Blank Generation IV: Zero Hour

WHAT IS THIS GAME?

BLANK GENERATION: ZERO HOUR is a solo journaling RPG Print and Play game that documents the final defeat of NYC's underground art scene (1994-1999). You play an artist who survived the previous 16+ years watching corporate colonization complete, nostalgia replace authenticity, and the last real venues disappear.

This is Book IV in the Blank Generation series, chronicling NYC's underground from 1977-1999. Each book stands alone, but together they document 22 years of struggle, compromise, and loss.

This is the darkest game in the series. By now, you should feel the weight of defeat.

HOW IT WORKS

YOU PLAY AN ARTIST IN THE RUINS

Create a character who survived the wars (AIDS, Giuliani, gentrification) and now faces the final question: what did it mean?

Track four stats:

• EROSION - The weight of defeat, exhaustion, giving up (At 6, you're done)
• SELL-OUT - Corporate compromise, commercialization (At 6, you're unrecognizable)
• CASH - Still broke in the sanitized city (At 0, make hard choices)
• LEGACY - What you leave behind, what survives, what mattered

GENERATE CRISIS

Roll 2d6 three times to create your scenario:

• SITUATION: Venue closing forever, documentary wants you, reunion show offer, last survivor
• OPPORTUNITY: Book deal, teach at NYU, VH1 special, mentor young artist, archive your work
• COMPLICATION: They want it sanitized, nobody remembers, rights stolen, you're "too difficult"

NAVIGATE THE ENDING

Roll 2d6 to overcome challenges. Make impossible choices:

• Stay Real: +1 Erosion, mark Legacy (it still matters)
• Sell It: +2 Sell-Out, +3 Cash, erase Legacy
• Teach It: +1 Erosion, +1 Legacy, pass it on
• Quit: +2 Erosion, keep integrity, walk away

DOCUMENT WHAT SURVIVES

Journal the cost. What did you create? What got erased? What's left of the scene? What's left of you?

At the end, you choose your ending based on your Legacy and Sell-Out:

• SURVIVOR (2+ Legacy): You made it. Changed, but here. Something survived.
• MARTYR (0-1 Legacy): Never compromised. Forgotten. Maybe someone finds your work later.
• SELLOUT (4+ Sell-Out): Corporate job, nostalgia circuit. Comfortable. Empty. Unrecognizable.
• GHOST (3+ Legacy): Young artists cite you. The work survived. You're gone but not erased.

WHAT YOU GET

THE COMPLETE GAME

• PDF Trifold Format - Two-page, double-sided, landscape (11" × 8.5")
• Print-ready - Optimized for home printing, fold into thirds
• Play Time: 1-2 hours per scenario

COMPREHENSIVE MECHANICS

• Character creation for survivors and latecomers
• Complete crisis generation tables (Situation/Opportunity/Complication)
• Locations table (sanitized NYC 1994-1999)
• Four distinct ending moves based on your choices
• Survival moves when cash runs out
• Journal prompts for documenting defeat and legacy

CAMPAIGN INTEGRATION

• Standalone play (start fresh in 1994)
• Carry forward from Books I-III (track 22 years of erosion)
• Series conclusion mechanics
• Legacy tracking across the complete NYC cycle

THIS IS NOT NOSTALGIA

BLANK GENERATION doesn't romanticize the underground. It documents the cost.

This series tracks what gets lost when cities kill their own culture—through disease, state violence, and corporate colonization. Each book gets darker because history got darker.

By Book IV, you're playing in the ruins. The city won. Some people survived. Some art survived. Most didn't.

The question is: did it matter?

THE COMPLETE SERIES

BLANK GENERATION documents NYC's underground across 22 years (1977-1999):

• Book I: BLANK GENERATION (1977-1983) - The Birth (pure struggle, CBGB to Basquiat)
• Book II: REAGAN'S CHILDREN (1984-1988) - The Corruption (AIDS, sellouts, commercialization)
• Book III: ZERO TOLERANCE (1989-1993) - The Crackdown (Giuliani, police state, resistance)
• Book IV: ZERO HOUR (1994-1999) - The Death (corporate colonization, legacy, defeat)

Each book stands alone. Together, they're the complete procedural documentation of how underground art dies.

Play them in order to feel the full weight of 22 years.

WHO IS THIS FOR?

• Solo journaling RPG players who want substance over safety
• Anyone interested in punk/underground history
• Artists navigating commercialization and compromise
• People asking "what happens when the revolution loses?"
• Readers of Jeremiah Moss, Samuel Delaney, Sarah Schulman
• Anyone who remembers when Times Square was dangerous and real

Content Warning: Cultural erasure, gentrification, corporate colonization, survivor's guilt, the commodification of rebellion, and the question "did any of it matter?" This game documents defeat with respect.

WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING

"By Book IV, you should feel the weight of defeat. The city won. But maybe the art survives. Maybe." - Design Notes

"This isn't a game about winning. It's a game about what survives when you can't." - Playtest Feedback

"The most honest documentation of cultural erasure I've ever seen in a game." - Early Reader

PLAY IT BECAUSE

The underground scene is dead. Not dying—dead. Times Square is sanitized. Your friends sold out or disappeared. Young artists don't know what was lost.

Someone needs to document what happened.

This game is that documentation. Not a celebration. Not nostalgia. Documentation.

The mechanics force you to feel what it costs to make art when the city declared war on authenticity. To choose between survival and integrity. To watch everything you built get erased or commodified.

And at the end, to ask: did any of it matter?

The answer is in your Legacy stat. The answer is what you created. The answer is what survives.

Make something real one last time. Before there's nothing left.

ABOUT THE DESIGNER

Julian Grant creates solo journaling RPGs that document what traditional media can't capture. Previous work includes the complete BLANK GENERATION series (NYC 1977-1999) and MAGICK SHADOWS (occult horror).

These games use procedural mechanics to preserve lived experience—the feeling of impossible choices, the weight of compromise, the cost of making art under hostile conditions.

Not nostalgia. Documentation.