1991 Ad for the “When Gravity Fails” Cyberpunk RPG Supplement

The thing I find most unusual about this 1991 advertisement for R. Talsorian’s Cyberpunk roleplaying game (find at Amazon.com*) has to be that the book itself is downplayed so much. Walter Jon Williams’ Hardwired (check out this other ad) gets top billing in the ad, but this is really promoting the sourcebook based on George Alec Effinger’s When Gravity Fails* novel. I can understand that they wanted to capitalize on the success of Hardwired — one of the super-fun cyberpunk novels of the eighties — but it is sad that Effinger’s equally-incredible novel has to play second violin to Hardwired. Still, fun to encounter this ad in Vortext magazine and it is totally worth remembering this work of art.