What interesting conflicts can arise in a SolarPunk kind of world?

what interesting conflicts can arise in a SolarPunk kind of world?

>Solarpunk: genre that has no representation yet on any works, but is talked about on some forums. Basically implies a eco-utopia where everything works by sun, wind and water powered technology; government has de-centralized into independent, self-suficient cities and settlements; humanity is much more integrated into nature.
The lack of corporation-induced ambition, consumism and money issues brings people to invest time in arts and research.
The artistic backtround for this is mostly art-decó and modernism; with large skyscrapers redefined into vertical gardens and things like that.

Let's discuss solarpunk and potential gaming hooks in here.

>free energy punk

How does that even work?

>LITERALLY an utopia where everyone lives in harmony with nature, there's no conflict for resources and is clearly spiritually more advanced than our current society, and with self-contained sustainable population
> -punk

What the fuck
The term has officially lost all meaning.

Well, let's assume we want to make -punk matter, we remember an assumption on OP's list is pretty unrealistic:

>The lack of corporation-induced ambition, consumism and money issues

Just because the power is sustainable doesn't mean the plants are. And even if they're not, growth will need upgrades, and a company is glad to spend millions on useless updates if they can make billions telling you those updates are important.

Especially if we accept that the national system breaks down into city-states. Doubly so when the unplugged masses who can't fit into society live a Mad Max With Trees lifestyle huddling around sources of power, stockpiles of "still good" obsolete batteries and charging methods while trying to live free of the constant demand of maintaining a citadel-scale colossus and the roving gangs of technobarbarians who decided it was easier to live off raiding and pillaging these guys and the cities' trade routes.

Basically it's "what if Handsome Jack won Borderlands 2 but was into eco-friendly energy".

You folks have no imagination. Countries could be covered in thick layers of smog, and there could be a powerful type of weather-manipulating technology that exists to "punch holes" in patches of this smog, but the workings of this technology could be protected by the elite, allowing them access to solar energy, while everyone else is smothered by smog and isn't allowed on their land.

Or it could be that solar energy is used as the "punk" energy since it's off the grid, but the big bad evil non-renewable resources companies intentionally smog up the place, so you need to use the meager energy you get from your solar farms to power your equipment to destroy coal-plants.

You could just do what the English did - close the commons of access to solar energy, detain the poor and ship them off to some colonial world where 90% of the population are going to perish every year for a couple of decades.

I would do a Post utopia version;

Sure everything still WORKS, people just died off, became overly isolated and forgot how shit is supposed to work. Machines go on producing food and energy, but there's so few people to consume it.

People are now valuable, especially new genetic material, anyone who knows anything about tech is being gathered by the BBEG.

Everything's stun based, because risking life is too wasteful, robots that hunt humans are dangerous during the day.

Solar Punk.

> what interesting conflicts can arise in a SolarPunk kind of world?
Pokemon?
Shinsekai Yori?
Literally anything?

What would one call solarpunk without using punk?

Solar fantasy? I think that's a better term desu.

Utopias can only create mediocre plots about "THE OTHER" fighting against the perfect system, that or plots that are pretty contrived like pokemon.

>>LITERALLY an utopia where everyone lives in harmony with nature, there's no conflict for resources and is clearly spiritually more advanced than our current society, and with self-contained sustainable population

This thread is exactly about what kind of adventures can one live on an utopia. It doesn't have to be class struggle. The Punk is just for sketching the concept, not something to be taking literally

I'd not have a utopia. Were I to make a solar"punk" setting it'd just be big green apocalypse with tribal people living in the ruins of humanity's past leading eco-friendly lives

Ideology war.

Well, there are certain evils that would still exist regarding of the social system:
>bandits and killers
>monsters from space, the oceans and the earth
>cosmic troubles like asteroids
>radioactive fallout, radioactive giant lizards or other debris from the pre-solar world
>colonizing other planets best suited for energy
>recovering magical/technological/ancient shit because reasons

I toyed witb the idea of an utopic setting were people just goes to war like if it was a sport and nobody gets killed
Or they g into adventures and quests as a hobby and rent dungeons or breed mosters just to fight them off

Vampires try to destroy the sun.

Not to mention the vampires.

I like solar fantasy if for no other reason it shuts up the screeching punk shitters

Thats not how punk works. Like, what the fuck.

That could be interesting, although since you need something compelling in a setting maybe a 'War' that was set up between two corporations/companies/rich dudes/whatever went wrong and people actually died, and someone has to investigate what's going on. Very cool idea though.

I think getting away from the solar part of it is important, because it's more about a general eco-friendly future, Eco Fantasy, or something along those lines maybe. Agree on ditching punk though, if only so people take it more seriously.

Well you could have people using different technology than sun, wind, and water trying to take over or unite the independent cities and settlements.

Or anti-form of sun trying to restore the world to how it was before the sun came and so on.

Please stop making up 'genres' by slapping punk onto the end of words.

Ecofantasy is good.

OP pic is good example, so is Jack and Daxter

As for potential conflicts:

Vs Industrial rivals (scouring of the Shire)
Vs Nature (the less you dominate nature the greater a threat it is to you)
Vs Technology (usually poorly understood or dangerous)
Vs Man (always our own worst enemy)

The set up war doesn't work
My idea of the conflict in an utopic setting is the character's introspection, insecurities and relationships
In a perfect world conflict come from imperfect humans

...

As long as it shuts up those fucks who keep going on about what -punk is and isn't, you can call it fucking Mike Hawk, desu.

reddit.com/r/Solarpunk

imzy.com/Solarpunk

SoL stands for Slice of Life, so what about solSoL?

That is a word in Solresol, the musical language.

Pollution and a failing sun......

>genre that has no representation yet on any works, but is talked about on some forums

Fucking stop this. Stop putting punk at the end of everything. This shit is like putting wave and core at the end of music genres when the tempo gets changed.

Sounds like it has the potential to be comfy as fuck.

Then don't call it a -punk setting, jesus fuck. Having some sort of class struggle is why you call it "whatever"-punk.
I'm down with this idea but if you want to call it -punk then make it punk.

>No Wavecore music yet.

If you want to keep the -punk mood, but without the grit, grime, and depression that goes with it?

Alright.

The theme oft touted for -punk genres is fighting 'da man'. High class divides between the rich and poor, with the stories themselves championing the lower class fighting back against the dehumanization of the upper class, often times using the technology that put the upper class where it is. This technology is often taken to a logical or conceptual extreme, a) for fun aesthetics and concepts, and b) to give a visual indicator to how extreme the divide between classes is.

And none of that requires grease or death though those are easily understood methods
The punks are inherently optimistic, and what better to rally around than the life-giver itself, Sol?

The 'lower class' protagonists of solarpunk (or solar fantasy, as suggested) would use the green technology to push back against the 'upper class' who have become dehumanized in some regard, isolating themselves in hyper-healthy bubbles. Victory could mean redeeming the upper class, not usurping them.

The cities are divided into dense (though utopian) urban centers, surrounded by nature. There are 'rules' to be broken. Maybe there are arbitrary rules preventing excursions that are outdated and only kept out of habit.

Adventurers into an indifferent, super-plant area to push back invasive smog-squelcher vines eager to dominate some fringe settlements who haven't yet fully moved into the new technology.

Technology isn't bad by itself. It is often the tool of the ingenious hero, reclaiming innovation for everyone's benefit. The villain might be scientist who refuses to release a new iteration of technology, not for selfish reasons, but because he keeps tweaking and refining, claiming 'it isn't finished' when really it's decades ahead of the game.

Maybe a greener version of Mirror's Edge? I think the visuals could work.

The term never had any meaning, cyberpunk was coined specifically as a catchy marketing term.

>What would one call solarpunk without using punk?

Dark Souls

personally fine with solarpunk as a name. Boktai was a cool idea too. though it was more about sungunners killing creatures of the night, still a cool idea. might want to take advantage of that as well. along with 's idea, and the mention of jak and daxter. these combine pretty well IMO. beauty combined with a dark contrast could be cool as well. also has some decent room for growth.

I shall call the setting Corona because it doesn't leave a shitty taste in my mouth like bud light

What if they punks are fighting back against a rising Sun worship theocracy? Both sides are on the conservationist/naturalist side of things but one group is a lot more authoritarian about it than the other

Corona is actually a really good name, nice work user.

The Earth is recovering. Coal plants have been shut down. Cities are powered with wind and sun. Carbon is sinking back underneath the crust. Radiation is being consumed.

But the surface is no longer friend to humans.

Hypermutated animals hunt and kill with mercury-tipped claws, massive mycelium trees shower the forests with acid and decomposing spores, and underground tunnels are choked full of smog and meter-thick vines.

Humans have taken to the skies to survive the Earth's self-recovery, but the threat of malnutrition forces expeditions into the world below for precious clean resources.