> The earth is a barren irradiated wasteland, scattered with vast, nigh-indestructible plexiglass-polymer domes which contain the surface skyscrapers of the remaining cities.
> Within the cities, the fortunate live above ground, in cramped and rundown apartment tenements, and the wealthy among them are able to afford natural vegetables, grown on satellite hydroponics farms, or more rarely, in one of the moon colonies.
> The unfortunate live below ground in the endless labyrinthine tunnel network, some in utilitarian tube-shaped hab units, but most in makeshift slums in the tunnels themselves, making due any way they can, subsisting on artificial manufactured paste and, more rarely, gene-modded fungus.
> Outside the city domes, well, we don't talk about what's outside the city domes.
Let's make a Cyberpunk setting
lets not and say we did
We've never done this before
But what's the fucking point?
Cyberpunk was never meant to be just an "aesthetic" for you to wank over, it was meant to be a commentary of late stage capitalism where we will eventually go when we leave people in power to control every facet of our lives because they keep us comfortably inept at dealing with our own vices.
If you just look at the cover of a post modern "cyber noir" book and think "oooh flashy lights and s3xy robots and a timeline where trench coats are finally in fashion, sign me up!" Then you've never had any idea about what cyberpunk was about and really just enjoyed it as a trend or fashion statement. What's ironic is that cyberpunk is meant to be a commentary on blatant consumerism in the first place so with all these rehashed ideas and blandly put together set pieces it's coming off as too spastic.
Have you even read Gibson?
If you set out to make a cyberpunk game the first thing to set your mind to writing shouldn't be to describe where the story takes place but how they got there and the context as to how it got so bad, and how it's maintaining the structure of oppression.
No please tell em about it.
> The earth is a barren irradiated wasteland, scattered with vast, nigh-indestructible plexiglass-polymer domes which contain the surface skyscrapers of the remaining cities.
That's post-apoc, not cyberpunk.
> Within the cities, the fortunate live above ground, in cramped and rundown apartment tenements, and the wealthy among them
> The unfortunate live below ground in the endless labyrinthine tunnel network, some in utilitarian tube-shaped hab units, but most in makeshift slums in the tunnels themselves
ok, that's pretty solid cyberpunk.
>are able to afford natural vegetables, grown on satellite hydroponics farms, or more rarely, in one of the moon colonies.
Waaaaayyyy too far into the future. Also, shipping FOOD back to earth is crazy-talk. Even "barren" and "irradiated" and "wasteland" still makes Earth a prime crop-growing real-estate when it comes to SPAAAAAAACE.
>, making due any way they can, subsisting on artificial manufactured paste and, more rarely, gene-modded fungus.
More typically it's soybeans/tofu which gets turned and processed into.... everything. But sure, whatever. Food alternatives are kinda interesting. Crickets are dense. algea baths are a trope. Never heard of super-fungus before, but sure, why not.
> Outside the city domes, well, we don't talk about what's outside the city domes.
. . . So... Dredd. Yeah, it's been done.
Excuse us for liking an aesthetic. Would you like my licence and registration, Fun Police?
Even if your issue is that we shouldn't be calling it cyberpunk because we're using the word wrong, meanings for words shift and change all the time. Reason being is that what's the point of a word having one definition of people just use another instead? Words and language evolve with us, and cyberpunk is coming to mean (at least in certain communities) something else.
>Would you like my licence and registration, Fun Police?
Friend computer incinerates you for initiating fun as known deviant behaviour.
Judge Dredd arrests and murders you as fun has been illegalized and you've failed to apply for a permit
Cyberpunk police LLC send a couple shots your way to keep the riff-raff on their side of the dystopia as anything more involve has diminishing returns on their profit margin.
> and cyberpunk is coming to mean (at least in certain communities) something else
Eh, not really. It's ALWAYS had the posers who just liked pink mohawks and neon and were generally clueless about the social commentary aspect. And frankly, that's fine. No matter what it is in life, you're going to have a spread of idealists and.... lazy fuckers. Accept it or go crazy or get bitter.
The cities are administrated by an A.I. who use the people as resources. If a certain job needs to be done, The A.I.s select people to do the job. If they require some extra training or gear, they get forcefully enhanced. Training is done in VR, electrodes stimulating the muscles and nanomachines building the required neural wiring (of course some memories will be lost in the process).
You're purposely just degrading the purpose of using cyberpunk which is *rooted* in the politics of the era. It's a fucking sham for some trend sheep to want to contribute and make oc when he doesn't understand 1/10th of what the purpose of cyberpunk is for.
It's a politically and ethically rich story platform, if you want to just post your spiky hair trench coat wearing sniper original character, or your uninspired city idea that doesn't make any functional sense or have any sustainability yet never touched on the why, how, when in complete stasis then go ahead, but nobody is going to take you seriously.
people who things things just shift and change have mental disorders
Nigga he's just posted some basic information for the setting, if you want to make it a clever commentary on the endpoint of western civilisation then be the change you want to see
There was a revolution in the UK and King Charles now controls a battalion of imperial bobbies with his Neuro-Crown.
Why don't you just use your mod powers to delete the thread?
Several mega cities were quarantined after the A.I. in charge went nuts and began an in-discriminant slaughter and monstrous experimentation on the human population.
Years later, words spread about the technological wonders within the quarantine zone. Nanite capsules that can turn the most arid radioactive desert into a lush paradise. Hand held weapons that can devastate armies.
Soon the brave, the foolish, and the desperate began to illegally flock to the quarantine zone hoping to make a fortune. However, bio-technological beasts created by the master AI still lurk among the dark halls. Ready to consume any intruders within their hive.
Oh nice, the dillwad geeks wasted no time in arguing about semantics. Thank god the internet has you boys to set the plebs straight about fiction.
Anyway, OP:
Interesting start but, I'll have to agree with the twerps, not very cyberpunk. Let's focus on the city:
1. Rival corporate AIs control every commercial space. When you walk into Gap Ultra to buy a mesh cardigan, you're greeted by the AI hologram from the tech company that purchased Gap Ultra. The AI messages some suggestions and locations of items you may be interested in, culled from your prior purchases.
2. The government doesn't care about your purchasing habits since they live off your taxes. What they want to know is who is trying to disrupt the status quo. Security cameras are everywhere. There are robotic mosquitos that can film you and illegally obtain your blood for DNA. The government will make clones of you to experiment on and sell your DNA to corporations. Snack corps use your DNA to make their snacks more addictive.
3. The underground districts are poorly regulated. The city gov does not care what poor people do to each other. They've hired a cyborg mercenary unit to keep order down there. The most educated sublevelers get service industry jobs on the surface and are treated as disposable. If you're good enough at selling cardigans or whatever then you'll get a promotion and may be able to afford a 6 x 6 room in a newly cookie cutter renovated tenement building on the surface. You'll share your apartment with 8 other people. There is 1.5 bathrooms if you're lucky. No windows unless you pay extra.
4. The lower corporate wage slaves work 50 hours a week for slightly nicer accomadations. Windows are standard. Maybe a balcony over the fun district. High speed net service with over 40 streaming sites to submit to. Music, movies, and video games are all curated so you never have to make a decision or be exposed to anything thought provoking ever again! This is the new middle class.
(Cont)
5. The upper class of yuppies and company men have 35 hour work weeks and lots of leisure time. They never cook or clean for themselves. The lower income guys have a sex robot to carry out their menial chores, the higher income guys buy people like in the good old days. These yuppies laugh extra obnoxiously and always smile. Sure it's a broken world, but you just have to make the best of it (ie exploit poor and stupid people and manipulate every networking connection you have to get the job you want). These guys act friendly but deep down are bloodthirsty creeps. They buy top of the line cybernetic enhancements to keep their dicks hard 24/7. Bionic livers so they can never embarrass themselves at the company pub crawl. Phone watches with neural interfaces. For sport, they go into the deepest sublevels to slaughter and torture the dregs of society. They wear their college colors and fraternity letters.
6. Tech has hit a ceiling. Smart phones are ubiquitous among all social classes, though the wealthy have the Alpha models with unfathomable capabilities. Quantum computing is powerful enough to simulate reality. Holodecks exist but have their bugs.
The human genome is fully malleable. Designer children walk the streets, but there is something strange and menacing about them. Cybernetic interfaces are difficult. Top of the line stuff is military and even then require a lot of surgical maintenance. The capabilities are astounding. Cyborg cops have torn through metal walls to get to perps.
7. Art and fashion are mostly controlled by nepotism. CEO daddy sends money to the institutions to get his snowflake artist/designer/actor child attention. Most artists live in the sublevels and salvage what they can to make art obsessed with identity and decay. Organic fabrics are often from cloned and genetically modified sources and thus more expensive. Techwear is in style and can regulate your body functions. A good hacker can kill someone through their techwear. Sublevelors have to wear military surplus clothes to increase their chance of survival. Puddles of acid are no match for polymer x boots. Surface dwellers wear soft neutral colored leisure wear or all black if they want to appear rebellious.
I like it, but it's more post-apocalyptic science-fiction than cyberpunk.
They recently discovered a portal to hell. How this will affect profits is under consideration.