Transhuman Fantasy - The Setting and Inspirations

So, next up - the setting.

I decided early on that, to get a more people-focused game, I wanted the action to stick within a few cities at most.

So, I had planned on a High-, Middle- and Under-city triad.

The High City is where the rich and prosperous stay. Cosmetic mods are common, and most of them are ususual. Trading in relics, antiques and information is common. Lots of chances for intrigue, politics and theft, of course.

The Middle City is your standard living area in this world. People work hard for their money, and have enough material possessions to keep them going. Many aspire to life in the High City. Cheaper "common" cosmetic mods are outweighed by more practical ones (fire resistant skin for ironworkers, Darkvision for miners etc.). Generally not too much adventuring is done here, but it makes a good living area/base of operations, and has many taverns and entertainments for R&R. Lots of racial diversity. Will probably have some kind of trading port or caravan system, maybe a market quarter.

The Under City is, to quote someone far wiser than me, "a wretched hive of scum and villainy". Street gangs are common, mods are dirty and cheap (and often illegal in the other Cities), with a large number of cosmetics and "weaponised" mods. Good place for dark and grimy adventures, tangling with the locals, gaining black-market mods and info, and a great place for more morally ambiguous PCs to come from. Still some honest trade, but it's falling by the wayside as pirates and brigands swee the city's population.

Other cities exist, of course, but they are painted in broad strokes - they might be feudal empires, savage encampments, or very similar to these cities - but they're not our focus cities. Not yet, anyway.

I also wanted a wee list of my influences for this setting, to show you where I'm coming from and what I want to achieve. So...
Ghost in the Shell
Cyberpunk 2020 (including a special mention to Listen Up, You Primitive Screwheads!)
Traditional Euro-Fantasy D&D

No doubt more will be added as I go!