Cyberpunk is a science-fiction sub-genre dealing with the integration of society and technology in dystopian settings. Often referred to as “low-life and high tech,” Cyberpunk stories deal with outsiders (punks) who fight against the oppressors in society (usually mega corporations that control everything) via technological means (cyber). If the punks aren’t actively fighting against a megacorp, they’re still dealing with living in a world completely dependent on high technology.
Icon created by @cloudless@feddit.uk.
Banner generated via AI model.
What was the first cyberpunk video game you played? Were you playing the point & click adventure games back on DOS? Shadowrun on SNES? Deus Ex on PC? Or did you just recently discover this thing called "cyberpunk" with Cyberpunk 2077?
I'm curious how long everyone here has been into cyberpunk.
Lemmy needs more content that isn't about US politics right now so I'm making a random post.
What's the most obscure cyberpunk movie you've seen? Name a cyberpunk movie you don't think anyone else has heard of.
I'm not saying you have to think it's a good movie (or that you even like it), I just want to discuss obscure, unknown cyberpunk movies. Come on, let's talk about something other than politics here.
Molli and Max in the Future is a strange movie. It's basically When Harry Met Sally but set in a cyberpunk world. So the main plot of the story is the various chance encounters between Molli and Max throughout the years and eventually realizing love was right in front of them the whole time (obviously, I mean, that's not exactly a spoiler).
While this movie doesn't really have any cyberpunk themes, the visuals are very cyberpunk.
They spend time together in cyberspace while dressed like Tron:
They have a date in their cyberpunk city:
And there's a part in the movie where Max becomes a mecha fighter and dates his mech's AI.
So even though this is primarily a movie about finding love, the visuals were cyberpunk enough to keep me interested and a lot of the comedy bits worked for me. I don't know, I won't say I loved this movie so it isn't exactly a strong recommendation, but I wanted to bring it to people's attention just in case there are others out there who are more interested in rom-coms than I am. I've complained before about Amazon's tv series Upload and how I wish it wasn't a rom-com and spent more time exploring the cyberpunk world instead. This is very similar. It's a fun (comedic) cyberpunk world but the story is focused on two people falling in love. And I'm just not a rom-com type of person. So I can't say whether this movie is good or bad, I just know it isn't for me.
But, decide for yourself. Here's a trailer, and it's currently streaming on Amazon Prime.
Not a GREAT movie, but I think it's fun, and the idea is solid.
"the truth is, there's more than enough. no-one has to die before their time."
cross-posted from !fullmoviesonyoutube@lemm.ee
In Time is a 2011 American science fiction action film written, produced, and directed by Andrew Niccol.
Justin Timberlake and Amanda Seyfried star as inhabitants of a society that uses time from one's lifespan as its primary currency, with each individual possessing a clock on their arm that counts down how long they have to live. Cillian Murphy, Vincent Kartheiser, Olivia Wilde, Matt Bomer, Johnny Galecki, and Alex Pettyfer also star.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Time
Does anyone remember cyberpunkreview.com ? If so, does anyone know who Mr. Roboto actually was? :P
I used to walk past abandoned trucks out in the woods, so I wanted to capture something of that.
The M9 Armored Combat Earthmover looks super cyberpunk to me, probably because it dates back to the 1980s, still in use. My inner Gibson fan wanted to include some kind of rusting, surplus military equipment in this rural cyberpunk comic, possibly a hovercraft. But I figure this fits the superfund site backstory nicely, since it’s supposedly rated for protection against chemical and biological agents.
Also, like most military vehicles, the M9 has a cult fan following, making it pretty easy to find photos from a variety of angles, along with photos of model kits, which in this format are just as good.
I have a (headcannon-only, at the moment) idea that these machines were upgraded a third time to house AI pilots on a similar level, perhaps a bit smarter, than the bodyguard. And that they might have been left with the chassis when the work was paused, then delayed and delayed, until they finally gave up on remediating the site. One possible resolution for the story might involve the bodyguard making friends with one, who is able to contact a human tech (a former site volunteer) who lives nearby and maintains the abandoned AIs as best he can. He might end up serving as a mediator between the robot and the outside world.
You probably shouldn't tap the trees in a superfund site for sap, but that feels like a fairly cyberpunk sort of resignation/indifference to circumstances. I know some folks who do sapping IRL and they say animals often try to get into it – cows in particular are very clever with disconnecting hoses and such to get access to the delicious sugar water. They didn’t have any stories about deer but I bet it’s happened.
I've almost run through the backlog of art for this silly rural cyberpunk webcomic. I'm hoping to make a few more, but the schedule might get a little unreliable for a bit after page 25. If want to read the rest of it you can find it here: https://jacobcoffinwrites.wordpress.com/president-deer-adventures/
If you’d like to read the related-but-mutually-non-canonical short story version, you can find it here: https://en.scrappycapydistro.info/harbour it’s in the first edition, on page 3!
A couple months ago, I shamelessly posted a darksynth recommendation guide someone on reddit made and a lot of people here on Lemmy seemed to like it. Well, the creator of that guide just posted a new version so I'm shamelessly sharing it here again.
You can see the full-sized, zoomable version here. Once again, this was created by khroshan over on reddit, not by me.
Let me get this out of the way first: this is a mindless pulp cyberpunk novel. It isn't high art. But it also isn't as bad as I would expect a book titled "Jack: Into the Beanstalk" to be. This isn't a bland re-telling of Jack And The Beanstalk with some human augmentations slapped on top. It's primarily a cyberpunk world first and any references to the fairy tale feel more like easter eggs than core story elements. So in that way, I was pleasantly surprised. With that said, this post is more about me trying to keep this community alive than a strong recommendation. It's a fun mindless story, not a "must read".
Both Astro Boy and Battle Angel Alita have the concept of a rich city in the clouds above the poor working class living on the ground. Even the Deus Ex reboot had Hengsha as a city on top of another city. So when this book has a rich city being held up above the poor city, I see that more as a cyberpunk trope than a "castle in the clouds" from the fairy tale. But maybe I'm being too generous. Anyway, the story is about a girl (named Jack) who has cybernetic limbs. She has a neurological implant in her spine which helps control these limbs. At the beginning of the story, she's doing odd jobs for a gang in the hopes of paying off the debt she incurred when purchasing the limbs. The implant in her spine gets damaged and suddenly she can see a glowing green line reaching from the ground to the rich city above. That green line is The Beanstalk. Her goal is to figure out why only she can see it and what exactly it is. No magic beans, no giants in the sky, nothing else that I would consider a reference to the fairy tale.
In the process of trying to figure out what The Beanstalk is, she joins up with a group of freedom fighters. And this is really my main complaint with the story. This may be a nuance of the cyberpunk genre that only I care about, but I don't think cyberpunk stories should have rebellions. I'm good with a group of mercenaries teaming up to take down a megacorp, but I don't want a group of rebels attempting to make systemic change. I think an aspect of the cyberpunk genre is in trying to find your place in the world, not trying to change it. But that really is just a nitpick regarding my own enjoyment of the story; and if that's the worst I can come up with, it's not bad. The characters all have distinct personalities, the world is fleshed-out, the story is good; it's a fun romp.
There are two books in the series so far and both are less than 300 pages. Both end on a cliffhanger though. I jumped right into book 2 to see the resolution of the first book's cliffhanger and now I'm left with another cliffhanger waiting for book 3. Also, I'm not a huge fan of where the story went in book 2. It's introducing too much "magic" for my taste. The book pretends it's based on quantum computing but as far as the world-building is concerned, it's magic. There's a lot of "oh, I guess she can do that now" in the second book. And while you might argue it's stupid for me to complain about magic in a re-telling of a fairy tale, it really has not felt like a fantasy or fairy tale at any other point in the story so it's pretty jarring to me.
So as I said before, overall, a fun pulp cyberpunk novel but mostly me showing this community is still active.
This was another of those still images, where I wanted to capture a specific kind of place, the old farmhouses you find all throughout my hometowns, and a specific time of day in November when the sun has set and everything is this almost monochrome purple but the grass and crops look almost tan. In a few months, on cold grey days like this, when there’s a layer of snow on the ground, it almost mirrors the sky with just dark trees between them. But for now it’s this very specific color.
I used to go for walks or snowshoe trips most afternoons, and would often find myself hurrying to get back as night settled in. On those early evenings, I loved the yellow lights in the distance, the warmth and human routine they contained.
I wanted the farm in the comic to be a little more active than some of the ones back home. I did a fair bit of reading about agriculture UAVs and autonomous tractors, and I very much liked the used-future feel of the brand new stuff from those articles being kind of old and hacked-together at this point. Something these folks bought second- or third-hand, probably after it was already hacked by a previous owner to remove the manufacturer’s ability to remotely disable it. I like the idea that they have a sort of workshop/hangar for launching drones and inspecting their crops set up in the loft of the barn.
The standing figure is based a bit on my grandfather.
If want to read the rest of this silly rural cyberpunk webcomic about a stolen secret service prototype and the endangered deer it thinks is the president, you can find it here: https://jacobcoffinwrites.wordpress.com/president-deer-adventures/
If you’d like to read the related-but-mutually-non-canonical short story version, you can find it here: https://en.scrappycapydistro.info/harbour it’s in the first edition, on page 3!
