31 Days / 31 Characters - HINATA 'HELLCAT' NEKOMOTO

As mentioned, there is no way I am going to be able to complete this year's 31 Day Character Challenge by Wednesday. Nonetheless I am going to keep going until I hit the full 31, however long that takes me. I am motivated, enjoying myself, and I at least beat the number of posts I made last January so I'm calling it a win.

Yatta! 

 

Character: Hinata Nekomoto

AKA: Hellcat, Nekomoto-9, N9

Player: Victoria (Can't remember her last name but it was Japanese). 

System: Cyberpunk 2020 / Mekton II - Interlock System with Houserules

Additional campaign ideas and mechanics were borrowed from the magazine Mecha Press. 

Nature: Short Campaign: Neo-Tokyo Boomrunners: INTERSPEC

Gamemaster: Adam Dickstein

Circa: 1992-93

Origins: Sometime in 1988 I had the idea to run a campaign titled, 'Neo-Tokyo Crimebusters: Freelance Police'. This was a Cyberpunk Action/Comedy inspired by Japanese Anime and Manga such as Appleseed, Akira, Bubblegum Crisis, Dominion Tank Police, and Mobile Police Patlabor. It went over really well, though we only got about a dozen sessions out of it before various schedule changes caused it to dissolve before its time.

You can expect to see a 31 Days /31 Characters entry from this campaign down the line. 

Roughly four or five years later I was talking Anime with some friends and we came up with what we thought would be a cool premise for a series. Then it dawned on me that it would also make for a great RPG campaign. The group agreed and we met that weekend to create the characters. To speed up the campaign prep time I resurrected my source materials from Freelance Police. Boomrunners was to be set in the same Neo-Tokyo as Crimebusters.

Backstory: POSSIBLE TRIGGER WARNING.

This game dealt with some darker and more mature subject matter than my usual campaigns. I used to dip into this type of thing more often but less so as I got older. I was extra cynical in the 90s. 

Viewer Discretion Advised.

Hinata is a Nekomoto-9 Pleasure Bioroid, found discarded in a pile of organic refuse with a gunshot wound to the chest. Discovered and called in by Agents of Interspec's Division 3, they were instructed to bring her back to HQ by Chief Medical and Biosciences Expert Dr. Shun Sasaki.

Dr. Sasaki treated the Nekomoto-9, nursing her back to health (which involved quite a bit of bio-engineering repair) until she was awake and able to move about on her own. Healing increasingly quickly after Sasaki's initial treatment, 'N9' proved surprisingly intelligent and knowledgeable. Digging into the doctor's file, N9 discovered he'd had a daughter, Hinata Sasaki, who died a few years earlier in a Boomer rampage. Dr. Sasaki joined Interspec right after. When he found out about her 'investigation', Sasaki wasn't upset at all and was happy to answer any questions she had. This led to a close 'father-daughter' relationship between the two of them, with N9 trusting Sasaki over anyone else in the world. Sasaki in turned asked N9 to honor him by having her take the name 'Hinata'. 

Not long after taking on her new identity, Hinata Nekomoto decided to make some cosmetic alterations to look the way she wanted to, instead of having the appearance someone else paid for. Additionally, there was still the mystery of who shot her, why, and what her life was before being found by Interspec (she had no memory of anything before that). Best not to look like someone who was supposed to be dead. 

Left: Pleasure Bioroid Nekomoto-9 or N9 / Right: Agent Hinata 'Hellcat' Nekomoto

 

Hinata applied to join Interspec herself, training for three years before going into the field. Two years after that she was recruited into the 'Boomrunners', a group of Special Agents operating out of Division 3. 

Overview: Set in the year 2092, the campaign followed the Boomrunners, a team of crimefighting operatives working for Division 3 of Interspec. Interspec is an Interpol-like organization that battles high powered android, bioroid, robot, and cyborg focused crimes. They are almost always brought in to deal with renegade Boomers (See previous post). 

Each member of the five person team had their own special skills and abilities, as well as a unique (custom) powered battlesuit. When in their suits, the team members are usually referred to by a codename or callsign. Hinata Nekomoto, who's callsign is Hellcat, is an extremely talented acrobatic, contortionist, and climber. She is remarkably adept at hand-to-hand combat. Hinata turns out to be a competent detective and has skills in stealth, infiltration, disguise, and seduction. 

Adding to her martial arts training, her armored powersuit is equipped with razor sharp claws capable of tearing through most materials easily. They also give her enhanced climbing ability (there are similar retractable ones in the feet). Additional features of the suit include increased leaping ability and a power cord 'tail' that can connect to energy outlets and temporarily super-charge the armor. Like all battlesuit users, Hellcat has increased strength, speed, and a sensor heads-up display. 

Hellcat had some additional abilities related to her bio-engineered origins. She had a heightened sense of hearing, excellent night vision, and a regenerative healing factor that only kicked in if she was reduced to 3 Hits or less (which is what helped save her from the gunshot mentioned in her Backstory). 

The rest of the Boomrunners team consisted of:

Killjoy: Incredible at reading people. Armed with a Samurai Sword similar to Hellcat's claws. 

Lighthouse: Team leader. Excellent detective. Tracker/Ranger type. Laser weapons.

Nightlight: Extreme stealth. Communications, Hacker. Special short-range laser weapon.

Pepperjack: Landmate style Mecha 'suit'. Gattling gun, Missiles, Buckler Shield. Jump Jets.

Lighthouse and Nighlight were brother and sister I believe (the characters, not the players).

Killjoy was a Cyborg. 

Highlights:

I really loved how the player, Victoria, gave the character a 'Noir Detective Story' feel while simultaneously completely fitting in to the over-the-top Anime action scenes. She, as well as most of the other characters, also totally bought in to various romantic subplots, even if they didn't all end positively. Their hardsuits could stop high caliber weapons but nothing deflects a broken heart. 

Many of Hinata's subplots were about questions of identity as much as trying to unravel her origins. We explored some deep ideas. How did N9 end up where she was and who she was really? What was her life like before someone tried to kill her? Why do I keep saying 'her' life? Isn't she me? Aren't Hinata and N9 actually the same person; why does it feel like that's not true anymore? Was N9 ever really a person; was she her own entity or was she just a doll who someone bought then grew tired of playing with?

One great fight I recall had Killjoy, Lighthouse, and Hellcat fighting a Boomer who had disabled Pepperjack (Nightlight was in a nearby basement tracking a signal that had hacked the Boomer). The teamwork was top notch, with Nightlight hacking the hack and throwing off the Boomer's sensors as Hellcat flipped and spun around the big brute occasionally rending a cable or other component. At some point she squatted down, balanced on the Boomer's arm as it began to shift the limb into a machine gun. Hellcat does a backward somersault/leap off the arm, damaging it with her feet claws, and creating an opening for Killjoy to charge in a slice off the arm with his sword. Super Cyberpunk Anime Badassery! 

Game Info:

It's been so long that, as with many of these entries sadly, I just don't have those character sheets anymore. It was primarily a Cyberpunk game, with Mekton II used for many of the Mecha elements and some tweaking to make it all fit together. In addition, I used articles in Mecha Press Magazine that covered Bubblegum Crisis and other Anime to get things to feel just right. Interestingly, the second issue (and one or two later ones I think) had an original mini-RPG called Techno Police 2100 AD, which was surprisingly close in concept to the game that preceded Boomrunners and set the stage for the world. 

This was also one of the games, maybe the first one, that used my alternative 'Humanity' mechanic as mentioned in this ol' post on Blade Runner. The basic idea being that while Humans who replace their organics parts with cybernetics are in danger of losing their Humanity and Empathy, Androids and Bioroids (similar to Replicants) start with with very little Empathy/Humanity and are trying to gain point in it through life experiences. While the goal is to be 'truly Human', it can also result in moments of desperate, passionate or panicked outbursts. A true Human can feel anger, fear, and sorrow but paramount above all else, they don't want to die. 

Roy Batty would approve. 

Notes:

Hinata is a gender neutral Japanese name that means Sunflower or 'Facing the Sun'. As for Nekomoto, Neko means Cat, while moto refers to a Book or 'true words'.

Dr. Shun Sasaki. His name means 'Talented and Wise'. 

The battlesuits of the Boomrunners, the term Boomers, and many other aspects of this setting were lifted (then customized) from Bubblegum Crisis and its many spin-offs. I would say that IP was the single biggest influence on the game. 

In the Bubblegum Crisis universe, 'Boomer' is a derogatory term for what is more property called a Voomer, an artificially created bio-mechanical life form. Voomers may be designed to be maids, waiters, soldiers, or any other vocation.

If one malfunctions and goes on a murderous rampage it is dubbed a Boomer. Some people call all Voomers Boomers, implying they believe every single one is destined or at least likely to go crazy. 

In this campaign only the term Boomer was used and these beings were almost exclusively created for combat related jobs. Other vocational roles were filled by androids, bioroids, and cyborgs.

The bright yellow hair Hellcat has while suited-up (See image below) is a hologram. It can be altered or deactivated on command.

Legacy:

Its been a very long time since I've thought about this character or her campaign, partly because its been a long while since I've felt particularly inspired by a Cyberpunk Anime or Manga. Certainly not enough to dig out my almost 30 year old notes on the subject. 

Now, with recent Anime titles like Metallic Rouge and Pluto, it may be something to consider revisiting in the not too distant future.

If you have some free time after school, how about joining our club and ya'know, saving the world from evil? Great! You can learn all about it from club Vice-President ICHIKO YORUHIME. 

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