Cyberpunk

Apparently I posted the reveal trailer for this game over a year ago. I totally forgot about that. At the time, I had said it looked like a Brazilian version of Anno: Mutationem.

This new gameplay trailer makes it look more like a 2D beat 'em up but they're also now calling it a metroidvania. I don't know what to think of this game. I think it just comes down to these trailers not explaining enough. Either way, the artwork looks great. I'll continue to keep my eye on it.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3066300/Sky_Dust/

There was a lot of discussion about the real-world inspiration for the world of Stellar Blade when the hit game came out. While it was set in a post-apocalyptic world, and there were clear real-world inspirations in terms of aesthetics, but the actual references were more vague references to North Africa and the Middle East. This doesn't seem to be the case for Stellar Blade 2, whose development seems to be in full swing. The official @StellarBlade account on X posted a teaser about the upcoming location for its "next title," and it looks as though the game will be set in a futuristic post-apocalyptic China, seemingly with an emphasis on Chongqing city. The city itself, which was identified by u/jamiebaby on Reddit, is known for its multi-layered construction.

Yes, I will gladly take any random date appearing in a cyberpunk movie as an excuse to post here.

Now go watch Johnny Mnemonic on Netflix.

I have been following the talk about Chat Control in the European Union and similar regulations elsewhere. Many people are still not aware of these developments, and I believe a fiction story can reach more people than a technical explanation ever could.

This is my short story about the logical conclusion of these laws. Please let me know what you think and share it with those who might benefit from seeing where this path leads.

For the Children

I feel the cold on my face. The only part of my body that is not covered by cloth. In this temperature you need to have good insulation or you will not be able to get far. And we have to get far. The whole path is 10 miles long and we are almost halfway there. We went as far as possible with the car, but the forest here is too dense and the snow too deep. It looks beautiful. But it is hard for me to recognize this beauty for more than a few seconds.

I look behind me and see the footsteps that I am leaving behind. Around twenty meters behind me is Elena. I know she is there, but because of the snow and fog, she looks like a black dot on a white paper. I can't see her face, but from her body language she does not look tired. We are already late, so I know I have to walk in front of her to keep up the pace.

I have lived in the Union my whole life. More than thirty years. I still remember the last trip I made out of it, about five years ago. It feels like yesterday in some way. But so much has changed since then.

It happened gradually. It was supposed to be a land of freedom and liberty. We always looked at other countries and felt disdain for their political systems. In school they always taught us that we are the promised land for other people and a beacon of democracy in this world. I do believe that it was actually like this in the past. But it all started to change with the acceptance of laws that seemed very innocent at first.

The first thing the Union did was pass the so-called "Child Abuse Protection Law". It required all internet companies to scan every message passing through their platforms. Not even that much has been talked about it. They said it had to be done to catch all human traffickers. They said it was for the children.

It didn't make much of a difference for the regular person yet. Some people complained about it, and there were some protests in the larger cities. But soon after they accepted it, nobody was talking about it anymore. We thought that was the end of it.

Then, they blocked access to some of the foreign websites. Some social media platforms that were deemed to be extreme and some news websites. Most of us just installed a VPN, thinking we were smart.

Last year, all the unofficial VPNs were banned. The only one that was allowed was the official VPN of the Union. They said some hackers used connections with the outside world to share fake news about the Union. But we knew that the reason they did it was to be able to look at everything that goes in and out.

A few months ago another rule was accepted. Now, every device that can connect to the internet has to be registered with the government. The government justified this by claiming that drug dealers used old burner phones for communication. Now every phone has to have a registered user, otherwise it is denied access to the internet. This means that the authorities now monitor every conversation and post on the internet all the time. Everyone is trapped in the system, and there is no way for someone to escape it.

Well, actually, there is one way left.

The only way to communicate with the outside world now is a satellite phone. It connects directly to orbiting satellites, which grants unmonitored access to the global internet. With it, the user can communicate privately to the outside world. The only problem is that they are very hard to get.

But lucky for me, I have one. It has been in my backpack since we started walking this morning. Without stopping, I move my backpack to the front and open the zipper. I pull out a satellite phone. I can't take my gloves off because it is so cold. So I type with my bulky glove one letter after another: "All good. T-1 hour." I press send.

I look back at Elena.

"Just a little further, then we switch!" I shout through the wind.

"Okay," I hear her voice through the cloth that covers her mouth.

The phone will send a message when it connects to the satellites. It should take around a minute, and Jack will receive the message. It takes noticeably more time than a regular internet connection. He is probably already there. Waiting for us.

I have known Jack since childhood. He always challenged authority. In school he debated teachers who hated his nonconformity, and later became obsessed with privacy, warning us how online surveillance works and how our digital lives are tracked. It could be tiring to talk to him, which was why our friend group meetings became less and less common. I was never as extreme as him, but always took his side when we were debating topics among friends, though I would push back when it was just the two of us.

So when they first started talking about the messaging scanning law, he was the first one I knew to talk about it. I remember a conversation between me, Jack, and some of our other friends whom we knew from college.

"What do you hide on your phone that you are so concerned about, Jack?" Brian asked Jack in the pub.

"It's not about having secrets," Jack snapped back immediately. "It's about where this can lead. You wouldn't want a government agent sitting in the corner of this room, recording us just in case one of us mentions something illegal, would you, Brian?"

"But as long as you are not doing anything wrong, you don't have to fear it," Brian dismissed nonchalantly.

"It's about the way the system is designed if they decide at any time they want to censor you, nothing will be stopping them," said Jack.

Brian seemed unwilling to engage further. He didn't have a good reply, or at least didn't want to think of one.

"Anyway, what are you going to do about it?" he asked.

A moment of silence followed.

"I'll fight it as best I can," he said. "But if all else fails, I'll leave the Union. I tell you, this is a slippery slope. It will get much worse from here."

"If you really leave the Union just because someone might read what you write to your friends in a group chat, you're even crazier than I thought," Brian laughed. The rest of the night passed with lighter talk.

And he was really that crazy. At least it seemed crazy at the time. We had long conversations about it. He was convincing me to take Elena with me, and that we all should leave. But I couldn't at the time. Although I agreed with him, I really thought it would not be that bad. Or at least I hoped so. But soon after they accepted the law, he left abroad and never returned.

Leaving the Union is pretty much impossible now. It is not because of a heavily guarded border, but because of the immense power the Union holds over its neighbors. If a neighboring country identifies a person from the Union, they must return them or risk losing vital trade agreements. For these governments, we are not people. We are just a threat to their economy, where a fugitive is nothing more than a risk to them. Occasionally, you hear of someone who tried to escape but was handed back and no one heard from them again.

"Stop, I'm getting tired. Can you carry him?" Elena's voice cuts through the wind.

I turn around and see her walking behind me, making small steps uphill.

"Of course," I say and stop.

"He has been sleeping this whole time," she says and opens up her poncho.

His eyes squeeze as the snowy white scenery flashes before him. Our little Max, so small and vulnerable, bundled against the cold, our precious little secret. I look at Elena who has tears in her eyes. I know we could spend hours gazing at our beloved child, memorizing every tiny feature of his, if we had time. But we don't.

"Give him to me, we have to carry on," I say.

She unravels Max from the poncho with which he was attached to her. I tie him to my chest and cover him with another blanket to keep him warm. I kiss Elena on the forehead.

"You go first," I say. She nods and takes the lead.

She was so strong in the past few days. I know that these were the saddest days of her life. The same is true for me. It was a hard decision we had to make. But once we made it there was no turning back.

It all started about a year before Max was born. Elena's father was a relatively popular journalist who worked his entire life for the national program. He was always critical of the government and of the politicians, even before things began to change. So when the Union first started censoring news in the media, he was writing articles about it wherever they would let him publish them.

He talked about how the censoring is not only done by the law but also pushed through bureaucratic incentives that you have to follow. Social norms change and some things are labeled as inappropriate. He said that the problem would not be that people would be punished for speaking, but that because of fear of punishment they would never speak at all.

Shortly after he began his exposé mission, he was completely blacklisted. No outlet would touch his work. His editor refused to even discuss the facts, only muttering, "If I run this, the Union will label us a 'High-Risk Platform' we’ll lose digital banking access by morning." Overnight, his internet accounts vanished and even his bank account was frozen. The official reason was that he was "spreading hate by spreading misinformation". Almost no major media covered it. And he was not the only case, many who spoke out at that time suffered the same fate. On platforms where free speech was still possible, it was a much talked about topic and people warned about where this can lead. If you search for his name now, there is only one side of the story.

For me, this was the breaking point. Elena felt immense stress at that time. I only felt anger. Anger that we let that happen. I know we probably couldn't have done much anyway. But at least we should have tried.

"When we have a baby, he can’t have a life like this.”

When Elena said those words, it was the first time this idea was spoken out loud.

We were planning to have a baby for a while. But because of the conditions, we knew that it would not be a good life. Elena's dad getting blacklisted changed her. Ever since she said that sentence that winter afternoon, we have been talking about it almost every day. We knew we would have a child, but it became clear to us that the conditions would get a lot worse.

At that time, I still spoke to Jack through an encrypted messaging platform on the internet. Then no satellite phone was needed. I told him that we wanted to have a child completely off the grid and that we wanted him to live outside of the Union. At that time, it was already obvious to us that we would not be able to go with him. The regulation was already too strict for traveling.

Jack was not hesitant one bit when I told him we wanted him to take care of our child. During the years he lived abroad, he met a girl there, and they were both open to this "adoption".

"We have to put all our electronic devices in a box when we’re at home,” I told Elena some time before Max was born. "We can't risk the existence of Max being recorded anywhere.”

We were already very careful not to leave any trace anywhere. But him being actually present in the real world meant an even greater challenge. I was buying all the baby equipment from a black market on the other side of town, trying to buy it in bulk, so I minimized all the possibilities that someone would catch on to something. We were very precise about covering all the tracks because we knew that if anyone found out about it even years later, we could be in trouble. We did not even really know how much the authorities actually monitored our data. We burned all the trash that could have been associated with Max and padded all the walls with foam to make it impossible for anyone near the house to hear him cry. I remember one night, Max had a fever and a cough that wouldn't stop. We sat in the dark, clutching him, terrified that a neighbor might hear us. We couldn't even take him to a doctor because every clinic required an ID scan just to enter the waiting room.

"I can't believe this is the last week we three are all together," Elena sobbed.

I was crying too.

We were looking at the pictures we had taken of the three of us. The good old analog Polaroid photos would be the only physical evidence that Max had ever existed.

The forest is beginning to thin out. I increase my tempo so that I can catch up with Elena. She reaches out her hand to me. I grab it and squeeze it. She squeezes back.

"We are almost there," I say, trying to hold back tears.

Elena nods, eyes fixed ahead through the fog. "He’ll run through forests like this one day,” she whispers. "Laughing. Free. That’s all that matters.”

We walk like this for about a mile. It seems like an eternity. We know we had to do it. As parents, we have an obligation to provide the best life for the children.

A fence around two meters tall appears through the fog. The border between the Union and the outside world. We see Jack already waiting there beside the fence. He has sawed a small opening in it, just large enough for Max. We didn't want to make it visible. My dear friend, who I have not seen for so long, and we will not even have time to have a short conversation. He lifts his hand as a sign of greeting. I wave back.

Max will only remember us through stories Jack will tell him. He will only have a few analog pictures that will remind him of where he truly came from. But at least he will be able to live a free life. For us, the people in the Union, this is a long forgotten idea.

Note: I self-hosted a formatted web version and PDF of this story here for easier reading or sharing: https://gigaprojects.online/post/1

Author @giga_private@lemmy.world

Original music: Kenny Chou (demoscene handle “C.C. Catch”)

Looks like an indie Sci Fi movie with a cyberpunk feel (set in a noir near-future with corporate battles and lowlife mercenaries). Not very optimistic about it tbh. imdb says it releases Feb 2.

cross-posted from: !trailers@lemmy.blahaj.zone original text:

A brilliant, principled mercenary with a traumatic past works with an insider to steal a valued asset from Peredor Corporation called “the sphere”. The C & Earth corporation, vying for global dominance, seeks to find a solution to an otherworldly technology via a scientist’s project. Meanwhile, a financial analyst, who despises his job at the powerful investment firm Mutual One, finds himself caught between deadly corporate rivals, financial fraud, and technological espionage, and is ultimately forced to run from a psychopathic military contractor.

https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/846049-the-dresden-sun

I've had my eye on this game since about 2021. Initially, it looked like you would be a blade runner in the wasteland hunting down androids. Now, it looks more like you're just exploring the wasteland with some gadgets that have a 70s aesthetic. That is, it looks more like cassette futurism than cyberpunk to me now. But, this trailer does have a glimpse of the hub area, which still looks like a cyberpunk city. I don't know, I'm not fully sold on this game but I'm still cautiously optimistic. I'll keep my eye on it.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1701840/ExeKiller/

"six-seven" has taken over elementary and middle schools in America. It's everywhere.

Here's a clip from a recent south park episode with six-seven.

And here's a recent xkcd:

And here's a six-seven character from Roblox:

Be thankful if you aren't around kids constantly shouting "six-seven!" at each other and laughing.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/40574993

You can see how I made it on my Mastodon.

In Chess, Checkers, etc, movement of pieces matters, but in Go it's the placement. Stones glow as they are placed, emphasizing this (traditionally the sound of the stone clicking on the board plays this role). The stone's glow also hints at its influence on surrounding spaces.

I'm not entirely sure what this game is. The trailer looks like a cool upcoming cyberpunk anime, but then it's interspersed with shots of a hyper-realistic racing game. Apparently this is actually a racing game trailer where the anime shots are its cutscenes? The two art styles look like they're from completely unrelated works to me.

This game has a steam page though, and a release date of March 26, 2026. It also has a price of $60. That seems high for a game I've never heard of from a studio I've never heard of. So... best of luck to them.

I promise not to make a habit of complaining about things here, but there's something specific I want to complain about in Tron: Ares. And while I know the cool thing to do on the internet is to complain about Jared Leto, it isn't that.

Let's say you're a billionaire CEO and want to make a movie. Who would be the main character? Well, obviously a billionaire CEO, they're the most important people on the planet. But oh no! there's a conflict in this movie! Who could possibly resolve this conflict? Obviously a billionaire CEO, they're also the smartest people on the planet. Hmmm, we should probably have other characters in this movie so they can tell the CEO how amazing and brilliant they are... let's add some of the poors into this movie, like the billionaire CEO's personal assistant. After all, he's "one of the good ones."

That's what Tron: Ares feels like to me. The protagonist and antagonist are both CEOs and the only other named characters in this movie are either 1) personal assistants to the CEO or 2) sentient intellectual property. There isn't a single named character in this movie who isn't on a first-name basis with the CEO. We couldn't possibly have the R&D department work on any of these problems, or have a security detail manage the safety of the CEO. No, only the CEO is capable of doing these things by themselves.

As a fan of cyberpunk, I just can't take a CEO protagonist seriously. So many cyberpunk works have an underlying theme of "the rich aren't human anymore" and it bugs me to root for the "good" billionaire.

Also, it's weird that the only other people in the movie who these CEOs respect... are other CEOs. We couldn't have the audience just assume a CEO would respect his mother, let's make his mother the previous CEO. And we couldn't have the audience just assume a CEO would respect her sister, let's make her sister the Co-CEO (whatever that means). The movie could've just as easily made the sister the head of R&D or something, but no, she had to be a reclusive scientist working in the arctic... who is also a CEO.

Obviously the visuals are amazing, but the plot is so awkwardly skewed towards CEOs that it feels forced. I guess you could say Tron: Legacy had a "trust-fund baby" protagonist (a reluctant billionaire?) but that entire movie was spent inside The Grid so his money was irrelevant. Tron: Ares spent the bulk of the movie in the real world where the CEOs were specifically using the assets available to them to drive the story forward.

There, see? I didn't complain about Jared Leto once.

I stole this post from mastodon: https://chaos.social/@realhackhistory/115736090452823387

I couldn't figure out how to embed a mastodon post or take a screenshot without the "ALT" and "HIDE" buttons, so instead I'm giving credit to the original post.

I'm not sure if I'm cheating by calling this cyberpunk. It has the 'cyberpunk' tag on steam, and it's made by Harebrained (the developers of the Shadowrun Returns trilogy) but this feels more like body-horror to me.

Of course, it might just be leaning more towards the Alien brand of cyberpunk. So even if it doesn't have that classic cyberpunk aesthetic, I think it might hit some cyberpunk themes. Or maybe it's just an isometric knock-off of Dead Space, who knows.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3141390/GRAFT/

It uses an induction coil to power the LEDs. The "stones" light up as you place them on the board.

I find it compelling because in many other games (chess, checkers, etc.) it's the movement of the pieces that matters. In Go, it's the placement of the pieces. Traditionally the clicking sound as the stone is placed emphasizes this. Now light also plays a similar role. The glow also hints at the influence of a stone on its surroundings.

You can see how I made it on Mastodon: @Jilanico@mastodon.social

I modified a goban found here.

The containers for the stones found here.

OC by @Jilanico@lemmy.world

I don't typically like making posts where I just complain about something, but I don't have anyone else to talk to about this movie and I wanted to write down my thoughts as a way of processing them. This post will be filled with spoilers for the new Running Man movie so don't read it unless you've already seen the movie (or have no desire to watch it).

As I walked out of the theater, I couldn't decide if I liked this movie or not. I didn't love it, and yet I couldn't point to any specific things I hated about it. After a couple days of thinking about it though, I realized it was the third act that I had problems with. The first two acts set up some interesting ideas, but all those ideas are either squandered or ignored in the third act.

I should mention that I've never read the Stephen King novel this movie is based on. I've only seen the 1987 Running Man with Schwarzenegger so that's what I'll be comparing it to. Also, I have a high threshold for pain when it comes to bad movies. I was raised on MST3k so I'm almost immune to bad acting and bad dialogue. Instead, I tend to focus more on story beats and overall plot. And that's what I'll be complaining about here.

The movie starts with Glen Powell as a bottle of rage trying not to beat up his boss. He even brings his 2 year old daughter with him to prevent himself from giving into his violent tendencies. When he gets back home, his wife mentions that she knows why he took their daughter with him, because she knows what type of person he is too. Later, when he's about to join the Running Man TV show, Josh Brolin (the showrunner) says that his anger is his superpower and will keep him alive.

Yet throughout the movie he never really gives into his violence. He never really goes unhinged. For the entire second act he behaves as rationally as possible trying to win the game. There are multiple occasions where he has a chance to kill someone (and is encouraged to), and doesn't. He even tries to save some of the people hunting him before a building explodes. It's almost like in an initial draft of the script he was supposed to be mild-mannered and the game eventually drives him to unlock his rage. But that doesn't happen either. In the third act, Josh Brolin lies to him and tells him his family is dead just to egg him on. He lets out a mind-breaking scream of rage and looks like he's about to go all unhinged... then continues with your standard action-movie fight sequence. He doesn't RIP AND TEAR UNTIL IT IS DONE, he continues fighting with his wits. He even takes control of a plane to gain the advantage during a fight. I thought the movie was setting him up to go full bloodlust where he blacks out and is covered in blood by the end of the fight, but that never happens. The setup of him being unhinged and violent in the first act never really amounts to anything.

When explaining the rules for the show, they say that each contestant must record a daily video to prove they're still alive and just share their thoughts for the day. That video could also potentially give clues to their whereabouts. The video must be placed in a mailbox and sent to the studio each day. If a contestant misses a single day, they'll forfeit any winnings but still be hunted down. With that very specific setup, I thought for sure there'd be a plot point where a mailbox would be guarded and time is running out to mail his next video and he has to find a way to mail it or else lose everything. But no, that never happens.

Making a daily video makes a lot of sense in-universe so I like the idea, but they spend so much time explaining this rule and it never really amounts to anything. Aside from a couple gags when mailing the video, this entire plot point could've been replaced with "upload the video to the internet each day" with the same effect. The physical act of mailing a video is never really used to increase tension.

In the 1987 Running Man, Schwarzenegger is accused of a crime he didn't commit. The audience is initially against him (as they are for all contestants) but as he keeps winning the crowd starts turning in his favor. I mean, what audience could resist peak 80's movie quipping like "here is Subzero! Now... plain zero!" Basically, the audience slowly learns who this guy really is and eventually roots for him to win.

This version of Running Man tries to do the same thing but I don't think it works. In this one, everything the audience ever hears Glen Powell say is changed to make him appear psychotic. In one of his daily videos he tries exposing the lies of the network but they change his words so that he's laughing about killing children. At no point does the audience ever hear him say anything reasonable. There's even a scene where a family is sitting next to him, talking to him, liking him, and protecting him, yet when the tv show airs that faked footage of him wanting to kill children the family immediately kicks him out of the house. So we never see any member of the audience take his side or even like him. Nor are they ever given a reason to. Yet in the third act of the movie there's a crowd of people cheering him on. It doesn't feel earned. There was no turning point, no words of compassion that ever made it through the censors that would've changed their minds.

In the 1987 version of Running Man, Schwarzenegger isn't doing the show for money. The producers want him dead and he's fighting back. Plus the entire show takes place in a single evening and he eventually kills those producers so the money is irrelevant anyway.

In this version, Glen Powell is explicitly doing it for the money. He's trying to earn enough money to give his daughter a good life, or at least be able to afford flu medicine. He needs the money, and more importantly, he needs the studio to pay out the money he wins. It doesn't make sense for him to kill off the producers of the show in this version. Even if he did want to kill the Josh Brolin character, that would only prevent him from receiving his money, which is his sole goal the entire time.

At the end of the movie, Glen Powell again tries exposing the lies of the network but they fake his death instead (for a compelling season finale). Then we cut to some indeterminate time later where his family is shopping at a high-end grocery store. So evidently the show paid out the money despite his attempts to sabotage it. And they let him live, which is another odd point. Apparently there were no hard feelings. The movie could've ended here. It would've been underwhelming, but plot-wise this is the logical end to the story. He was just another contestant. But no, there was one more scene (and my next complaint).

In the 1987 version of the movie, Schwarzenegger's primary objectives were to clear his name and get revenge on those who put him in Running Man. In this version, Glen Powell only needs the money. He doesn't really care whether the show continues or not. He doesn't really have a vendetta against Josh Brolin's character; he voluntarily signed the papers in this version. He knew what the show was from the beginning and aside from Josh Brolin's character egging him on to create more compelling tv, the show met his expectations.

Yet the final scene of the movie is (again) some indeterminate time later, where the next season of Running Man is having its season premiere. Apparently the entire audience is on Glen Powell's side now and they decide to riot. Josh Brolin trips and falls on the floor, then Glen Powell slowly and calmly shoots him. Again, not filled with rage, no impulse control issues, just slow and calculated. It's like they shot this scene before deciding how the characters would arrive at this moment. The riot feels unearned, killing the showrunner has no purpose, and the killing isn't unhinged or violent at all. It's like they had two versions of the movie and kept swapping back and forth between them.

To be clear, I don't think the 1987 Running Man movie is flawless or anything. It's just an easy comparison because they're basically trying to tell the same story. And its plot is cohesive. It makes sense. Dumb as it may be, you can see the flow of logic through the entire movie. This version feels too scrambled. Like I said, I don't think the movie does any single thing wrong, but it can't decide what it wants to be. Is the main character unhinged or not? Can the audience see through the network's lies or not? Does the main character want the show to end or not? The movie itself is never really sure.

I don't know anything about this game but the trailer makes it look like it takes place in Night City. Seriously, it looks like an unlicensed Cyberpunk 2077 game to me. Plus, it was made by Neon Giant, the team who made The Ascent, and I absolutely loved that game. I went from never having heard about this game to being extremely excited about it in the time it took to watch the trailer.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2161710/NO_LAW/

Another game I talked about a couple months ago. Dystopika is a chill game where you just create a cyberpunk city... and that's it. They just released a DLC called "B-Sides" which includes a bunch of content they had cut from the initial release but the game ended up being so popular they decided to finally release that cut content.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3859970/Dystopika_BSides/

I made a post here a couple months ago where I mentioned that I'd had this game in my steam wishlist since 2021. Well, it finally has a release date: March 12, 2026.

Replaced is a 2.5D pixel-art platformer and looks very cyberpunk. I hope the gameplay is good because the aesthetic looks amazing. I've been waiting years for this one.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1663850/REPLACED/

This is an officially licensed TTRPG set in the GItS: Arise universe. The kickstarter just ended so I'm not trying to convince anyone to back it, I just think it's impressive that they only wanted ~$11k to fund the project and raised almost $500k. That's awesome!

I've been looking forward to this one. It's a mix of run-and-gun with gallery-shooter mechanics. The demo was really fun and I love the pixel artwork.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2957720/Neon_Inferno/

Last year I posted the previous version of this guide. Since the author just made a new version, I figured I'll keep posting it here. I like how there's now a 'midtempo cyberpunk' genre separate from the normal 'cyberpunk' genre.

As before, this is not made by me but by a user on reddit named khroshan.

You can view the full-sized image here or a version not hosted on reddit here.

Some of you might remember me as the guy who built CyberpunkHub.com, a small side project that tries to catalogue every cyberpunk film, series, game, book, and short out there.

I have been down with Covid for the past few days and, with too much time and not enough energy to do anything useful, I started adding more cyberpunk shorts to the database. Somewhere between fever and caffeine I had a strange idea: what if I made a player that could pull entries that have links to full-length content (usually shorts) and play them right inside the site.

So I kind of gorilla-taped one together while half hallucinating.

You can try it here: https://cyberpunkhub.com/player

It can even be installed as a PWA app on mobile or tablet.

There is also a very early TV version that you can test in your browser using a keyboard: https://cyberpunkhub.com/player?tv=1

Just to be clear, I am not hosting any of the actual content. All videos come from YouTube, Vimeo, and occasionally direct mp4 links that are already public. It might not always work perfectly, but that is part of the charm of something coded under the influence of Covid. * Probably useless for now, but it was fun to build while being sick in bed and pretending to be a futuristic hacker trapped in quarantine. *

This is an extremely long article and I'll admit I only skimmed it, but I don't disagree with any of the items included. Also, I'm a massive cyberpunk nerd and I've at least heard of everything in the article (except for some authors in the 'Global Voices, Local Futures' section) so the author definitely did their research.

If you're interested in some of the more obscure cyberpunk works, this article is a great start.

I love the look of this dark cyberpunk world. Throw in a soundtrack by Mick Gordon and I'm even more excited.

My only complaint is that it seems you play as a police officer. Lame. Change nothing in the game but tell me they're mercenaries and I'm all in, but I don't want to play as police in a cyberpunk world. Anyway, that's an extremely minor gripe and definitely a "me" problem, not a problem with the game. I'll definitely be keeping an eye on it.

DEFECT is a cyberpunk, squad-based immersive shooter set in a dystopian world ruled by an AI, The System. Play in Single-player for a deeper offline experience, team up in Co-op, or face off in a new 4v4v4v4 PVP mode featuring dynamic multi-objective, battles with advanced weapons and tech.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2470010/DEFECT/