Gangster World

Got a friend of Bill W that needs to dry out? Are they perhaps addicted to gambling as well? Don't take 'em to Gangster World, where the hooch is so strong it can strip paint — and your fortune — from you.

Parallel History

In 1919, the 18th Amendment was passed, creating a need for bootleg alcohol all around the nation. However, unlike on Earth Prime, the 21st Amendment negating the earlier Prohibition was never passed on this Earth. The result: A United States so weak it couldn’t stop California, Nevada, Washington and Oregon from seceding from the Union in 1997.

Sobriety can’t be blamed for all of the woes of the nation. Weak federal powers brought on by Ronald Reagan in the 1980s pretty much removed power from the federal government in an attempt to return autonomy to the states. It failed, as the mob powers that grew rich on selling the perils of society to the average Joe simply vested said autonomy into their own organizations.

In 1996, two crime families governing California and Nevada, the DeBellos and Greenfelds, attempted to merge their families together in a play for missile command of the nuclear arsenal west of the Rockies. With the help of Rembrandt Brown and his FBI task force, the Incorruptibles, the merger was stopped and District Attorney (and gubernatorial candidate) Joe Biacchi was revealed to be a co-conspirator with the Mafia. Ronald Reagan, running for the position of governor in California also, won in a landslide. The Reagan of this world didn’t suffer Alzheimer’s and governed until his death in 1998.

However, mob forces were able to combine the launch codes held by the DeBellos and Greenfelds and forced the United States to accept secession of the Western territories. The new country is now a haven for tax evasion, gambling and drinking.