For me, the thing that's missing in the later editions isn't the "pink mohawk" but what the pink mohawk represents: the Punk attitude. The earlier editions had a Robin Hood-esque, "Frag the Megacorps" vibe. Even when you were taking jobs from the corps, there were usually built-in options for sticking it to them in some small way. In new editions, runners just feel like criminal mercenaries and lapdogs. Again, just my 2¥.

What bothered me the most with the changes from 3rd edition to 4th edition was that it felt like the game designers needed to up the tech (especially wireless tech) to a level that exceeded the real world equivalents at the time. The time jump in the time line gave them the perfect excuse to do this. I never felt that the Shadowrun timeline and tech had anything to do with real world equivalents and felt that it was done to maybe draw in a younger generation of players that already had access to some tech (smartphones) that were better than similar tech in the game. I also wonder if Cyberpunk had an influence on the idea to increase the wireless nature of everything. I wasn't as fond of that aspect that was added to the game because it wasn't the Shadowrun that I knew and had played/run since 1st edition. I also noticed that the timeline information hac become more and more minimalized the further back towards beginning someone went. The writers began to gloss over the big events that set the standards or reasons that the world Shadowrun was the way it was and instead focused on more current events (almost like the real world today 😳). Without knowing the great history and background that was created in the first three editions the later editions feel less grand.

Enjoyed this. I have every edition, but 2E will always be the edition I play. I don’t know about “losing its soul”, but from 4E onwards, the game looks, feels and plays very different. The things I miss from the earlier editions are the “Horrors” metaplot, Critters and the overall art and aesthetic.

I just recently discovered The Sixth World (the world, not the channel) back in quarantine. The videogames were my introduction, as I was always a loner kid and a gamer, and I grew up around peers and jerks who would just turn you into a target if you showed your nerd card in any way. The poor kids who played Magic at lunch were constantly harassed and ridiculed. So, I've never played a TT RPG. After playing the old SNES and Genesis games, I discovered the "new" PC trilogy. Enjoyed them all. When I started looking for TT books and fiction books, I expected it to be like the games, but the games seem to draw from 1e-3e. I started looking at the 4th edition, and thought, "... well, this is like 30 years after the time I want." I honestly prefer the 80's aesthetic. I love the neon, the synth-leather, the heavy KISS makeup on gang members, and a whole lotta cords and plugs everywhere. At this point, I'm about 70% into creating my first TT adventure, using 1e and 2e sourcebooks. Had to dig for many of the 1e ones, and to find the early fiction. "Never Deal With a Dragon" should be required reading for anyone who likes this world. In searching for answers to common questions on the forums and reddit, it seems most folks play 4e and 5e. But I adore that everything is evolving and building upon what came before it. I don't feel like I'm wasting my time with old editions (save for a few rules which, honestly, needed tweaking.) I feel like I'm learning the foundations. -Side note: The Maxwell House medium roast coffee in the blue container with the added "Breakfast Blend" is the closest to what I imagine soykaf actually tastes like. It's awful, but when I drink it while I'm writing or drawing or playing, it's perfect.

I don't know about loosing its soul, but there definitely a tonal change between the FASA and the Catalyst editions. FASA had that certain something that made all their games wicked cool (Shadowrun, Battletech, Renedage Legion, and Earthdawn). Catalyst... not so much :(

it's not just shadowrun, society has lost it's soul

This is such a great topic to speak about. I've been quietly working on a Shadowrun FPS game for the last year as my contribution to the Shadowrun community being that my talents are relegated to coding. I struggled so badly deciding which rulebook to base my initial system development around. I was introduced to Shadowrun right after the release of the 2nd Edition and really enjoyed both 2nd and 3rd editions, but the 4th through 6th editions just don't feel like the Shadowrun I've fell in-love with. One thing I really loved was the original aesthetic of the game, the 80s punk + retro-futurism always appealed to me and that is completely gone. I understand the need to grow and traverse eras of time, but I also feel that it's ok for some things to remain the same between product if they are major aspects. As an example, imagine if all of a sudden the Fallout game series suddenly transitioned to occuring in like the year 2100, and the retro-futurism and mid-century aesthetic and musical selection was completely gone. Even if there were mentats, stimpaks, energy weapons, etc., I wouldn't be surprised if fans of the original Fallout concept had no interest in those releases. I've personally found that the 3rd Edition seems to be a solid compromise amongst the 1th through 6th editions. Great video as always.

I'll say that, yes, past 4th Edition it's definitely lost its soul. Which is why I'm still on 4E.

Like the generation that plays it, SR represents its time. Five and six are soft, watered down and surface deep. A co-opted version of its original self.

6ed is the DnD 4ed of Shadowrun. I've loved shadowrun since it started. The only real reason I favor 5e is that I never had a chance to really play it in previous editions (only a couple friends, and we kinda did one-offs and I made characters and campaigns). When my group got bigger, someone brought SR5e to me and I had a moment then dove face first back into it and we went HARD into it. That said, I prefer playing in the earlier days of the 6th world when magic is still special and new races are still coping with the pressures of a society not ready for them. I am also SUPER comfortable bending a nice crunchy 5ed into the system I want.

5th ed brings back.Hooding and fighting the man very well and the best part is you can get the story and changes but use whatever engine you want. 6th is doing a lot magic creeping into the world. We do run the modern story with the Anarchy rule set As for time: it is 61 years after the day it was printed. So the current game is 2083

Thank you this is a very well written look at the current game and setting as a whole. I appreciate all that you have presented here and I totally agree.

I don't think modern Shadowrun has lost its soul. The themes, views, and technology have certainly changed and evolved but it's basically the same game it always was. That said I've played from 1st to 6th and the last three editions and timeline jumps haven't been really all that to my liking. The novels are a little all over the place too. I run my games from 2050 to the mid-60s, and honestly, most teams rarely live to retire.

Thanks for this video, I’ve been looking to introduce Shadowrun to my D&D group; only one other had played before. I was going to do a one shot intro and see where it goes from there. Wasn’t sure what version I should go with. I have 1st and 2nd edition books and the newest box beginner set. I think I’m going to do 2nd Ed and run it with the pink Mohawk characters in a Johnny Mnemonic corporate vibe.

80s pink mohawk look was always the best

The biggest underlying factor is that the horror was stripped from the game when it left FASA, both from magic (so it would no longer be associated with Earthdawn) and the cyberpunk themes. Shadowrun switched its tones to transhumanism, illustrated by many of the designers of 4e moving on to make a pure transhuman game, Eclipse Phase. Losing the horror aspects changed the feel of the game.

He new subscriber here. I'll gladly share my thoughts. First I think the points you made are very valid. I am a veteran Vampire the Masqerade Storyteller and I have seen the same happen in that game: 1e was horror, 2e was punk, 3e was conspiracy rabbit hole, etc etc. People complain about certain editions, but when it comes down to it its just a personal taste. I got introduced with Shadowrun 4th edtion about 6years back: played it with my twin brother. And it was AWESOME. I think a good Storyteller/GM and player will always try to incorporate what works best for the group and try to convey a good story. Mechenics are just a means to an end. Yea I love it. I bought 6th edition and apart from the map and some artwork I would say its a bad buy. Ill stick to a heavy houseruled 4th ed shadowrun.

I love how you broke up the different editions into the different fads of their time. Didn't see that up until now. Understood like that, the stile changes during editions make sense. I would be really good if a capable publisher did latch on to that idea and bring out different eras with their specific feel (rules and stileswise) and campaign arcs, i.e 2050s, 2060s, etc. Did Shadowrun loose its soul? I think, it evolved to meet new tastes. Not always successful. The main gripe will always be the rules. The publisher that brings out a bare bones redux version of the rules, that unifies the different theaters (combat, matrix, astral) into one manageable experiance, will get my money in an instant.

My group is still in 2nd ed (running Harlequins back for the first time TONITE) we sometime have 3rd ed mechanics sneaking in when they make sense & the 3rd rd corebook is SO well laid out, my main fave mechanic was 1st ed damage codes esp for the options shotties could give you, but yeah, like you say, most things are transferable, of course there is a lot of casual world lore spoilers for your players but the metaplot may not matter to most groups. 4th ed, in my view, is awful both mechanics wise (wireless deckers? not on MY watch chummers) but the fluff books were wide ranging & although lacking the familiar style of the early eds answered a lot of questions and really expanded the scope of spellslingers of all types, skills, gear....all the things so ka?

Today authors and artists tend to forget to put the "punk" in "cyberpunk"... more or less because they don't fully understand that historical and cultural context.

I have capped at 3rd edition, running all the 1st and 2nd edition adventures. I didn't like the concept of Technomancers, nano-tech and wireless. Thus I've stuck with 3rd edition.

What I got from this video is that the next character I make is gonna have a huge neon pink Mohawk

I gave my thoughts in the little bit of fiction I published on good, old Shadowrun. Still, @1hilarym spoke some truth, contrary to him I am not well-mannered, so: Original Shadowrun & early editions (dunno about the third), were about personalities forming a functional team to either oppose or survive corporate foul play (beyond the usual job-abuse). Later editions unleashed hordes of players, who knew all the rules, had chars so streamlined that Nazi would get boners from their absence of individuality, and who were so self-absorbed they could not even imagine that nobody had any fun with them along. 🤔

I'm going to go with yes. Though a lot of it is probably they just lost talent. The quality of the writing in 1e and 2e is just far superior to that of anything in 4e-6e. This is the setting, the rules, the shadow talk which doesn't exist in some editions, the set up for chapters, the organization of the books etc. Without the writing talent from their original designers they can no longer convey the core aspects or soul of what shadowrun is.

Comparing the Shadowrun media as it was back in the Genesis/SNES era it was definitely gritty, punk, in your face and bombastic. I don't want to mean any disrespect to fifth and sixth edition which are awesome in their own way but looking at the art style, it does seem more uniform and somewhat expected but the colours are more drab and there's less 'pop' is that makes sense. Take borderlands for example it's very stylistic and the enemies are very stylish as well.

I agree with you that Shadowrun has evolved, not lost its soul. As we've seen from many editions of many different games, old players like their "comfy slippers" and often don't want to change with the times. Shadowrun is no different. I've played every edition but 4th now, and each have had their pros and cons, but despite having played since the game first released, I have enjoyed my experiences with 6th Edition and the various supplements and story books have been decent to very good. Personally, I really like the Edge mechanic, because I like my games to be more cinematic and I feel like that mechanic encourages that to happen. It reminds me a little of the FFG Star Wars game's custom dice, in terms of bringing storytelling to the forefront. Of course, depending on the group, that may happen anyway, but modern RPG design definitely skews to cinematic over tactical and this is no different. Does it make it better? YMMV. But I'm about to teach a teenage co-worker and his gaming group Shadowrun (after he expressed interest in it and I mentioned my long history) and I'm excited to do 6th again.

I still play 3e. It’s alive and well around my table.

The GM & his players are the soul of Shadowrun. If you can Role Play, the edition isn't a stumbling block.

I think you nailed it pretty much, it has evolved as a near future analogue of whatever decade we happen to be living in. I am currently running using 5th Edition (my favourite rules set with the possible exception of third), but I am starting again in 2050. I'm doing my best to make it 'shiny chome obvious cyberware' and mohawk centric, plenty of punks etc, as I want to move away from it as time passes so it feels like society has moved on. I think 5th however is the first time it may have started to 'lose it's soul', First through Fourth were all strongly influenced by tonal stimuli of the time, but Fifth is far more thematically bland, and falls back on the events that occur in game to define it: it's what happens, not how it happens. Fifth for me is the best set of rules, but is the worst feel... sixth is like fifth, but with worse rules.

I think that shadowrun is now more cyber and less punk if you take my meaning the tech has become more what the game is about and dirty rain wet streets feel has taken a back seat to the corps

(west)cyberpunk is just finally catching up to 80s-90s japanese cyberpunk. It seems like *looking back*, but in reality its just a retrograde relationship

I also hold a strong nostalgia about the whole 2nd Ed. aesthetics, the book's art was sublime, I hated every art and specially the archetypes in next editions, yeah, the vibe has totally changed, but the game I think it's just the same, just evolved, which makes sense, definitely we put a lot of personal attachment to the older editions because it caught us in that time of your life when you are highly influential, idealistic and concern about being original and different, but tell me you didn't love every and each of those references as well, Matrix, Akira... anyways, did it lost it's "soul", not sure, that's too subjective, did it lost it's "original vibe", probably yes, is it still Shadowrun? Totally it is, and indeed, the videogames can prove it well too.

Shadowrun lost me when they introduced decker tablets and i felt betrayed by the shallow cash grab edition.

Started with 1st now doing strictly 3ed every week. Endless possibilities for running games and never get bored. Would love to find another online group to run with.

i love 4A and 5. I think 5 is a good improvement over 4a. I don't like 6. I love 4 and 5 for the crunch. I would say it's the players and GM's that have moved to toward the black trenchcoat/mirror shades vs the pink mohawk. From what I have observed most shadowrun players would rather be in the movie Ronin vs tank girl or johnny nuemonic

This really was quite nice, I've only gotten to make a shadowrun game happen once. But there was a lot of debate over edition, and honestly. I feel like this video was much more mature and measured when compared to what was said in that situation.

Actually everything lost its soul nowadays - do the math! Movies, comics, DND, Shadowrun, games - remakes, ports, remasters, re-releases - not only everyone is without creativity but everything they touches loses its soul

You been knocking these videos out. I need to get the time to make more videos lol

I just touched on this topic in a forum post on the SR forums. What timing.

I do believe that the soul of the game is entirely depended on the players, so, maybe your group just disliked the other versions and no one in the group had fun trying the other eds.

Without saying too much, as someone who has had the privilege to work with and talk to so many of the writers and people involved in Shadowrun, I can say beyond a shadow(heh) of a doubt that the people involved now are just as filled with passion for punk as the people that were there in the 90s. Some of which are, of course, the same people. I think to even encroach on saying Shadowrun has lost it's soul is to take a shot at people who have grown up and enwrapped themselves in punk for their whole career if not their whole lives. I grew up with third edition, but I have played every edition and damn near every adventure and I can say that same the through line and connection between these feels and themes are not as different as you may think. I'm deep in to 6th edition now, Free Seattle and 30 Nights were great campaigns and had an influence on the writing of my fan campaign. I could go on about the themes, the writing, and the world of Shadowrun until I was on the ground out of breath.

the fandom refers to what you call "90s grunge style" as "mirrorshades" (neuromancer) or "trenchcoat" (matrix) mercenary gameplay. And I agree: it's not as well know, I too prefer the "pink mohawk" style (Akira) . I love shadowrun's First Nations inclusion (they basically took back their country), and I play in Texas Walker style WildCat martial artists / physical Adapts with Ruger Super Warhawk handguns

SR2 was may gateway to roleplaying, and 3E is my go-to Shadowrun game. I read 5E, but I'm kinda stuck in the 2060s. 😊

The things I hate most about 5E are limits and gating functionality behind the wifi requirement. The latter really should be applicable with any form of mutual communication between devices and/or implants, such as DNI. Both of these are essentially in place for no reason other than to be punitive.

I have two big complaints with modern Shadowrun. 1. The art style is so far from the earlier works. Orks look like humans. Dwarves look like humans. Trolls look like humans. What hapepned to the gross warts all over their faces? 2. Shadowrun is woke. Now I know this won't be everyone's favorite criticism but everywhere you look these days the focus is on rainbows. I never cared what sexuality someone was, now it's a big focus of everything. I'm just tired of it, it's boring to me. I bought one of the new novels and the cast had 2 lesbians, 1 gay guy, 1 each of about 6 ethnic groups. Literally just ticking the boxes. It reminds me of how on tv shows there would always be one Asian guy (comic relief), one overweight person, one black person, etc. It feels very corporate, ironically. Then one of the Jackpointers is a "Xer". I'm sorry, it's just ridiculous. This is not me saying "White power!" it's just that I wish the focus was on the stories and characters, not a political movement. And maybe I'm wrong on some points but all I can say is the vibe just doesn't feel right anymore. I feel like Shadowrun has turned into something totally different. I have been thinking about going back to 3E or 4E, back when the game felt more normal.

I have not played shadowrun since 3rd edition. Not because I hate 4E, but just because my life got too busy to role play. Haven't played an RPG since 2009 and even then, that was after a LOOOONG break. Sad to see the state of shadowrun. At least I can fire up the old SEGA emulator though... And I was a shadowrun returns kickstarter backer. You can hire me in the game! No I am not telling you which runner I am :)

I liked the 4th edition of the game. Although it lays it out that the player characters are expendable assets, you do have the option of double crossing Mr. Johnson. Although I don't think it's lost it's soul, more than it's become unplayable. I didn't like 5th edition and I don't like sixth. SR: Anarchy is okay. But I think the present developers have lost the soul of Shadowrun.

I played 2e in the mid-90s. Not sure if 3 was out, but I never saw it.

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Since I only got to start wit Shadowrun in 4th Edition, I feel hardly qualified to comment on the state of its 'soul' as it were. The reason why I flat-out reject 5th Edition and whatever came after is much simpler: Excessive streamlining. Especially when it comes to character creation. In 4th edition you had a pool of build points and from there could make the character you envisioned - with very little in the way of constraint. The downside is that character creation took a fair amount of time - which I guess many people are loath to invest? To me the intricate character creation was a convenient way not just for creative expression, but also to really get a feel for the character. In 5th edition this was replaced with some sort of priority-system, which admittedly means you can get to playing more quickly, but at the cost of character-depth. The template-nature of that priority-based process means the resulting characters come off as bland and generic to me. That's Mage#43 and Rigger#142. And where is StreetSam#633? That sort of thing. It just feels ..sterilized for lack of a better word. And as a result I stuck with SR4 while exploring with my players what once happened in the world - by way of exposing them to some of the ripples caused by past events. We are still in the early stages though. They have yet to make the jump from working for local syndicates to the corporate big players, once they've gotten a bit of a rep.

Having played editions upto 5th i can say i,m back to 3rd as my preferred rules. Ran 5th for a while but god damn - limits really started to grind on me. Plus 5th is super crunchy & poorly laid out. Huge walls of text with no headings to break things up! I do acknowledge that the magic in 3rd is a little powerful but balancing this is the rules for Magic Loss and deadly wounds. Magic in 5th really curtailed magicians with force / limits & splitting magical skills into non default sub skills. Have heard that 6th is a hot mess with insane uses of Edge. Last point is that with 6 editions, there's a ruleset for everyone so that's a good thing. Having said that, there are people who hate all the rule editions & use Savage Worlds. Forged in the Dark.

Well, the fact that Shadowrun is still around, seeing as how it appeals to a VERY niche market, is amazing (people who actually want to see Fantasy dipped into their Cyberpunk......or the other way around 😅) I played a couple of sessions of the 1st Edition when it first came out (yep, THAT old 😏). I thought it was okay, but it never really grabbed me, because I guess I'm yet another iteration of that Niche Market: I want to see actual Dungeons and Dragons mixed into my Cyberpunk (I want all the 'classics' like Drow, Beholders, Illithids, and Dragons of various colors/metals). Thanks to D20 Modern, it became possible to 'Home Brew' such (Base Rules, their 'Urban Arcanna' setting- DnD in Modern Day- and their 'Cyberscape' Rules Add On), but adventures for such were all on the GM (although you could probably, with a LOT of work, modify Shadowrun adventures, I guess).

Shadowrun hasn't lost its soul so much as the real world has turned into the fascist state forewarned by the original material.

The Artifact Rush adventure series were just as good as the 1st Edition adventure modules.

From 4e it became darker and darker, going into horror. It's hard to "fight for" something, when everything is shit. my preference now is: Android: Worlds of > Cyberpunk RED > Shadowrun 4 > Every other Shadowrun. Shadowrun 5e and 6e have those pretty pictures, but the system is not worth it. I like Eclipse Phase, but it's too out there for most people (technologically and socially)

Welcome to wk40k 3rd to 4th rule sets

the ultimate question here has to be "So what?" I don't think at any point you came close to defining just what the "pink mohawk feel" was. It's been over 30 years since the first edition released. It was automatically dated as soon as it came out: punk culture was aging and maturing, and had virtually died out by the end of the 90s. a game about the near future rooted in the fast moving cultures in the 70s and 80s necessarily couldn't cope with the rapidly changing post cold war world of unipolarism the rise of web, and the realworld geopolitical shifts and turns from the real 2012 and beyond. A story about the near future inevitably must shift and mutate along with the times. It is not an imagination of a distant past but of our looming present. I think the issues with the game lie in more mundane issues: there's not much activity and energy behind the publishing and the community is very small relative to the uh, dragon in the room.

Personally i like all the editions so far.

I agree there’s a hard style/content/concept shift but Akira is more classic cyberpunk than anything in modern Shadowrun. I WISH modern Shadowrun took more inspiration from that era of cyberpunk anime, it was like it’s own little golden age (including stuff like Cyber City Oedo). But modern Cyberpunk games really have given up on the PUNK part. Everyone is just a merc doing dirty work for corps and trying to buy the coolest trenchcoats (hyperbole, but that’s the vibe).

Found a fourth edition anniversary rule book for free online. Do you think this would be a good place to start? Or are the other versions easier to run for beginners I could try to find a pdf for them too

I've been playing since 1st and haven't stopped yet. I feel that the earlier editions had more horror where as the newer editions focus more on technology. Magic seems the same throughout all the editions to me.

I thought 4th edition on have been awful, and the campaign setting has definitely nosedived since dunkelzahn was assassinated

Coming back to SR after 25years away (except for vidgames, etc.) as a old 1st/2nd ed player.... I just can't stomach technomancers, wireless matrix, etc.... I run a 2050s game using Anarchy ruleset. House-rules allow bringing in all my 2nd Ed supplement books, etc. Biggest challenge is I like the crunchiness of money vs. karma for upgrading chars, and Anarchy kinda mushes all that together. But since the vast majority of my games are one-shots or very short campaigns (only 2-3 sessions) it doesn't matter much.

Shadowrun for sega is the best

Truth be told, I always found the earlier editions of Shadowrun to be a bit harder to get into until 4th edition. Don't get me wrong, I had a lot of fun with 2nd and 3rd editions, but 4th is really where it clicked for me. Take that for what you will. But 4th edition will always be my favorite edition. I haven't tried 5th edition, and I didn't even know there was a 6th edition until this video, but the little I saw of 5th edition didn't make me want to change out. I'll check out 6th ed, though. However,my games will probably always take place in or around 2070.

I mean, it's not much of a topic for debate imo, it clearly has lost its soul. The current publisher doesn't care at all about the franchise and even they know what's up - hence the SR2050 for 4th and 5th edition, and the announced Anarchy 2050. The metaplot is Shadowrun's strongest point, and it was suffering since 4th edition. 6th edition metaplot isn't even a shadow of its former self, just reheated content but "bigger and better" - spoiler alert, it's not actually better.

It's still there, but its subgenre has grown and changed with the times.

Started in 5th, I claim 5th though I did demo's of 4th back in the day. To me shadowrun is the haves and the have not. The mega corps verse those who have little. I can't get into 6th, I dislike what they did with edge and how combat functions, av and dv to point them out. Pink Mohawks or Akira feel is still there for me.

I only like 1E and 2E and primarily play 2E only. Everything from about 4E onwards has tried to, in the finest WOTC and D&D tradition, to turn the game into a pencil/paper copy of a video game. There are so many viable combinations now in 6E and anything outside of them makes that character weak and a detriment to the group. It's also been a sponge to absorb the current "cool" thing (anime, movie, game, etc.) instead of forging a unique style of its own. I also know that Cyberpunk and Shadowrun were competitors at one point and I preferred (and still prefer) the more realistic and less chop-socky world of Shadowrun....but Cyberpunk still has that 80s cyberpunk vibe and SR has lost it. The art and writing and the snarky, hip, literati-style writing of the earlier editions still holds up today while 6E had more typos than a Sailor Moon erotic fanfic forum and reads like people who WANT to make Shadowrun cool but don't know how to do it. The one thing Cyberpunk did better than Shadowrun (I have all the books from both systems) is to keep Mike Pondsmith as the central constant to keep the atmosphere and flavor consistent. The FASA breakup and subsequent new ownership problems with the SR universe has contributed significantly to the shifting of its style.

I realize this video/audio is several months old now, but after listening to it all I have a question. What does the "Soul" of Shadowrun actually mean? You seem to be debating the themes, old and new, with the terms Pink Mohawk and Black Trenchcoat being only two of which are available. I've been a fan of the SR Universe and have GM'd and played Shadowrun from 1E to current day, so I am definitely wanting to have a better, more in depth discussion, of something that is the wider view of the game itself.

The time skip between 3 and 4th edition was 6 years. From the crash 2.0 in 64 to 70.

Anyone out there who can point me to get hold of free pdf files for 2 and 3 edition?

I don't think ithas lost its soul, the setting was amazing in the earlier addtions but gameplay could become bogged down and clunky abd basic art. Wereas, the latter editions seem to be smoother gameplay but less flavour text and depth than before but more advanced art.

1-3 were the best. 4th was trash 5th is good sixth has been meh.

4th ed was my favorite. solved a lot that annoyed me about 3rd. since then...meh

Western story telling has really died over the past 20 years

with things like techno mancer..etc. the game has gotten silly. The new book looks really skimpy on the lore too.

I don't know about the games, since I'll always love the 2nd edition the most. It was easy to learn, for me and my friends... I was obsessed with all things shadowrun for a long time, but the novels just disgust me to the point where i won't read them again. I remember reading one where the author put in a troll raping a human woman (just because?) in an act of revenge or some shit. Totally turned me off the literary portion of shadowrun. How does stuff like that even get published?