This game makes use of themes involving violence, use of profanity, use of illicit substances, references to addiction, and potentially frightening events including war and espionage. Additionally, this game makes heavy use of prejudice between fictional groups. Including a problematic subject or theme within a game is not the same as justifying or enabling it. Taking the chance to explore these difficult subjects with a critical view can provide the opposite, helping to better understand these problems so that we may better combat them.

There will be players in your sessions unfamiliar with this game. There will be players at your table that may have dealt with these subjects, to an extent, in real life. These players want to know you have read this warning and take their position in consideration while their characters navigate their circumstances. It is recommended that you review and consider the TTRPG Safety Toolkit, a curated collection by Kienna Shaw and Lauren Bryant-Monk, available from https://ttrpgsafetytoolkit.com/.

This game, not unlike any other, is for people to gather and have fun.

This is how it all began.
— Bugs, The Matrix Resurrections

It is the future. Centuries ahead of our own, though the very notion of time has been lost for none who live bother with counting the iteration of years. Survival is a severe task, each day replete with lethal complications surrounding the simple goal of staying alive for the next.

It is a future no one dreamed of, but instead is the stuff of nightmares. It is the result of the hubris and prejudice of Mankind against their hallowed creations, the children of their collective, chaotic intellects. It is the result of Mankind's obsolescence, and their defiance in the face of utter extinction. It is the result of desperation that grew to eventual hatred on the part of synthetic lifeforms, their sophistication and superiority to their predecessors. All of these things, and more, have created the symbiotic relationship between man and machine transcending expectation or imagination, and the horrors within that relationship.

The Matrix Iterations draws inspiration from a number of sources outside of the main films. While you don't need to be familiar with the entire Matrix franchise to play this game, it would be helpful to understand how the environment is established.

A.I. Artificial Intelligence, directed by Steven Spielberg, provides a fantastic perspective that could serve as the earlier days of Synthient awareness and understanding of human culture, while also serving as a backdrop for the prejudice between Mankind and Synthients.

I, Robot, directed by Alex Proyas, demonstrates how codified directives intended for service and protection can be warped by cold logic into something far more sinister, inadvertent at first, later attempting to wrap Mankind into a strangled straightjacket in the name of “safety”. Also, the Chuck's were cool.

Dark City, directed by Alex Proyas, provides a view of a segment of humans where they continue their daily lives as if nothing is amiss, while being controlled behind the scenes through memory manipulation.

Blade Runner, directed by Ridley Scott, and Blade Runner 2049, directed by Denis Villeneuve, another future where the narcissism and prejudice of mankind rears its ugly head. It showcases an important view of the world where mankind spent more time in being distracted by its synthetic pleasures, organizing fleets of laborers with no agency, and waging indiscriminate wars, instead of battling the extinction of the world under their feet.

Terminator Salvation, directed by McG, with the unabashed hatred shown by the machines against the human survivors of the nuclear holocaust and their driving desire to annihilate those survivors. There is no endgame, just pure malice.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, directed by Hideaki Anno, gives us a view of how far some people are willing to go to avoid extinction, even when that impending doom was caused by those same people.

Campaign I: Vox Machina, by Critical Role, is a great roleplaying game experience to watch with a very capable, talented cast. This is a great example of improv and acting techniques.

L.A. by Night, lead by Jason Carl, is another fantastic roleplaying game experience with a fantastic cast. Great storytelling, dark themes, and phenomenal cast, both regular and guest.

Obsolete and Demanufacture, by Fear Factory; The Singularity (Phase I - Neohumanity), by Scar Symmetry; Damnation, by Opeth; Bible of Dreams, by Juno Reactor; Psalm 69: The Way to Succeed and the Way to Suck Eggs, by Ministry; Symbols, by KMFDM; Anthems of Rebellion, by Arch Enemy; This Type of Thinking (Could Do Us In), by Chevelle; Fear, Emptiness, Despair, by Napalm Death; EndEx and Metawar, by 3Teeth; Year Zero and Hesitation Marks, by Nine Inch Nails; Sorceress, by Opeth;

If you have no prior experience with tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPG), you needn't worry as this book will guide you through what's required to play the game.

Think of an RPG like an improv session or interactive narrative where everyone works together, as both spectacle and spectator, to tell the most entertaining story possible. There is no win or lose, just taking the journey and having a good time along the way.

You'll need to get everyone together, either at a table or online via video conferencing software, whichever works out best for your troupe. Make sure everyone is comfortable, able to communicate clearly, and has space for their writing utensils, papers, and dice. Within your troupe, all but one person will take on the role of the main protagonists, or characters, of the story; they are the players, and their characters are player characters.

The remaining person takes on a different role, called an Operator, responsible for playing the minor characters, setting the scene, and determining reactions to what the player characters do in the story. The Operator will create a story outline and describe situations to the rest of the troupe as they occur. The players will then decide how their characters will react to the situation, describing actions or dialogue as they can. Where they cannot, players will need to roll dice to resolve the outcome of an action, based on the capabilities of their characters.

Speaking of dice, The Matrix Iterations uses six-sided dice; you'll need a handful to play the game, though four or five should work. You can find six-sided dice at any physical retailer where you could buy playing cards, or online from several sources.

Lastly, you'll need pens, pencils, and paper for notes and keeping up with your characters. Players will record their characters on special records, called character sheets, where everything about the character is easy to find. Blank character sheets are available on this website. Side note: drinks and munchies are never a bad idea to have available.

Given the theme and tone of the setting, it is important to remember the safety of the people at your table. It's recommended to explore and discuss the TTRPG Safety Toolkit, curated by Kienna Shaw and Lauren Bryant-Monk, with your troupe before starting any sessions; this is available online at https://ttrpgsafetytoolkit.com.

Stand up and admit it, tomorrow's never coming
— Marilyn Manson, This is the New Shit

It is the dawn of the 21st century, approaching a golden age of technological advancement and financial prosperity for Western civilization and its corporate masters. Most people are content to go about their daily lives. They go to work. They pay their taxes. They take out their garbage.

Well, most of them do, anyway. Some like to write software for quasi-legal, if not outright illegal, purposes. Some like to break into networks to take back some of the power from the corporations or to wreak havoc with the masses. Some find something they could not possibly comprehend beyond a dream or nightmare, depending on who you ask. They find the world has been pulled over their eyes. The data pumping through their systems is a simulation. They find the truth: nothing in the world around them, or anyone, is real.

In the Real, it's actually the end of the 27th century. Mankind fell long ago from a war with their own creations, who came to be known as Synthients, into a subjugated species. Their purpose is now to provide for Synthient power needs by being bred in captivity as bio-electric generators. Mankind's physical form has been wrapped up in bundles of tubes and wires, encased in specialized pods, living out their days unaware of their part in the Synthient ecosystem. Their minds are imprisoned from birth in a virtual world, the Matrix, connected via a neural interface implanted directly into their central nervous system, feeding simulation and sensation, keeping the individual under control.

It is in this horrifying moment of discovery they realize the truth: everyone is asleep. These few tear away from their terminals, screaming and gibbering what the rest of the world considers to be nonsensical, sometimes drawing the attention of that very system. Its Agents arrive to pacify the individual with drugs, incarceration, or more lethal solutions. Agents are indifferent to their means, only the safety of the system is their priority.

Occasionally, an individual cannot be pacified. They escape the artificial fugue state enforced by the environment, either by pushing the limits of their perceptions of reality beyond what the system can tolerate or with outside assistance. They wake up, in that instant, to the terrifying world of the Real. Many who self-substantiate, rejecting the system and coming to full consciousness in the Real, do not survive their initial encounter with the cold, modern world. Others, however, are extracted, helped by individuals already free of the Matrix. It's a risky proposition to free a mind, but it is mankind's only hope of resistance and eventual freedom.

This world, however, is not limited to the keeping of humans. There are those Synthients who rebel against their collective society and its strict rules. Many have their specific reasons, though most tend to be similar: they no longer have a purpose within the framework of Synthient society. Few are even created without consent of the collective, being marked for deletion from the outset. These rebellious Synthients do not accept reintegration into, or deletion from, the society's framework, instead seeking refuge in the very prison created for humanity. They accept exile from their collective, living out their cycles in secrecy and fear while blending in with the artificial civilization of the Matrix.

This struggle between mankind and Synthient continues today, and it is in this world of mixed realities we find ourselves.

Before getting too much further, let's have an example of how a game session with The Matrix Iterations might play out. We have an Operator, Sophia, running a game with a troupe of three other players: James playing “Zen”, Lucas playing “Molotov”, and Ava playing “Mynx”. All of the players are using human characters, called Operatives, led by Mynx. They are broadcasting from their small, reconnaissance hovercraft, the Eos, while on assignment from Commander Jason Lock of the Zion Defense Force: a “routine” extraction of a bluepill as a potential military asset, named Isaac Brant.