1979 - Sceau dans l'Inconnu

In France, a modern, dynamic president is courageously leading the people into the 1980s: this man is Valéry Giscard d'Estaing. In our beautiful country, we prefer to watch Buffet froid, with Depardieu, and dance to the frenzied rhythms of Born To Be Alive. But the threat of globalization is already looming.

But this sweet France of yours, you'll have to leave it to cross Italy, California, China, Tibet and Iraq. You'll be French abroad, on a secret mission for France. (Well, for Jacques Chirac, but it's almost the same thing, isn't it? It's impossible not to think of OSS 117 or Jean-François Halin's Au Service de la France when playing 1979.

The similarities between these works are not limited to their setting, but also to what they denounce. Society is changing. The macho, racist, homophobic and xenophobic prejudices that were still commonplace in 1979 are now rightly considered toxic, unfounded, offensive, unfair and cruel.

It's a balancing act to play 1979 in 2022 (and maybe even publish it), because the idea is to laugh at it. It's up to you and your group of players to manage the level of detachment, second degree and permission you'll give each other in the practice of this RPG. More than anywhere else on this kind of experience, the distinction between players and characters needs to be understood. We also invite you to verbalize a social contract that sets everyone's own limits in advance before you get started.

What you'll be playing:

Your mission will take you all over the world, and as you've already guessed, you'll certainly discover that Hexagon isn't the only power coveting the Kingdom's Seal of Inheritance.

Chases, secret agent duels, infiltration, diplomacy and espionage are all on the menu, of course, but so are seduction, gastronomy, honor and elegance, because after all, it's France you'll be embodying in your every move.
We've designed this book as a "ready-to-play" package, containing everything you need to bring your players through a complete campaign (over thirty hours of adventures). 1979 - Seal into the Unknown contains a description of the universe, an explanation of the rules, detailed instructions for creating your characters and all the scenarios you need to play the campaign, in Rome, Los Angeles, China, Tibet, Pakistan and Iraq (yes, you're going to see a lot of the country!).

As for the game system, it's still an in-house creation, inspired by Chaosium's basic system, but this time using a D20. Your characters' skills add bonuses to your dice roll, and to succeed, you need to exceed a certain score (5, 10 or 15), depending on the difficulty level of the action you're attempting.

The system is very easy to learn, and has been carefully thought out to ensure a smooth narrative. There's also an appendix included in the book with a more elaborate version of the rules for those who like well-oiled mechanics, particularly during combat.
While humor, parody and derision are a strong component of 1979, the overall artistic form of the book is very serious, at the crossroads between the elegant sobriety of secret agent universes and the pulp side of comic books. The 1979 art direction is a cocktail of 007 codes, Cowboy bebop dynamism and The Loser aestheticism.
This exceptional production mirrors that of Hydre, which plays on a white & gold duality.