Back in the 1990s and the Oughts, I loved conspiracy-based RPG settings and material. I devoured GURPS Illuminati, Delta Green, Kenneth Hite's Suppressed Transmission columns, and so on.
But in the last decade, I've moved away from them. Part of it may be that I realized that how many conspiracy theories ultimately originated in antisemitic slanders. Part of it might be their mainstreaming by the resurgent fascist right and their supporters. And, of course, the great villains of our day perpetrate all their villainy in the open, rarely even bothering to hide what they are doing.
So I no longer enjoy settings where "The Conspiracy" and their schemes are the main focus of the setting. While I don't mind having "small-c" conspiracies in a game, I don't like it when there is a secret cabal of conspirators running everything.
How about you? Do you still enjoy Conspiracy-based setting, or have you lost your taste for them as well?
I really want to get the old Illuminati "INWO" Card Game from Steve Jackson and play it, but the big boxes are way too much money on the ebay and idk anyone who plays.
Instead I've been playing Munchkin's Fantasy variant.
If you haven't read the Illuminautus Trilogy from Robert Anton Wilson you might get a kick out of it, it (along with Discordianism and The Church of the SubGenius) seem like clear influences on Steve's Illuminati work (there is after all a SubGenius INWO expansion which I do happen to have, though I lack the rest), I think he knows it's tongue in cheek.