah, I get the harder part of things back in the day. I did a report on General Custer in junior high, having to go to someplace called a "Public Library" and read these things called "books" to learn about the man because the word "internet" did not exist. As accurate as the addresses are given it is commendable how good a job was done. Despite that, though, even within one book the information is off. I can get how a nightclub can be off in its location (the given grid coordinate for Loveland Quinn's isn't close to the actual address), and that's totally fine given the age of the material (at least the grid coordinate was partly in Puyallup), but when there are locations that are given to be in one place but when you actually look at the data they're not within the district it's supposed to be it makes me wonder.

And as for the Underground, Bull already covered pretty much everything I had expected regarding what it is in reality vs. what it is in the 2070's of Shadowrun. That was never in question.

It's possible that several locations were moved and the addresses never adjusted, or maybe the other way around.

Exactly why I said I don't worry about the inaccuracies and just play the game. After living in Washington and spending a decent amount of time in Seattle I have an RL understanding of certain aspect that the game doesn't jive with. With that being said it's a game and things are different in that world then ours. So screw some of the inaccuracies, play the game, and enjoy.

I will admit I use to want Seattle maps to be as accurate as possible but there is one thing I can put my finger on that make that impossible.... RenArk's not there just like the Orc Underground isn't; well, I guess no accurate Seattle maps for us.

You can see the lines of the cutouts and where they kinda slipped to the sides during print pricessing in the maps actually. I'd love to know what they used for Hope (the huge slab of high-density city in central SR Puyallup), though. Kinda looks like a bit of Chicago, actually.


Reminds me, wasn't there supposed to be an Underground sourcebook once? Was it canceled?

So why on earth didnt they set it in Chicago?

Because they wanted to keep the Indians in the picture, and there's not a lot of them left in the East?

Anyone remember the "Trail of Tears" from school as an example of this.

And if you ever get around to working on a source book about this....
I would LOVE to help and work on that with you. I really did enjoy living in Washington State [though driving in Seattle sucked at time (I'd still take it over Maryland any day though)]

Not just Native Americans, but ones with totem poles hence totems. Seattle also has a diverse selection of Domains for conjuring different types of spirits. A nearby volcanic mountain to provide some eco disasters. Seattle underground is so wacky it seems fictional. Abundant Sasquatch sightings not too far away.

Plus, the Space Needle. And the Monorail.

Damn, Berlin was so damn close to getting a maglev elevated train network. Damnit ...


There was supposed to be one. I have looked up a couple of official locations from random sources, if interested I can PM them to you. The dwarven part of the underground has carvings that dazzle with spikes of obsidian. All craftsdwarfship is of the highest quality ...

To be honest, I always figured the game was set in Seattle because one or more of the developers were from here. I hadn't really realized how much they had wrong about the city, or that it was mostly made in Chicago.

That said, having set my own games in New Orleans without having been there, I can really relate to whole set of problems about making a game set somewhere you haven't been. At the table there is an advantage to no one being familiar with the area, because you can just sort of do what works for you instead of worrying about it being weird our outright wrong.

Dresden Files calls this the Vancouver setup. So many shows and movies are filmed with Vancouver Canada standing in for somewhere else that they names the improvised city rules after it.

I think I was told this when I asked, "Seattle?" upon first discovering the game. I wrongly, assumed the person telling me had more information than I.

I did a quick wikipedia search on the designers and saw no Seattle connections, unless maybe Navy service had involved a stint in Seattle.

Weisman seems to have done tours on merchant ships in his youth and worked extensively at Microsoft, though his work at MS was after Shadowrun was published in 1989.

http://www.shadowrun.com/forums/discussion/27953/why-seattle

tl;dr According to one person who asked, Seattle had a wide variety of terrain available for different adventures while still being a port city with a large international population.