Cyberpunk, aka "Sade got badly sidetracked"
In the wake of my latest "I wannabe an Epic!"-fic, Blackguards, I crashed hard back into a genre I've loved for a very long time, namely cyberpunk.
Talking with hugemind got me thinking about that genre, its definitions and its possibilities.
This is, then, my attempt to explain what I see/hear/feel when I come across the term 'cyberpunk'. What it means to me, what pop-culture references I can draw up as a cheat sheet to get a picture of its world.
Descriptors
Everyone knows what SciFi is, right? Science Fiction, the land of tomorrow and what has never been. A dream of what humanity could become, could achieve.
Cyberpunk, after a fashion, is scifi gone sour; a dystopia where all the white and black has long since bled together and become grey. It's "jet-black sinister architecture" and ghost in the machine. It's noble cyborg savages and Project 2501. It's living on the edge and losing oneself in the uncharted expanses of the information overflow. It's "style over substance" and "high tech, low lives". It's man, machine and everything in-between; designer drugs and dreaming androids.
It takes place here, on Earth, and stars are nothing but a dream behind the smog.
It's humanity at its most wretched; sick and twisted and just trying to survive, riding on technology that failed to ennoble the species.
Pop-culture references
Aka Taking Advantage of Wikipedia. :p
Books:The Sprawl trilogy by William Gibson
Burning Chrome-anthology by William Gibson
When Gravity Fails by George Alec Effinger
Mirrorshades-anthology by Bruce Sterling
Akira by Katsuhiro Otomo
Ghost in the Shell by Masamune Shirow
Movies:
Yes, some of these are set in past (like 1990s), but still... it's the mood and the 'feel' of them that hits the correct chords in me. Especially when we're talking about Strange Days and the adventures of Snake Plissken. Blade Runner
Strange Days
Johnny Mnemonic
Ghost in the Shell
Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence
Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. Solid State Society
Akira
Escape from New York
Escape from L.A
RoboCop
TV Series: Dark Angel
Ghost In the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
Ghost In the Shell: S.A.C. 2nd Gig
Computer Games: Dreamweb
Deus Ex
Syndicate
Beneath A Steel Sky
Longest Journey (namely Stark)
Blade Runner
System Shock
BloodNet
And we better not forget about the role-playing game Cyberpunk 2020, either. Because the Finnish edition of that has become well-worn in my hands. :)
However, there's more out there. These are only what I could think of right now.
In sort of related news, I do believe I like the fact that paraplegic people can choose something other than a wheelchair within a couple of years. \o/
Talking with hugemind got me thinking about that genre, its definitions and its possibilities.
This is, then, my attempt to explain what I see/hear/feel when I come across the term 'cyberpunk'. What it means to me, what pop-culture references I can draw up as a cheat sheet to get a picture of its world.
Descriptors
Everyone knows what SciFi is, right? Science Fiction, the land of tomorrow and what has never been. A dream of what humanity could become, could achieve.
Cyberpunk, after a fashion, is scifi gone sour; a dystopia where all the white and black has long since bled together and become grey. It's "jet-black sinister architecture" and ghost in the machine. It's noble cyborg savages and Project 2501. It's living on the edge and losing oneself in the uncharted expanses of the information overflow. It's "style over substance" and "high tech, low lives". It's man, machine and everything in-between; designer drugs and dreaming androids.
It takes place here, on Earth, and stars are nothing but a dream behind the smog.
It's humanity at its most wretched; sick and twisted and just trying to survive, riding on technology that failed to ennoble the species.
Pop-culture references
Aka Taking Advantage of Wikipedia. :p
Books:
Movies:
Yes, some of these are set in past (like 1990s), but still... it's the mood and the 'feel' of them that hits the correct chords in me. Especially when we're talking about Strange Days and the adventures of Snake Plissken.
TV Series:
Computer Games:
And we better not forget about the role-playing game Cyberpunk 2020, either. Because the Finnish edition of that has become well-worn in my hands. :)
However, there's more out there. These are only what I could think of right now.
In sort of related news, I do believe I like the fact that paraplegic people can choose something other than a wheelchair within a couple of years. \o/