The Holy Empire of Gregalia is a colossal, orderly nation, notable for its ritual sacrifices, complete lack of prisons, and stringent health and safety legislation. The hard-nosed, cynical, humorless population of 5.249 billion Gregs are ruled with an iron fist by the dictatorship government, which ensures that no-one outside the party gets too rich. In their personal lives, however, citizens are relatively unoppressed; it remains to be seen whether this is because the government genuinely cares about its people, or if it hasn't gotten around to stamping out civil rights yet.

The enormous, corrupt, socially-minded, well-organized government juggles the competing demands of Defense, Healthcare, and Administration. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Greg. The average income tax rate is 77.5%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The all-consuming Gregish economy, worth 548 trillion Chessbricks a year, is driven entirely by a combination of government and state-owned industry, with private enterprise illegal. However, for those in the know, there is a large, well-organized, quite specialized black market in Information Technology, Tourism, and Arms Manufacturing. The private sector mostly consists of enterprising ten-year-olds selling lemonade on the sidewalk, but the government is looking at stamping this out. Average income is an impressive 104,549 Chessbricks, and distributed extremely evenly, with practically no difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

The Smythe is protected from hunting and slowly coming back from the brink of extinction, adverts proclaim it has to be healthy if the Mornay uses hand-grated Gallopavian Gruyère, foreign planes and migratory birds are shot down as spies, and if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to hear it... Gregish satellites can detect it. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Gregalia's national animal is the Smythe, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests.

Gregalia is ranked 281,945^th in the world and 1,139^th in The Communist Bloc for Largest Automobile Manufacturing Sector, scoring -11.92 on the Henry Ford Productivity Index.