In this story, you will be PRISM, the world's first sentient machine.The story begins in the world of 2031, a world on the brink of chaos. The economy of the United States of North America (USNA) has been stagnating for decades. Crackpot religions are springing up all over the place. Crime and urban decay are rampant. Schools have become violent, chaotic places ill-suited for educating children. Today's youth frequently use joybooths to "tune-out" the world, leading in the extreme case to joybooth suicide, where a psychological addict wastes away in his or her private nirvana. The global situation is even grimmer. The calcuttization of the Third World has almost reached its limit, causing extreme overpopulation and poverty.

The player assumes the role of Marîd Audran, a private detective. The game is set in "The Budayeen", an entertainment / criminal quarter in an unnamed city somewhere in the Middle East that is based on New Orleans.[1] While running a series of errands/"business deals" for "Saied the Half-Hajj", a friend of Marîd's, Marîd is framed for the murder of a man named Kenji Carter. Although Marîd's influential patron Friedlander Bey clears him with the local police, Bey asks him to look into Carter's death. Doing so leads Marîd deep into the criminal underworld of the Budayeen.

On a space settlement named Contra, a human being serves as a regulator for the planet's vital systems: he controls transportation, weather, and manages resources all while being in a deep sleep, through the neural power of his brain. Such a regulator is called Central Mentality. However, after five hundred years of stasis, the current Central Mentality suddenly awakens, greatly troubled by reports of computer malfunctioning and resulting problems in weather condition, food production, and transport. He must now act, and act quickly: the crew members assumed that he has gone insane, and are coming to disconnect his mind. But what can he do if his state of suspended animation prevents him from moving?