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Cyberpunk is a cool genre we have never covered exclusively on a Quackcast before. But what IS cyberpunk? It's a subset of SciFi, it's usually near future, involves body modifications, grittiness, street level computer use, techno body modification, and hacking. At least that's the way it started. Formative influences on the cyberpunk genre were the first Tron movie, Bladerunner, and Escape from New York. Tron showed us what cyberspace was, while Bladerunner and Escape from New York gave us gritty near future dystopias with cool tech, modified humans, and most importantly the punk aesthetic which was the gritty street youth fashion of the late 70s and early 80s.
Punks plus computers signalled a more universal use of the new technology of computers in the near future world especially as imagined by Willian Gibson with his novel Neuromancer. There were other influential cyberpunk writers like Neal Stephenson with SnowCrash and many more. My fave was Manga creator Masamune Shirow with his books like Ghost in the Shell, Appleseed and more which tackle subjects like trans-humanisim as humans evolve with technology and then INTO technology itself. In the late 80s and early 90s cyberpunk was very influential in anime with the likes of the Ghost in the Shell movie, Bubblegum crisis, AD police, and the amazing milestone that is Akira!
A very formative game in the world of cyberpunk was the RPG Shadowrun, which was near future urban fantasy plus cyberpunk in all its pure glory. These days we have the computer game Cyberpunk 2020, but it's an extremely derivative and pale shadow of what had gone before it, it functions as a sort of a retro “greatest hits” of the genre, but it's a good intro into it and that goes for the Netflix anime of the same name. There were various unrelated genres inspired by cyberpunk- Steampunk, Dieselpunk, and the later dubious genres raypunk and atompunk which are just rebranded early standard SciFi.
What is your fave example of cyberpunk? Do you know what cyberpunk is? When did you first come to cyberpunk?
This week Gunwallace gave us a theme inspired by The Return of Jake Sunrise - A desolate red dirt desert, a wind whistles through and carries with it a torrent of sound and energy, flooding in like a sudden rainstorm, bringing with it life, colour, and revitalisation! The desert blooms.
Topics and shownotes
Links
Featured comic:
The Books of Avo - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2024/oct/01/featured-comic-the-books-of-avo/
Featured music:
The Return of Jake Sunrise - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/The_Return_of_Jake_Sunrise/ - by Picture_Books, rated E.
Special thanks to:
Gunwallace - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Gunwallace/
Tantz Aerine - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Tantz_Aerine/
Ozoneocean - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/ozoneocean
Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei
Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/
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Quackcast 708 - Cyberpunk
Ozoneocean at 12:00AM, Oct. 8, 2024
Banes,
Cyberpunk,
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featured music,
Gunwallace,
Kawaiidaigakusei,
Ozoneocean,
Quackcast 708,
The Books of Avo,
the return of jake sunrise,
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Ozoneocean at 6:08PM, Oct. 8, 2024
The videogame wasn't retro in that regard so much from memory... (I played it during Covid times and a friends house haha) It was more retro in its older ways of showing cyberpunk's trans-humanist stuff with the mechanical add-ons and things (very clunky in an unnecessary and obvious way), while the style of everything was more modern- the fashions and design styles were not 80s punk or 80s modernism, they were all from the 2000s. So It felt very awkward and off to me, if that makes any sense?
marcorossi at 9:44AM, Oct. 8, 2024
@Ozoneocean I didn't play the videogame, however if it is based on the Cyberpunk 2020 rulebook, that is from the 80s, it will probably look very retro: for example in the rulebook setting there was something called dailyfax (I'm backtranslating from Italian so I don't know if this was the actual name), that basically was a newspaper that was faxed directly in everybody's home due to technology: in the 80s this still looked futuristic, today the idea of fax is so retro that it is difficult to even remember it. So if the videogame is faithful to the RPG setting there will be a lot of stuff that in the 80s actually was supposed to be futuristic but now is very funny. PS I remembre Cyberpunk 2020 as one at the time very famous RPG, on pair with, say, Call of Chtulhu. They reprinted a new edition recently, Cyberpunk Red.
PaulEberhardt at 7:49AM, Oct. 8, 2024
I was never quite sure about how to define cyberpunk, but it has its distinct aesthetics. It's always been a know-it-when-you-see-it genre to me. Gotta love that title image!
Ozoneocean at 7:32AM, Oct. 8, 2024
@Banes and Tantz- THANKYOU! ♥️ I was really trying to go old style original cyberpunk with that pic haha!
Ozoneocean at 7:31AM, Oct. 8, 2024
@Jazzy- yup, good example!
Ozoneocean at 7:30AM, Oct. 8, 2024
@marco- I didn't know Cyberpunk was an RPG in the old days! But when U played the computer game and watched the anime they both felt very retro, rather then genuine parts of the genre, you know? I agree GeMiTo 2073 is cyberpunk
Tantz_Aerine at 6:34AM, Oct. 8, 2024
Awesome image Oz!
Banes at 5:19AM, Oct. 8, 2024
'Quack of 1984'
Banes at 5:19AM, Oct. 8, 2024
Another awesome image for this one, ozone!
marcorossi at 4:18AM, Oct. 8, 2024
I'm talkative today so: favourite cyberpunk movies are Ghost in the Shell (animation) and Nirvana (live action). Also I'll note the comic Meatware that I'm following here, it is a biopunk I think (if we go for the various -punk subgenres) but has the "social collapse" and "identity questioning" aspects of cyberpunk.
jazzy at 3:12AM, Oct. 8, 2024
Robocop
marcorossi at 1:28AM, Oct. 8, 2024
I'll also leave a shameless plug here and note that my first webcomic, GeMiTo 2073, that was featured some years ago, is actually a cyberpunk, complete with cybergirl protagonist, but without the virtual reality thingie.
marcorossi at 1:25AM, Oct. 8, 2024
marcorossi at 1:23AM, Oct. 8, 2024 delete The videogame Cyberpunk 2020 is based on the tabletop RPG Cyberpunk 2020, that I think was older than Shadowrun (I played both, though I prefer Shadowrun). During the pandemic lockdown, in 2020, I played Cyberpunk 2020 with some friends via a Discord server, we all commented that the reality at the time was quite cyberpunk.