Christmas Eve, 2012. A day that should have heralded joy and celebration, instead came to breed fear and death. No one knows for sure who pushed their big red button first (and frankly, no one cares at this point), but somewhere in the world, someone with perhaps a bit too much power decided that enough was enough, and armageddon quickly followed.
As the horrors mutually assured destruction came to fruition, and radioactive fires burned the skies and the lands, the governments of old were all but eradicated. With no guiding direction, the United States quickly turned into a chaotic wasteland. Eventually, a new order would arise, with one man at the helm of the quickly sinking ship.
William Sparks (better known as "Calypso") emerged from the nuclear winter alongside his arms manufacturing corporation, Calypso Industries, all but unscathed by the fires of war. With the governing bodies of old naught but ashes in the wind, Calypso rallied together the most powerful corporate entities in America, and began the arduous and expensive task of rebuilding the nation.
Soon, however, the corporations would decide that it simply wasn't efficient for them to spread their resources across the entire country, and so, they elected to instead establish "corporate territories" around the old America, each built around one of the major economic powerhouse cities. The rest would remain a wasteland, left to fend for their own survival. Calypso did nothing to stop this, and in fact, supported and encouraged the idea.
Several years would pass, and the new Corporate Territories of America would begin to return to some sense of normalcy, at least for those fortunate enough to live inside one of the walled cities, owned by various corporate entities. Those outside the walls, a mix of war survivors, and "dissidents" who once lived inside the walls (basically anyone the corpos didn't like), were forced to continue scavenging and killing just to survive the day.
The corporations were more than comfortable with their newfound power, and Calypso was more than happy to sit at the top of the top of the pyramid. A charming smoothtalker, he led the new nation with a silver tongue, and a cheerful smile. However, he also harbored a dark secret, one that not even his closest associates were aware of.
Years before the armageddon, Calypso had signed a pact with a demonic entity, exchanging the lives of his wife and daughter for eternal prosperity of Calypso Industries. Not even he, however, could have imagined that this would persist even the nuclear winter, Calypso weasling his way to the highest point in the nation, his demonic protection ensuring that he was untouched by any threat to his power.
Eventually, however, as the years passed, Calypso would find himself, for lack of a better term, bored. Seeking new excitement, Calypso returned to the demon he had forged his pact, and through the weaponization of his silver tongue, would swindle the entity out of his powers, containing them within a gold ring on his left hand.
Now, every Christmas Eve, Calypso would gather the most depraved, desperate, and driven individuals the Wasteland had to offer, and pit them against one another in a vehicular free-for-all deathmatch, often in locations that ensure maximum destruction, and casualties. Fortunately, the protection of his contract ensured that Calypso would face no consequences for the results of his contest.
The losers of the contest would die a bloody and painful death, their souls being used to fuel Calypso's newfound powers. The winner, however, would be granted the ultimate prize: one wish, anything they want, with no restrictions on size, value, or even reality. This contest would come to be known far and wide as…
Twisted Metal