[gurps] What do you look for in a cyberpunk game?

[Matt Riggsby]

On 7/26/06, hal at buffnet.net <hal at buffnet.net> wrote:
>
> What is it that people look for in a cyberpunk game?

I try to avoid great big defining conflicts like "capitalism vs.
communism" and "east vs. west."  Bruce Sterling once defined "boredom
with the apocalypse" as one of the defining characteristics of
cyberpunk.  Rather, old-school cyberpunks were interested in ways new
technologies would fragment the old, dinosaur-like power blocks and
give rise to entirely new ones.  So I get rid of all of that kind of
thing in favor of a world which is losing or has lost most of its old
centers of loyalty in favor of current expediency.  Traditional
cultures have fragmented and religions have lost most of their power.
It's capitalism uber alles and globalism gone wild.  Everybody has the
freedom and ability to connect to a distributed community of whoever
shares their particular tastes, so while there may be hard-core cells
of Muslim bomb-throwers (and Christian bomb-throwers and Tamil
bomb-throwers and vegetarian bomb-throwers and...), most people spend
their time and energy on gambling, games, pop stars, and porn.
Culturally, there's no there, there.  The only real powers left are
the ones which make money.  It's not that evil corporations have
intentionally taken over the universe.  It's just that people with a
desire for material gain are sufficiently plentiful and well-organized
that they're marginally more effective at getting things done than
groups with less pragmatic goals and no other force is in a position
to stop them.

Oh, and it rains all the time and everyone wears black.


-- 
My wife's food blog is quite interesting:
http://thehappysorceress.blogspot.com