Two superpowers, one divided city, and a small UN agency trying to keep the airwaves from drowning each other out.
Two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, are locked in a standoff that could end the world in an afternoon.
Neither can afford open war, so they fight at every level below that of armed conflict—in spy agencies, in space, in divided cities.
…is one of the open fronts. The city sits deep inside East Germany, split between the Soviet East and an American, British, and French West. In August, the Berlin Wall formally cut East off from West.
…is getting heated. The Soviets just got their first man up into orbit, and the Americans are scrambling to catch up.
…is omnipresent. Children practise hiding under their desks at school. Both sides are testing ever-larger weapons. Quietly, everyone wonders if this will be the year the Cold War goes hot.
…well, radio is what brings this world on the brink together. Broadcasts, military signals, spy transmissions and propaganda all compete for the same airwaves—and someone has to keep them all from drowning each other out.
The Second World War ends. Germany and Berlin are divided among the victors.
Germany splits into West and East. The Soviets test their first atomic bomb.
Austria regains independence as a permanently neutral country.
The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite.
The UN General Assembly establishes the International Spectrum Commission in Vienna.
Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human in space. Days later, the US-backed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba fails.
Kennedy and Khrushchev meet at a summit in Vienna. It goes poorly.
East Germany seals the border and begins building the Berlin Wall.
US and Soviet tanks face off at Checkpoint Charlie.
The ISC is a small UN agency, established in Vienna in 1958 to investigate complaints of harmful radio interference between states and arbitrate disputes.
Its cases include jamming, unlicensed transmitters, and diplomatically sensitive broadcasts. Its investigators locate transmitters by direction-finding, take testimony and submit reports on their findings. Like many of the UN's arbitration decisions, the ISC's reports are merely recommendations which the states in question are free to accept or ignore.
It receives funding from its member states in proportion to their size. Naturally, the United States and the Soviet Union are its largest donors by a significant margin.
The member states loan their own experts to the Commission. Americans and Soviets serve openly side by side as international civil servants, sworn to neutrality. Some even take that oath seriously.
The smallest of the ISC's departments, created in early 1961 to investigate unattributable interference.
Since its founding, the ISC has logged an increasing number of cases it couldn't close: transmissions on unassigned frequencies, receivers picking up voices with no transmitter, equipment behaving in ways its engineers couldn't explain. Rather than turn a blind eye, the Commission established a small team to hunt these anomalies down. On paper, the section is listed as “Special Technical Inquiries.” Most people just call it Section 0.
In theory, the job of a Section 0 field team is simple. Travel to the site of the complaint, investigate, and file a report. In practice, things often turn out more complicated.
Its personnel are a mix of officers from member countries, scientists and linguists, police and private investigators, and civilians who witnessed something they were never meant to and found themselves with nowhere else to turn. Officially, everyone is neutral. But everyone comes from somewhere.
Opened in 1961, the West Berlin field office works out of a rented building in the American sector as a frequency-monitoring station. Its walls are lined with receivers running around the clock. Berlin's contentious position at the intersection of East and West means it's a hotbed of signals interference.
You're the first team to call it home.
Everyone in Berlin works for someone.
These are the major players your character is most likely to cross paths with as an agent of the ISC, for better or for worse.
The game opens in Berlin, at the field office of the International Spectrum Commission. The ISC is headquartered in neutral Vienna. Some cases will take you further afield, but these locations constitute your playground in between story chapters.
The capital of neutral Austria and one of the Cold War's main diplomatic (and espionage) centres. The ISC headquarters is an austere grey building near the Danube, packed full of very professional filing cabinets and men in tailored suits. Section 0 answers to the director here, usually by teletype, and on a particularly bad day—by personal summons.
An island of the West inside East Germany, accessible by air corridors, strictly controlled motorways and rail lines. West Berlin glows in defiance of the Soviet austerity pressing in on all sides—neon, jazz clubs, refugees and soldiers too familiar with death… and streets which end abruptly at a tall, concrete wall. The Section 0 field office is located in the American sector.
The capital of East Germany. Wide avenues, reconstructed monuments, bombed-out shells of once-grand buildings still waiting their turn, sealed lips and shifty eyes. The Soviet military is headquartered in the Karlshorst district. ISC staff may cross on UN papers, but every visit is noticed and logged.
Located on Friedrichstraße, the crossing point for foreigners, diplomats, and Allied personnel. Not much more than a small hut, a handful of signs, and—at the moment—two rows of tanks staring each other down across the checkpoint. Most likely how your character crosses to the eastern side, if they do.
People talk—at the bar, during the quiet hours of a late shift, in the canteen queue. Most of it is probably nonsense, blown out of proportion at best. But rumours have to start somewhere.
Your character may have heard all, some, or none of these rumours. They may believe them, dismiss them, or even be responsible for spreading them.
Radio operators on both sides talk about a ghost frequency that started up in the autumn of 1957, a few days after Sputnik. So far, nobody's claimed it.
Amateur astronomers in three countries claim to have tracked something in high orbit. Both the Americans and the Soviets are silent on the matter.
Last spring, the Commission sent people to an Austrian village near the Czechoslovak border after the local TV transmitter started broadcasting on its own. The file is closed, and the people involved refuse to discuss the case.
Both superpowers' radio telescopes are booked solid, and neither will disclose the nature of their work.
A border guard at a crossing on the Wall reportedly stood at his post for a whole shift without blinking, writing the same line of numbers over and over on any surface he could reach.
Tenants in a Kreuzberg tenement have been complaining to the post office about voices on their radios at night.
THE SIGNAL is a slow-burn, psychological horror.
Your characters will encounter strange, inexplicable events and phenomena, but much of the horror will arise from the mundane, human aspects of the setting. Your characters live in a world which is holding its breath, knowing that every day may be the last. The story is designed to build tension and seed distrust between characters, not between players. The supernatural horrors you will encounter are simply the icing on the cake.
The main story of THE SIGNAL is fictional and often fantastical, but real-world history plays a big part in the setting and the narrative. While creating an enjoyable, comfortable environment will always be the priority, please do respect the constraints and gravity of the setting.
You will never be asked to exhaustively research a real-world aspect or event, and it is expected that small mistakes and historical inaccuracies will happen. That said, please make a reasonable effort to avoid major historical inconsistencies. If it happens, it's okay! I ask only that you be prepared to work with me to resolve the inconsistency while preserving your vision for your character and part in the story.
Period-accurate racial, ethnic, gender, and sexual discrimination exists in this world but will never be a focal point of the story. You may explore these themes in your character's backstory or a private plot, with the enthusiastic consent of everyone involved and with appropriate care. Keep them out of shared IC and OOC spaces.
Slurs are not permitted, in or out of character. Historical accuracy and in-character beliefs are never a justification for making another player uncomfortable.
The game includes psychological horror, body horror, violence, period-typical state repression and surveillance, and the threat of nuclear war. Character death is possible, but only with the player's consent. Full content rules and safety tools are provided in the group's Discord server.