The setting of AIT is a world very similar to our own. It is the final gasp of the 20th century and the United States is one of the leading world superpowers, the European Union has formed, the Phantom Menace is the most talked about movie of all time and the world waits nervously for the clocks to roll past the millennium. But ethnic cleansing occurs in more places than Yugoslavia; school yard slayings are not so shocking or rare; the rape and pollution of the Earth's natural resources continues at a ravenous rate, unchecked by International treaties; the cities swell with populations to their bursting points; the dusk comes earlier and is more dreary; the tension, fear, mistrust and abuse crease the lines of the faces of the people in the streets. Every alley has a menace and every shadow has a name. The world is colder, meaner, less forgiving and filled with monsters of the mind and spirit. It is a world filled with despair, a World of Darkness.

Imagine the worlds created by Tim Burton, Frank Miller and James O'Barr. Dark and Gothic architecture, towering cathedrals that claw against leaden and stormy night skies where gangs of thugs and underworld crime thrive in the shadow of corrupt officials, police and bureaucrats. Now add a splash of Poe and Lovecraft, creatures half-unseen in the darkness, the dim glow of red eyes from the trees, hideous horrors from the deepest nightmares and tomes, spells and magicks to chill the spirit. These are the places where Vampires make their homes. From the Ventrue boardrooms of Shreck's department store to the shrieking halls of the Malkavian homes in Arkham Asylum to the dank and dripping pools of the Nosferatu sewers, the night is filled with their stories.

Cities are the lairs, breeding grounds and playing fields of the world's Vampires. In the World of Darkness, the cities are much more densely populated than in our own world. A city like Atlanta would have a population of 9 million, rather than the 3 million in our own world. With the overpopulation comes additional crime, strife, suffering and Vampires.

Cities provide all that the Vampires need. Security from the Werewolves and other denizens of the wilderness, nearly limitless blood to slake the endless Hunger, contacts and suppliers of every convenience, vice or whim, comaraderie with other Vampires and, most importantly, a gigantic concrete and steel jungle in which to hide their own predatorial existence from the eyes and minds of perhaps their worst enemy and most treasured ally--Mortals. There are constant struggles being waged every night, the struggle for survival, for power, for mastery, for security and, most importantly, for secrecy.